Team of lawyers helps family push for answers after fatal Lenexa police shooting
The family of a Grandview man killed by Lenexa police last month have hired a team of high profile attorneys to represent them as they fight for more information.
Relatives of Jose Enrique Cartagena Chacon, 25, have received few details from the Lenexa Police Department about the shooting and what led up to it. Though family members requested last month to see body camera footage from the early morning June 22 shooting, they have yet to be able to do that.
“We’re going to be working toward trying to obtain access for the family to view the body cam or dash cam videos for the police who were there,” said Ben Stelter-Embry, a Kansas City area attorney, “and emergency responders in the early morning hours of the shooting.”
Stelter-Embry, of Embry Law, is working alongside Chicago attorneys Andrew Stroth of Action Injury Law and Steven Hart of Hart, McLaughlin & Eldridge.
The team of attorneys is also involved in representing the brother of Cedric “CJ” Lofton, a Kansas foster child who died in September 2021 in the custody of officers at the Sedgwick County Juvenile Intake and Assessment Center in Wichita. The 17-year-old, according to media reports, was restrained in the prone position for more than 40 minutes until his heart stopped beating. Lofton was later resuscitated but never regained consciousness. He died two days later in the hospital, his death later ruled a homicide.
Last month, a federal appeals court denied qualified immunity to five Sedgwick County juvenile detention officers involved in Lofton’s death, allowing the excessive force lawsuit to proceed.
Stroth and Stelter-Embry also helped represent the family of Andrew Finch, who was fatally shot in late 2017 by a Wichita police officer in what authorities say started as a hoax call known as swatting. In 2023, the Wichita City Council approved a $5 million settlement in the federal lawsuit.
What happened June 22?
Since the shooting death of Chacon, the Lenexa Police Department has said little about what happened that morning. Officials have not answered questions about what specifically led up to the shooting or what prompted at least one officer to shoot Chacon.
Known by many as Enrique, Chacon lived with relatives in Grandview. Police knocked on the family’s door around 7 a.m. June 22 to tell them that Chacon had been shot.
What Lenexa police have said is that at 3 a.m. June 22 police were called to the Lenexa Crossing Apartment Homes, in the 12400 block of West 97th Terrace. Officers responded to a report of a disturbance involving someone with a gun, according to the department’s initial news release.
Once officers arrived at the complex, the release said, they located an individual inside a parked vehicle near the pool/clubhouse area.
“During the encounter with that individual, at least one Lenexa officer discharged their firearm, striking the individual,” the release said.
Chacon was transported by Johnson County Med-Act to a nearby hospital and was later pronounced deceased, police said.
Family wants to view footage
The Star emailed a spokesperson with Lenexa police last week asking when the family would be able to view the body cam footage; no one responded.
Kansas law allows certain family members of individuals fatally shot by police to view the video within 20 days of the request.
“We believe that under the Kansas statute, that we’ll be able to satisfy the criteria,” said Stelter-Embry. “We’re hoping that the City of Lenexa will work with the family in order to obtain access and viewing of those videos.”
In Kansas, body camera footage is considered a criminal investigation record. Under state law, that classification gives police departments or other public officials like district attorneys broad discretion in deciding whether the recordings get released or stay shielded from public view, even after a case is closed.
Earlier this week, the ACLU of Kansas called on the Lenexa Police Department to release the body camera footage from that morning. In a Facebook post, the ACLU said it stood with the community wanting justice for the young man.
“Trust in law enforcement requires transparency — and the people who have sworn to protect us should not be allowed to kill members of the community and remain anonymous, and avoid accountability,” the post said.
