Chicago Cook County Violence Against Women Task Force Meeting - April 21, 2026
Chicago Cook County Violence Against Women Task Force Meeting - April 21, 2026
The Chicago Cook County Violence Against Women Task Force convened on April 21, 2026, at 5:15 PM, chaired by Commissioner Miller. The meeting focused on data transparency, domestic violence advocacy, and survivor needs. Two public speakers testified, and presentations were given by the City of Chicago Office of Inspector General, the University of Chicago Crime Lab, the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago, and LifeSpan.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Lena Care Curry spoke about institutional violence against women in the court system, specifically the domestic relations division. She highlighted issues such as orders of protection being vacated, lack of court reporters, judicial misconduct, and lack of accountability. She urged the task force to work with survivor-provided data and explain what the public can do to address these systemic problems.
- Patricia Punta Clappus shared personal experiences of harassment and alleged police misconduct, including being handcuffed without reason and taken to a hospital against her will. She also alleged that judges are being paid under the table to favor certain groups and that a local official said they only help Hispanics. She called for better law enforcement and judicial accountability.
Discussion Items
- City of Chicago Office of Inspector General (OIG) Presentation: The Inspector General introduced the OIG information portal, highlighting two public safety dashboards: one on 911 calls for police service (3.7 million calls from 2023 through early 2026) and one on reported crimes (236,000 reported crimes in the last 12 months). She demonstrated how to filter for domestic battery, domestic disturbance, and violations of orders of protection, showing 373,000 such calls in the period. The crime dashboard includes clearance rates, with a 70.1% clearance rate for offenses against family. The dashboards provide continuous, publicly accessible data with geographic and demographic filters.
- University of Chicago Crime Lab Presentation: Javier Lopez and Martin Barron presented the Violence Reduction Dashboard, inspired by a 44% increase in non-fatal shootings and 61% increase in fatal shootings from 2015 to 2016. The dashboard, launched in 2021, provides victimization data by demographics, geography, and time. They demonstrated that domestic violence-related homicides and fatal shootings increased 56% from 2024 to 2025. The tool can identify community areas with rising domestic violence victimization despite citywide declines.
- Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago Presentation: Robert Owens presented the Chicago Public Safety Data Hub (shypublicsafety.org), a collaborative project with NORC. The hub combines public and proprietary data, including a survey on public trust in police and courts. It also tracks the Civic Committee's own programs, such as a hiring initiative for South and West Side residents. Future plans include block-level crime data, expanding to Cook County, and integrating data across criminal justice agencies.
- LifeSpan Presentation: Amy Clax, Executive Director of LifeSpan, discussed the complexity of domestic violence advocacy. She explained the Illinois Domestic Violence Act, the role of confidential advocates, and the differences between criminal and civil court systems. She noted that LifeSpan turns away 60% of those seeking help due to lack of resources. She emphasized the need for sustained funding, affordable housing, survivor input, and systems accountability. She called for collaboration with other domestic violence organizations and mapping of services across Cook County.
Key Outcomes
- The task force acknowledged the need for greater data transparency on domestic violence, especially for Cook County beyond Chicago. The OIG and Crime Lab dashboards were praised as models for a potential county-wide dashboard.
- Barriers to data integration include the need for MOUs with individual law enforcement agencies in the county and the challenge of accurately coding domestic violence incidents in crime data.
- The task force will work on synthesizing data from multiple sources, prioritizing survivor input, and addressing the need for affordable housing and emergency shelter as critical to survivor safety.
- Next steps include forming working groups to develop recommendations, coordinating with other domestic violence organizations, and exploring ways to streamline court services across courthouses.
- The meeting adjourned with a call for continued collaboration and action outside of formal meetings.
