Mayor Lori Lightfoot publicly scolded her new police superintendent Tuesday for not coming up with a good enough strategy to contain violence over the Memorial Day weekend, the deadliest in five years, though she acknowledged the department is facing its greatest challenge in decades.
“While I know that there was a lot of energy and coordination among a variety of groups, what I said to the superintendent this morning is this was a fail,” Lightfoot said. “And whatever the strategy is, it didn’t work … This weekend’s violence was out of control.”
At least 10 people were shot to death and at least 40 others were wounded by gunfire over the long weekend, despite a statewide stay-at-home order and a plan by Superintendent David Brown to step up patrols and better coordinate their deployment across the city.
The death toll nearly matched the long holiday weekend of 2015 when 12 people were killed. Last year, seven people were fatally shot and 36 others were wounded.
Lightfoot said department brass were “hard at work and looking at the data,” adding, “I have a meeting with them later this afternoon. But we have to do better. We cannot have weekends in the summer turn into a bloodbath.”
Despite her harsh words, Lightfoot said she understood this was “one of the most difficult times” for the department in the 20-plus years she’s followed it.
She noted that federal agents who usually work with officers “have been on the sideline now for weeks. We have the courts that really aren’t taking a lot of criminal cases. That’s a problem. We have the jails that are effectively closed to new persons, so we have officers that are risking life and limb and arresting people who are absolute drivers of violence, and they’re cycling in and out of the jail, out of the court system, in 24 to 48 hours.”
“The Police Department really is effectively on its own in fighting (for) public safety across the city,” Lightfoot continued. “And we have officers, and I understand this, who are concerned themselves with getting COVID and whether or not they’re going to be sick themselves or take that to their family members. So this is probably one of the most difficult times for policing that we’ve experienced in this city.”
Hours earlier, at a separate news conference, Brown called the violence “nothing short of alarming” and “unacceptable.” Still, he said he was not discouraged going into the summer months, typically the most violent time of year in Chicago.
“My resolve (hasn’t) been shaken at all in making Chicago the safest city in the country, and neither should yours,” Brown said as he was flanked by other top officers at police headquarters. “We are committed and dedicated to making this city the safest in the country. This was a challenging weekend. But we are not shaken. We are not going to … give up on our city.”
The weekend’s shootings began within hours after Brown spoke to reporters on Friday about his plans to contain the violence, which included a new “summer operations center” that would rely on police cameras and other technology to deploy officers where needed.
Those plans, however, depended on different staffing levels than in the past. “We did not utilize the normal 1,000 additional officers,” Brown said. “We had several hundred that were dedicated and coordinated a little bit better with (the summer operations center). … But the level of officers … was different than previous years.”
More than 1,000 people have been shot this year in Chicago, about 100 more than this time last year, according to data compiled by the Tribune.
Brown said the weekend shootings stemmed from disputes between rival gang factions, as well as clashes involving the sale of drugs. He said the coronavirus outbreak, which prompted the stay-at-home order more than two months ago, has made people eager to spend time outdoors and likely added to the violence.
“People are feeling restless after being cooped up for weeks,” said Brown.
Chief of Operations Fred Waller, one of Brown’s top deputies, told reporters that police responses to the violence and the dispersals in places like Englewood and in the downtown area — where a group demanded that businesses reopen during the pandemic — showed how officers were where they were needed during the long holiday weekend.
“As you can see, our officers were busy in all parts of the city this weekend,” Waller said. “Yes, we need to do better. And we will do better.”
Lightfoot indicated morale problems may be worsening the department’s problems on the street.
During her news conference, she noted that many officers were dissatisfied when they were sent from the bureau of organized crime — which includes covert narcotics units and officers who do long-term gang investigations — to uniformed patrol assignments. This was part of the reorganization plan of former interim Superintendent Charlie Beck.
Just last week, Brown demoted to the rank of lieutenant two top-ranking organized crime unit officials, Ronald Kimble, who was commander of the narcotics unit, and William Bradley, deputy chief of the entire bureau, law enforcement sources said. One of the sources said Kimble’s demotion to lieutenant in the Rogers Park patrol district occurred after Lightfoot became dissatisfied with him during a meeting with top police brass.
“They’re used to being by themselves as a separate organization, frankly with not a lot of accountability,” Lightfoot said. “I’ve been asking for a year, ‘What do they do?’ And they haven’t been able to demonstrate what they’re doing to really significantly aid in the crime fight.
