'I failed Ms. Roberts': Council President Osili regrets forcible removal of harassment accuser

Indianapolis Star

11-06-2025

Indianapolis City-County Council President Vop Osili apologized two days after he ordered a sheriff's deputy to forcibly remove a woman from the June 9 council meeting when she refused to obey a time limit while speaking about alleged mistreatment by Mayor Joe Hogsett and his former right-hand man.
Multiple councilors have criticized Osili for kicking out Lauren Roberts, a former Hogsett employee who has criticized the mayor's handling of her allegations that top aide Thomas Cook sexually harassed her in 2015.
As Roberts read a statement asking why the city-commissioned report investigating those claims did not include evidence about texts from Hogsett that made her uncomfortable, Osili interrupted her and told her she had only two minutes, the standard time limit for public comment. Roberts, who said she had crowdfunded and taken off from work to travel to the meeting from her home in Denver, responded that she would take her time. She told Osili he was welcome to have law enforcement haul her out.
When Roberts' time was up and she kept speaking, Osili told deputies to "remove anyone who is talking at this point." Officers pushed Roberts and her multiple supporters out of the room while she resisted and yelled at them to stop touching her.
Osili said in his June 11 statement that he regretted his decision to remove Roberts and should have acted to deescalate the situation.
"While I believe and practice upholding the longstanding council rules that limit public comment to two minutes per speaker," Osili said, "I regret the trauma to Ms. Roberts and her supporters. An already difficult moment for a survivor was made even harder.
"As it is my responsibility to ensure the council conducts its business with decorum and civility, I should have called a recess, created space for calm, and shown a sensitivity in that emotionally charged moment. In that, I failed Ms. Roberts, my fellow councilors, and those who attended the meeting that evening."
Outside the City-County Council Building, Roberts read aloud to media what she had hoped to tell councilors on Monday night. She later posted on social media that "what happened tonight is why some survivors (kill) ourselves."
In his written statement, Osili commended the courage of Roberts and Caroline Ellert, a second Cook accuser who was one of three women to share her allegations with IndyStar last year.
"As a result, the council will be enacting meaningful changes in how the issue of harassment and misconduct is relayed, addressed and accounted for in the future," Osili said in his statement. "While we did not create this problem, our members will ensure that harassment has no place in our city and county government."
The council's Democratic caucus will soon introduce a proposal for reforms in city policy including appointing an independent inspector general to investigate potential violations and an independent human resources board to replace the city's current HR department.
The council will discuss the remaining $300,000 it owes to Fisher Phillips, the law firm that investigated the alleged harassment, at a meeting of the Administration and Finance Committee. Councilors voted Monday to delay the bulk of the $450,000 bill after IndyStar revealed that the firm's 54-page report excluded Hogsett's late-night messages to Roberts and Ellert, which they had shared with investigators.
Saying he felt "terrible" about Roberts' removal Monday, Councilor Frank Mascari, chair of the Administration and Finance Committee, said he will allow alleged victims to speak for 20 minutes or more at the June 17 meeting at 5:30 p.m. Osili said he supports that move and "will be listening and learning."
In a June 10 interview with IndyStar, Hogsett acknowledged that Roberts was discomfited by personal texts he sent her mentioning her boyfriend and calling her "feisty," and Ellert by his questions about her poetry preferences.
He added that in the 24-hour endeavor that is a modern political campaign, "it has become easier to develop a casual conversation style with those who you happen to work very closely with."
"It was not my intent to cause anybody any discomfort or make them feel uncomfortable. ... But I do in retrospect understand how that may have been something that I change (moving forward)," Hogsett told IndyStar.
Hogsett said he has no intention to resign despite three councilors' calls for him to do so, two of which have come in the past two weeks since the law firm's report was released May 29.
On Monday, Osili called Hogsett's texts to the women more than 30 years younger than the mayor "odd" and "strange," but said they weren't serious enough to warrant Hogsett's resignation.
Roberts, however, said Monday that Osili and other councilors are implicated in the alleged wrongdoing until they call for Hogsett to resign. She criticized the mayor and other city leaders for allowing Cook to step down from his role in late 2020, more than two months after an HR recommendation to fire him and three years after Roberts first raised concerns.
"Your constituents cannot afford for you to spend another moment wringing your hands or claiming that your role is limited to policymaking," Roberts read in her statement intended for councilors. "Your positions are not neutral."