Asian Carp: 'Nice Try, Suckers'
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Extra, Extra
Reappointment For Daley's Nephew
We aren't naive. We know the police protect and serve, that it's a largely thankless task, and recognize their achievements when we can. Overall, though, this hasn't been a good year for the Chicago Police Department, public relations-wise.
So if there were a list of the bad seeds in existence, wouldn't you want to know the names? Wouldn't you know who's out there perverting their oath to protect and serve? Judge Joan Lefkow thinks so. Last week she ordered the city to release a list of 662 officers with more than 10 official complaints filed against them in the last five years, an order the city has been fighting tooth-and-nail.
Yesterday the Mayor's office released the list to aldermen, but in a bullshit move redacted the names of the officers. The list, which was compiled by attorneys for a woman accusing the CPD of abuse in 2003, was released two days before an important City Council vote on the way police misconduct claims are investigated. If passed, the measure under discussion will require the Office of Professional Standards to report directly to His Elective Majesty, summaries of investigations would become public record, and OPS investigators would receive subpoena power. The release of the lined-up list only adds fuel to speculation that the measure will only tighten the flow of information to the public in police misconduct cases to even more of a "need to know" basis while keeping the "thin blue line" intact.
To be fair, the number on that list might be an inflated number, given the penchant of individuals to look for a quick buck in a litigious society to file complaints against an policeman who's just doing his or her job. Where there's smoke, however, there's fire. And 10 or more complaints indicates a pattern for some to act outside the boundaries of his oath. The sheer number of officers this list breaks down to one of every 20 cops in the 13,200-strong force. Five percent of the force is still too large a number, when the citizens the police serve should be demanding zero tolerance for unprofessional behavior. The list also indicates that some officers have more than 30 complaints against them, with no significant punishment handed down to them, who still have their jobs. Have we learned nothing from the actions of Jon Burge and the like?
Image courtesy of www.truthdig.com.
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What ever happened to innocent until proven guilty?
"Have we learned nothing from the actions of Jon Burge and the like?"
Yes, we have.
We have learned the city is great at denying access to its dirty laundry.
We have learned the city will break agreeements and all but defy judges to hide dirty laundry.
We have learned the city would rather pay a fat pension to a disgrace of a police officer sunning it up in Florida than actually deal with numerous torture claims.
Do you really expect anything different now? The whole collective bargaining argument seems like more bullshit from city leaders, who continue to treat residents more as proles than actual citizens. You almost have to hand it to city leaders: They keep doing this shit--and guess what, taxpayer pay one way or another--and still get to keep their jobs year after year after year.
Why anyone could claim Chicago is a progressive city--yes, people still do--is beyond me.
Fuck the (Chicago) police. They really are, on the whole, a group of uniformed thugs.
Apparently some police have discussed this in the comment section of an officer's blog post on the topic. Although all comments are anonymous, it's very interesting to see what they think. Quite a few seem to think this will lead to a change in the way police will police. The blog is http://secondcitycop.blogspot.com and the 82 (as of now) related comments are at https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=13350456&postID=2838933238330258014
Honestly, what would one expect from Richie Daley, given that he was complicit in police torture while he was the state's attorney, and the effort he and his administration continue to expend to block investigation of said torture? Daley is as corrupt as G.W. Bush, and as cruel as Cheney. Between making deals with developers and protecting Burge, I'm amazed Daley has time to fly to Rio to promote Chicago for the olympics.
Do you morons honestly believe all these complaints are legitimate? There are a fair number of people who are automatically going to complain if they get so much as a speeding ticket, just because their pissed they got caught breaking the law
You idiots will rip the police all day, and then beg for their help when someone tries to steal the stuff your mom bought for you. Its all a big scam headed by Daley. MOVE YOUR ASS OUT if you don't like it here.
And only an hour after the first comment comes the "love it or leave it" moron.
I don't believe all the complaints are valid. I doubt anyone does.
What I do believe--and I base this on face-to-face dealings with police through my work and my daily life, as well as interviews with other Chicago residents and readings of history, and, finally, exposure to other police forces in the USA--is that the police in Chicago are far more secretive, paranoid and thuggish than all but a few departments, and that the city leadership has taken extraordinary steps to hide any and all possible dirty laundry from the public.
Yes, this is Chicago 101--nothing new under the sun, perhaps. But instead of running away, I think I will stay and try to fight, and do what I can to improve it. If you don't like it, fuck the hell off. If you don't like it, you can move the hell out, asshole.
By the way, does anyone know what bars the coppers will be at tonight? I'd like to go out for a drink but don't want to get beat up by a drunken moron from the force and, perhaps, a few of his buddies from SOS.
#6, If you don't want to meet the business end of a drunk, off-duty copper's fist, it's as easy as keeping your mouth shut if you see a crying drunk in a bar.