“So what’s happened over the last couple of weeks is these officers have either been taken out of plainclothes, put into uniform and back in the districts under the control of district commanders and deputy chiefs. Or, if they’re staying in plainclothes, they have to be actively involved in supporting district efforts at crime suppression,” Lightfoot continued. “They don’t like that, and I get that.”
In the midst of the weekend shootings, a viral video showed a scuffle between police officers and a large gathering on the South Side on Sunday night that caught the attention of everyone from Chance the Rapper to Lightfoot.
Officers were called to the 7000 block of South Lowe Avenue in the Englewood neighborhood to disperse a crowd that had gathered on the street. The video shows a chaotic scene as officers struggled to break up the crowd, grabbing some of the people and chasing off others.
During the incident, an officer saw a man take a handgun and put it in front of a car before running south on Lowe, according to police. Police chased him down and arrested him. Sedrick Monroe, 42, was charged with one count of being an armed habitual criminal. Police said a loaded Glock handgun was recovered.
Not long afterward, officers responded to a “10-1” call — an officer needing immediate assistance — when shots were fired in the area.
Jaquan Hayden, 21, of Homewood, was arrested about 10:45 p.m. in the 7000 block of South Lowe Avenue after he was seen grabbing his waistband and running through a vacant lot, police said. After a short chase, he was taken into custody and a loaded revolver was recovered.
He is facing charges of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon and resisting arrest, police said. He did not have a valid firearm owner’s identification card or concealed carry license.
Two officers were taken to a hospital in good condition for minor injuries, police said. It was unclear what their injuries were.
Chance the Rapper shared the video and asked the city to “stop sending large groups of militarized police into our neighborhoods exclusively.” He noted that photos had been posted of large gatherings in North Side neighborhoods and in the downtown area without similar police action.
Lightfoot tweeted that she was aware of the video and said, “We will continue to investigate the incident to ensure proper tactics were used — ensuring constitutional rights are protected — and that CPD officers are wearing face coverings to maintain public health.”
Brown said the video from the Englewood incident highlighted how officers are facing challenges on two fronts: fighting violence and getting the public to adhere to the stay-at-home order.
“Officers were challenged with saving lives,” Brown said, reacting to the video. “Because (these) crowds spread the virus. While at the same time there were guns and shots fired in that crowd and our officers had to take action to save lives of people in the crowd that may have been victims of the shots that were being fired . … We recovered two guns that were in the crowd. … It’s a twofold challenge that happened.”
Lightfoot said police enforcement should be the last resort to ensure social distancing, but “for the greater good, when absolutely necessary, we will — no matter which neighborhood large crowds are gathering in.” She added that police responded to dozens of reports of social distancing violations across the city, from Lincoln Park and Humboldt Park to Andersonville and Auburn Gresham.
The Englewood district, where the scuffle occurred, logged two fatal shootings over the weekend, the second most gun homicides in the city. The West Side’s Harrison district, one of the most violent in the city, had the most with three. Five other districts — Morgan Park, Grand Crossing, Shakespeare, Gresham and Calumet — all had one homicide each.
Three teenagers were shot over the weekend, including 16-year-old Darnell Fisher, who was killed Saturday night in the Washington Park neighborhood. Police took someone in custody for a weapons charge, but the person was released about 4 a.m. Sunday because prosecutors denied charges.
A 15-year-old boy was shot in the face, chest and abdomen early Saturday in the South Shore neighborhood and taken to a hospital in critical condition. A 15-year-old girl was grazed in the leg by a bullet early Monday in the West Pullman neighborhood while sitting on a porch.
The tally of shootings doesn’t include an attack in which four people were stabbed at 9:15 p.m. Sunday after an argument erupted with tenants of a Gresham apartment building in their backyard, police said. A 46-year-old woman took out a knife and stabbed three men before someone stabbed her, police said. They were all taken to hospitals with injuries that were not life-threatening. Charges were pending against the woman.
The last homicide of the weekend was about 8:30 p.m. Monday in the 2800 block of West Wilcox Street in the East Garfield Park neighborhood on the West Side, police said. Two men, 45 and 52, were standing on the sidewalk when someone in a white sedan fired shots at them, police said.
The younger man was shot in the head and torso. He was taken to Stroger Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. The older man was taken to Mount Sinai Medical Center in good condition with a gunshot wound to the left leg, police said. No arrests have been made.
