Protesters in Chicago have held a rally to demand the police shut down a formerly abandoned warehouse that is reportedly being used to interrogate suspected criminals without recourse to legal representation.
The detention facility, which was first brought to public
attention in a report by the Guardian in February, is a plain
warehouse located on Chicago’s west side known as Homan Square,
which has “long been the scene of secretive work by special
police units,” the paper revealed.
While many Americans are aware of the ongoing militarization of
their police departments, with the federal government backing
programs that allow local police forces to receive military
equipment, including armored vehicles and powerful firearms, news
that interrogation methods are also occurring has attracted shock
and scorn.
#protest in
front of #homansquare
today. Jacob Church on the mic. #chicago#news#Gitmo2Chicagopic.twitter.com/LSKaSkdpwk
— Rick Majewski (@rickmajewski) March
5, 2015
Activist Brian Jacob Church, who claims to have been detained at
the facility in 2012, addressed a crowd that assembled at Homan
Square on Saturday.
“For too long, we as Americans have been subject to brutality
at the hands of the police… Specifically black people, poor
people and Latino people,” Church said as cited by The
Guardian. “This building needs to be shut down.”
A similar rally previously took place on March 1.
The controversial facility does not appear to operate like a
regular police precinct where criminal suspects are registered
into a publicly accessible registrar.
At Homan Square, there
are no apparent records, therefore, individuals like Church who
find themselves at the facility for all intent and purposes
‘disappear’ without any accountability.
“Homan Square is definitely an unusual place,” Church
told the Guardian last month. “It brings to mind the
interrogation facilities they use in the Middle East. The CIA
calls them black sites. It’s a domestic black site. When you go
in, no one knows what’s happened to you.”
“They just disappear,” said Anthony Hill, a criminal
defense attorney, “until they show up at a district for
charging or are just released back out on the street.”
Crowd’s nearly doubled at #Chicago
rally to shut down #homansquare#gitmo2chicagopic.twitter.com/OlEH8yDAxI
— InsureXnistx (@daneyvilla) March
7, 2015
At least one watchdog group has blamed Chicago Mayor Rahm
Emanuel, presently involved in a tough reelection campaign, for
failing to address the issue of possible human rights violations
at the site.
“It’s a hot issue now because the current mayor is up for
reelection in a few weeks and he has not been willing to make any
statement about the situation at Homan. Neither the hiding of
arrestees nor the potential torture in the interrogations,”
Donald Goldhamer, Chicago Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights
treasurer said as cited by Sputnik.
READ MORE: Gitmo2Chicago: Activists demand probe of ‘secret
interrogation facility’ (PHOTOS)
Goldhamer said the issue
of abusive interrogations at the Homan facility has been
addressed by lawyers for years, but the city has failed to act on
it.
“Police hiding of
arrestees has been looked at and discussed with the [Chicago]
police department, the superintendent, and the police board, but
these efforts have not had an effect,” Goldhamer said.
The CPD has denied its
involvement in the alleged interrogations and detentions at Homan
Square.