Chicago police Superintendent Larry Snelling on Monday said officers would respond to any call of a crime being committed following uproar over his department’s role in the aftermath of two alleged hit-and-runs and a shooting on Chicago’s Southwest Side Saturday that involved federal agents.
“We want to make sure when we show up, we’re keeping every single person in this city safe, and we want to keep the peace,” he said.
Snelling spent about 10 minutes of the 50-minute news conference defending Chief of Patrol Jon Hein following furor over a Saturday dispatch attributed to Hein that “no units would respond” to a call for assistance from armed Border Patrol agents who said they were in the middle of a crowd in Brighton Park following the traffic crashes and shooting.
The resulting internet furor to the computer message, attributed to Hein and quickly picked up among right-wing social media commentators, highlighted a tricky balance that CPD leaders must strike in keeping with Chicago’s self-declared sanctuary city status: officers may not assist federal immigration authorities with their operations, as dictated by the Illinois TRUST Act and Chicago’s welcoming city ordinance, but are still obligated to respond to enforce the law and respond to potential illegal action.
“We have to be politically neutral if we want to enforce the law,” Snelling said. “In law enforcement, we don’t make the laws, we uphold them.”
Snelling said the department was conducting an after-action evaluation about Saturday’s events and said “there are some things we can work on” regarding communication in those situations, without elaborating.
He also condemned people posting about the department response “without any background, without any context, without any information,” and noted that 27 officers had been on scene and taken tear gas along with neighbors and protesters as federal agents sought to control the crowd, which was at some points hurling bricks and water bottles at agents and federal vehicles.
Snelling said he’d been in touch with federal authorities since Saturday about “how we are going to work this out.”
“Communication does not mean collaboration,” he said. “This had nothing to do with immigration enforcement.”
A pair of deputy chiefs were part of the response to a call of a person shot in the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue about 10:30 a.m., Snelling said, and turned the scene and investigation over to federal authorities after it became clear that Border Patrol agents had shot a woman who allegedly tried to “box them in” with her car.
According to an internal police notification attributed to the chief of patrol obtained by the Tribune and later circulated widely on social media, “no units would respond” to a call from armed border patrol agents who said they were surrounded by a crowd in the 3900 block of South Kedzie Avenue. The notification went out at 12:28 p.m., almost two hours after the shooting.
It quickly got picked up on social media by right-wing commentators and Trump administration officials who incorrectly stated that Gov. JB Pritzker, a well-known political foe of the president, had jurisdiction over CPD.
Snelling did not mention the computer message attributed to Hein until reporters questioned him about it following his address. He denied that officers had been told to stand down and closed the news conference with a lengthy defense of Hein, a 30-year department veteran who became chief of patrol in March 2024.
“The chief of patrol would never tell anybody to stand down when anybody is in trouble or in need of help,” Snelling said. “I will say there was a lot of miscommunication, back and forth about what was really happening out there on the ground, and we need to do better.”
Sources confirmed the message’s authenticity to the Tribune.
Chicago police were on the scene Saturday afternoon, with patrol officers from multiple districts, at least two deputy chiefs and Deering (9th) District Cmdr. Joseph Marks all on-site throughout an hourslong standoff between federal agents, neighbors and activists.
Federal authorities arrested two U.S. citizens in the lead-up to the confrontation. Marimar Martinez, 30, and Anthony Ian Santos Ruiz, 21, both of Chicago, are each charged in a criminal complaint filed Sunday with forcibly assaulting, impeding and interfering with a federal law enforcement officer in the first incident.
One of the agents involved in the alleged hit-and-run on Kedzie Avenue is based in California and was driving a 2025 Ford Expedition registered in Illinois, police records obtained by the Tribune show.
In the wake of the traffic crash and shooting, agents liberally deployed canisters of tear gas and flash bangs up and down Kedzie and nearby residential streets as neighbors and protesters screamed profanities and threw bricks and water bottles at departing cars. Officers, who were mostly looking on and doing crowd control, did not appear to be equipped with safety gear and had to get out of the way of the chemical crowd controls along with civilians.
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Snelling said 27 officers suffered the effects of tear gas Saturday, but none were seriously harmed.
Former interim Chicago police Superintendent Charlie Beck said he did not have enough information to comment on the specifics of the case but said the dilemma it raised is one that’s “always an issue with law enforcement.”
“Think about the times when the Klan marches and you have to protect a Klan march. Think about the times when you have the vast majority of officers that work for you have a different opinion than the people engaged in a protest and you protect their rights. Policing has to be, ideally, apolitical,” Beck said in an interview. “Your charge is to create safety in your city for everybody who lives, works or passes through. That includes protesters and federal agents. Your job is to provide safety.”
Northwest Side Ald. Nick Sposato, who represents a first responders-heavy ward, said the Police Department is in a “terrible spot” because of the tension between the city’s sanctuary status and ongoing immigration actions. But, he said, police need to respond to dangerous situations where there’s potential for violence against federal agents or anybody else.
“When a cop’s in trouble, they call for help. When a police officer hears an officer is in trouble, they want to help,” Sposato said. “Now the CPD is in a predicament because we made it perfectly clear (to ICE) you’re on your own on this. But if they’re being swarmed and jumped on, we should be helping.”