Last month, Jason Van Dyke was sentenced to nearly 7 years in prison for the killing of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald back in 2014, for which the former police officer was charged with second-degree murder and 16 counts of aggravated battery with a firearm back in October. Meanwhile, however, it's now been reported that Van Dyke was attacked in his cell on February 7th, two days after he arrived at a federal prison in Connecticut.
His attorneys say that Van Dyke suffered facial and head injuries during the attack, that were significant enough to require medical attention. They also say that Van Dyke had been transferred from a prison in Illinois to the facility in Connecticut without any reason provided, and was placed in general population like he was "a lamb to the slaughter."
"He was placed in general population in a unit filled with gang-bangers, violent criminals," his attorney Tammy Wendt said, "Even though they call this a minimum-security prison, these are violent criminals on the last leg of their sentence. To put a police officer who has spent his entire career locking up bad guys in with these bad guys, it doesn't take a genius to know that it's obviously going to get him in trouble. It's unconscionable that this happened."
Meanwhile, prosecutors are also reportedly challenging the leniency of his sentence, while looking to vacate the second-degree murder charge to impose a sentence for the 16 counts of aggravated battery with a firearm. Each of the 16 counts would carry a minimum sentence of six years in prison, while when combined, Van Dyke would be facing up a total of 96 years.
Source: youtube.com
