Chicago mayor proposes anti-gang ordinance threatening fines and property seizures

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot proposed an ordinance Tuesday that will enable civil lawsuits to grab property from gang members and positive them if they’ve taken half in avenue violence.

The “Victims’ Justice Ordinance” would enable judges or court docket officers to impose fines of $10,000 for every offense and seize “any property that’s instantly or not directly used or supposed to be used in any method to facilitate avenue gang-related exercise.”

The ordinance is predicted to attract pushback from social justice teams and civil attorneys as a result of attainable disproportionate focusing on of black and Latino demographics, the Chicago Tribune studies .

AT LEAST 44 SHOT AND SEVEN KILLED IN WEEKEND VIOLENCE ACROSS CHICAGO

“To be very blunt and clear, we’re going after their blood cash,” Lightfoot mentioned. She added that it “instantly targets the gang management” and isn’t meant to focus on common gang members.

“Town additional finds that avenue gangs are sometimes managed by criminally subtle adults who make the most of our youth by intimidating and coercing them into membership by using them as drug couriers, and through the use of them to commit brutal crimes towards individuals and property to additional the monetary profit and dominance of the road gangs,” the ordinance says.

The ordinance, launched throughout a metropolis council assembly, would have proceeded to the council’s Public Security Committee for a vote, however Northwest Aspect Ald. Rossana Rodriguez-Sanchez used a parliamentary process to maneuver it to the council Guidelines Committee, possible delaying its attainable approval. Now it should advance out of that panel earlier than being despatched to the Public Security Committee for an additional voting course of.

“Sadly, it additionally grew to become clear that not all the members of the town council perceive how vitally essential it’s for us to guard victims of gang violence, and so they must reply to their constituents for that,” Lightfoot mentioned.

Violence total within the metropolis shot up throughout the coronavirus pandemic.