NewsHound
10-28-2011, 03:25 PM
ACLU suit alleges police slower to respond in minority areas
From ChicagoTribune.com
Serethea Reid called 911 on a recent late night from her Austin neighborhood home when she heard screaming outside.
Despite her repeated emergency calls to Chicago police, no officers showed up for nearly three hours, long after the beating had ended, according to Reid.
On Thursday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city that alleged Chicago's deployment of police officers results in slower response times to 911 calls in primarily black and Hispanic neighborhoods compared with service in largely white communities.
"Because of experiences such as this, many of our neighbors simply will not call the police," Reid, who is black, told reporters at a news conference at the ACLU's downtown offices.
The Central Austin Neighborhood Association in Chicago's crime-plagued West Side also joined the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court. Reid is its president.
The suit is based on recent news reports that found police districts that cover minority neighborhoods had disproportionately fewer officers than those covering white neighborhoods as measured by response times to emergency calls and rates of serious violent crime.
The ACLU said its own efforts to gather such data have been stonewalled by city officials. The city has cited security reasons for not releasing the information.
"The situation has been so opaque for so long that no one knows what their deployment policies are," said Harvey Grossman, the ACLU's legal director. "The city ought to be transparent about that."
The suit asks that the city submit a plan that will guarantee that all neighborhoods receive equal emergency services.
After making a campaign promise to get more cops on the streets despite city budget woes, Mayor Rahm Emanuel attempted to move more cops into troubled neighborhoods without touching off a polarizing debate about race and crime in Chicago. Aldermen whose wards would lose officers have long opposed the idea of moving officers from safer neighborhoods to more crime-ridden areas.
Under police Superintendent Garry McCarthy's leadership, more than 1,000 officers were moved to beat patrols, primarily by closing down two specialized units — whose officers were already on the street —- and reassigning officers from desk duty and jail lockups.
On learning of the ACLU suit, Emanuel defended his actions on the police front since taking office in mid-May and said he's not done yet.
"We've put more officers in those districts where there's high crime and higher crime," Emanuel told reporters. "I'm not done nor is Garry ... in looking to see if we need to put more officers where we have the crime problem.
"It's not just manpower alone," said Emanuel, citing an earlier curfew for younger children and higher fines for illegal firearm possession.
"Now, we have applied more resources to the areas that need them and we're not done and we constantly take a fresh look and it's not static," Emanuel said. "If it were static, I would have been stuck with the system we had on May 15. I didn't accept the way police officers were distributed."
From ChicagoTribune.com
Serethea Reid called 911 on a recent late night from her Austin neighborhood home when she heard screaming outside.
Despite her repeated emergency calls to Chicago police, no officers showed up for nearly three hours, long after the beating had ended, according to Reid.
On Thursday, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois filed a civil rights lawsuit against the city that alleged Chicago's deployment of police officers results in slower response times to 911 calls in primarily black and Hispanic neighborhoods compared with service in largely white communities.
"Because of experiences such as this, many of our neighbors simply will not call the police," Reid, who is black, told reporters at a news conference at the ACLU's downtown offices.
The Central Austin Neighborhood Association in Chicago's crime-plagued West Side also joined the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court. Reid is its president.
The suit is based on recent news reports that found police districts that cover minority neighborhoods had disproportionately fewer officers than those covering white neighborhoods as measured by response times to emergency calls and rates of serious violent crime.
The ACLU said its own efforts to gather such data have been stonewalled by city officials. The city has cited security reasons for not releasing the information.
"The situation has been so opaque for so long that no one knows what their deployment policies are," said Harvey Grossman, the ACLU's legal director. "The city ought to be transparent about that."
The suit asks that the city submit a plan that will guarantee that all neighborhoods receive equal emergency services.
After making a campaign promise to get more cops on the streets despite city budget woes, Mayor Rahm Emanuel attempted to move more cops into troubled neighborhoods without touching off a polarizing debate about race and crime in Chicago. Aldermen whose wards would lose officers have long opposed the idea of moving officers from safer neighborhoods to more crime-ridden areas.
Under police Superintendent Garry McCarthy's leadership, more than 1,000 officers were moved to beat patrols, primarily by closing down two specialized units — whose officers were already on the street —- and reassigning officers from desk duty and jail lockups.
On learning of the ACLU suit, Emanuel defended his actions on the police front since taking office in mid-May and said he's not done yet.
"We've put more officers in those districts where there's high crime and higher crime," Emanuel told reporters. "I'm not done nor is Garry ... in looking to see if we need to put more officers where we have the crime problem.
"It's not just manpower alone," said Emanuel, citing an earlier curfew for younger children and higher fines for illegal firearm possession.
"Now, we have applied more resources to the areas that need them and we're not done and we constantly take a fresh look and it's not static," Emanuel said. "If it were static, I would have been stuck with the system we had on May 15. I didn't accept the way police officers were distributed."