Lewis Parker will never forget the face of the man who shot and killed his brother, Jeremiah Lee. The man attacked the siblings in an attempt to steal their car. Jeremiah, 17, fought him, but the man shot him. “I was frozen,” Parker said. “I couldn’t really say anything.” After Jeremiah fell to the ground, the shooter fumbled with the wrong keys, and tried to start the Corolla. When he realized he couldn’t steal the car, he ran away.
Parker eventually went to the police station and identified the assailant’s picture. A man was arrested, but almost three years later, prosecutors dropped the charges because they said there was insufficient evidence to meet their burden of proof. Still, the Chicago Police Department closed the case and marked it as cleared, a term law enforcement agencies use after they’ve concluded an investigation.
It’s not unusual for CPD to mark unsolved cases as cleared, even though this designation often confuses surviving families. Under the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program, law enforcement agencies can use a broad category called “exceptional means” to clear cases when circumstances outside their control prohibit them from arresting, charging, and prosecuting a suspect…