Cook County Commissioner Richard Boykin’s demand for a federal probe into Homan Square, which some critics have likened to a CIA “black site” operated by the Chicago Police Department, may become a test of wills of how much authority Cook County government can assert over the city of Chicago.
Boykin took flak from fellow commissioners after a December hearing on alleged civil rights abuses against detainees held at Homan Square, a so-called “off the books” detention facility in North Lawndale.
“It’s important when one government questions the actions of another government that we have the legal authority to that … and I don’t think we do,” Silvestri said.
Boykin isn’t the first county official to seek a Justice Department investigation into police practices either. Cook County sheriff Tom Dart has asked for just that—a probe into the scandal-plagued Harvey Police Department, which he said showed “grievous and repeated problems,” much to the chagrin of Harvey city officials.
Boykin hoped that people who had been detained at Homan Square would testify at last month’s hearing, providing information the Department of Justice could use as part of its patterns and practices investigation of Chicago police.
“This was my first encounter with police,” Wright testified. “So when they took me I didn’t know I had a right to an attorney. I was just a poor black kid, and like a lot of poor black kids, we don’t have access to correct information to help us out in particular situations like this.”
