The image that has shocked the world. Source: Supplied

Two caucasian cops, armed with rifles, pose proudly with their “prized” catch; an African-American man on his belly, deer antlers attached to his head, with what appears to be blood smeared on his face and an expression too shocking for words.

Officer Timothy McDermott holds up the man’s head, while officer Jerome Finnigan smiles and points to his catch, antler in hand.

The Chicago Police Department successfully kept the polaroid photo suppressed for more than a decade, but no longer, after a judge released the startling image for the world to bear witness.

In March, lawyers for Chicago Police argued that the polaroid should be kept hidden in order to protect the privacy of the victim, but Judge Thomas Allen ruled against it, leading the Chicago Sun-Times to obtain a copy through court files.

Details of the circumstances behind the picture are scant, but it is believed to have been taken between 1999 and 2003 at a police station on the West Side of Chicago.

The infamous polaroid: Officers Timothy McDermott (L) and Jerome Finnigan, with the unidentified black man. Source: Supplied

The identity of the black man is unknown, but Finnigan later told authorities the man was arrested for carrying “20 bags of weed”. He said the photo was taken in the tactical office of the Harrison Police District, reports the Sun-Times.

The police department confirmed the Bureau of Internal Affairs could not clearly identify him.

He told the FBI the man was let go due to his clean criminal record, while an unnamed official said the photo was taken “in the spur of the moment”.

The photographer has not yet been identified.

The Intercept claims Chicago Police confirmed “no suspect is detained without proper paperwork”, but on the night the image was taken, Finnigan and McDermott failed to file an arrest report.

Finnigan, once a member of the police department’s elite Special Operations Section (SOS), was jailed for 12 years in 2006 after he was found guilty of leading a “gang” of rogue officers who robbed suspects, illegally invaded homes and stole thousands of dollars in cash, reports The Intercept.

In an interview with Playboy in 2012, he admitted the SOS beat and tortured suspects in their care.

He has been described as a “notoriously dirty cop”.

McDermott, also an SOS member but cleared of any wrongdoing in the SOS scandal, was fired last year after prosecutors handed over the racially offensive image to Chicago police.

Upon his dismissal, the police board said “appearing to treat an African-American man not as a human being but as a hunted animal is disgraceful and shocks the conscience.”

He is reportedly driving a truck to support his family, but is fighting his dismissal in court.

His lawyers also acted to suppress the image.

“I do remember an incident where I took a photo with Finnigan and it appears that this is it,” McDermott said in a 2013 interview with internal affairs.

“Finnigan called me over, told me to get in the picture and I sat in the picture. The photo was taken, and I went back to the business I was doing that day.

“I am embarrassed by my participation in this photograph. I made a mistake as a young, impressionable police officer who was trying to fit in.”

The image couldn’t come at a worse time for American authorities, as conflicts between white officers and black suspects in the past 12 months have led to wrongful deaths, riots and global protests.

Supt. Garry McCarthy said in a statement to the Sun-Times that the photo “is disgusting, and the despicable actions of these two former officers have no place in our police department or in our society.

“As the superintendent of this department, and as a resident of our city, I will not tolerate this kind of behaviour, and that is why neither of these officers works for CPD today.

“I fired one of the officers and would have fired the other if he hadn’t already been fired by the time I found out about the picture. Our residents deserve better than this, as do the thousands of good men and women in this department.”

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel told the Sun-Times, “Good riddance”.

“Let me be clear, that photo does not represent the values of the city of Chicago that we all share in common. It doesn’t represent the values of the Police department.”

“To that individual, ‘Good riddance ... You don’t belong in the Police department’. Our whole idea of the Police Department is to serve and protect.”