Former Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke was beaten in his prison cell after being transferred from Illinois custody to a Connecticut federal prison last week, the Chicago Tribune reports. The attack occurred a few hours after Van Dyke arrived at the Connecticut facility, a move his family and attorneys only learned about after it was done. “We are petrified and very worried about Jason’s safety,” said Van Dyke’s wife, Tiffany. “Jason wants to serve his time and does not want any trouble. We are hoping prison officials will take quick action to rectify this situation.”
It was unclear why Van Dyke was transferred out of Illinois, where he had been held since he was sentenced to 81 months in prison last month. He was convicted of second-degree murder and 16 counts of aggravated battery in the 2014 fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald. The former officer was held in isolation when he was in an Illinois prison, and no security threats or other incidents occurred there that would have prompted such a dramatic transfer, a source said. The federal Bureau of Prisons website lists Van Dyke as at Danbury Federal Correctional Institution, a low- to minimum-security facility. He was put in the general population, said a source, who added that the former officer has received other threats since last week’s reported beating. Van Dyke isn’t the first high-profile ex-police officer from Illinois to be attacked after being moved into federal custody. A month after his transfer to a federal Indiana prison for security reasons, Drew Peterson was attacked in 2017 by a fellow inmate armed with a food tray in the dining area. Peterson, 65. a former Bolingbrook, Il., police sergeant and convicted murderer, was jumped in the maximum-security facility in Terre Haute.