Is getting made fun of an excuse for five guys to break some faces? No. But if the "he said he said" is correct, it all could have been avoided if some businessman would have looked the other way instead of opening his mouth.
There's a reason Chicago police have never been followed around for an episode or two of COPS. That being said, I think the officers have a very difficult job dealing with what are not the best elements of our city on a daily basis. I know I wouldn't deal with it as well as the majority of them do, but still believe transparency is the best policy when it comes to government issues.
#7: Good points, but it fails to explain the crappiness of the coppper response to the Jeff Tap incident, when some officers were waved away, and apparently the drunk coppers got preferred treatment. And, it fails to explain why the coppers, who should know better, didn't man up and look the other way. These are the SOBs we pay to enforce the law, right?
As well, it fails to explain other fights, including those involve female bartenders.
I know, I know: One bad apple and all that shit. But the CPD and Daley, et al. seem determined, at the least, to go out of its way to protect its tubful of bad apples.
#8: I would imagine being a cop in Chicago is a difficult, grinding job that doesn't pay enough.
Still, like you say, that is no excuse to hide from the public details of a service we all pay for, and upon which we rely for our daily safety.
I don't see why it is anyone's business any more than how many complaints are filed against any of us during our jobs.
The important thing is that the city deal properly with serious complaints of abuse--which should be settled and/or pursued in court.
Demanding absolute, complete transparency about every officers' record is too much. I don't see why they should have to live their lives in a fishbowl.
Big difference between being employed in the private sector and the public sector, #11.
Guest 11: As a taxpayer, I want to know what taxpayer-funded workers are doing.
You call it fishbowl, I call it sunshine. If you don't understand the difference between private and public jobs, please take civics again.
And your trust in the city to oversee itself is cute, really, considering this is Chicago we are talking about.
"...I think the officers have a very difficult job dealing with what are not the best elements of our city on a daily basis. I know I wouldn't deal with it as well as the majority of them do, but still believe transparency is the best policy when it comes to government issues."
Julene, in your comment above you rightly acknowledge that cops have a tough job but then go on to advocate "transparency." This suggests that you advocate the release of the 662 names and the respective complaints.
First, you do not seem to understand that the vast majority of these complaints are completely unjustified. Gangbangers? Drug dealers? Drunk drivers? Lawsuit-happy opportunists? Are these people who are to be believed more than cops?
More important, yhe release of these names will only hurt the citizens of this city who need police protection the most. Who do you think gets a lot of complaints? It is the cop who is out there working hard. It is the cop who steps forward to wrestle down a violent offender. It is the cop who takes on the toughest street thug. It is no wonder that cops of this type get a lot of complaints.
What kind of cop do you think gets no complaints? The cop who lays back. The cop who lets some else take point. The cop who lets a block get dominated by thugs while residents cower indoors. Do you want a police force composed of these passive cops?
That is what will happen if we lend credence to these phony complaints of brutality. Aside from the fact that you will harm the careers of some of the most heroic cops on the force, you will be hurting the rest of our city.
Sure, there are bad cops. But the assessment of these bad cops must be done without hamstringing the rest of the force. That ends up shortchanging the law-abiding citizens of our poorest neighborhoods.
You are probably the same people that flipped out when the government started listening in on the phone calls of suspected terrorists. Where is the ACLU when you need them, lol.
I think a lot of hipsters are against the police department because they themselves have been the target of police abuse because of their ironic moustaches and slogan Ts.
I believe there to be a way to release data on complaints and how they are followed up on without releasing the offending officers' names. Just like releasing the crime statistics on the City of Chicago's website - it doesn't list the criminals names, but it does give you an idea of what kind of crime is happening in a certain area. Why can't that sort of transparency be applied here? Once a law is broken or a certain number of viable and authentic complaints are made against a certain officer, then (s)he has to deal with those repercussions because (s)he is not a good policeman anymore.
Law-abiding citizens are not "hamstrung" by the creation and enforcement of laws. Why would law-abiding policemen be hamstrung by having to obey those same laws?
"First, you do not seem to understand that the vast majority of these complaints are completely unjustified."
According to WHOM? You say so?
Ward Up: You write, "First, you do not seem to understand that the vast majority of these complaints are completely unjustified."
How exactly do you know that?
Why can't you trust citizens to make the same sound conclusions you've apparently made?
How does open government and transparency hurt anyone but bad cops?
Do you think hiding this info--even the unjustified complaints--does more harm than good, as it appears the cops have something to hide?
Is this really about protecting this info from bottom-feeding lawyers, as some have claimed? If so, why should citizens be denied info about taxpayer funded workers and services just because some lawyers are scum?
Try answering those questions instead of giving an emotional "speech" about good cop work.
A police force that allows the "bad cops" to continue on without a system, that the citizens can see working fairly and equitably, only diminishes the police's capability of doing their jobs effectively and safely. It makes the jobs of the good cops even harder, because citizens may not trust that they are there to help.
