CHICAGO _ Chicago's top cop says he's personally upset by public perception that the city is overrun by murder and other violence, even as a deadly November pushed homicides overall here to the highest level in nearly two decades.
"The truth of the matter is Chicago is not out of control. There's certain parts of the city that we have to address the violence," Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said Tuesday at a downtown breakfast of the City Club of Chicago. He and Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart told the room full of civic leaders and others that they continue to push for new legislation to toughen penalties for repeat gun offenders.
Johnson described his department as getting off to a "rocky start" this year because of the continued fallout from the Laquan McDonald shooting by Chicago police but said the department had "righted the ship" despite the skyrocketing number of homicides.
Chicago recently topped 700 homicides for the year, the first time in nearly two decades, with November homicides totaling 77, the worst for that month since 78 in 1994.
"When you leave here today, I want you to burn into your memory 711," Johnson told the packed banquet room inside Maggiano's on West Grand Avenue. "Seven hundred and eleven people have been murdered in the city of Chicago to date. Seven hundred and eleven lives, 711 families that won't get to see their relatives for Christmas this year."
Both Johnson and Dart spoke of an upcoming partnership that will pair Chicago police officers and sheriff's officers to combat certain crimes, though the final details were still being worked out. Johnson also said bringing in at least 350 new detectives over the next two years could help ease the strain within minority communities, which he said were fed up with the shootings.
During a lighter moment, Johnson dismissed any suggestion that Mayor Rahm Emanuel had a heavy hand in the operations of the Police Department.
"It's funny to me because I didn't really know the mayor before I became superintendent _ we didn't know each other like that. But I have to tell you all I've been pleasantly surprised because everywhere that I go, people that know him talk about the micromanager in him, and that may very well be true. But with me at CPD, he lets me run CPD, as he should," Johnson said.
"The mayor and I talk once or twice a week, maybe. So that right there should be an indication that he doesn't run CPD." Added Johnson: "If he wanted to run CPD, he could have been the superintendent," Johnson said to laughter from the breakfast audience. "But he charged me with that, and I'm doing the best that I can."
