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The Special Operations Section of the Chicago PD has yet another scandal on its hands: An unconstitutional sweep of a bar on March 27, 2004, was caught on video, and the officers' story does not, in any way, match what's on the tape, which is now in the hands of the Tribune. News of this perversion of the social contract comes as part of the bigger take-down of the SOS cops' style of protecting and serving.
Police reports claimed Raymundo Martinez threw a beer bottle outside a bar, prompting the officers to search him, whereupon they discovered a bag of cocaine and arrested him. Officers stuck with this story through preliminary hearings — er, isn't that perjury? — until Martinez's lawyer presented the bar's surveillance tape to the prosecution. "Instead of two officers approaching a man drinking on a public street, the video shows more than two dozen police from the SOS unit raiding the bar and searching everyone, and arresting Martinez inside the bar," sayeth the Trib. Charges against Martinez were dropped, but now the question is: Why didn't anyone investigate the SOS cops after something this damning surfaced?
The search of the bar was bogus and illegal. Then the police lied about their conduct. And this was all on the table in 2004. (Martinez and another man arrested in the same sweep also say that while they were in police custody, officers went to their homes and robbed them. This isn't the only pending robbery allegation against SOS officers.)
U of C law prof Craig Futterman sums it up pretty perfectly: "You have 30 officers in a clearly illegal sweep, and they knew it. There's clearly something wrong with the culture there."
Largely unrelated: There's a CPD judo club?
Photo by our editor at large, Rachelle.
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I wonder how many people in need who we could have helped with all the money that Chicago will have to instead pay out in law suits?
The department is without proper leadership from top to bottom. Dozens of police officers and you'd think a few sergeants and a lieutenant would be there.
No problem with them going into the bar. No problem with them searching people who look suspicious or whatever ground is required. But falsifying an arrest report (apparently proven)? And going and illegally searching a home while the arrestee is arrested (alleged)? The first should have resulted in discipline (firing), and whoever declined to discipline should now be disciplined. The second should result in charges.
But, again, the entire department is without decent leadership, from top to bottom. There are a few decent bosses scattered around, but not many. And that is where all of this starts.
Actually, this isn't a top to bottom thing. It's one unit, and if memory serves me correct, it's the one this thug Finnigan was a part of. Connect the dots, people, but don't create dots where there are none.
I'm sure this is just a diabolical and elaborate scheme by poor Chicagoans and storefront preachers to make Chicago's finest look bad.
#3, I can connect dots from here to eternity. Unsupervised tactical units in Austin, Morgan Park, Grand Central, Englewood indicted in the last 10 years or so. The citywide SOS unit is just one part of all this.
And you want to know who you will find in the SOS unit during all this? The children of numerous supervisors, including numerous recent exempt commanders.
Oh, and the top? Cline, Mr. plead the fifth in a federal case. Under him Starks, reputedly the father of children by at least 3 other officers in the CPD. Look up O'Shields and see if any bells get rung. Hanhardt?
Seriously dude, this was SOS but these complaints went up and down the chain of command, thru Cline and IAD and out to the judges and prosecutors and back to OPS.
I'd be shocked if there was any supervisor in the whole city who wasn't aware of these kinds of allegations being made on occasion against SOS. I'd be even more shocked if you could find a single person in the CPD is genuinely surprised that this stuff was allowed to fester.
Has there been a good Top Cop since Joe DiLeonardi [who allegedly was fired by mayor byrne because supposedly he would not give in to her outfit pals]?