And TRUE DAT to Ferdy and #19.
Most of the complaints are probably for police officers mispronouncing a word in the Miranda when arresting drug dealers with 78 prior convictions.
I think a criminal wouldn't complain about that since he would use it as his get out of jail free card. HA. HA.
"....Once a law is broken or a certain number of viable and authentic complaints are made against a certain officer, then (s)he has to deal with those repercussions because (s)he is not a good policeman anymore."
Julene, I agree with your above statement completely. The current review system is not acceptable. There are some cops who need to be exposed and weeded out. We should get rid of them. The current review process is not tough enough on the bad apples.
However, I believe that they number far, far less than 662. Putting the names of falsely accused cops out in the public domain will hurt the citizens of our city who need an assertive policie force.
Guest 21 obviously doesn't believe in a saying of one of my favorite cops, Joe Friday from Dragnet: "Just the fact, ma'am."
If the complaints are frivolous, then the facts will speak for themselves. But we don't have "the facts, ma'am."
Ward: Again, how does one conclude the cops are falsely accused?
Are citizens merely to take the word of city leaders? In Chicago? The same leaders who have dodged the torture investigations?
You are really avoiding this aspect, and therefore your point, so far, lacks credibility.
They should also list the information of the people filing the complaints. "Complaint made while being arrested for so-and-so."
I think we would all be surprised how many frivolous complaints are made against police officers.
I have a benign job and we still get lots of complaints.
The bad apples need to be sorted out but I'm not sure if opening police personnell files to the entire world is the best way to do it.
this comment from the blog reminds me WAY too much of my own experiences with the chicago cops.
"do you want to know why people don't trust chicago cops? because they've dealt with them.
a couple years ago i was playing basketball with a couple friends in rogers park by the lake around 10 pm. as we were playing, a cop car rushed through the lawn, hit the lights, blared their search light, and hopped out like we were manufacturing crack. they harassed us and told us to leave. as we were walking away, complying with their request, i jokingly said to a friend "thank god this isn't a dangerous neighborhood or this would seem like a real waste of the cop's time, huh?"
a minute later as we were almost out of the park, the cop car drove up and the cops hopped out. one grabbed me and put me on the hood of the car searching me while the other put his hand on his gun. they cussed me out ("you think you're so motherfucking clever now, huh?" e.g.) pushed me around, and made me stand with my hands on the hood of their car for a half hour. when friends asked what this was all about they told them "fuck off or you're next." after hassling me for the better part of 45 minutes, they pushed me off the hood of their car. noting my TN driver's license they told me to "go home cuz we don't need any more sister fuckers up here." i was given a ticket for being in a park after closing time (despite no sign being up notifying us).
i submitted my complaint to the IAD people along with photos of the car, badge numbers, and statements from my friends as well as a random person who was walking by at the time all corroborating my story. the complaint was called unsubstantiated and it disappeared.
THAT is why i never, ever, give chicago cops the benefit of the doubt. because there are thousands of stories like mine."
#27, That sucks. But maybe if you wouldn't have gone out of your way to be a smart ass to the cops when they were just doing their job (clearing you out of the park after dark), maybe they wouldn't have gone out of their way to give you an extra hard time.
And you should be glad that it was CPD that gave you a hard time. If you were out in Naperville and mouthed off to a cop, they'd call for backup, bring out the dogs and then find some way to haul you in for obstruction of justice or interfering with a peace officer.
Not that I don't sympathize but my parents warned me about smarting off to cops since pre-adolesence. It's like touching a stove.
Maybe Chicago cops are way too interested in showing they're tough when a simple comment causes this kind of overreaction. That's abuse in my book, but obviously not in Guest 28, the police employee's book. Let's face it. We're civilians and you're military, and you don't serve us the way you think you do some of the time.
I guess I would be on edge too if every time I pulled someone over I had to wonder if they were going to blow me away.
Ferdy, I don't see how siding with the police in #27's case makes me a cop. There are ways to interact with people and police that'll get positive results on both ends. You don't have to be scared of the police and be all "Yes, massa. Thank you, massa" if you have to talk to them.
But mouthing off in a situation where they don't know who you are but are trained to treat every situation as if it's a threat isn't the best way to make a new friend.
#28
Well, the Special Operations Section is the unit that has historically been used to saturate up-for-grabs neighborhoods and shut down gang wars and dope spots. All while district units were responding to 9-1-1 calls, the marine unit was out surfing, the horsy unit was learning how to ride horses, the thousands of officers behind desks were writing reports, and so on and so on.
This is what you get when you give aggressive police a free hand in the ghettoes of Chicago. Do any of you think for one second you could do this job right and not get beefs by the dozen?
