When a Chicago Park District lifeguard was accused of capturing and killing a young person at Douglass Park in late June, Ald. Monique Scott (twenty fourth) and her brother, former Ald. Michael Scott, weren’t shocked.
Each had served as Douglass Park supervisors and feared one thing like this could occur, they contend, as a result of the park district has too few lifeguards, too little employees coaching and insufficient park safety.
And, they are saying, a part of the issue lies in assigning white and Latino lifeguards to swimming pools in African American neighborhoods.
Lifeguard Charles Leto is accused of fatally capturing 15-year-old Marjay Dotson and severely injuring 14-year-old Jeremy Herred close to the park pool June 26. Leto faces a homicide cost and different legal prices.
Leto’s legal professionals say he acted in self-defense after an altercation outdoors the pool and predicted he could be exonerated. Prosecutors say {that a} surveillance video and witness statements contradict Leto’s claims.
A Prepare dinner County choose ordered Leto held pending trial, calling him a menace to the general public and saying that he “overreacted” at Douglass Park. Leto’s subsequent courtroom date is scheduled for July 16.
Authoritative presence
“There’s a sure approach you need to cope with these children,” Monique Scott stated. “They’re going to present you a tough time. You could have an authoritative presence with out disrespect. You’ve acquired to know the way to speak to those children and never demean them.”
Scott stated she acquired a name lately from a South Facet park supervisor who reported {that a} Latino lifeguard had walked off the job after declaring that he “can’t work with these varieties of individuals.”
“Identical to you place Black supervisors in Black parks so you may cope with the residents, you must do the identical with swimming pools and spend money on coaching,” she stated.
Lifeguards have been skilled June 18-19. Park district day camps began June 23. That’s a recipe for catastrophe, the alderperson stated.
“You have got 16- and 17-year-olds monitoring 6-, 7- and 8-year-old kids. They’re kids monitoring kids with a two-day coaching,” she stated.
Throughout a Douglass Park assembly the day after the capturing, Monique Scott stated she pleaded with Mayor Brandon Johnson to offer extra safety for park district patrons and staffers.
No steel detectors
“I stated the identical children that move by way of steel detectors on their approach into the general public faculties are the identical children being monitored by park district employees with no steel detectors or safety,” Monique Scott stated.
She stated Johnson’s reply infuriated her.
“He instructed me if his [2026] funds is handed, he might be certain that we’ll have extra safety or security within the parks,” she stated.
“I don’t know what his funds is, however I do know we’re not going to commerce lives for safety. That shouldn’t even be a thought. It needs to be, ‘Let me attempt to save lives now,’ not speaking about his funds.”
Monique Scott stated Jeremy’s spinal accidents are prone to deprive him of “any high quality of life.”
Michael Scott spent 5 years as Douglass Park supervisor earlier than changing into space supervisor of 11 West Facet parks. He stated that if the Douglass Park capturing is handled as an remoted incident, it’ll occur once more as a result of tensions between lifeguards and patrons have been brewing for years.
“Should you don’t have a powerful lifeguard, and the guard doesn’t seem like the neighborhood they’re serving, there’s an issue,” stated Michael Scott, who’s now a Prepare dinner County commissioner.
“It causes safety officers to have to return in and intervene, and it causes swimming pools to get shut down the place no person is ready to take pleasure in it. That has occurred. It’s been years and years and years within the making. This can be a new [fatal] consequence. However this type of factor has occurred within the parks for years.”
Seasoned lifeguards with tenure inevitably select the “simpler” assignments at North Avenue Seashore and in additional “prosperous” neighborhoods, he stated. That leaves the youthful, extra inexperienced lifeguards at “more durable” swimming pools in African American neighborhoods.
“Extra seemingly than not, they’re not of colour. Then, all hell breaks unfastened. I’ve had younger individuals bullied. I’ve had younger individuals I’ve needed to switch to different parks. I’ve needed to shut down the swimming pools at instances. That is one thing the parks have been grappling with for fairly a while,” Michael Scott stated.
The scenario acquired so tense throughout Michael Scott’s tenure on the Douglass Park pool that he would maintain separate free swims for teen boys, teen ladies, toddlers, adults and day campers to “hold the issues out.”
Newly appointed Chicago Park District CEO Carlos Ramirez-Rosa stated he has nothing however respect for the Scotts and plans to behave on their suggestions.
Diversifying the lifeguard employees
“They’ve a wealth of expertise and data. I’m in search of to lean on that. Because it pertains to the push to diversify our lifeguard staffing, the park district is dedicated to that objective,” Ramirez-Rosa stated.
Noting that his predecessor launched a lifeguard explorers program that sought to diversify the ranks, Ramirez-Rosa stated he’s dedicated to increasing that program.
“We all know that the extra younger individuals from communities that we will recruit to get on the trail to changing into a lifeguard, the extra people from the neighborhood we’ll have working locally,” he stated.
Ramirez-Rosa stated he has left no stone unturned to learn how it was that the park district allowed somebody with Charles Leto’s troubled historical past to work at return to Douglass Park. with lethal penalties.
“I wish to make it possible for one thing like this by no means occurs once more. I wish to make it possible for we’re doing the whole lot in our energy to guard our younger individuals and to make it possible for our lifeguards are saving lives — not taking them,” he stated.
Leto, who’s white and 55 years outdated, joined the park district as a lifeguard a little bit greater than two years in the past, with a beginning wage of $16.19 an hour, data present. Officers say he had been promoted to the rank of lifeguard captain and was being paid $25 an hour by the point of the deadly incident at Douglass Park.
On Thursday, the park district stated Leto had moved between swimming pools repeatedly this 12 months — however officers stated that they had “not recognized any complaints from patrons involving Charles Leto.”
Nonetheless, patrons at Gill Park pool and Douglass Park — and a former co-worker — have instructed reporters they’ve had altercations with Leto.
Leto was working at Gill Park’s indoor pool earlier this 12 months till, officers say, he transferred to Welles Park “to extend his hours.” He returned to Douglass Park pool, the place he labored in the summertime of 2024, for this season.
Park district spokeswoman Michele Lemons stated officers will share the findings of an inner probe “within the coming days.”
Ramirez-Rosa stated the park district has off-duty and retired cops working as safety guards throughout Chicago. In response to the deadly capturing, he stated “a everlasting publish” was arrange at Douglass Park, and he promised elevated safety at different swimming pools for the remainder of the summer time.
Shortly earlier than the capturing at Douglass Park, park patrons and activists in one other Chicago neighborhood accused a park district safety guard of pointing his firearm at a lady who was strolling her canine in Kosciuszko Park.
That incident prompted park activists there to name for officers to enact reforms associated to how the safety guards function.
Information present a safety guard for the park district confronted a lady in April as a result of her canine was not on a leash and so they have been on a turf discipline. The girl stated in a written account of the incident that she was left “shaken.”
A park district spokeswoman confirmed that the safety officer “unholstered his firearm” in concern of an unleashed canine that “growled and swiftly superior” at him, however she stated the officer had pointed his gun “downward.”
The advisory council for Kosciuszko Park on June 10 despatched a letter to Ramirez-Rosa and different park district officers saying, “We’re involved that an unarmed citizen and her pet have been threatened with lethal drive after committing a minor infraction of park guidelines.”
Citing alleged discrepancies between the officer’s account and witness statements, the advisory council handed a decision that safety officers there ought to now not carry firearms “until these officers are additionally geared up with body-worn cameras.”
