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“That was a very difficult and fraught time in our city,” Ms. Lightfoot said. “And I think that many people carry the trauma of that moment and others like it with them to this very day.”

In the aftermath of Mr. McDonald’s murder, before becoming mayor, Ms. Lightfoot led a panel that found a pattern of systemic racism in the Chicago Police Department. She said there had been improvements since then, including in police training and oversight, though she acknowledged that more needed to be done.

“There has been some change — not enough,” she said. “Not enough by any stretch of the imagination.”

Mr. Van Dyke, the first Chicago police officer to be convicted in an on-duty murder in almost 50 years, was found guilty of second-degree murder and 16 counts of aggravated battery with a firearm, one count for each bullet he fired. Prosecutors requested a sentence of at least 18 years in prison, but Judge Vincent Gaughan sentenced him to less than half of that.

Judge Gaughan sentenced Mr. Van Dyke only on the murder count; a penalty for the aggravated battery counts could have resulted in a much longer prison term.

William Calloway, a community organizer who in 2015 pressed for the release of the video of Mr. McDonald’s murder, described the response to the shooting and conviction as a watershed moment for Chicago.

“We finally held a police officer accountable,” Mr. Calloway said. “The justice system didn’t give him the punishment to match his crime, but a just verdict was rendered for murder, so it gave us a lot of hope to keep fighting.”