'Healing' Meeting With Mayor, Police Raid Victim A No-Go: Emails

CHICAGO — A proposed private meeting between Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Anjanette Young, the Black social worker who was handcuffed naked when police wrongfully raided her home last year, won't happen Wednesday due a dispute over a "public forum" on the matter, according to tense emails between the city's top attorney and Young's lawyer.

Lightfoot sent an email Dec. 17 asking to meet privately with Young "to talk to her directly about the incident in her home in February 2019."

Young's attorney, Keanan Saulter, replied on Saturday agreeing to the private meeting, calling it a potential "opportunity to start the healing process for Ms. Young and the wonderful City of Chicago."

On Sunday, Saulter followed up with an email agreeing to a private meeting with the mayor followed by a public forum with police Supt. David Brown and all 50 aldermen "where we plan to address the issues surrounding her case in further detail."

On Monday afternoon, Saulter emailed aldermen saying the city's acting Corporation Counsel Celia Meza had informed him "the Mayor didn’t accept our invitation for a private meeting and a public forum."

"This was an opportunity for Transparency. The Mayor seems intent on playing politics, and that’s fine. She “offered” to reject the terms that Ms. Young requested, instead to meet with Ms. Young privately and then speak to the press at 12:00 p.m. while the rest of us (me, Ms. Young and any Alderman who had the respect enough for Ms. Young to stay for the public forum) were inside addressing the issues and doing the hard work of moving towards Transparency and Accountability for this incident and many others," Saulter wrote in the email.

"We won’t play politics with these issues as the Mayor seems to want. ... For Ms. Young, her apologies without action ring hollow and fall of deaf ears. We will proceed with our lawsuit against the City ... Sadly, that's not what the Mayor desires."

Meza replied saying Saulter had twisted her words. The city's top attorney said the mayor accepted the invitation for a private meeting with Ms. Young, but would not participate in "the public gathering you have arranged," according to the email.

Saulter curtly replied to Meza's message: "There was one invitation. Not two. The Mayor decided that she was going to reject the invitation Ms. Young gave. That's fine. Let's not parse words or play games. We will move forward."

At an unrelated news conference Monday prior to the attorneys' email exchange, Lightfoot said she was "anxious to meet directly with Ms. Young, and I’m hoping that the details can be worked out so that will happen."

Meza, in an email to aldermen, advised ward bosses to proceed with "caution, prudence, and restraint" when considering meeting with Young publicly or privately.

Her letter aimed to inform aldermen of potential legal pitfalls they could face, including being subpoenaed in a future lawsuit, participating in a gathering that might violate the Open Meetings Act and coronavirus social distance restrictions that prohibit gatherings of more than 10 people.

"Any statements that an alderman makes during such a meeting could place such alderman in either a direct or perceived conflict, which could then be used to attempt to impose liability to the City. Such an outcome would place the alderman, who by virtue of his or her office has a fiduciary duty to the City, in an untenable position," Meza wrote.