Is Ten Years Too Long For An Abusive Cop To Be Fired?

August 23, 2016 (Fault Lines) – Two Chicago police officers, after ten years of investigation and appeal, have finally lost their jobs. In 2006, a guy walked into a Taco Burrito King in Chicago complaining about a car that was parked blocking the parking lot entrance to the fast food joint, and, according to witnesses, stating:

Yeah, that guy’s an asshole for parking like that.

The problem was that the car had been parked there by Jason Orsa, an off-duty Chicago police officer, who was a little miffed at being described as an asshole and responded verbally to the guy, Obed DeLeon, who then suggested that the “asshole” go move his car and park it properly.

Well, you certainly can’t allow mere citizens to call off-duty police officers, who are dressed just like every other citizen in the joint, an “asshole,” so Brian Murphy pulled his gun, pointed it at DeLeon’s head, and the beatdown commenced. It was even captured on the joints surveillance camera.

At the end of it, DeLeon[1] was arrested, along with two other men whose sole involvement was that they tried to be good witnesses. For sticking around, Shawn Nelson and Joseph Mularczyk were also arrested, because the responding sergeant, Louis Danielson told officers to:

[A]rrest these two for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

After charges were dropped, DeLeon filed a complaint against Orsa, Murphy, Danielson, and Daniel McNamara (who didn’t participate, but didn’t stop it or report it). After a four-year investigation where the officers were assigned to non-police, administrative duties, the department decided to fire Orsa and Murphy for multiple violations that included excessive force and making a false report. McNamara was suspended without pay for 18 months. Danielson was suspended for 180 days.

Orsa, Murphy, and Danielson didn’t like the results,[2] so they appealed their discipline to the Circuit Court.[3] And there it got interesting. Judge Kathleen Pantle ruled in favor of the officers, stating that the termination more than four years after the incident violated the officers due process rights, that the charges were barred by laches, and the decision of the board was against the manifest weight of the evidence. According to her decision, the officers were to be reinstated, which ignores the fact that they were still getting paid while the appeal progressed.

As a sidenote, Chicago paid each of these officers over $600,000 in salary over the ten years while this process dragged on—over a million bucks. You really are encouraging officers to appeal if you keep them on the payroll while this is going on. We don’t operate that way down in Texas. Once the city board says you’re fired, you turn in your badge and gun, and you clean out your locker. If you want to file suit, you are on your own for the costs, plus you have to figure out how to put food on the table. You damn sure don’t get to continue to collect a monthly paycheck from the city.

Now the City of Chicago didn’t like the decision, and appealed.[4] On August 9, 2016, the Illinois Appellate Court reversed Judge Pantle. Not only did it reverse her, the opinion pretty much called bullshit on her decision. Judge Michael Hyman, delivering the opinion,[5] stated:

Although we review the decision of the administrative agency and not the decision of the circuit court, our careful and close review of the video leaves us puzzled by the circuit court’s rejection of the Board’s prima facie true and correct findings.

That, combined with this statement at the end of the opinion, pretty much sums it up:

The Board determined Murphy’s and Orsa’s conduct to be sufficiently serious to warrant discharge. For Murphy, this conduct included pointing a gun at a civilian without justification and pushing DeLeon against a wall, not remaining at the scene of the incident, and making false official reports in an attempt to cover-up his and others’ misconduct. For Orsa, this conduct included kicking a civilian repeatedly without justification, actively participating in rather than attempting to control a dangerous and disorderly situation, not remaining at the scene of the incident, and making false official reports in an attempt to cover-up his and others’ misconduct.

This much is crystal-clear. The officers used excessive force. They lied about it. And they depended on the system to keep them on the payroll for the next ten years.

The way you fix a problem like the one Chicago has on excessive force, lying, and the thin blue line is that you start firing people, as close to the event as possible. Laquan McDonald was killed in 2014, and the city is just now getting around to firing seven officers accused of lying about it, over two years later.

That doesn’t cut it. You investigate it immediately, both criminally and administratively, and if they violated policy, you fire them.

It really is that simple.

[1] DeLeon is not a saint. He is a former gang member with multiple felony convictions.

[2] McNamara apparently served out his suspension.

[3] Circuit courts are the trial court of general jurisdiction in Illinois.

[4] The city did not appeal as to Danielson, and he was reimbursed for his back-pay.

[5] Orsa v. The Police Board of the City of Chicago, 2016 IL App (1st) 121709.

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