Nov. 22 (UPI) — Former Chicago police officer Marco Proano was sentenced to five years in prison this week for shooting into a car and injuring two teenagers.
U.S. District Judge Gary Feinerman imposed the 60-month sentence in federal court in Chicago on Monday.
“Mr. Proano was not maintaining the ‘thin blue line’ that separates us from anarchy, and chaos and violence,” Feinerman said, according to the Chicago Tribune. “He was bringing the chaos and violence. He was the source of it.”
In August, a federal grand jury found Proano, 42, guilty on two counts of deprivation of rights under color of law on Dec. 22, 2013, when he “fired 16 shots into a vehicle that contained numerous people,” the Department of Justice said.
Proano was indicted in 2016 after the Chicago Reporter published dashcam video of the shooting. The video showed Proano firing his gun at the car as the teens were backing away from him.
The shooting victims filed a civil lawsuit against the city, which settled for $360,000 before Proano’s conviction this year.
Defense attorneys for Proano argued that he was being used as a scapegoat for a police department that had been criticized by the Justice Department for widespread racial bias, excessive use of force and poor training.
Acting U.S. Attorney Joel Levin blasted the notion that officials were trying to rehabilitate the Chicago Police Department’s image by attacking Proano.
“This case is not about Officer Proano being a scapegoat at all,” Levin told reporters after the sentenced was handed down. “In this case, Officer Proano was investigated for the conduct that he committed…And ultimately today he was sentenced for his crimes, no one else’s crimes.”
