Vote On Mayor Lightfoot's Gang Assets Seizure Proposal Put Off Amid Buzzsaw Of Opposition
by Todd Feurer, CBS Chicago web producer
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Mayor Lori Lightfoot's proposal to allow the city to file civil lawsuits in order to seize assets from Chicago's street gangs and their leaders hit a roadblock on Wednesday, when two allies used a parliamentary maneuver to stall a final vote when the measure appeared headed to a defeat by the full City Council.
Ald. Anthony Napolitano (41st) and Ald. Chris Taliaferro (29th), the mayor's hand-picked Public Safety Committee chairman, delayed a final vote on the ordinance at least until the next City Council meeting, a signal that the mayor didn't have the 25 votes needed to approve the ordinance, amid a swarm of criticism from progressive aldermen that it would be an ineffective waste of resources.
However, the mayor insisted she and her allies delayed the final vote "to continue to educate people" about what the ordinance would do.
"There's been a lot of misinformation. Unfortunately we heard a lot of that today," she said.
The ordinance passed the Public Safety Committee by an 11-4 vote last week, but it was clear there was much more widespread opposition to the plan among non-committee members, particularly among progressive aldermen. The committee vote came only after Lightfoot agreed to narrow the scope of the ordinance, to allow the city only to file lawsuits against street gang leaders, not rank-and-file gang members.
Critics have raised consistent doubts about how effective the ordinance would be.
The ordinance mirrors a 1993 state law that allows county prosecutors in Illinois to file civil lawsuits against gangs and gang members in an effort to seize their assets. The mayor's ordinance would give that same authority to the city's Law Department.
Lightfoot and her top advisors have insisted it would be a crucial tool in targeting gangs and reducing crime by going after their assets.
However, many progressive aldermen have repeatedly raised questions about whether there's any evidence that such lawsuits have been effective at reducing crime in neighboring counties where prosecutors have gone after gang members in civil lawsuits in the past.
Aldermen opposed to the mayor's proposal were clearly frustrated at last week's Public Safety Committee, when Deputy Mayor for Public Safety John O'Malley and Chicago Police Department Deputy Chief Ernest Cato both acknowledged they could provide no data to show the proposal has worked in other cities, counties and states with similar laws.
At that meeting, Ald. Rosanna Rodriguez-Sanchez (33rd) said the Lightfoot administration has provided no data that lawsuits against gangs have served as a deterrent to crime, only anecdotal evidence based on claims from prosecutors in neighboring counties who have insisted that lawsuits against gangs in their communities have been effective at fighting crime.
"Correlation is not the same as causation, and I think it would be very beneficial if we had some studies or something that is provided besides the word of the counties saying 'this actually helped reduce crime or reduce gang violence,' because that's not how it works," Rodriguez-Sanzhez said. "If we want to have evidence-based approaches, we have to see evidence."
Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th) also at that meeting that he feared, without proof the lawsuits would be effective, city attorneys would be wasting time better spent on other matters.
"So you're spending a whole bunch of time on things where you may not get any damages, as opposed to spending time on things where we might be able to move forward on those," he said.
O'Malley said he believes there is evidence out there to support the effectiveness of filing civil lawsuits against gangs, but acknowledged he couldn't provide any actual data. Still, he insisted going after gang leaders' assets is an important tool for fighting crime.
"I would think there is evidence. We don't have it, fair point, but if it were not a deterrent, I don't think asset forfeiture would exist," he said.
Ald. Michael Rodriguez (22nd) said the Lightfoot administration's claims seem to be based on a "hunch."
"I think this is an 80s-based strategy to 2022 problems, and I'd argue that this wouldn't work in 1980 either, and it didn't work," he said.
Rodriguez also noted gang culture has changed significantly in the past few decades, and street gangs no longer have the organized hierarchy that they once did, blunting the potential impact of suing them for their assets.
Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th), one of the mayor's harshest critics, said he was "repulsed at the amount of stunned silence from those presenting and defending this ordinance to the questions my colleagues have raised."
"In my opinion, that means that there are plenty of unresolved issues in this ordinance still," he said. "I think that holding criminals accountable, as you all know, is key. But we have to do it right, we have to do it in a way that makes sense, and we have to do it in a way that works."
Critics also have raised concerns that gang members' innocent relatives could end up having their assets seized, but the mayor said in order to seize assets under the ordinance, city attorneys would have to prove that a defendant has engaged in a pattern of criminal activity, including at least two gang-related convictions.
"We would always have the burden of proof," she said.
Critics also have said that, because the cases would be filed in civil court, defendants would not be entitled to a free attorney like they would in a criminal case.
Lightfoot shrugged off that criticism.
"I really don't see that as an impediment for this. I think the people that want an attorney are going to have ample opportunity," she said.
The mayor said, while she expects many civil rights attorneys would be willing to represent an accused gang leader sued by the city for free, if needed, she said the city would only be targeting high-ranking gang members who have significant assets and who would have no trouble hiring a lawyer on their own.
"The people that we will target, they have plenty of money to pay an attorney, and they have attorneys that they regularly go to in defense of themselves and their members when they get into any kind of legal trouble," she said. "I think it's a little bit of a red herring to say these poor murderous gang members, gang leaders, are not going to have ample representation."
"Sympathy for people who are literally spilling blood on our streets every single day is, quite frankly, hard for me to understand or fathom," she added.