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Riding the Storm Out
Even with accountability and advocacy groups swirling and
job performance constantly being challenged, Chicago Police Officers can find shelter to be safe and successful
n BY MITCHELL KRUGEL
When working conditions threaten job priorities of getting home to the family and getting to the pension, how should officers react to somebody coming at them swinging a base- ball bat? They should respond the way Officer Robert Rialmo did in December 2015 and take out the piece of spit.
But Chicago Police Officers currently work in a world where police accountability offices and associations, aggres- sive public advocacy groups, attorneys looking for multi-mil- lion-dollar scores, news media with an agenda and even the City’s citizens incessantly look to scrutinize them for trans- gression. Rialmo’s shooting of a bat-wielding assailant on Dec. 26, 2015 symbolized the heat coming down on Lodge 7 members.
Even though an expert opinion concluded that Rialmo’s 2015 police shooting in which two people died was justified, the scrutiny from the Civilian Office of Police Accountability persisted. Even though the use of deadly force was in keep- ing with generally accepted and nationally taught tactics, standards and principles, media reports still questioned the response. Even though a Lodge 7 FOIA request resulted in discovering questionable practice in COPA’s investigation of the incident, and even though the Department declared Rialmo followed proper practice, the court of public opinion deferred complete exoneration.
But in a world filled with alphabet soup of COPA, GAPA, BLMCHI, ISRs and ULPs relentlessly demanding so much ac- countability that it takes a big bite out of time that could be spent making the city safer, what is the best response? When the criminals don’t even really hide their weapons anymore because they know beat cops are reticent to search their ve- hicles, how do you patrol so as not to jeopardize your career or family?
“The problem with fanaticism is that it’s forever hungry and needs constant feeding,” Lodge 7 President Kevin Gra- ham asserts. “You can never make these people happy, so they come up with things, real or imaginary. It’s a world look- ing for problems.”
So while doing the work they are required to do versus the work they enjoy doing or signed up to do, Lodge 7 members must have faith that there is shelter from the storm.
“Every time we have taken the City to court this past year, we have won on the unfair labor practice (ULP),” President Graham continues. “We are holding the City’s and the De- partment’s feet to the fire making sure they don’t railroad innocent police officers. You can count on us putting pro- tections in your contract to make sure you are not unfairly treated or criticized.”
Storm warnings
As President Graham alluded to in his report on page 5 of this issue, every Lodge 7 member – active or retired – could get caught in the storm. A substantive contributor to such a cloud is the burgeoning Wrongful Conviction movement that has been so eloquently documented on the Lodge 7 blog, The Watch.
Attorneys conjuring an industry built on seeing the City as a mark for million-dollar settlements resulting from claiming flaws in the way cases were handled has led to the exoner- ation of Nicole Harris for the murder of her own child, the exoneration of Stanley Wrice for the vicious rape and severe burning of a woman, the exoneration of Anthony Porter and the possible wrongful conviction of Alstory Simon and the exoneration of Madison Hobley for an arson that killed seven people.
“We are holding the City’s and the Department’s feet to the fire making sure they don’t railroad innocent police officers.”
Lodge 7 President Kevin Graham
“It has left officers concerned on a daily basis if they are going to get jammed up,” reasons Pat Fioretto, an attorney with Baum Sigman Auerbach & Neuman, which represents Lodge 7 in labor matters. “This is fear of being investigat- ed and finding something from two years ago because they didn’t properly fill out a report. They are fearful every day they go to work.”
Investigations resulting from the Wrongful Conviction movement are just the tip of the melting iceberg seeding the storm. The Lodge 7 Legal Defense Committee has had to request FOP attorneys be assigned to represent patrol cops and detectives named in lawsuits because the union doesn’t feel city attorneys “have the best interests of police officers in mind,” according to Legal Defense Committee Co-Chair Bob Bartlett. And FOP attorneys have filed a complaint with the City’s inspector general accusing an alderman of harassing and filing false complaints against the city workers, contend- ing an attempt “to undermine their First Amendment rights by employing illegal and coercive tactics.”
An eye of the storm gathered March 26 for a panel discus- sion on Chicago Tonight. Lori Lightfoot, president of the Chi-
32 CHICAGO LODGE 7 ■ APRIL 2018