Last week, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot was under fire after it was revealed that city lawyers attempted to block the video release of a botched police raid caught on an officer’s body camera.
What We Know:
- Anjanette Young, a social worker, filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) last year requesting to show the public the body cam video exposing a botched raid of her home. Local TV station CBS Chicago also requested the video separately as part of a series on police raids, but the Chicago Police Department rejected both requests. A federal judge eventually forced CPD to turn over the footage as a part of Young’s lawsuit against the police department.
- On February 21, 2019, authorities broke down the door to Young’s townhome as she was getting ready for bed. Young had just gotten undressed when she heard what she described as loud slams. She said she grabbed the closest jacket to conceal her body and ran to the door.
“Before I knew it, there was a swarm of police officers,” Young said. “They had these big guns, long guns with scopes and lights… I thought they were going to shoot me.”
- The police were given a vague tip, but according to CBS 2, they did not conduct enough research to verify it. Through a brief search of public information, the news station found the suspect’s home was listed across the street from Young’s. Naked and handcuffed for over 40 minutes, she cried, yelling to police over and over again that they were in the wrong home. She said everything connected to the apartment was in her name, so had they done the appropriate research beforehand, she would never be telling this story.
- A few hours before the footage was set to be released, CBS Chicago obtained it as part of an investigative report. In an effort to block the video’s release, city lawyers filed a last-minute emergency motion in federal court. Despite the city’s attempts, CBS went ahead with the report, and as it was being broadcasted, a judge denied the motion.
- In a statement made last Wednesday, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said:
“Today, I became aware of an incident involving Ms. Anjanette Young from February 2019, before I became Mayor, and I saw a video today for the first time. I had no knowledge of either until today. I had a very emotional reaction to what was depicted on the video as I imagine that many people did.”
- Lightfoot claims she found out city lawyers tried to block the video from media reports and would not have allowed them to try to stop the story had she known. “This is not how we operate,” she said. Community activist, Ja’Mal Green dismissed the mayor’s claims. “How are you suppressing videos and the mayor don’t know about it? She has to be held accountable,” Green disputed.
- When asked what she would say to Mayor Lightfoot, Young said, “I was there when you came to my church, and I voted for you. I told people to vote for you. I believed in you as a black woman running for mayor.“ Young continued, “I want you to come back…tell the people in my church and me how you’re going to fix this. It’s not OK.”
- During an online City Council meeting, Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th) called out Lightfoot saying, “I hold you accountable, Mayor, to have a hearing on the matter … because the public deserves an explanation for what happened and why the Law Department was trying to sue the plaintiff because she was trying to make this public, as was her right.”
- Lightfoot is the first Black woman and the first openly gay person to be Chicago Mayor. When elected, Chicago voters put faith in her to execute her plans promoted throughout her campaign to reconstruct CPD, positioning herself as the resolution to her predecessor Rahm Emmanuel who delayed footage of a white officer shooting a black teen in 2015.
Mayor Lightfoot asked Young’s lawyers to set up a meeting between the two of them.
