Economic misconduct by cops

            I was honored to have been able to serve under Chief Bill Parker at the LAPD.  He truly is credited with changing the culture of the LAPD, during the late 1940s and 1950s, from an anachronistic, corrupt police agency to a professional one.  He was a strict disciplinarian.  Theft was theft whether it was $5 or $50,000.

            Theft in law enforcement seems to be a recurring incident of misconduct these days.  It seems to have become even more prevalent since the economic downturn in 2008.  I wrote an article for the PATC eNewsletter back then signaling that it was time for every agency to refocus its efforts to prevent and/or uncover this abuse.

            What kinds of thefts are we seeing these days?  Chiefs, Sheriffs, officers and trusted clerical personnel stealing from the evidence room, selling police evidence/equipment on EBay, and misusing police funds set up for official business.  Police union officials are misusing funds.  Police officers entrusted with funds set up for killed or wounded officers are caught using these for their own purposes.  Manipulation of time sheets, overtime, and paid detail work with the employees often triple dipping – working one job yet getting paid from two or three different sources for the same hours worked.  Vice and narcotic officers taking money based on alleged payments to nonexistent informants.  Theft by special operations units during high-risk raids and warrant service.  Employees misrepresenting financial incomes and swearing under penalty of perjury to obtain mortgages.  Defraud linked to misuse of the workers’ compensation program. 

            What seems to be some of the driving forces for this misconduct?  The most common appears to be that the officer got used to having a certain level of income with constant overtime and paid details.  They spent to that level.  When the economy tanked these sources of income dried up.  But their mortgages, car/boat payments, and credit card bills didn’t!

            Another common factor seems to be gambling addiction.  They get themselves so overloaded with debt and hope that gambling more will get them out of it.  The gambling establishments don’t build those megaresorts on winners!

            Continuing economic misconduct is uncovered in the various real and sting operations for protection of drug dealers and gamblers.  There also have been several instances of steering traffic collision victims to favored repair shops for kickbacks to the officers.  

            And, of course, there still is the pressure of substance abuse; alcohol, drugs and steroids.  Steroid use can run as much as a $1000 a month.

            So what should we be doing in our agencies?

            First, make roll call/briefings and in-service training more realistic by using actual economic misconduct incidents.  Do a Google search or use a pretty comprehensive site – policemisconduct.net.  Get examples to use with your people and show them that this form of misconduct will also end up in significant jail time.  Yes, we need to remind them that theft is wrong!

            Second, ensure that the auditing of special and operating funds is real.  Overtime and paid details can still be done in-house.  These realistically should be done monthly, but quarterly would still be acceptable.  Look for end of watch arrests to pump up overtime.  Consider a sudden increase in traffic ticket writing as a potential attempt to increase court time.  Consider whether teams or watches are putting excess numbers of officers on arrest reports to increase potential court time.  Someone involved in the task should not do the audit of this usage.  Special funds, like confidential monies, community action, charitable fundraising, youth programs and employee union finances can only be done by an outside approved accounting firm to remove any stigma of impropriety.  Most of these types of audits are done on an annual basis.

            Third, don’t overlook the evidence/property room audit.  Where we get into trouble is guns, narcotics and money.  Too often an agency allows this audit to be done by the employee responsible for the task.  It doesn’t work!

            Fourth, everyone in the agency must keep their eyes open and ears attuned to changes in fellow employee behavior.  You’re not snitching, you’re helping everyone in your agency if you identify this type of misconduct early on.  Look for unusual spending sprees.  Which employees are hogging OT or paid details?  Who’s suddenly become stressed and talks more about money problems? 

            Fifth, consider the use of annual financial disclosure reporting.  I know this is controversial in law enforcement agencies, but this is common in all sectors of the private employment field.  Nearly every elected official has to submit these types of oversight forms.  It would be unrealistic to require all police employees to do this.  But, those in high profile, vulnerable tasks and assignments known to present temptation should be required to submit these pretty much innocuous forms. 

