Chicago cops face suspensions, firings after raiding wrong home and handcuffing naked woman

Several Chicago police officers should be suspended or terminated for their role in a dehumanizing raid of an innocent woman's home two years ago, a new report from the city's Civilian Office of Police Accountability recommends.

In February 2019, officers broke into the home of Anjanette Young, a Black social worker who had just returned home from work. She was naked, alone, and hadn't committed any crime: police had mistakenly identified the wrong apartment in executing a search warrant.

Footage from police body cameras, released in December 2020 by CBS Chicago, shows officers smashing Young’s door with a battering ram and barging into her home with guns drawn. They handcuffed her while she was naked, and attempted to cover her in blankets that continued to slide off while she repeatedly screamed, sobbed, and told officers they were at the wrong home.

"It’s one of those moments where I felt I could have died that night," Young told WBBM-TV. "Like if I would have made one wrong move, it felt like they would have shot me. I truly believe they would have shot me."

Police let Young put clothes on after 10 minutes had passed, and held her in handcuffs for 10 more minutes before accepting she had no connection to the target of the search warrant, the police accountability report says. The officers were in her home for over an hour in total.

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The report raises nearly 100 allegations of misconduct against fifteen involved officers, concluding that many of them violated applicable laws and policies, including “knock-and-announce guidance” that failed to let Young clothe herself before police entered her home.

Three officers failed to activate their body cameras, the report found. None of them had received more than a few hours of warrant-related training since leaving the police academy, it says.

The report singled out officer Alain Aporongao, the officer who signed the affidavit supporting the warrant application. Aporongao didn’t cooperate with the investigation and refused to identify other department employees who helped him with the warrant investigation and approval,the report says.

It also noted that Sergeant Alex Wolinski, who with Aporongao, didn’t present the search warrant to Young and “failed to take reasonable actions to protect her dignity” in keeping her handcuffed naked for at least 10 minutes.

The report recommended that Aporongao face a minimum 180-day suspension, and Wolinski a minimum year-long suspension. It also recommended Sergeant Cory Petracco, who was not present at the raid, but supervised Aporongao and “is held out as a leader” in the department, face a minimum year-long suspension. The office recommended that the suspensions could include separation from the department.

CBS Chicago reported that Police Superintendent David Brown has already moved to terminate Wolinski.

The report also recommended suspensions for five other officers, ranging from one to 60 days, which did not include possible termination.

A 2021 report by researchers from several universities found that white Chicago police officers make more stops, more arrests and use force more often than Black and Hispanic officers facing similar situations. Male officers take those enforcement actions more often than female officers, and the trends were more pronounced when white officers interacted with Black people.

Out of the 15 officers and sergeants involved in the raid at Young’s home, nine were white, four were white Hispanics, and two were non-white, the report says. They were all male except one.

Young’s experience “reveals problems far more pervasive than any individual incident of officer misconduct,” the report says. “The intrusion against her person and the invasion of her home implicate other concerns, including lack of adequate training and supervision surrounding the Department’s use of search warrants and the disproportionate impact of police actions on people of color.