Crime & Law
Chicago Officer Who Fatally Shot Partner Krystal Rivera Stripped of Police Powers After New Allegations
(WTTW News)
The Chicago police officer who fatally shot his partner, Officer Krystal Rivera, during a foot pursuit earlier this year has been stripped of his police powers following a separate alleged incident over this past weekend.
A Chicago Police Department spokesperson confirmed that Officer Carlos Baker has been relieved of his police powers, effective Friday. That move comes days after he allegedly struck another female officer during an alleged incident inside a Wicker Park bar Sunday.
The Chicago Sun-Times and the Illinois Answers Project reported on that incident earlier this week in which Baker and another woman are accused of beating a 29-year-old officer late Sunday at DSTRKT Bar & Grill in Wicker Park.
That officer has since filed a police report and has claimed she was being treated for a split lip, the Sun-Times and Illinois Answers Project reported. CBS News has also reported Baker called a neighboring business and identified himself as a police officer investigating that incident while seeking access to their surveillance footage.
A spokesperson for the CPD’s oversight agency — the Civilian Office of Accountability — on Friday confirmed they are in the “early stages” of an investigation into this incident.
Baker’s name surfaced earlier this summer following the fatal shooting of the 36-year-old Rivera. She was fatally shot by Baker as they pursued two men on foot. Police have said Baker mistakenly fired after one of those men pointed a gun at him.
COPA is also investigating that shooting.
But Rivera’s family has called for a separate investigation into the shooting led by the Illinois State Police and sought to pressure Chicago police officials to publish the not-yet-available body and dash camera footage from the fatal shooting.
Antonio Romanucci, an attorney for Rivera’s family, previously argued that Baker shouldn’t have even been with the police department at all, as the Chicago Sun-Times and the Illinois Answers Project reported he racked up three suspensions and two reprimands since becoming an officer in 2021.
That included an incident during Baker’s time as a probationary officer in which he allegedly brandished a firearm at a woman whom he’d met online while she was on a date with another man, according to the Sun-Times and the Illinois Answers Project.
Romanucci said in July that should have been a “career killer.” On Friday, he said Rivera’s family and their attorneys “wholly believe removing Carlos Baker’s police powers is the appropriate decision.”
“The City hired this rogue police officer despite knowing he was a danger to the community while he was a probationary officer,” Romanucci said in a statement. “They took affirmative action to hire Carlos Baker when the only action should have been to terminate his probation and ensure he never wore a CPD shield or carried a gun. Krystal Rivera would be alive today."
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