The Chicago Police Department on Wednesday announced a plan to create a new gang database that department officials promise will be more fair and useful, hoping to answer critics who have long complained the current version is flawed.
The new Criminal Enterprise Information System, which will officially be announced Thursday, comes after more than a year of stinging criticism, lawsuits and a scathing Chicago inspector general report that found the department’s decadeslong practice of collecting gang data to be inaccurate, racially biased and ineffective for crime reduction.
The new system will use only timely and vetted information, police leaders said. Under the new rules, there will be stricter criteria for entering names into the database, and all submissions will be checked by supervisors and police district intelligence officers, the department pledged.
There will be an appeals process for people to get off the list, and the database will be regularly purged, retaining names generally for only five years, police said. The information will not be shared with immigration officials, and access by other law enforcement agencies will require the signing of an agreement committing to that restriction as well.
Interim Chicago police Superintendent Charlie Beck said the changes aim to strike a balance between using all available data to respond to daily shootings that are rooted in street gang conflicts and the need to avoid false labels for individuals and over-criminalizing communities.
“There is no one tool that will reduce gang violence in a city as complicated as Chicago,” Beck said in an interview with the Tribune. “You have to have a number of tools. Some are intervention, community-based. But some are enforcement-related. We have a small minority of individuals who are involved, who are extremely violent, who are killing people literally on a daily basis, and we need to have investigative tools.”
The existence of any such database, however, continues to be met with opposition.
Sheila Bedi, a professor at Northwestern University’s Pritzker School of Law, questioned whether the continued warehousing of gang information will really help reduce crime.
“There is a much bigger issue, which is the (Inspector General’s Office) said they should evaluate whether this is a legitimate tool,” Bedi said. “Or whether these gang databases are essentially useless, and the city has failed to engage in that inquiry. This really suggests a missed opportunity to bring policing in Chicago into the future and address some of the unconstitutional and racist policing practices that have haunted our communities.”
The department has for years gathered gang data from multiple places — arrest reports, gang cards and contact cards, for example — and warehoused them in its massive computer information network. The end result was an out-of-date, inaccurate and racially biased list of known gang members that swelled to more than 130,000 names, according to lawsuits and the report from city Inspector General Joseph Ferguson’s office.
Critics have said the past practice of designating someone as a gang member was too subjective, based on who some city residents associated with or what they might have been wearing when they came into contact with police officers.
And because the information was readily available departmentwide — and to outside law enforcement agencies — there have been devastating consequences for people on the list. Some critics have said people have been ordered for deportation based on falsely being labeled as gang members, for example. Some classified by the city as gang members have reported struggling to find work after the affiliations popped up on background checks, community groups have said.
Beck said he expected it would take six months to a year to bring the new database fully up to speed. It could partially rely on existing gang information in the department’s computer system, but only if it passes a vetting.
Going forward, the criteria for gang designation will include either recorded admission by a person that they are affiliated, police said, or reliance on a combination of two of the following criteria: information from confidential informants who have provided reliable information, identification by another penal institution or law enforcement agency, conviction of a crime where gang membership was a part of the crime. Gang clothing can also be considered — but not as a standalone criteria.
The new safeguards in place also include that only officers trained on the new system will have access to the database, Beck said.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s office praised the move Wednesday, saying the proper safeguards were being put in place.
“Mayor Lightfoot has been clear that completely overhauling and reforming the way in which the Chicago Police Department collects, maintains, and shares information on gangs and criminal enterprises is a necessary step toward building greater transparency, accountability and trust between our law enforcement and the residents they serve,” spokesman Patrick Mullane said in a statement. “The department’s reformed Criminal Enterprise Information System fulfills that commitment by allowing CPD to better prevent, investigate, and solve gang-related crime while also protecting the constitutional rights of citizens.”
Ald. Chris Taliaferro, 29th, who chairs the City Council Public Safety Committee, said the proposed changes that allow for people to try to get their names removed from the database are important.
“I think a key will be this increased checks and balances and transparency,” Taliaferro said. “Under the proposal I saw, you would be able to fill out an application, for lack of a better word, to find out if your name is in the database. And if it is, you would be able to appeal to have it removed.”
Taliaferro said he hopes to hold an evening meeting about the newly created database at Malcolm X College or another neighborhood site so residents can easily attend. And he said he’s optimistic activists opposed to the database can get their ideas considered if they’re willing to engage in the process rather than simply insist the database be shut down.
Bedi was among the critics still questioning whether the new system will avoid the pitfalls of the past. She said she is not yet convinced the department will have a strong enough vetting process or adequate training to make sure there are no civil rights violations.
“I think there is not enough assurances that there will be the kind of rigor behind these processes,” she said. “We don’t have information about how police officers are going to be trained, how supervisors are going to be trained.”
Community groups who oppose the collection of gang data by police also launched an online campaign Wednesday to renounce the idea, knowing the announcement of a new system was imminent.
In a news release, the groups said that public comments gathered around the issue by the department show that nearly 90% of respondents did not want any new database created.
“Reading through the comments I realized an overwhelming number of suggestions urged the city to consider investing resources in communities instead of creating a new gang database,” said Veronica Rodriguez, youth organizer with Brighton Park Neighborhood Council. “I believe people know the issue here is about CPD’s inappropriate use of these databases and the fact that it can’t be easily solved only by tweaking the system. People want to see more investment in public education and mental health resources in our neighborhoods instead of more surveillance and criminalization.”
The information released by the community groups Wednesday included more than 400 individual statements made by community members at meetings held by the city challenging the existence of any such database. Many of the comments said the old database unfairly targeted people of color and was filled with errors and names that were unfairly included.
The groups are encouraging aldermen to continue considering abolishing the database all together. Ordinances have been introduced at City Council aimed at curtailing or stopping use of the system.
“We were told that the Chicago Police Department would consider the comments made by the public last spring regarding the proposed Criminal Enterprise Database,” Chaz Lee, an organizer at HANA Center, a Chicago-area organization that focuses on social service and advocacy, including around immigration, said in a news release Wednesday.
“We now know that an overwhelming majority of those that submitted feedback oppose the implementation of the new gang database. We ask City Council to move forward with our proposed ordinance and stop the implementation.”
