Photojournalist arrested, shoved by Chicago police; gear seized and damaged

Independent photojournalist Josh Pacheco was arrested by Chicago Police Department officers on Aug. 20, 2024, while documenting a pro-Palestinian protest planned to coincide with the nearby Democratic National Convention. Law enforcement also hit them with bikes and batons, confiscated their press credentials and dropped two of their cameras on the ground, damaging one.

A small gathering of protesters, unaffiliated with and more militant than other groups that had organized larger demonstrations earlier in the week, converged around 7 p.m. outside the Israeli Consulate in Chicago’s West Loop section. The demonstrators and police, who far outnumbered them, clashed repeatedly. The protesters were later ordered to leave the area and police began arresting them, Block Club Chicago reported.

Other journalists besides Pacheco were among the dozens detained, according to the Chicago chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. CBS News reported that Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling said three journalists were arrested for not complying with officers’ orders when police began moving in to arrest protesters who had attacked police.

Pacheco told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that the scene was chaotic, with officers issuing conflicting, often inaudible commands to the crowd, and pushing people onto the sidewalk, which was already crowded with police bicycles.

Pacheco said that members of the press were caught between protesters and police as officers tried to keep demonstrators out of the roadway and intersections, and that officers slammed the photojournalist multiple times with bicycles and batons, seemingly intentionally.

Stuck on a corner amid protesters organizing themselves to disperse, Pacheco, whose New York City–issued press credentials were prominently displayed on a lanyard around their neck, was grabbed from behind by Deputy Chief Daniel O’Connor and pulled past the police line.

“He said something like, ‘I’ve told you over and over again you have to leave, now you’re being arrested,’” Pacheco told the Tracker. They were handcuffed with zip ties tightly enough to leave bruises on their wrists.

“The police are saying they ordered a dispersal three times and warned of a mass arrest, which did not happen, and even if it did, there was no way to hear it,” Pacheco said. “They weren’t using megaphones. There were just random police officers screaming different orders.”

In a video shot by journalist Talia (Jane) Ben-Ora, she asks O’Connor why he arrested Pacheco, a credentialed journalist. “We’re figuring everything out right now,” O’Connor says, then walks away. Pacheco told the Tracker they also informed police they were press.

During the arrest, police officers tried to stuff Pacheco’s photography gear into a bag, which then broke, sending two of their cameras to the ground, lens-first.

In a video shot by journalist Sean Beckner-Carmitchel, the gear can be heard hitting the ground as Pacheco says to the officers, “Come on, are you serious?” Pacheco examined the cameras later and told the Tracker that one appeared to have sustained around $500 in damage to the shutter.

Another police official, who Pacheco identified as Tom Ahern, deputy director of news affairs and communications, “took my press pass pretty violently,” they said, which “ripped my hair out.”

Pacheco told the Tracker that they felt targeted as a journalist, perhaps less because of their visible press credentials and camera equipment and more because they were wearing a full-face gas mask. “I was told by local press that when they see that, they interpret you as an agitator,” they said of the police. Pacheco also said that Ahern “was definitely following me around and ordering me around more than the rest of the press, and I don't know why.”

In a phone call from the precinct with Ben-Ora, a video of which she posted on the social platform X, Pacheco called the arrest “an obscene abuse of power.”

“I can’t believe that I’m here again in the same summer behind bars for having a camera,” they said. Pacheco was arrested three times in May while documenting protests related to the Israel-Gaza war.

“My arrest was clearly just because, I don’t know, I look arrestable to them,” they told Ben-Ora.

Pacheco was released after 9 1/2 hours in custody and charged with disorderly conduct, with an initial hearing scheduled for Sept. 30. They told the Tracker that their left wrist was red and bruised the day after the arrest, and one of their shins was bruised from a police bicycle. Their press pass was returned later in the day.

Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association, told the Tracker that in advance of the DNC, he had offered the Chicago Police Department a training on interacting with the press similar to one he gave the Milwaukee Police Department before the Republican National Convention in July.

“They told me that they had been providing First Amendment training and they didn’t need anything from NPPA,” Osterreicher said. “Given the events of last night, I would have to say that that alleged training was an abysmal failure.”

The DNC’s Public Safety Joint Information Center confirmed that Pacheco had been cited for disorderly conduct — breach of peace. It did not respond to an additional question about why the journalist was arrested.