Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot described the looting that occurred earlier in the week as irresponsible and behavior that should never be tolerated, and dismissed an activist’s previous comments.
Widespread looting broke out in Chicago’s Magnificent Mile late Sunday night, hours after community members raged over an officer-involved shooting. While Chicago officials condemned the looting, Black Lives Matter organizer Ariel Atkins supported the more than 100 people who were arrested, saying they could take whatever they wanted because “companies have insurance” and like the theft to “repairs.”
Lightfoot did not name Atkins during her briefing on Friday, but said people “can never normalize or allow it to justify its behavior.” Despite a person’s individual life circumstances, Lightfoot said “it’s never fair to take what you are not.”
“We learn that the basic premise of our democracy to our children and every thought, every speech, every action that suggests that taking and plundering is somehow just plain wrong and I reject it in the strongest terms possible, “said Lightfoot.
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Newsweek reached Black Lives Matter for comment but received no response in time for publication.
Getty / Jonathan Daniel
At least 13 officers were injured during the looting that took place Monday morning. After checking video footage and other evidence of the looting, officers were able to identify some of those involved. They presented 44 cases involving criminal prosecutors to the Cook County State Attorney’s Office, which approved 43 of the cases, according to Cook County State Attorney Kim Foxx. Of those cases, 28 are for what Foxx’s office burglary considers looting.
“The message for this weekend is simple: Chicago does not belong to looters and thieves. Chicago belongs to the good people who work hard to earn an honest living,” Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown said on Friday.
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Chicago, like several other cities nationwide, experienced looting and destruction of property in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death on May 25. Recordings of Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd’s neck before his death sparked widespread protests that often turned violent at night, resulting in hundreds of people in Chicago being accused of crimes.
Brown and Lightfoot criticized prosecutors and judges for not showing up through the justice system that will not tolerate looting, a case that Foxx is defending its office. Seen together on Friday’s information day, the three parties agreed to take a collective approach to hold people responsible for looting.
Part of that strategy is to be proactive and Lightfoot announced the city to create a task force on social media, a unit of 20 people tasked with monitoring social media for looting around the clock. If officials are unable to stop farms before this happens, the Detective Task Force, set up in collaboration with the FBI, will ensure that people do not ‘get away with it’, according to Lightfoot.
“I want to be crystal clear: if you break windows, go in and out of stores with broken windows or transport merchandise from a looted store, Chicago police will arrest you,” Brown said. “If you leave us, we will work with state and federal partners to find you and we will arrest you.”
