Court oversight of Chicago police reforms sought in lawsuit
CHICAGO — Several leading community groups, including a local Black Lives Matter organization, filed a class-action lawsuit against Chicago on Wednesday in a bid to bypass or even scuttle a draft agreement between the city and the U.S. Department of Justice that seeks to reform the nation’s second largest police force without federal court oversight.
The 132-page lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago argues that an overhaul of Chicago’s 12,000-officer force in the wake of a damning civil rights report in January can’t work without the intense scrutiny of a court-appointed monitor answerable to a judge.
“Absent federal court supervision, nothing will improve,” the lawsuit says.
The civil litigation is also a signal that longtime advocates of far-reaching police reforms don’t trust President Donald Trump’s administration.