No Witness to Misconduct
The troubling history of Eddie Johnson’s blindness to excessive force
Police
Is Eddie Next?
Mayoral candidates say they would replace Eddie Johnson as superintendent
James Tsitiridis
This week, candidates running to replace outgoing Mayor Rahm Emanuel condemned his decision to hire Eddie Johnson, a Chicago Police Department insider, to reform the department after the release of the Laquan McDonald video. Several criticized the convoluted system by which Emanuel selected his handpicked police superintendent, with one calling for an independent investigation into Johnson’s track record as a police supervisor.
Cognitive Dissidence
Chicago’s abolitionists make space for conversation after the Van Dyke trial
Jedidiah Brown, middle, erupted in cheers with a crowd as they watch the broadcasted verdict for Jason Van Dyke outside Cook County. Jason Van Dyke, a white Chicago Police Officer, was convicted of Second Degree Murder and 16 counts of aggravated battery with a firearm for each of shots in the shooting death of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. Soon after the conviction, Chicago activist took to the streets in protest for police reform, chanting, "CPD! Guilty of conspiracy." (Sebastián Hidalgo)
The evening after the Van Dyke verdict came down, Trina Reynolds-Tyler took to Instagram to ask her followers a simple question: “What is justice for Laquan McDonald?” An organizer and abolitionist, Reynolds-Tyler has been involved with activism around the McDonald shooting since before it caught the public’s attention.
Know Your Movements: The #EraseTheDatabase Campaign
The organizers working to reform and abolish the city’s gang database
Kahari Black
In the coming months before the February municipal elections, the Weekly will be profiling not only the candidates for public office, but also the grassroots movements that shape the political landscape in Chicago communities. Over the next few months, we will be asking mayoral and aldermanic candidates about their positions on each of these movements.
West Garfield Park residents reject proposed police academy, organizers argue
#NoCopAcademy surveyed 500 Garfield Park residents for their new report
#NoCopAcademy organizers Sammy Aly Ortega, Destiny Harris, and Ardamis Sims at the #NoCopReport release at Bethel Lutheran Church in West Garfield Park (#NoCopAcademy / Twitter)
Does police spending reduce harm or cause greater harm?
Tania Unzueta
An organizer challenges the way we think about—and police—immigration today
Dan Rowell
Tania Unzueta is a fierce advocate for the rights of undocumented immigrants around the country. She helped found the three organizations that defend the rights of immigrants, including Organized Communities Against Deportation and its predecessor the Immigrant Youth Justice League, and Mijente, a national Latinx organization. She was first arrested for staging a sit-in in Senator John McCain’s office in 2010 in support of the Dream Act. These days, she continues to work with OCAD and serves as the policy director for Mijente, a political hub that calls itself pro-Latinx, pro-Black, pro-woman, pro-queer and pro-poor.
Little Village Speaks Out About the Gang Database
Inside the Gang Database
The Fight Over Chicago’s Largest Private Police Force
Organizers return to challenging the University of Chicago Police Department's practices—this time with a more radical agenda
#CareNotCops organizers march to the occupation site (milo bosh)
On the night of April 3, an officer of the University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD) shot a student in the grips of a mental health crisis. Charles Thomas, who had been wielding a metal pole and smashing windows, and who the officer identified as undergoing a mental health crisis before shooting him in the shoulder, was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Streeterville to receive treatment. Over the following two weeks, he was charged with eight felonies, including assaulting a police officer.
We Got Power, and We Got Love
The Chicago Torture Justice Center honors the mothers of police torture survivors
Maddie Anderson
Reparations Won!” a white sheet cake boasted in blue lettering. The names of survivors of torture by detectives within the Chicago Police Department hung from clotheslines draped across the walls. A dozen cardstock letters from CPD torture survivors who remain in prison dangled by pink string from the ceiling. On orange and pink post-it notes, questions like “What do you want the world to know about your mom?” and “What gives you hope?”—and corresponding answers like “Artists give me hope!”—colored the windows. A microphone stand arose from a makeshift stage set up in front of two large banners reading “Consent is Everything” and “You Are Never Alone.” Among all of this, over fifty activists, young and old—torture survivors, their mothers, and their allies—greeted each other, hugged, ate, and mingled.