Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Monday she hopes to “meet soon” with Anjanette Young, who was a victim of a botched 2019 raid by Chicago police officers that continues to spark outrage.
“It’s certainly my hope that Ms. Young and I will meet and meet soon; the details are being worked out, so once I have some specific confirmation we’ll certainly let folks know,” Lightfoot said.
The mayor fielded questions about meeting with Young at an unrelated press conference.
As for Young’s invitation to meet with members of the Chicago City Council, Lightfoot pointed to the pandemic and “specific guidance that’s been out for several months” that limits gatherings, as well as concerns about the Open Meetings Act.
Young previously agreed to meet privately with Lightfoot Wednesday morning at Progressive Baptist Church, 3658 S. Wentworth Ave.,“to start the healing process,” her lawyers said in a statement Sunday.
Despite her concerns, the mayor left the door open to meeting one on one with Young, saying, “I am anxious to meet directly with Ms. Young, and I’m hoping the details can be worked out so that will happen.”
Young previously told reporters she voted for Lightfoot, who, as a candidate, visited Young’s church in the Armour Square neighborhood just a few blocks west of CPD headquarters.
“I was there when you came to my church and you campaigned, and I was all on board for voting for you, and I did vote for you,” Young said, addressing Lightfoot directly nearly two weeks ago outside of CPD headquarters.
“I told my friends to vote for you. I believed in you as a Black woman that was running for mayor in the city of Chicago. So I want you to come back to my church and I want you to respond to this because that’s where you asked me to vote for you. So come back and tell me and the people at my church how you’re gonna fix this so this never happens again to me or to anyone else. It’s not OK.”
Though Young’s Near West Side home was wrongly raided in February 2019, it wasn’t until earlier this month the raid came to light when Lightfoot’s Law Department tried to block CBS 2 from airing body camera footage that showed a naked and handcuffed Young telling officers more than 40 times they had the wrong home.
In light of the raid, Mark Flessner, the city’s corporation counsel, resigned, and the officers who took part in the raid were assigned to desk duty.
Lightfoot initially said she wasn’t aware of the raid on Young’s home but later acknowledged being informed of the raid more than a year ago.
At a protest outside of police headquarters Sunday, some demonstrators called for the firing of all the officers who participated in the raid as well as police reform and more transparency from the city and the Police Department.
As for any potential policy changes, Lightfoot said she’s been in contact with the organizers of Sunday’s protest and expressed optimism about getting “to the same place.”
“Many of the things they’re calling for are things that we have talked about either me individually or collectively with them, so I’m confident that we’ll get to the same place,” Lightfoot said.
