Politics
Anjanette Young, 5 Others Nominated to Fill 3 Vacant Seats on CPD Oversight Board
Anjanette Young joins “Chicago Tonight” on Feb. 3, 2026. (WTTW News)
Anjanette Young, a social worker who was handcuffed while naked during a botched 2019 Chicago Police Department raid, is among six nominees to fill three vacant seats on the city’s police oversight board, officials announced Thursday.
Young has worked for more than six years to force CPD to change the way it uses search warrants after a political firestorm erupted in December 2020 when footage of the raid become public.
If tapped by Mayor Brandon Johnson and confirmed by the Chicago City Council, Young would serve on the seven-member Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability, which oversees the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, the Chicago Police Board and has the power to set CPD policy.
Young, who endorsed Johnson in the 2023 mayoral race, has urged CPD to ban no-knock warrants, require officers to wait at least 30 seconds before entering a home with a warrant and prohibit officers from pointing guns at children. Young lives on the South Side.
While CPD has significantly changed its search warrant policy since 2020, police brass have refused to make those changes. In December 2021, taxpayers paid $2.9 million to resolve the lawsuit Young filed against the city.
An effort by the City Council to pass an ordinance named for Young that would impose more restrictions remains stalled.
The commission, known as the CCPSA, does not have the authority to change CPD’s search warrant policies, since that issue is covered by the federal court order known as the consent decree, which requires CPD to change the way it trains, supervises and disciplines officers.
The other nominees are Angelique Guzman, Hamza Jilani, Darrion Johnson, Rebecca Levin and Javier Vasquez, officials said.
All of the nominees have “a strong commitment to police accountability, and a focus on centering the voices of those most impacted by public safety and policing issues in our city,” said Elianne Bahena, a member of the Ogden (10th) Police District Council and a member of the nominating committee.
Johnson has until April 12 to make his picks to replace Commissioners Aaron Gottlieb, Abierre Minor and Angel Rubi Navarijo.
Gottlieb represented the North Side on the commission, while Minor represented the South Side and served as a youth representative. Navarijo also represented the North Side and served as a youth representative.
Two of Johnson’s picks must be between the ages of 18 and 24, according to the commission’s rules. Another must represent the North Side.
More than 50 applications for the three vacant CCPSA seats were reviewed by a 22-member nominating committee, made up of one elected police district council member from each of Chicago’s 22 police districts, officials said.
The committee selected two nominees for each seat, officials said.
Guzman is a senior at Mather High School on the North Side and an intern in the office of Ald. Andre Vasquez (40th Ward).
Jilani, a South Side resident, is a policy analyst for the Civic Consulting Alliance, which advises governmental agencies.
Darrion Johnson, a South Side resident and a nominee for one of the youth spots on the CCPSA, is a co-founder of Good Kids Mad City. That organization’s Peace Book ordinance would take 2% of CPD’s budget to fund neighborhood peacekeepers and mediators charged with reducing conflict between groups while providing “restorative resources” to prevent retaliatory violence.
Levin, a North Side resident, is vice president of policy at Treatment Alternatives for Stronger Communities, which helps those who have substance abuse disorders navigate the criminal justice system.
Vasquez, a North Side resident and a nominee for one of the youth spots on the CCPSA, is a special education classroom assistant in the Chicago Public Schools.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
