Six years after a botched police raid hit her home, activist Anjanette Young mixed criticism and encouragement of Mayor Brandon Johnson Friday as she called for him to finally make promised police reforms.
Young, who also pressed former Mayor Lori Lightfoot to tighten rules on Chicago police warrants, endorsed Johnson as a mayoral candidate in 2023 in hopes he and the City Council would do more to change laws.
But on the 6th anniversary of the wrong-house raid that left her handcuffed and naked in her home, Young said she is “still demanding that those in power keep their promise,” even as Johnson re-upped his pledge to pass reform soon.
“The leaders who vow to fight for change and justice have not followed through. Two years ago, Mayor Brandon Johnson stood with me,” she said at a City Hall news conference. “I believed him. And yet another year passes, and I’m still deeply disappointed that we have not gotten to our ultimate goal.”
A top mayoral aide said Friday morning the Johnson administration has three versions of the ordinance involving varying degrees of restrictions and has told Young they are committed to proposing one she finds acceptable.
Johnson said passing the so-called “Anjanette Young” ordinance is a top priority for him in the first few months of this year. Young and Ald. Maria Hadden, 49th, said negotiations over the legislation are ongoing, but remain hung up on several major sticking points.
Young and Hadden said they hope to see the codification of the amount of time officers must typically wait before breaking into a home after knocking with a warrant. They also want tighter rules preventing officers from pointing guns at children during raids, and are also advocating for similar legislation proposed in the Illinois General Assembly.
“These are not just ideas. They are real people,” Young said. “I am a real person, this happened to me. Real people are being harmed and continue to be harmed because this current administration and others are not acting.”
Young, a social worker, said Johnson’s team has told her that it is “open to whatever language that I want,” but blamed “other factors that are not at the table” for weakening the proposed legislation. She added that she does not blame Johnson for the ordinance’s failure to pass because he “inherited a lot” and said the mayor has met with her and takes her calls to discuss the issue.
Hadden, a co-chair of the aldermanic Progressive Caucus who has at times been critical of Johnson, called on the mayor and police Superintendent Larry Snelling to “get on board.”
“What we’re trying to do is change culture. And there is a difficulty with culture change,” Hadden said. “But we are closer than we’ve ever been and this is about closing the deal, getting it through the finish line.”
The Johnson administration is working to “find a solution that will ensure that what happened to Anjanette Young never happens again,” a statement from mayoral press secretary Cassio Mendoza said. The botched raid cost taxpayers $2.9 million in a settlement with Young and grossly violated her Civil Rights “without making our city any safer,” Mendoza wrote.
