Aldermen Criticize Weis, Daley Defends Sit-Down With Gang Leaders
By Kevin Robinson in News on Sep 1, 2010 1:30PM
Police Superintendent Jody Weis's recent tete a tete with local gang leaders has angered some aldermen, who say that Chicago's top cop shouldn't be "negotiating with urban terrorists." 2nd Ward Ald. Bob Fioretti, who is rumored to be considering a run against Daley for mayor, lashed out at Weis Monday for his mid-August meeting. "I can't believe we're sitting down and negotiating with urban terrorists who are killing our kids with guns and drugs on the streets," Fioretti told the Sun-Times. "These are not people the superintendent ought to be negotiating with. They've now been elevated to equals. They're not equals. They belong in jail. It's an admission that the Police Department can't control the streets." Fioretti also questioned Weis's threat of going at gang leaders with federal racketeering charges if they don't back down, wondering why the police superintendent hadn't already applied that tactic. "We ought to be working hard with the feds and U.S. Attorney's office to start applying these RICO statutes now instead of giving them a warning that says, 'If you kill somebody.' That didn't help this weekend." 49th Ward Ald. Joe Moore, a longtime Daley critic, wondered if a crisis of leadership in the department was to blame. "What would accomplish more is to have a Police Department with good morale that believed in their leadership and believed in their mayor. We haven't had a Police Department with that kind of leadership in 22 years," Moore said.
Weis isn't without his defenders. Mayor Daley spoke up in his defense of the meeting two weeks ago at the Garfield Park Conservatory. “We’ll negotiate with anyone to have peace — even during the war. You sit down with anyone. If you save one life — if I can save your son’s life, you’d want me to sit down with them. But, it’s not your son. It’s not your daughter,” he told the Sun-Times, noting that similar tactics have been tried in Boston and Los Angeles.
May Day then turned to one of his favorite topics: gun violence. “They had people there who lost their sons and daughters and telling them what happened to them. What happened to them at the funeral, the wake, what happened to them afterwards. Their son or daughter was gonna graduate — trying to get a personal side to this,” the mayor said. “If you can save one life, you’ll sit down with anyone. If it saves your child’s life, you would want me to sit down.”
9th Ward Ald. and Police Committee Chairman Anthony Beale also defended Weis, saying "I believe the superintendent's intention was to calm our city. You have to think outside the box and talk to the people who can get the message out." Beale isn't the only alderman that defended Weis. Black and Latino aldermen spoke up for the top cop's meeting with gang leaders as well. “Once you talk to people, a possibility of something getting resolved exists. I think he’s made the right step by talking to people,” said 28th Ward Ald. Ed Smith. 27th Ward Ald. Walter Burnett said that he's heard from residents in his ward as well. “I’ve gotten calls from people related to the gangs [who] want to have meetings in certain communities to try to have truces. The gang leaders don’t want to deal with this kind of pressure, so they’re gonna try to get the kids to stop fighting,” Burnett told the Sun-Times. “To me, that’s a good thing. That means less people getting shot or killed in my ward. ... I don’t think it was negotiating. It was telling them, ‘We’re gonna do anything necessary to stop this killing. And we’re just giving you a heads-up. We’re gonna start treating you all like the mob and do RICO. I think that’s fine.” 22nd Ward Ald. Ricardo Munoz said that "it's not a meeting of equals. It's the broken windows theory taken to the next step. If one of these guys‚ nephews or grandkids doesn't go out shooting this weekend because grandpa got called into a meeting, then it's worked its purpose."
"I said, 'The word you need to remember is RICO ... Go talk to the mafia. They know that word very well," Weis told the press over the weekend, suggesting that the feds would go after gang assets if need be. "We are focusing on group responsibility. If one of these guys should kill another gang member, we are going to come down on them with all the firepower we have." Second City Cop, however, remains skeptical.