            And lastly, train your IA/OPS investigators how to best conduct an investigation of economic misconduct. These are significantly different than most of our other misconduct investigations.  My good friend Steve Rothlein wrote “Hidden Assets” regarding these types of investigations and you can access this at patc.com.

The NYPD Stop, Question and Frisk civil trial

Anybody who has been a cop has made pedestrian/suspicious person stops.  It’s an essential tool in any community; big, small, urban or rural.  The cop looks for things that are out of the ordinary and not appropriate for the place and time.  High crime areas and recent crime trends are also considered.  You look at things the subject does, or maybe doesn’t do under the circumstances.  It’s something you develop when you’re a cop.  These objective observations build the “reasonable articulable suspicion” that’s necessary to detain someone on the street, question them and, when necessary, conduct a frisk/cursory search to eliminate any potential weapons that could endanger the officer.  Cops have been doing these stops long before I began my career in 1961.  The U.S. Supreme Court simply codified this practice in 1968 with the Terry v. Ohio case.

Now rarely do courts take notice of this type of citizen encounter, unless it results in something else…a criminal suppression hearing or use of force.  In November 2011 I testified in a Federal bench trial on the legality of a pedestrian stop; Petro v. Town of West Warwick, RI.  That encounter ended in the man’s death due to the subsequent altercation with the officers involving batons and OC spray.  The young man was dead when they arrived at the police station 4 minutes later.  His situation was exacerbated by a congenital heart problem.  But, the main issue was the legality of the initial stop which the Judge found to be unlawful primarily based on the involved officers’ own testimony.  This case resulted in a sizeable money verdict.

So what’s the big deal with the current Federal class action civil lawsuit in New York City?  One thing it covers 10 years worth of documented SQF encounters totaling over 4.5 million.  Everything seems to be bigger and more complicated with the NYPD. Spicing this up is the allegation by some officers and tape recordings of their superiors that there is a quota forcing the field officers to make these stops.  The Department’s position is that there may be a performance number, not a quota.

Last week I testified for the Plaintiffs at the Federal bench trial in this SQF case; Floyd, et al., v. NYPD.  The thrust of my expert testimony was (1) notice to the NYPD was ample; (2) deficient supervision of the field implementation of the SQF operation; and (3) administrative investigations involving citizen complaints stemming from these types of stops weren’t done in a reasonable manner.  None of the NYPD citizen encounters ended in a death or serious injury.  This trial is focusing simply on the legality of the encounters and the sufficiency of the documentation by the field officers.

What was the agency notice?  Going back to 1999, the N.Y. Attorney General studied the practice.  Some of the findings of that study indicated that there was a racial imbalance in the SQF encounters.  At that time the NYPD required officers to do a narrative on the form used for these stops.  This report found that the narratives in 39 percent of the stops were either unlawful on its face or lacked adequate sufficient articulation to determine the legality one-way or the other.

Then in 2003 the NYPD entered into a settlement agreement with a class of plaintiffs known as the Daniels Settlement.  The Department said it would develop a form for these stops and conduct audits to determine the sufficiency of the articulation for the stops.  The Department developed very extensive and adequate written training, policy statements and legal bulletins.  The form developed was the UF-250, which is a double-sided form with the specifics of the time, location and individual and a very extensive group of check-off boxes.  About 2008 a section was added regarding use of force during these SQF encounters including “taken to ground, baton, and OC spray.”  Unless there is an actual arrest resulting from the SQF, this appears to be the only notation or report of whatever force might have been used.  Of course no one in police work today would accept this as being adequate reporting of this level of use of force.

The other essential piece of the SQF written agency directions is that the officers must “fully articulate” the reasonable suspicion for the stop in his/her memo book/activity log.  NYPD seems to be the only police agency that uses this type of documentation of police activity that the officer then takes home or places in his/her locker at the end of the shift. 

Every year since 2003 until 2012 the Department has audited the use of the UF-250 and memo book entries associated with the SQF encounter.  On a scale of 1, being failure, to 4, being superior, the Department’s own auditing has shown a consistent failure by all patrol commands with the exception of Transit and Housing who have reached the 3, or passing.  I’ve wondered whether this is due to better supervision or the fact that both of these operations are the most heavily controlled by surveillance cameras.  It’s obvious that the field officers are thumbing their noses at the written provisions.  The field officers and their sergeants have created an “operational policy” markedly different than what the Department professes in written training and policy.

When you discover a problem in your agency, do something about it!  Fix it!

A wide range of field sergeants and precinct Integrity Control lieutenants were deposed and testified in this NYPD case.  With rare exception, they all said they just looked at the 250 forms to see if the boxes were filled out.  Virtually none of these including the officers themselves said anyone looked at their memo books.  There were virtually no documented sanctions for any sergeant or officer for this omission.  Even when there was a citizen complaint filed, these areas of omission were either not investigated or no sanctions were imposed on the sergeants and officers who violated the written guidelines.  On the eve of trial the Department adopted a new requirement that now the officers copy the page of their memo book and attach it each UF-250.  Fat chance that will happen!

What is amazing is that the Department either will not or has not considered making a report form consistent with its own legal requirements.  A police report that has a number.  An official report that can be retrieved without asking the officer to bring it in. 

So what can we learn from the troubles in this NYPD civil case.  Maybe we need to fully document the elements of reasonable suspicion even in cases of a simple Terry stop.  We are seizing the citizen, aren’t we?  A lot of you probably do that between your CAD system and the officer writing a full description of the stop in the vehicle computer identified to the CAD number.  Like any field police activity, supervisors should be required to look at these forms when they sign off on them and ask the officer questions when the information is lacking.  As with any field activity some quality control effort should be exerted to see whether the officer and the citizen have similar versions of what occurred.  And, of course, just like with traffic enforcement someone in the agency has to determine whether these types of stops are consistent with the make-up of the community being policed and the current crime patterns. 

Reform of the Chicago Police

Yesterday, April 15th, I was invited to give a presentation at this forum organized by the University of Illinois Chicago Criminal Justice Society.  Three other presenters were significant.

Rob Warren, Ex. Dir. of Northwestern University Center for Wrongful Convictions talked about his experiences that have resulted in 35 persons being exonerated and freed from prison.  His suggestions to combat this type of wrongful conviction based on false confessions is fourfold:  (1) record all interrogations, (2) limit the length of the interrogations, (3) prohibit investigators from lying to suspects during interrogations, and (4) allow expert testimony on false confessions at trial.  I found one of this points interesting.  He said that confessions that were not false averaged a little over 2 hours of interrogation, while those found to be false confessions lasted for over 6 hours and in one case 16 hours.

Ignacio Cano, a professor from the State University of Rio de Janeiro, came to us via Skype.  It seems that our TSA had shut down its vista computer link for 24 hours so he couldn't get on the plane in Brazil.  His presentation concerned police reforms in South and Central American countries. His experience wasn't good.  The bottom line was that outside efforts to change the culture of the police wasn't effective or lasting.  He believes that it must be a joint effort between outside influences and the officers inside the agencies.  He also said that officers involved in misconduct fell into two types.  The first were those who were lining their own pockets with money from drug operations or extortion. The second group were those who did misconduct designed to reduce crime even through murder of suspected criminals.  My good friend Steve Rothlein talks of this being coined 'Noble Cause.'  Professor Cano noted that all of the agencies refused to accept or acknowledge any responsibility in the actions of these officers. Just 'bad apples.'

The most interesting presentation, I believe, was the intimate explanation of Chicago Police corruption by Craig Futterman a professor from University of Chicago Law School. He and his students have been deeply involved in this area of police misconduct for nearly 20 years.  His law students rode with special enforcement units during one his research projects of police misconduct in public housing projects. These students came away with the perspective that the Constitution wasn't the same in these minority communities.  Terry stops were done without any hint of reasonable suspicion or any degree of articulation.

The other area of his historical work concerned the systemic and cyclic reform movement.  Every few years following a public outcry or high profile incident, the politicians would call for reform, have some sort of study, find a couple of scapegoats and then slip back into the way it always was when the hue and cry ended.  He has amassed a wealth of statistics on the officers involved in many of these most significant incidents of police misconduct.  In all of these the officers involved amassed huge numbers of citizen complaints, but the OPS or IPRA process and even that of IA did not identify these officers.  There was never any intervention.  These officers were not judged to have committed misconduct and were never disciplined.  Statistics seemed to overcome any intervention.  Of course, all of these units worked in minority areas of Chicago. 

Last week I read an article in TGest concerning an Ohio mayor who was foiled in his attempt to get someone to conduct an administrative investigation into actions of his Chief of Police.  The State agencies wouldn't help him unless it concerned a criminal allegation.  Even the Ohio Chiefs' Association refused to get involved.  Unfortunately this isn't uncommon!  Few want to wade into the dirty laundry of any agency.  Yet, it's a task that is often necessary.

 I've been involved as an outside consultant in several of these types of internal administrative investigations.  I've learned some valuable lessons.  In 2012 protections for an outside consultant in these types of investigations was enhanced by the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Filarsky v. Delia, 566 U. S. ____ (2012).  The Court extended qualified immunity to an attorney hired by a California Fire Department to conduct an IA on a firefighter.  The Court's decision hinged on common law and discussed the historical precedence of governments bringing in volunteers and outside experts to help in the affairs of the local government.

But, you should be aware of a few issues.  First, since you're not in a position to discipline the employee being investigated, you need to get someone in the local government to be the one to issue any admonishments such as Garrity or Kalkines.  After this is done that person can continue to sit in or leave and allow you to conduct the interview.  

Secondly, you have to familiarize yourself with the due process rights of the employee.  This means you must determine what, if any, provisions are in place in the personnel code, civil service rules, collective bargaining agreement or state police officer bill of rights.  Just because you're not an agency employee doesn't mean you get to step on the rights of the accused employee.

Lastly, some states may have requirements that someone doing this type of investigation must be a licensed private investigator.  I've run into that in two states.  It seems ridiculous since the same provisions doesn't stop an IACP or PERF investigation that is the same in scope.  I realize that this usually is just local politics at work.

A local government, whether it's the mayor, council, manager or chief of police, must have the option of looking outward for some administrative investigations.  Even if the state or another agency might take it on, these usually are very narrow in scope.  They don't look for the systemic issues.  They rarely try to cure the agency.  But, there aren't many outside consultants around with the depth of experience and knowledge to conduct these types of administrative investigations.  If you need one, begin the search early and vette whomever you might decide to pick.  The wrong choice will produce the wrong outcome.  Everyone will end up being hurt!

Code of Silence, part 2 of 3

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The “Code of Silence” or similar issue is prevalent in all walks of life.  Most people are reluctant to come forth with information that might hurt a fellow co-worker, many fear retaliation, and others feel safe hiding in the shadows.  I frequently hear cops say, “Why pick on us; the Code applies to lawyers, doctors, clergy and a lot of other professions?”  But, what makes it different in law enforcement is the impact it can have on the personal liberties and well being of civilians. Police employees have authorities given to no other employee in our society. Who else in America can use force, even take a life, or take away someone’s liberty by throwing them in jail without any immediate oversight?  And, usually other police employees are the only witnesses to police conduct or misconduct.

Then, of course, the existence and impact of the Code of Silence has been documented historically more frequently in law enforcement than in any other walks of life, as well.  After the Civil War, the KuKluxKlan Act was enacted in 1868 and the Voters’ Rights Act in 1871.  These came about when Southern sheriff’s and prosecutors looked the other way when blacks were lynched and persecuted by whites.  In the late 1960s the Johnson Study and Kerner Commission studied the urban riots in many American cities and found that the Code of Silence in law enforcement was one of the factors that caused community unrest.  Police sociologists have written about the influence of the Code in law enforcement; Neiderhoffer, Wilson and Skolnick in the 60s and 70s and later with Delattre.  Then, of course, you have the influence of movies and television with shows like Serpico, NYPD Blue, Chuck Norris’ Code of Silence, and the countless other productions.

The Code of Silence either currently exists or the potential for its existence is present in every police agency. It has significant implications on police agency employees who come forward with information adverse to other agency employees.  These employees who have done the right thing and acted professionally are often subjected to various forms of retaliation.  This retaliation frequently ends with the employee, who has done the right thing, being forced out of the agency due to the hostile work environment.  This often can end with these employees taking civil action against the agency.

But is it something that is inherent in and affecting all police agencies?  I don’t think so!  In some agencies it is deeply rooted in the history of the agency.  Many older agencies have three and even four generations of the same family who have been cops. In other agencies you might get a new, reform Chief who does all he or she can to eliminate or minimize the adverse impact of the Code on the agency.  But, unfortunately, these Chiefs don’t stay around too long.  The malcontents and promoters of the Code seem to last forever.  They exert a tremendous amount to influence and they know that the reform Chief is temporary.

On the other hand there are many examples where police employees have stepped forward and given information that results in significant agency changes.  There may be many motivations for these employees.  Some may truly be offended and outraged by the conduct of other employees.  Some may fear they may get caught up in the misconduct and are looking to protect themselves.  Some might see it as a way to step on others in an attempt to gain influence or promotion.  Others may see it as a way to create a change in administration.   

 

The four most reasonable approaches for a police agency to take in addressing the “Code of Silence” is (1) to acknowledge that the Code of Silence exists or the potential for it does exist, (2) have a written prohibition against it, (3) involve the subject in basic, in-service and supervisory training in realistic ways with real life examples, and (4) discipline, when appropriate, an employee who engages in giving false and/or misleading statements during an administrative investigation.   Don’t make the mistake many police administrators have done by replying that it doesn’t exist, has never existed and is simply something Hollywood has created.  Why be made to look foolish?

My next blog on the Code of Silence will delve into the telltale signs within a police agency that indicate that it may be alive and well and flourishing.

Will state social media legislation affect police personnel practices

Last week I published an article on the PATC Newsletter site concerning the current movement by several states who are passing restrictions on employers' use of social media for hiring and employee control.  Most of these are focusing on educational employers, but there are no provisions exempting law enforcement employers.  The following is the article:

How will the current trend to legislate employee rights regarding social media access affect our law enforcement personnel practices?  Not much if we continue to use reasonable and defensible practices.  Recently, six states have passed legislation directly targeting employers’ access to and use of employees’ social media sites.  We should expect that more would do so or be encouraged to do so.  The legislation in New Jersey and Delaware is specifically oriented to educational institutions and Maryland’s is focused on hiring.  But we should look at the elements in three other states that might signal the trend for the future – Illinois, California and Michigan.

In Illinois, 820ILCS55/10(2012), states, “It shall be unlawful for any employer to request or require any employee or prospective employee to provide any password or other related account information in order to gain access to the employee's or prospective employee's account or profile on a social networking website or to demand access in any manner to an employee's or prospective employee's account or profile on a social networking website.”  It does indicate that this is not applicable to employer electronic equipment.  It further states, “Nothing in this subsection shall prohibit an employer from obtaining about a prospective employee or an employee information that is in the public domain or that is otherwise obtained in compliance with this amendatory Act of the 97th General Assembly.”

California 2012 Cal ALS 618 (Chapter 2.5 § 980) states, “This bill would prohibit an employer from requiring or requesting an employee or applicant for employment to disclose a username or password for the purpose of accessing personal social media, to access personal social media in the presence of the employer, or to divulge any personal social media. This bill would also prohibit an employer from discharging, disciplining, threatening to discharge or discipline, or otherwise retaliating against an employee or applicant for not complying with a request or demand by the employer that violates these provisions.”  It has provisions, however, for investigations of allegations of employee misconduct, “(b) An employer shall not require or request an employee or applicant for employment to do any of the following:  (1) Disclose a username or password for the purpose of accessing personal social media.  (2) Access personal social media in the presence of the employer.  (3) Divulge any personal social media, except as provided in subdivision (c).  (c) Nothing in this section shall affect an employer's existing rights and obligations to request an employee to divulge personal social media reasonably believed to be relevant to an investigation of allegations of employee misconduct or employee violation of applicable laws and regulations, provided that the social media is used solely for purposes of that investigation or a related proceeding.”

Michigan, in its HB 5523 “Internet Privacy Protection Act,” states, “Sec. 3. An employer shall not do any of the following:  (a) Request an employee or an applicant for employment to grant access to, allow observation of, or disclose information that allows access to or observation of the employee’s or applicant’s personal internet account.  (b) Discharge, discipline, fail to hire, or otherwise penalize an employee or applicant for employment for failure to grant access to, allow observation of, or disclose information that allows access to or observation of the employee’s or applicant’s personal internet account.”  It further has specific sections on employer’s rights, “Sec. 5. (1) This act does not prohibit an employer from doing any of the following:  (a) Requesting or requiring an employee to disclose access information to the employer to gain access to or operate any of the following:  (i) An electronic communications device paid for in whole or in part by the employer.
(ii) An account or service provided by the employer, obtained by virtue of the employee’s employment relationship with the employer, or used for the employer’s business purposes. (b) Disciplining or discharging an employee for transferring the employer’s proprietary or confidential information or financial data to an employee’s personal internet account without the employer’s authorization. (c) Conducting an investigation or requiring an employee to cooperate in an investigation in any of the following circumstances: (i) If there is specific information about activity on the employee’s personal internet account, for the purpose of ensuring compliance with applicable laws, regulatory requirements, or prohibitions against work-related employee misconduct. (ii) If the employer has specific information about an unauthorized transfer of the employer’s proprietary information, confidential information, or financial data to an employee’s personal internet account.”  It further has provisions, “(2) This act does not prohibit or restrict an employer from complying with a duty to screen employees or applicants prior to hiring or to monitor or retain employee communications that is established under federal law or by a self- regulatory organization, as defined in section 3(a)(26) of the securities and exchange act of 1934, 15 USC 78c(a)(26). (3) This act does not prohibit or restrict an employer from viewing, accessing, or utilizing information about an employee or applicant that can be obtained without any required access information or that is available in the public domain.”

We can see that each one of these legislative acts is a little different.  Most allow for some exception if the employer is conducting an investigation about employee misconduct.  If your agency is in one of the states that have enacted this type of legislation, you should consult with your legal staff for specific guidance. 

One interesting aspect of all of these, however, is that it doesn’t preclude obtaining data in the public domain.  Now, if your investigators are up to date and know their stuff, they certainly know how to access this type of data in social media sites without the assistance of the employee or candidate.

This article will address this issue on two fronts.  The first will be the affect during the hiring process for new employees.  And, the second from the perspective of any potential impact to administrative investigations.

During the employment aspect in law enforcement we currently access numerous restricted and/or protected areas of a candidate’s personal data.  We require them to tell us about their medical history.  If necessary, they might be required to provide a medical release so we can access their medical histories directly from the medical provider.  We do similar requests for employment history and again, if necessary, request that the candidate sign a waiver to allow the prior employer to divulge this information.  We use our law enforcement position to access the candidate’s driving and arrest histories.  In many cases we access the candidate’s credit history.  All of these are reasonable.  In law enforcement we can show the relationship between these personnel behavior and performance indicators as relevant predictors of future success as a member of our public safety agency.

If the candidate has a social media account, that information is as relevant as those described above.  At LLRMI we have advocated that public safety agency employee candidates sign an affidavit or affirm their activity with any social media site.  Again, if necessary, we would request that the employee candidate allow the background investigator access to this site.  We don’t need their secret password!  We have recommended that the background investigator do this in the presence of the candidate so that explanations can be given directly to the investigator.  A candidate is not going to be screened out simply because s/he has a social media account.  But, sometimes the candidate’s behavior as reflected in the social media site might reasonably warrant further inquiry during the background investigation.

The second area for us in law enforcement is access to an employee’s social media account during an administrative investigation.  Again, at LLRMI, we recommend that your written policy specifically address this issue to put all employees on notice.  None of our public safety agencies are routinely monitoring these types of social media sites.  We certainly have much more to do.  But when it comes to an agency’s notice that something on an employee’s social media site might have the potential to adversely affect the employee’s performance or ability to perform, or might have the potential to adversely affect the agency’s morale, operations or efficiency, we have a duty and responsibility to look into the matter.  Think of the impact that we’ve seen throughout the country when something in an employee’s site hits the local news media or is found by a civil plaintiff or criminal defense attorney.

Again, we don’t need the employee’s password.  If it “directly, specifically and narrowly” relates to the employee’s job performance, we need to simply order them to allow us to have access to the site.  Again, it’s recommended that you conduct any review in the employee’s presence.  This will allow the employee an opportunity to clarify or explain any content in the site.

The Chicago "Code of Sience" civil trial

Last November I testified in the Chicago Police civil trial, Obrycka v. Chicago Police Department and Anthony Abbate (this is more fully described in an excellent article, including my expert report, “Code of Silence” by Americans for Effective Law Enforcement at www.aele.org).  You might recall the original incident that occurred back in 2007.  The videotape of the incident captured a very large off-duty, intoxicated Chicago cop, Abbate, coming behind the bar counter and beating the slight framed female barkeep.  As graphic as the videotape showed, it was an incident that occurs all too often with officers throughout the country when they get drunk and go crazy.  What made this different?

This became the Chicago PD’s Code of Silence watershed.  Why?  The City Attorney argued, unsuccessfully, that this was simply a minor battery involving an off-duty, drunken cop.  The City Attorney fought vigorously to deny any supervisory or agency liability.  The jury and Court found differently.  It resulted in a $850,000 verdict and a finding that the Police Department engaged in a Code of Silence to cover-up the involvement of the officers and supervisors.  That verdict doesn’t include the attorney’s fees and costs that might be three times that amount.

How did this assault become a significant and now reported decision for the Chicago Police Department?  Following the assault, the bar patrons called the PD to report the incident after Officer Abbate left.  The two Chicago officers who responded were told that the offender was an off-duty Chicago cop and that the incident was captured on the newly installed surveillance camera.  They left without looking at the video, attempting to determine more about the officer or notifying their supervisor.  It took four days for them to complete their report that also neglected to report these facts.  Abbate, other detectives and these officers were shown by cell phone records to have been in constant contact with each other.

The Department was caught off guard when the plaintiff attorney released to the press.  The Police Department immediately tried to push the case through the local courts as a misdemeanor crime.  Later, in deposition and in court, the Department and members of the State Attorney’s Office kept pointing fingers at each other in denying any impropriety in this decision.  Both Internal Affairs and the Office of Professional Standards investigated the case.  Abbate eventually was terminated and the initial responding officers received suspensions for not notifying their supervisor; not false reporting or false statements to OPS.

And so what does this mean to you in law enforcement?  Shits happens and it frequently happens when off-duty officers do strange and crazy things.  We can handle that!  But when you try to shine dung, you drag in supervisors and your agency.  A methodical and consistent investigative protocol is the only reasonable way to proceed.