Chicago Judge Under Fire For Allegedly Sharing Fake ‘My First Ankle Bracelet’ Image With Fellow Judge 

Cook County judge Caroline Glennon-Goodman was reassigned shortly after winning her first six-year term election for allegedly sharing a fake racist “My First Ankle Bracelet” image with another judge, Injustice Watch reports. 

The image portrays a Little Tykes toy box with a picture of a Black boy and a foot outfitted with “My First Ankle Monitor.”

A screenshot shows Glennon-Goodman sent the image alongside a text saying, “My husband’s idea of Christmas humor.” After the text was uncovered, Chief Judge Timothy Evans reassigned Glennon-Goodman on Jan. 10 from the pretrial division in Chicago, where she once was responsible for deciding whether defendants facing criminal and domestic violence cases could face jail time, be confined to electronic monitoring—or ankle bracelet,—or be released. 

Glennon-Goopdman, elected in April 2024, was also remanded to implicit bias training along with being referred to the Judicial Inquiry Board in order “to determine whether further sanction is warranted.”

A close friend of Glennon-Goodman said the message was sent to another judge by accident and was initially intended to reach another friend with the same first name. However, the damage may already be done.

The region’s largest and oldest professional association of Black lawyers, the Cook County Bar Association (CCBA), released a statement condemning Glennon-Goodman’s actions and said as a judge already sitting on the bench, she should have enough “unbias” to know better.

“It is our understanding that the photo was meant to be shared with a different audience and that the judge involved has apologized profusely as a result. Nevertheless, such media is inappropriate to share regardless of the intended audience,” the statement read. 

“Discernment and judgment are of utmost importance for the qualifications of a judge. Any judge should be unbiased enough to not further circulate such a racist trope.”

Originally assigned to the courtroom at 26th and California, according to CWBC Chicago, Glennon-Goodman came to the bench as a long time Cook County assistant public defender, starting her career in 1997 and handling a number of murder cases. She has the reputation of being one of the most lenient of the division’s nine judges sitting on the bench by rejecting almost half of the all detention requests that reach her desk. The overall pretrial division approved close to 66% of such petitions. 

Such data heightened CCBA’s viewpoints of Glennon-Goodman understanding the damage that the projected image can present. “The imagery recalls our nation’s history of inappropriate media images of Black people (such as blackface) and such imagery continues to shape the opinions of Black people, particularly Black men,” the group continued. 

While Glennon-Goodman sits under review, a former Cook County state’s attorney, will take her place.

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