Building owner OK’d Trump administration’s raid of Chicago apartment complex, court records show
Federal agents carried out a military-style raid on a South Shore apartment complex last fall with the permission of the building’s owner and manager, according to new court filings that appear to confirm residents’ suspicions and corroborate key allegations driving a state investigation.
The Trump administration has claimed the squalid building was a magnet for criminals and Venezuelan gang members, but the court records filed Tuesday indicate the harrowing raid was actually based on intelligence that “illegal aliens were unlawfully occupying apartments in the building.”
Arrest reports for two of the 37 people detained in the overnight raid at 7500 S. South Shore Drive were included in a motion filed Tuesday in a federal court case accusing immigration agents of making unlawful arrests.
The made-for-TV sacking of the building on Sept. 30 became an early flashpoint of Operation Midway Blitz, the monthslong deportation campaign targeting the Chicago area last year.
Federal agents descended on the 130-unit complex from helicopters and used flashbang grenades to burst through doors. Residents reported seeing men, women and children pulled from apartments and zip-tied, some of them naked.
Some U.S. citizens reported being detained for hours. But one man, who helped neighbors hide, was left undisturbed by the feds, prompting questions about what the heavily-armed agents knew about the building and its residents prior to the raid.
The new arrest reports show the building’s owner, Trinity Flood, and property manager, Corey Oliver, gave “verbal and written consent” to search the building. Agents only checked units “not legally rented or leased at the time,” according to the reports.
Flood and Oliver couldn't immediately be reached for comment. ProPublica first reported on the newly released court records.
Tenants had complained about the abysmal conditions at the building for years, long before the arrival of Venezuelan migrants. Residents long suspected that Flood and Oliver had tipped off the feds ahead of the raid.
Last month, the Illinois Department of Human Rights announced an investigation into Flood, her company and Oliver’s property management firm. The agency said it’s reviewing claims that the targets of the investigation alerted federal authorities about the Venezuelan immigrants living in the complex in an attempt to “intimidate and coerce the building’s Black and Hispanic tenants into leaving.”
Days after the raid, WBEZ and Chicago Sun-Times reporters found a crumpled map on the floor of the building that had labels for each unit: “vacant,” “tenant” and “firearms.” Some units appeared to be marked as both “tenant” and “firearms.”
All remaining building residents were forced out in December after the complex was foreclosed on, along with two other South Side buildings owned by Flood.
Federal officials said the surrounding South Shore neighborhood was “a location known to be frequented by Tren de Aragua members and their associates," referencing a Venezuelan gang President Donald Trump has designated as a terrorist organization and used to justify his aggressive immigration operations and attacks on boats in international waters.
However, crime in the three blocks surrounding the South Shore complex has fallen in recent years and few people have been charged with crimes that occurred inside the building. There was a brutal murder in one apartment unit over the summer, but tenants said they hadn’t felt a spike in crime or seen a sprawling criminal enterprise operating out of the building.
Still, the feds claimed the raid targeted people “believed to be involved in drug trafficking and distribution, weapons crimes and immigration violators.”
Of the two arrest reports included in Tuesday’s filing, one person had a prior arrest for soliciting prostitution and the other had no criminal history. Neither report mentions any gang affiliation.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security didn't respond to a request for comment.