To cut to the chase, these are the guys who are/were told to go out and be the most aggressive. Nobody should be surprised that they get a hugely-disproportionate percentage of the complaints. And yeah, units like this are necessary when gang skirmishes in a neighborhood look like they are about to turn into all out war. Which has been the case somewhere or other in Chicago for every warm day of the last 30 years.
That said, I agree with the poster above who said to release the information on individuals without releasing the individuals name. If there is a public outcry for reform, so be it, but there is no good reason to release the name of an individual for complaints against the individual that were not sustained, but there is a public interest in seeing the volume and type of complaints leveled against various individuals in the CPD.
"...i submitted my complaint to the IAD people along with photos of the car, badge numbers, and statements from my friends as well as a random person who was walking by at the time all corroborating my story. the complaint was called unsubstantiated and it disappeared."
Well, whoop-de-freakin'-do. Perhaps next time you should just leave the park and not smart off.
Everybody's afraid of Chicago cops and it's because doing something as simple as showing some spunk (aka, "smarting off") will get you in a whole lot of trouble. That's not protecting and serving in my book. Police torture, police brutality, police riot (eg, 1968 covention, I was there), don't make the cops automatic good guys in my book. They are not above the law, though many act like they are (routinely violating traffic laws at a minimum, and I've seen that a lot, too).
Does this sword cut both ways?
When a drug dealer is convicted of a crime, can we add up all those arrests that ended in a not guilty and increase his sentence? Better yet, can the police simply look up people with more than 10 arrests in a five year period and bring them to jail?
Somehow unsubstantiated allegations require discipline measures when we talk about the police. What a great opportunity for a liberal witch hunt! Hey, they have complaints, THEY MUST BE GUILTY OF SOMETHING! Fire them!
What if those 600 officers (5%) made more than 20% of all of the arrests for the Chicago Police Dept.? What if they made more than 40%? Does it matter? Is it possible that a defendant arrested for a felony would allege that the police put those drugs on him or beat that confession from him? Is it possible that the defendant's family might also allege a complaint to assist his defense? Is it possible that the allegation is not true?
If this information is ESSENTIAL for the public good, then maybe all police information should be available on the internet for all to see. Every arrest, every ticket, EVERY ALLEGATION for all the world to see. Has someone told the police you stold his watch? Just lookup SMITH, John and have a look-see.
It's a brave new world.
It never ceases to amaze me how so many people argue that keeping information about the government from the public actually serves the public good, as 36 and others basically do.
In essence, you are saying citizens are too dumb to judge this information on their own, and that we should just trust leaders to make those judgements for us.
It's not really a Chicago thing, I guess, but more like a sheep thing, a subject/ruler thing. But it seems a big part of the Chicago landscape.
And this is why democracy and a true free society never stands a chance, either here or, really, in the country--people don't really want it and all that it requires.
Well, my local newspaper runs a police blotter every week with people who have been arrested and charged with crimes. That's pretty common. So, 36, it is already happening, but only to the alleged criminals.
"Perhaps next time you should just leave the park and not smart off."
And perhaps *you* ought to find a different country to live in, one where there isn't that pesky "freedom of speech" and all...
By your logic, the next time someone smarts off to me, I'm allowed to physically assault them? Brilliant. What are you, 10 years old?
Amazing what sort of thug behavior people are willing to justify as long as it's coming from someone with "authority"...
People like Low digit IQ-ed Cavedogs like Ward Up represent a very unhealthy segemnt of people who become cops, i.e people who need "control" and "power".
If you have a gun and a badge, you MUST be able to respect the US Constitution including "freedom" of Speech. Also I know good cops that will tell you, gang bangers and criminals don't file complaints against police as they don't want to be on record with any city department, including OPS. We all know its nearly impossible to fire police. This has got to change. Personally I think a officer needs at least a four year of college. As first responsers, they have more power than lawyers.
This has got too stop, I mean it was o.k when it was just innocent Black people getting beaten, not its blonde white women and white Bussiness men! White Bussiness men founded this County!
Hi...I'm the guy who posted the story that was copied into comment 27.
I was completely polite to the cops and only made a snide comment as I was walking away. For people who say this justified the cops harassing me physically and verbally like they did, maybe you should move to China. The cops are paid money from my paychecks to keep me safe, not to harass me when they feel like I've challenged their authority. At no point in my interaction with the cops did I do anything to justify this conduct. I wasn't drunk, I had no contraband, I was respectful until our encounter ended and I obeyed their orders.
I'm not some shady dude. I'm a young, successful attorney in this city with no criminal record beyond the occassional parking ticket. I've never been in a fight in my life.
The real kicked of this story is that the same night this happened to me, a woman was raped a few blocks away right around the time the cops were bothering me and pushing me around.
If that's the meaning of protecting and serving, maybe we should just outsource the job to the Mobsters who I'm sure would conduct themselves with no less dignity.