Assassination of Fred Hampton
Chicago police killed Black Panther leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in a 1969 raid aided by information from an FBI informant.
Fred Hampton chaired the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party and helped organize the Rainbow Coalition, which brought the Panthers together with the Young Lords and the Young Patriots. He became a target of FBI surveillance and its COINTELPRO program.
On December 4, 1969, police assigned to the Cook County state’s attorney’s office raided a Chicago apartment where Hampton and other Panthers were staying. Hampton and Mark Clark died in the raid. Investigators and lawyers later disputed the officers’ account of a shootout and examined evidence that the police had fired the overwhelming majority of the shots.
FBI informant William O’Neal supplied information about the apartment before the raid. That assistance became a central issue in civil litigation brought by survivors and the families of those killed. In 1979 a federal appeals court ordered a new trial on parts of the case after finding that the plaintiffs had presented evidence from which a jury could infer a conspiracy. The parties settled in 1982, before a jury issued a verdict on those claims.
Bibliography:
- Hampton v. Hanrahan, 600 F.2d 600 (7th Cir. 1979).
- Hanrahan v. Hampton, 446 U.S. 754 (1980).
- Haas, J. (2010). The Assassination of Fred Hampton. Lawrence Hill Books.