Alds. Monique Scott (left) and Silvana Tabares at the City Council meeting in March Credit: Jim Daley

A social media post that a 10th Police District Council member made about a police-involved killing has sparked complaints and recriminations between her and two alderpersons. The district councilor, Kiisha Smith, said that a letter Ald. Silvana Tabares (23rd Ward) and Ald. Monique Scott (24th) disseminated about the post led to her receiving an anonymous threat. Scott, who also told a pastor he shouldn’t host the district council’s meeting at a Lawndale church, denied the threat was connected to the letter. 

In the early morning of January 6, Chicago police officers responding to a 911 call about a domestic disturbance in the Albany Terrace Apartments shot and killed Timothy Glaze, a fifty-eight-year-old man. Body-worn camera video released by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability on February 4 shows Glaze exited the apartment and approached the responding officers while holding a knife before two officers fatally shot him. 

Glaze’s family released a statement that said he was “experiencing a mental health crisis, [and] deserved help, compassion, and care—not bullets. The Chicago Police Department’s decision to fire twenty-eight shots at a vulnerable individual in distress, when non-lethal options were available, is not only a tragedy but also a profound failure to serve and protect.”

On February 8, Smith posted in a North Lawndale community Facebook group about that month’s district council meeting. “Come out and join us to address all of your community concerns! COPA will be present to answer your questions, and to address your concerns regarding the Police Murders in the 10th District!” the post read.

That prompted Scott and Tabares to send a letter to CCPSA President Anthony Driver calling the use of the term “police murders” in Smith’s post “deeply troubling” and requesting Driver share whatever guidelines CCPSA has established about district councilors’ “rhetoric and professional conduct
especially with regards to public meetings and their promotion.” 

“We have a fiduciary duty as an elected official, and [Smith] is an elected official too,” Scott told the Weekly. “She has to have the same kind of decorum.”

Smith told the Weekly her post was merely reflecting the attitudes in the community surrounding the shooting of Glaze and another man, Kurt Kilbert, who was killed in North Lawndale on February 2 after allegedly exchanging gunfire with officers. 

“When I posted that, it wasn’t me saying all police are murderers or anything,” Smith said. “It was simply the verbiage that the community had—like in our January [district council] meeting, they were like, ‘The police keep murdering us; they keep killing us, and they killed that man.’”

Driver sent Tabares and Scott a response that noted that police district council members are independently elected and don’t report to the CCPSA. “Like all elected officials, district council members have the authority and autonomy to promote their public meetings and engage with stakeholders as they see fit,” he wrote. Driver declined to comment for this story.

Smith said she doesn’t know Tabares, who declined to comment. She does know Scott: the alderperson, whose ward includes the 10th District, backed Smith’s candidacy and attended the council’s first public meeting. “She could have basically called me if she felt some type of way” about the Facebook post, Smith said. “She has my number.” 

“If Kiisha wanted to sit down and talk to me, of course, there’s no malice there,” Scott said. “This was just to tell you, ‘Hey, you made a mistake. Watch the words that you choose.’ I mean, you can say freedom of speech. But freedom of speech is not always the best.”

Tabares and Scott copied Smith’s fellow 10th District Council members on their letter to Driver, as well as other CCPSA commissioners, the commission’s executive director, then-COPA chief Andrea Kersten, CPD Superintendent Larry Snelling, and Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) President John Catanzara. 

The next day 8th District Council members, two of whom were endorsed by the FOP, posted the alderpersons’ letter on Facebook and called for Driver to demand Smith’s resignation. Jason Huff, the 8th Police District Council chair, did not respond to a request for comment.

The day after that, Smith got an anonymous email that directed racist and misogynist slurs at her. The author threatened to show up at the next district council meeting. Smith blames the alderpersons’ dissemination of their letter for the threat, a charge Scott denied. “She posted it on social media,” Scott said. “You did that to yourself. The letter was addressing what you did.”

Smith acknowledged that she posted a public status on Facebook, but that it was via her own campaign page, not an official district council page. “Had the police seen it themselves and felt the need to comment? That’s one thing, but for you to include them and introduce [the FOP president in the email], that means you’re stirring the pot.”

Eighteen police district councilors signed on to a complaint to the Office of Inspector General accusing Tabares and Scott of violating a part of the ordinance that established the district councils and CCPSA prohibiting anyone from retaliating, intimidating, discouraging, or threatening district councilors. The OIG complaint, which the Weekly obtained a draft of, claims Tabares and Scott’s letter “directly targets” Smith. 

CAARPR activists, some of whom are regulars at 10th District Council meetings, also came to Smith’s defense, creating a web page with a petition supporting her. On March 13, Smith shared a Facebook post from CAARPR promoting that month’s district council meeting, scheduled to be held the next day at St. Agatha, a Lawndale church that’s been a regular location for 10th District Council meetings. The post included a flyer that said Smith “is facing attacks by alder people Silvana Tabares and Monique Scott for bringing light to the police murder of Timothy Glaze.”

Scott, who has attended St. Agatha for her entire life, texted an image of the flyer to Father Larry Dowling, who led the church until retiring last year. “Morning. The pastor shouldn’t allow this,” the accompanying text message read. “She called cops murderers. I spoke on it. Her position is to support the police not attack them.” 

Dowling referred Scott to Father Thadeo Mgimba, the current pastor of St. Agatha. Scott said she didn’t contact Mgimba about the meeting. According to Smith, Mgimba told her the March meeting could be held at the church, but that she would need to meet with him and a police representative before the next one. Mgimba declined to comment.

Scott said she texted Dowling about the March 14 district council meeting because it was a “hate” meeting. “Do you think that a hate meeting should be held within a church?” she asked. “That’s my church that I was born and reared in, and so [Smith] is gonna have somebody come in and bash me as somebody in my church?” 

Smith said Scott is interfering with the district council. “She doesn’t want me to host meetings in the community, but that’s my job,” she said. “It’s in the ordinance that I’m required to hold these meetings.”

COPA’s investigation of Glaze’s death is ongoing.

✶ ✶ ✶ ✶

Jim Daley is the Weekly’s investigations editor.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *