Officers Behaving Badly

By Matt Wood in News on Oct 26, 2006 11:24AM

Greed must have been contagious in Chicago-area police departments this summer and fall. That, or those holiday gift exchanges have gotten really out of control, because cops have been stealing money so they can buy the chief an iPod instead of just knitting him an oven mitt this year.

Two Chicago officers were arrested yesterday in an FBI sting for stealing $31,000 in cash from suspected drug dealers. An informant tipped off the FBI that officers Richard Doroniuk and Mahmoud "Mike" Shamah were planning to rip off money that should have been taken as evidence. In June, they executed a search warrant at a self-storage company and swiped a bag containing $20,000 planted by the feds, then reported that nothing was found. They pulled the same stunt again in August, taking over $18,000, but this time they turned in $7,000. The two also face lawsuits for beating a suspect and planting drug evidence. Doroniuk on his own has been sued by the family of a suspect that he fatally shot, and another officer who he attacked with Mace. And if that's not all bad enough, he's been cheating on his wife too. His girlfriend showed up at court yesterday, telling the world she loved him so much that she named her chihuahua after him.

A Gary police officer didn't want to haul around bags of stolen cash, so he just decided to forge a $20,000 check and have his daughter try to cash it at a Currency Exchange this September. Victor Mobley used a neighbor's name to endorse the check, which was supposed to be for a student loan for his daughter. Both of them now face forgery charges.