List of officers recommended for firing grows to 50 as process to discipline Chicago cops in the most serious cases remains frozen

The Chicago Police Department concluded nearly two years ago that one of its officers sexually assaulted a woman in the back seat of her car while she was intoxicated and unable to give consent.

Although the criminal investigation was largely halted after the victim declined to press charges, the Civilian Office of Police Accountability’s investigation carried on, and earlier this year it sustained charges of domestic violence, sexual misconduct and making false statements.

The officer remains employed by CPD, even though COPA says he should be fired and Chicago police Superintendent Larry Snelling agrees.

The case is one of dozens in administrative purgatory as the Fraternal Order of Police — the union representing rank-and-file CPD officers — continues its effort to overturn a Cook County judge’s order that allowed for third-party arbitration but also called for public access in cases of the most egregious misconduct by Chicago police officers.

Since the beginning of 2024, records show, COPA has recommended CPD terminate 50 officers for various departmental rule violations, up from 28 in February. The agency has called for another 313 officers to be suspended so far this year.

The officer in the assault case was hired in 2019 and is now 28 years old. He has remained on CPD’s payroll, though stripped of his police powers and assigned to desk duty since July 2022. FOP President John Catanzara told the Tribune that the union did not provide any legal assistance to the officer because the alleged conduct was not related to any sort of police action and allegedly occurred while the officer was off duty.

The woman applied for and was granted two orders of protection against the officer, records show, but CPD’s criminal probe was largely halted after she declined to press charges. The officer sat for at least two interviews with investigators, including detectives from the Confidential Investigations Section of CPD Internal Affairs.

It’s unlikely the officer’s misconduct case will be resolved anytime soon as the protracted dispute over the future of police discipline in Chicago continues to play out before the Illinois Appellate Court.

The Tribune is not naming the officer because he was not criminally charged and the city has not brought any administrative charges against him.

“Due to the fact victim does not wish to pursue criminal charges against Offender for Criminal Sexual Assault and Simple Battery, Reporting Detective is requesting this case be (exceptionally) cleared closed,” the primary detective assigned to the criminal investigation wrote in October 2022.

Last February, based on “a preponderance of evidence,” COPA called for the officer to be fired. Snelling — who that same month issued a blistering critique of COPA’s investigative practices — agreed.

Though the legal fight continues over serious misconduct cases, the Chicago City Council last year approved the lion’s share of the proposed FOP collective bargaining agreement.

It provided officers with a nearly 20% pay raise over four years while creating another, new disciplinary mechanism to quickly adjudicate more minor disciplinary cases. Those hearings — the “Peoples’ Court” — are not documented by a court reporter and are not publicly accessible.

However, the city has not filed administrative charges against any FOP members since that judge’s order was handed down last March. The order stipulated that no police board proceedings can be held without the consent of the officer.

Meanwhile, the city and the FOP have not agreed on a structure that would provide for public access to arbitration hearings in serious police misconduct cases.

The FOP filed its brief with the Illinois Appellate Court late last month.

The FOP argued Cook County Judge Michael Mullen erred in his order by largely disregarding the factual findings of the independent arbitrator who oversaw contract negotiations between the city and union. That arbitrator ruled that CPD officers, as public sector employees represented by a collective bargaining unit, have the right to have major disciplinary cases decided out of public view by a third-party — a departure from six decades of precedent in Chicago’s often opaque and bureaucratic police-discipline apparatus.

“A presumption exists that arbitrators do not exceed their authority,” FOP attorneys wrote in their appellate brief, filed July 26. “Deference is owed to the arbitrator because the parties have chosen by contractual agreement how their dispute is to be decided, and judicial modification of an arbitrator’s decision deprives the parties of their choice.”

Further, the union argues, there is no established public policy in Illinois that requires serious police misconduct cases to be handled in public view. The ongoing federal consent decree governing CPD reforms is no exception, the union says, and a carve-out of the consent decree stipulates that the union’s collective bargaining agreement may not be overridden.

“As a voluntary settlement, the Consent Decree does not satisfy the threshold showing of a well-defined public policy and may not affect or interfere with the rights of a third party such as the Lodge,” the union wrote. “The Lodge did not consent to any of the provisions of the Consent Decree that were cited by the Circuit Court pertaining to the transparency requirements and did consent to any implied modification of its bargaining rights over these issues.”

Attorneys for the city are expected to soon file their brief with the Appellate Court.