Inquiry Finds Police Abuse, but Says Law Bars Trials
By Jodi Rudoren
The New York Times
Published: July 20, 2006
CHICAGO, July 19 - Special prosecutors said Wednesday that scores of criminal suspects were routinely brutalized by police officers on the South Side of Chicago in the 1970's and 1980's, but that extensive legal research persuaded them there was no way to skirt the statute of limitations preventing prosecution.
After four years, more than 700 interviews and $6 million, the prosecutors said they could prove beyond a reasonable doubt in court at least three cases of torture by the police, involving five former officers, and that they had found credible evidence of abuse in about half the 148 complaints they thoroughly investigated. But they rejected arguments by lawyers for people alleging abuse who said criminal charges could still be filed.
"We want to make it really clear, we only wish we could indict in these three cases," Robert D. Boyle, the chief deputy special state's attorney, said at a morning news conference downtown.
But Flint Taylor, a lawyer who represents some plaintiffs in abuse cases against the police, likened the situation to Ku Klux Klan killings in the 1960's that have led to prosecutions in recent years. "Something as serious as police torture, there shouldn't be a statute of limitations," Mr. Taylor said. "It's like murder."
The prosecutors' long-awaited 292-page report tries to provide closure on a painful chapter in Chicago history, one that has helped create a chasm between black residents and white police leaders, has driven changes in law enforcement procedures and has played a critical role in the national debate over the death penalty. In May, the United Nations Committee Against Torture highlighted the Chicago abuse accusations, complaining of "limited investigation and lack of prosecution."
The political implications were clear from the roster of people questioned in the inquiry, including Mayor Richard M. Daley, who was Cook County's top prosecutor when some of the most egregious complaints were lodged, and his former assistant, Richard A. Devine, now the Cook County state's attorney.
Mr. Boyle rebuked a former Chicago police superintendent, Richard J. Brzeczek, saying he "did not just do his job poorly; he just didn't do his job." But he had only mild criticism for Mr. Daley, who as prosecutor received a letter alleging serious abuse in 1982 but delegated its investigation. "We accept his explanation, but would not do it the same way he did," Mr. Boyle said of Mr. Daley.
A few prisoners had cattle prods placed against their genitals, guns shoved into their mouths or plastic typewriter covers held over their heads until they passed out, Mr. Boyle said, adding that most were abused with milder weapons like "the fist, the feet, telephone books."
Prisoners who have alleged torture and their lawyers said they were profoundly disappointed with the report and that Mr. Daley and Mr. Devine should face federal indictment along with former Commander Jon Burge, whom they accuse of overseeing torture, and some officers under his command at what are known as Detective Areas 2 and 3. They cited at least recent 20 instances of court testimony by police officers, prosecutors and other officials that they said constituted continuing criminal behavior that would justify charges of obstruction of justice, perjury, racketeering and civil rights violations.
"Somebody needs to go to jail," said one of the lawyers, Lawrence Kennon. "Burge needs to go to jail. His henchmen need to go to jail. The mayor should be indicted for covering up."
The report, along with 1,452 additional pages on the remainder of the 148 cases, is likely to become fodder for five civil cases alleging abuse pending in federal court, as well as more than two dozen instances in which prisoners are challenging their convictions based on accusations of mistreatment by the police.
Mr. Boyle, whose investigation was ordered by a judge in 2002, said a copy had also been requested by the United States attorney's office, which has previously declined to pursue the case.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Daley said the mayor was in San Francisco and would not comment on the report until later this week, if at all. The city's corporation counsel praised the special prosecutors' "hard work" but said she had not yet thoroughly reviewed the lengthy report.
Mr. Burge, who joined the police force months after returning from the Vietnam War in 1970, and rose to the rank of commander before being fired in 1993, did not respond to a telephone message left at his home in Florida. He has previously denied wrongdoing.
Mr. Brzeczek, who ran against Mr. Daley for state's attorney in 1984 and is a lawyer in private practice, denounced the report as "a big political cover-up," and questioned why it focused on his brief tenure as police chief when abuse accusations stretched for many years before and after.
"I think it's the work of two political appointees who had to fix the blame on someone who's not connected to Daley - that's me," Mr. Brzeczek said in a telephone interview.
Asked whether he would read the report, he added, "I have some back issues of The National Enquirer that I'm going to read first."
In a written statement, Mr. Devine, the prosecutor, said that when he was Mr. Daley's assistant, "claims of systemic abuse at Area 2 had not yet crystallized," and that in terms of the critical complaint that came to his attention, "I had no reason to believe that the claims were not handled appropriately."
Both he and Philip J. Cline, the current Chicago police superintendent, pointed to changes in policies, including videotaping of interrogations and the computerization of abuse complaints, that they said would prevent such a pattern from occurring again.
The special prosecutors enlisted eight lawyers and several former F.B.I. agents for the investigation, which included 217 subpoenas and produced 33,360 documents.
But the report offers no recommendations and little synthesis of the accusations of systemic abuse under Mr. Burge's command. Instead, it recounts a handful of cases, giving both the details of the underlying crimes and conflicting testimony through years of criminal and civil actions.
In each case, the prosecutors say whether an indictment could have been sustained against certain officers, though the conclusions are rendered moot by the overall decision that no prosecution is permissible.
David Bates, who said he was tortured four times over two days of interrogation in 1983, called it a "half-baked report" that is "hard on my family."
"Torture did exist,'' Mr. Bates said Wednesday. "There were several sessions of torture, starting with slaps and kicks and name-calling. What happened to me happened to so many other individuals."
"They never gave me water, they never gave me food," he added. "They only gave me pain."
Gretchen Ruethling contributed reporting for this article.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/20/us/20chicago.html?_r=1&oref=slogin