The Chicago Police Department on Thursday identified the police officer who was fatally shot in the line of duty while responding to a domestic incident in the city’s Gage Park neighborhood on the Southwest Side on Wednesday.
Police identified the fallen Eighth District police officer as 32-year-old Andres Vasquez-Lasso.
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“We are heartbroken. Policing is a big family. People know at some point they may be asked to make the ultimate sacrifice. But you never wish or hope that it actually happens. And tonight, this tragedy did,” Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown said during a press conference Wednesday.
An investigation is underway and body camera footage from the responding officers is currently being reviewed, according to officials.
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Who was Andres Vasquez-Lasso?
Andres Vasquez-Lasso was married and had recently completed his five years with the police department. His family lived in Columbia and other parts of the world.
The department had been working to inform them about the incident, said Brown.
The 32-year-old officer was shot on Chicago’s Southwest Side in an exchange of gunfire with a man accused of chasing a woman down the street with a gun. When officers reached, one group went to the front door of the house, but a second squad car spotted the suspect on foot, police said.
As officers got out of the squad car, the armed man, started running, authorities say.
“At close range, shots were exchanged,” Brown said. According to authorities, the officer was shot multiple times.
He was based out of the 8th Police District near 63rd Street and Homan Avenue. On Thursday morning, officials put up black and purple bunting over their entrance as a symbol of mourning and honoring the fallen officer.
Late Wednesday, dozens of police cars lined city streets and escorted an ambulance carrying the body of a fallen officer from Mount Sinai Hospital to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Superintendent Brown asked the city to pray for his family.