CHICAGO — When prosecutors this week dropped criminal charges against an Oak Lawn police officer accused of using excessive force to arrest a 17-year-old boy, it was the latest in a growing list of victories for officers charged by the state of Cook County were accused of misconduct. Law firm.
“After a thorough investigation, we have concluded that the evidence is insufficient to meet our burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt to proceed with the prosecution of this case,” the prosecutor’s office said in a written statement.
CWBChicago reported Thursday that Illinois State Police documents showed prosecutors rushed to get a grand jury indictment against Oak Lawn Police Officer Patrick O’Donnell just one day before state police were set to conduct a comprehensive investigation into the O’Donnell’s case to determine whether the agency supported criminal charges.
In one report, an ISP researcher wrote that “there is no discussion [an] research with [ISP’s Public Integrity Task Force] before an officer was charged has never happened in the past 20 years of PITF investigations.”
Retired Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel called the decision to prosecute O’Donnell “outrageous and unprecedented in my experience as a police officer.”
“The fact [former Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx] that she chose not to follow the investigators’ advice suggests that she made her decision before the investigation was completed, effectively using her investigators to justify her conclusion,” Weitzel said. “In addition, the involvement of its researchers [in securing the grand jury indictment] raises concerns about a potential conflict of interest.”
Just last month, a Chicago officer accused of unlawfully seizing and inventorying firearms while on patrol was found not guilty of all charges.
In one particularly high-profile and racially charged case, Foxx’s office charged CPD Officer Bruce Dyker with aggravated battery and official misconduct in June 2022 after viral videos showed him struggling with a Black woman walking her dog after hours on North Avenue Beach. A year later, the Public Prosecution Service dropped the whole case.
In another incident captured on video, Sgt. Christopher Liakopoulos and Officer Ruben Reynoso were accused of shooting an unarmed man in Pilsen in 2022. Judge Lawrence Flood acquitted both men in September.
“The fact that the Cook County State’s Attorney charged police officers with serious criminal offenses and did not win in court means a lot,” Weitzel said. “It means they didn’t have the evidence, plain and simple, which means the preparation of the case was mediocre at best.”
Weitzel believes prosecutors have pursued weak cases to score political points.
“Kim Foxx has taken ‘defund the police’ to a new level by attempting to ‘reimagine’ policing by accusing police officers of crimes when they had no justification to do so. She and her office staff were more interested in gaining national exposure…which would give her a national platform for her agenda.”
Other cases that prosecutors have brought against police, only to later drop the charges or lose in court, include:
- CPD Lieutenant Wilfredo Roman was found not guilty of shoving a flashlight between a teenager’s buttocks while arresting the boy suspected of carjacking.
- Sergeant Michael Vitellaro gained widespread attention after he was captured on video pinning a teenage boy to the ground because he mistakenly believed the teen had stolen his son’s bicycle. The boy was not involved and prosecutors charged Vitellaro with assault and official misconduct. Judge Paul Pavlus acquitted Vitellaro said in a court filing that he did not believe the boy and his friends had given credible testimony.
- Prosecutors charged Officer Christopher Hillas with official misconduct and aggravated battery in 2022, saying he punched a handcuffed man in the groin. According to Hillas’ lawyer, the situation was a misunderstanding resulting from the men butting heads. An embarrassed prosecutor was forced to drop the case within weeks after a grand jury declined to indict Hillas.
- Melvina Bogard, accused of shooting an unarmed man as he fled a physical altercation with her partner on the Grand Red Line platform, was found not guilty.
- Angel Escobedo, a CPD officer accused of threatening two off-duty officers with a gun during an early morning argument in Roscoe Village in 2021, was found not guilty in a trial by Judge Donald Panarese.
- Earlier this year, a former Chicago police officer was found not guilty of murdering his girlfriend while on the force in 2021.
Asked about instances in which he believes Foxx’s office properly pursued criminal charges, Weitzel pointed to allegations that two Chicago cops and a former prosecutor conspired to collect more than $100,000 in overtime. The retired chief also pointed to charges against an off-duty sheriff’s deputy in connection with an off-duty collision that seriously injured a jogger.
Weitzel suggested that Foxx’s successor, Eileen O’Neill Burke, who took office on Dec. 2, should take steps to rebuild the relationship between prosecutors and the county’s police departments.
“She should appoint a Cook County Police Department liaison for her cabinet-level staff,” Weitzel said. “This would go a long way to restoring trust between police services and the public prosecutor.”
O’Neill Burke started on the right foot, according to Weitzel.
“She had an impact on the law enforcement community on her first day. She immediately appointed experienced prosecutors to positions of authority, and the same prosecutors are the decision makers. She explicitly stated what her initiatives would be, and they were all aimed at reducing violence in Cook County by gaining public confidence in her enforcement of public safety initiatives.
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