Time runs out for torture case
A former Chicago cop, now in Apollo Beach, is one of five whom prosecutors say they could have successfully prosecuted.
By TIMES WIRES
Published July 20, 2006
CHICAGO - A former Chicago police lieutenant now living in Apollo Beach is among five former officers that special prosecutors say could have been successfully prosecuted on allegations of torturing suspects.
The problem, they announced Wednesday, is that the cases are too old to prosecute now.
The investigation stems from allegations that police tortured nearly 150 black suspects in the 1970s and '80s while under the command of Lt. Jon Burge.
Burge, who bought his canal-front home on Flamingo Drive in Apollo Beach about 12 years ago, declined to comment Wednesday.
He walked outside the rose-colored ranch home, manicured with palm trees, around 2 p.m. to get the mail as thunderclouds rolled in. He shuffled down his driveway in loafers, jeans shorts and a polo, asked a Chicago television news crew if it could shave a few pounds off his frame, but otherwise didn't talk to reporters. Reached on the phone at his home, he apologized and said his lawyers wouldn't let him talk.
"I'm not at liberty to say anything," he said.
In three of the cases, the prosecutors said the evidence was strong enough to have warranted indictments and convictions.
"It is our judgment that the evidence in those cases would be sufficient to establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt," Robert D. Boyle and Edward J. Egan wrote.
The four-year investigation focused on allegations that 148 black men were tortured in Chicago police interrogation rooms in the 1970s and '80s. The men claimed detectives under the command of Burge beat them, used electric shocks, played mock Russian roulette and started to smother at least one to elicit confessions.
No one has ever been charged, but Burge was fired after a police board found he had abused a suspect in custody. His attorney has said Burge never tortured anyone. In about half the cases reviewed, Boyle and Egan said they found evidence of abuse.
Their report concluded that then-police Superintendent Richard J. Brzeczek was guilty of dereliction of duty and did not act in good faith in an investigation into claims of torture involving Burge.
They also faulted procedures followed by the Cook County State Attorney's Office and the Police Department at the time, saying the procedures were "inadequate in some respects" but had since improved.
Mayor Richard M. Daley was the state's attorney during part of the period investigated, but Boyle dismissed any notion that Daley knew about the torture. Daley delegated responsibilities to other people in his office and his only mistake was "perhaps relying on the judgment of others," Boyle said.
Of the cases Boyle and Egan said they found with enough evidence to prosecute, one involved the man whose allegations of abuse led to Burge's firing.
Andrew Wilson, who was convicted of killing two police officers in 1982, claimed Burge and two detectives beat and tortured him with electric shocks.
"Regrettably, we have concluded that the statute of limitations would bar any prosecution of any offenses our investigation has disclosed," the prosecutors said.
The statute of limitations for criminal charges from the allegations is three years.
Several people who claimed to have been abused or tortured by Chicago detectives have filed civil lawsuits against the city and police department, and the report could bolster their legal claims.
There had also been a legal battle over the release of the report.
The Illinois Supreme Court eventually denied a request from a former prosecutor, listed in court documents only as "John Doe," to block portions of the report from being released.
In May, a United Nations antitorture panel said the Chicago investigation needs to go further than it has.
The panel said the United States should ensure that law enforcement officials who mistreat suspects are punished.