Police Brutality / Individual record
Bettie Jones
The Washington Post's Fatal Force database records Bettie Jones in a fatal on-duty police shooting on 2015-12-26 in Chicago, IL. Individual circumstances and legal outcome require case-specific review.
- Record ID
- PB-334
- Incident date
- December 26, 2015
- Outcome
- Fatal
- Location
- Chicago, IL
- Agency
- Chicago Police Department
- Category
- Fatal on-duty police shooting
- Age (reported)
- 55
What happened
Bettie Jones, 55, was an unarmed mother of five who was fatally shot by Chicago police Officer Robert Rialmo while answering the downstairs door of her apartment building on December 26, 2015. Jones had no involvement in the dispute that brought officers to the building: a call for help concerning upstairs neighbor Quintonio LeGrier, 19. When Rialmo fired at LeGrier, a bullet also struck Jones. City officials acknowledged she was an innocent bystander, and her family pursued a wrongful-death lawsuit. Chicago approved a $16 million settlement with Jones's family in 2018. The case illustrates the consequences to an uninvolved resident when officers use gunfire in an occupied building; her death must be distinguished from the separate confrontation with LeGrier.
Investigation & findings
Individual legal and investigative outcome not yet reviewed.
Washington Post Fatal Force v2; 2015–2024
Source record details
- Source incident ID
- 1123
- Race code in source
- B
- Race source method
- not_available
- Gender (source)
- female
- Armed status (source)
- unarmed
- Agency IDs (source)
- 265
Sources & records
- Primary source
- Additional source
- Methodology and national police killings trackingMapping Police Violence · Dataset/methodology
- Fatal Force v2 — fatal on-duty police shootings, 2015–2024The Washington Post · Dataset