WAUKEGAN, Ill. — The founder of a Black Lives Matter chapter in Illinois was caught on video fighting a female subordinate at the group’s office, amid allegations he mishandled the organization’s money. He was wearing a BLM hoodie during the violent incident.
Clyde McLemore, founder and executive director of Black Lives Matter Lake County called police Jan. 12 to report a battery at the BLM office. Officers arrived to find McLemore and project manager Nyesha Hill with minor injuries, including scratches and broken nails.
McLemore told officers Hill entered his office demanding money and cigarettes before the fight. Hill said that McLemore shoved her first after she refused to leave until he paid her for work.
“I told him, ‘it’s not fair that I come here and I work and you running around taking care of other things that don’t got nothing to do with Black Lives Matter with Black Lives Matter money,’” Hill told Waukegan Police Department officers in body camera video.
Police found no probable cause for arrests. Hill told police she saw McLemore spend the organization’s funds on “girls” and gambling. McLemore told officers the organization had no money left from a grant.
Surveillance video, shown above, from a separate incident in October or November 2025, showed another fight between the two.
McLemore is also a member of the Lake County Regional Board of School Trustees. He has a criminal history.
In October 2024, he was sentenced to 40 days in jail for contempt of court stemming from misconduct in a Lake County Circuit Court courtroom. He has prior arrests for trespassing at a Waukegan City Council meeting in 2022 and being at a riot in Kenosha, Wisc. in 2021.
Hill’s criminal history include being sentenced to more than four years in prison in 2021 for her role in a kidnapping case in Zion, Ill. where she and an accomplice beat a victim and demanded ransom money.
Numerous BLM leaders and activists, even outside the U.S., have been accused of or convicted of fraud. BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors notoriously built a personal multi-million dollar estate profile while leading the organization. She has not been charged with any crimes.
