Chicago aldermen debate halts to no-knock search warrants and police gang database
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Backers of stricter Chicago police search warrant rules in light of the wrongful raid on Anjanette Young’s home made their case Tuesday that more needs to be done to make sure officers don’t traumatize or injure innocent Chicagoans.
The City Council Public Safety Committee held a hearing on the proposed ordinance to outlaw no-knock search warrants, prohibit police serving warrants from pointing guns at kids and set other standards on officer behavior.
But aldermen did not vote on the package, which Mayor Lori Lightfoot opposes. There’s no immediate plan for the committee to vote on it in the future.
The mayor made her own changes to Police Department warrant rules in May in response to the notorious raid wrongfully conducted on Young’s home in 2019 by officers who made her stand naked while handcuffed as they searched her apartment.
Several aldermen say the mayor’s changes don’t go far enough.
“We’re focused on the safety of some of our most vulnerable residents,” said North Side Ald. Maria Hadden, 49th, a co-sponsor of the proposed tougher warrant rules.
The new ordinance would outlaw no-knock warrants, require police executing warrants to use “tactics that are the least intrusive to people’s home, property and person and least harmful to people’s physical and emotional health,” and record information about warrants.
It also would prohibit police from seeking a warrant based “solely on an informant’s representation,” instead requiring an independent investigation to corroborate any information from an informant.
Most warrants would need to be executed between 9 a.m. and 7 p.m., and officers would be prohibited from handcuffing or pointing guns at children, or at their relatives when children are present.
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But Lincoln Park Ald. Michele Smith, 43rd, pointed out aldermen just approved the creation of a civilian police oversight board. Smith said new policies like those her colleagues are proposing should go through that body or be covered by the federal Police Department consent decree, rather than be created by City Council ordinance.
Under pressure to fix police warrant rules after the Young raid came to light early this year, LIghtfoot set her own new policies in May.
Among those, search warrants now need to be approved by a deputy chief or higher.
“No-knock” warrants are to be used only when there’s a safety threat, which the Police Department previously said already was its practice. These warrants will need to be approved by a bureau chief or higher and executed by SWAT.
Officers are required to perform a planning session before serving a search warrant, and an independent investigation of the raid is to be conducted to make sure the information used to obtain the warrant was accurate.
Young has sued the city over the wrongful raid, and blamed Lightfoot for failing to resolve the case in a compassionate way.
The Public Safety Committee on Tuesday also debated — but took no vote — on an ordinance calling for the Police Department to suspend using its controversial gang database.
The city watchdog found earlier this year that the Police Department had made little progress in fixing the database, which reports have described as an error-laden tool of racial discrimination.
Police Deputy Chief Thomas Mills said the department uses the information to investigate criminal networks in neighborhoods and craft crime-fighting strategies.
But South Side Ald. Jeanette Taylor, 20th, who co-sponsored the measure, said kids stay out of school because they are erroneously listed as gang members in the police database, and residents of her ward have been denied apartment rentals and loans because they’re on the list.
“This is a wheel we don’t need to reinvent,” Taylor said. “This is a wheel we need to destroy.”
Twitter @_johnbyrne
