Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has admitted that she knew about the now-viral botched raid, after first denying any knowledge of the fiasco.
“There’s a lot of trust that’s been breached, and I know there’s a lot of trust in me that’s been breached, and I have a responsibility to build back that trust,” she said, per The Chicago Tribune.
The remarks were a complete 180 from her remarks just two days ago. Lightfoot denied that her administration withheld footage of the raid from Young. On Thursday, she finally confirmed that her administration had rejected an open records request submitted by Young for the footage.
“Any time a person who’s a victim requests information about an incident that happened to them, our government’s obligation is to respond in a fulsome, transparent and immediate way,” Lightfoot said.
Anjanette Young filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request last year for the video to show the public what happened to her that day. Chicago Police denied her request, but a court-ordered them to hand over the footage — and she was in disbelief.
“I feel like they didn’t want us to have this video because they knew how bad it was,” Young said. “They knew they had done something wrong. They knew that the way they treated me was not right.”
In the videotaped on Feb. 21, 2019, a group of male officers entered her Young’s at 7 p.m. Young has just finished her shift at the hospital and had gone into her bathroom to undress. She then heard loud knocks on her door before officers broke the door down using a battering ram. Despite being naked, officers left her standing naked before eventually attempting to cover up her nude body. Young was visibly upset and repeatedly told officers that they had the wrong address.
They did have the address but seemed unremorseful over the incident, she says left her feeling traumatized.
Chicago Police Supt. David Brown, who stood beside Lightfoot during the news conference, said: “If that was your mother, how would you want her to be treated? You don’t train that in an academy. We hire people who we think know right from wrong, and if they don’t know right from wrong, they don’t need to be police officers,” he said. “It’s not complicated. Treat everyone with respect. Everyone deserves a measure of respect. … Even if we had been in the right house, Ms. Young should have been treated with respect.”