Meeting Transcript
Well, that's all right. So that's the up here. They could just want to like section. Okay, that's perfect. So you'll be there all the time. Yeah, just or the idea just for that one. Like to call the Chicago Cook County Violence Against Women Task Force meeting to order. I'm Commissioner Miller. And are there any registered public speakers? And can Amy also read the public speaker process? Yes. Yes, we have two public speakers. Yes, we have two public speakers. Members of the public who wish to testify have until 24 hours before the scheduled start of the meeting to register in order to do so. Speakers will have three minutes to address the task force, and we'll be alerted when they have one minute time remaining, and 30 seconds remain, and when time has expired. of the public we have uh uh public register uh lena care curry good morning everyone this is very important meeting for all survivors of domestic violence and and uh i personally and some other people want to gain more understanding with what data the this task force will be working um and i would request that task force would work more with data provided by survivors um the domestic violence or intimate partner violence is only the beginning it's very hard but it is also way harder when that abuse actually happening in the court system so the major the major um problem is institutional violence against women and domestic relations division is that institution that actively participates in violence against women where uh domestic violence division gives orders of protection those orders of protection in domestic relations division uh vacated there are no court reporters it's uh complete failure and uh since July of the of 2025 the majority of victims of domestic violence we testified actually about institutional violence in domestic relations there is no accountability evidence suppressed there are no court reporters judges allowed uh misconduct of of attorneys there are everywhere rules judges should report them they do not attorneys should report judicial misconduct they do not and there is no oversight multiple of us were complaining to chief judge's office and there is no significant changes nothing didn't have to reporters are not there is continuous day sequenic office refuses to prosecute miscolandic in spite of the QT and so I'm here to bring attention to this institutional violence against women and I would I'm asking the task force to actually explain to the public what we can do what you can do how this peace can be worked on thank you thank you then we have another uh registered public speaker patricia punta clappus thank you very much for listening to me um I have an issue it's everything that she said I went to five five five to complain about two Puerto Ricans have been harassing me and they wouldn't let me inside my building and then the other one wouldn't let me get out now I'm an elderly I'm 66 years old they're younger than me what do they want with me they want me to go and drink beer with them and what have sex with them what the heck is that I'm an elderly I don't need a man so then I went to Pi Pi5 what is it that that happened they know people Hispanic people that protected them and they just threw my teeth out I was like what happened here they didn't show up oh yeah they did show up but you didn't no I had this date and you are talking I'm really good in my dates because I put them on my phone I used to be a stenographer I used to be a secretary okay so then I know how to handle papers so then they act to me like oh no you didn't show up since I moved to 6252 South Knox Avenue I've had problems with the Hispanic with their loud music it's 10 11 12 1 2 3 o'clock in the morning four I was working as a part-time driver I needed to get up at four o'clock in the morning to go and then I couldn't I was so tired because they would have their loud music I started complaining they started harassing me okay now the thing is it stopped it's 95% quiet okay but I've been gone I've been through a lot the police handcuffed me without any reason I asked them to speak with a supervisor they denied me and they let me to Mount Sinai I was like wait I had to speak with a supervisor why am I a Mount Sinai they didn't tell me anything is this the way how the law enforcement takes care of the woman oh you know all the women are crazy they don't know what they're doing da da da no i am my sixth sense and everything but the thing is just what she said a lot of judges are being paid under the table because they say we help the Hispanics only that was anti Guerrero Coilar when I went to her office to talk about the migrants that were being uh harassing other people and doing gang signs and she said like oh we're not gonna do anything because I we only help the Hispanics thank you very much this is the United States of America I was even told by the none by the immigrants that wasn't allowed A lot of judges are being paid under the table because they say we help the Hispanics only. And that was anti-peral coiler. When I went to her office to talk about the migrants that were being uh harassing other people and doing gang signs, and she said, like, oh, and we're not gonna do anything because I we only help the Hispanics. Thank you very much. This is the United States of America. I was even told by the none by the immigrants that wasn't allowed to speak English. What the heck? What the heck is going on in the United States of America? Thank you. And that blessing, I hope you do a good job. Time is up. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to the public speakers. Um I just want to thank everyone who's here for the task force. Thank you all for your willingness to serve on the task force. I want to thank Katie Dunn for helping us organize and facilitate these meetings. Alderman, otherwoman Tavares is also here. Would you like to say a few words of introduction? Yeah. Good morning, everybody. Good morning, everybody. I just want to welcome everybody. Thank you for being here. Thank you to our Cook County Commissioners who are here today. To uh Marianna Serapoulis, too, who was here today. Thank you for listening. I know we have a lot of presentations today. So I want to thank those who are here. Um I see the Chicago Police Department, Department of Family and Support Services. Thank you for listening. And this is very survivor led. And thank you also to Katie Dunn as well for organizing. Thank you.
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