Prisons + Policing
As an elitist institution located in an area of extreme inequality (created in part by its own business operations), the University profits by upholding punitive and carceral ideas of “safety” that directly harm our Black and brown community members. The University owns and operates one of the largest police forces in the world, the University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD), which has a jurisdiction that extends well beyond campus. As a private police force, which in 2017 refused a request to have its actions and policies made available under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), UCPD offers no transparency about their policies, actions, or budget. This vision of safety clearly disregards students and community members alike who are a part of historically marginalized groups that have seen the brunt of police violence and surveillance.
While the UCPD claims to aid students, few students are afforded this privilege. In 2010, an officer placed Mauriece Dawson, a Black student in a chokehold for allegedly being “rowdy” in the A level of UChicago’s Regenstein library, an area in which students don’t need to restrict their volume. This racial profiling resulted in the student’s arrest and indictment for trespassing and resisting arrest, despite being a University student with open access to the library. In 2018, an officer shot Charles Soji Thomas, a then-student in the midst of a mental health crisis. Shortly after, in February of 2022, UCPD officers shot our neighbor and community member, Rhysheen Wilson, as he was undergoing a mental health crisis. Rhysheen was shot by the same officer who shot Soji in an eerily similar situation.
The University is a crucial player in expanding surveillance in Chicago. Through the Crime Lab, a privately-owned UChicago lab, the University has direct ties to the Chicago Police Department (CPD) and contributes to its violence against marginalized communities. The Crime Lab actively helped implement several new technologies in CPD’s policing practices, including Shotspotter. While shotspotter is meant to detect gunshots, it has only served to bring more police to Black and brown neighborhoods and create hostile situations. For years, community organizers across Chicago embarked on a successful campaign against CPD’s use of Shotspotter, concluding last February, as Mayor Brandon Johnson heeded to the coalition’s demands and stated that the city of Chicago would not renew their contract with ShotSpotter.
University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD), has a jurisdiction that extends far beyond campus. Of the 65,000 residents in its jurisdiction, only 20,000 are actually affiliated with the University, and over 50% are Black. Yet according to UCPD’s own data, 73.3% of traffic stops and 93.5% of street interviews since January 1, 2022 were with Black people, most of whom have no university affiliation. These same residents are double policed, since the UCPD (a state-certified department with the same powers as municipal police) actively collaborates and maintains concurrent jurisdiction with the Chicago Police Department (CPD).
More than just the disparate stop and search statistics referenced above, the University has actively embraced “broken windows policing” by the UCPD, a strategy which punishes minor crimes severely in hopes of deterring overall crime. Applied in New York City, LA, and elsewhere, this strategy has been widely acknowledged as highly ineffective and racist. As evidenced by the statistics, broken windows policing has had similar effects when deployed by the UCPD. Furthermore, the surveillance utilized by UCPD keeps increasing. The summer of 2021 marked a new expansion in security guard surveillance, “blue light” stations with security cameras, and Deans-on-Call who can report crimes as initiatives that deter crime, increase safety, and further increase access to immediate assistance. Later that fall, following the November 9, 2021 shooting of UChicago graduate Shaoxiong “Dennis” Zheng and an outcry for more policing from students and faculty that fueled anti-Black sentiments, the university announced a number of short and long-term security measures. All of these initiatives – each serving as direct lines to UCPD and CPD officers – link increased policing and surveillance with crime reduction. We know that these surveillance efforts only serve to bring more cops onto our streets, while diverting resources from actual community needs.
This past June, UCPD officer Nicholas Twardak, who shot both Rhysheen Wilson and Soji Thomas in 2018 and 2022 respectively, graduated with a fully funded masters degree in public policy alongside fellow UCPD officer Janelle Marcellis. Marcellis has a storied history of protest repression, not only posing as a protestor to surveille the Trauma Center Campaign as an undercover cop, but also creating and leading the plan to violently raid UChicago United for Palestine’s encampment, the Popular University for Gaza at 4 in the morning.
Get Involved on Campus: CNC
CareNotCops (CNC) is a campaign demanding that the University disarm, defund, and disband its private, militarized police force, and invest in existing community care networks and resources for students and communities of color.
Currently, CNC is focusing on building infrastructures of community care within UChicago and the surrounding community. CNC runs a monthly mutual aid network in which folks can pledge to commit anywhere from $5 to $20 to mutual aid every month, which is then given to a local fund in need of support. If you want to get involved, go to https://linktr.ee/carenotcopschi to fill out the CNC interest form or sign up for the mutual aid network. If you’re interested in learning, practicing, or organizing for abolition, follow CNC on Instagram as @carenotcops, or on Facebook as UChicago Care not Cops.
