Members of Chicago’s black community are wondering if the recent federal report on the Chicago Police Department is going to make a difference.
Panelists at a Rainbow PUSH event Wednesday were split on the document, which found that Chicago police officers have a pattern of using unconstitutional excessive force. State Rep. Mary Flowers thanked the Department of Justice for their efforts.
"If nothing else, for the mothers who lost their sons and daughters and their babies. Who were told to their faces that they were lying."
But Attorney Andre Grant, head of the Cook County Bar Association, blasted the report for failing to address racism within the department.
"I believe the impact of this report is synonymous to taking a cup of water and throwing it on a five-alarm fire," he said.
Illinois State Representative La Shawn Ford says in response to the report, the City of Chicago shouldn’t go through with Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s plan to hire more police officers. He stressed the need for CPD to fix its "broken" training system first.
"That’s adding fuel to the fire," he said. "So we’re gonna hire one thousand new police and train them the same way we been training them. That means more black people will be killed. That’s increasing the odds of me getting shot."
Police Deputy Chief Larry Watson asked the crowd to give Superintendent Eddie Johnson time to fix the problems.
