Former Chicago police Supt. LeRoy Martin mourned
BY TINA SFONDELES Staff Reporter September 7, 2013 6:48PM
Constance Maxine Martin mourns as officers carry the casket of her husband former Chicago Police Supt. LeRoy Martin out of House of Hope on Saturday. | Alex Wroblewski/Sun-Times
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Updated: September 8, 2013 2:39AM
LeRoy Martin, Chicago’s police superintendent under Mayors Harold Washington and Richard M. Daley, was remembered Saturday as “a tireless advocate for the oppressed” and a true believer that the police can make a difference in the world.
Family and friends filled hundreds of seats at a funeral service for Martin on Saturday at the House of Hope on the city’s South Side.
Another 100 or more police officers and retirees also came to pay tribute to Martin, who started as a beat cop and rose through the ranks.
Martin died Aug. 31 at the age of 84.
Martin’s niece Ruby Rogers read aloud a poem titled “Top Cop,” written by Constance Martin, the superintendent’s wife of 59 years, when her husband was named by Washington to the department’s top job.
“Born and raised on the West Side of town, a poor Depression kid with skin of brown, before black became beautiful, you were called black, a derogatory term, you determined not to let it hold you back. . . . As a policeman, you started from the bottom and went all the way to the top. You worked hard and earned every promotion you got. That’s why you became Chicago’s top cop.”
Martin spent 37 years with the department. He was buried in a police uniform, with his police hat, and the casket bearing his body was wrapped in a city of Chicago flag.
“He had seen it all in the most devastating and overwhelming forms, yet he remained a calm steady agent for change in our society, a beacon of hope, a lifeline for many, a role mode for us all,” Rev. Jesse Knox III of the Church of the Good Shepherd said. “He was, in Dr. King’s words, a drum major for justice . . . and in reflecting on what will be his legacy, we accent his never-ending quest for justice.”
Eugene Williams, chief of the city’s Bureau of Administration, called Martin “brutally honest” and spoke of the difficulty of the position.
“It can get awfully lonely at the top. Ask Garry McCarthy, Jody Weis, Phil Cline, Terry Hillard, Matt Rodriguez,” Williams said. “Indeed, those four stars can become very, very heavy — heavy on your shoulders. But you have to take the hits. And Supt. Martin took more than his fair share.”
His tenure was also marred by allegations that detectives in the South Side Area 2, working under now-imprisoned Cmdr. Jon Burge, tortured crime suspects. Martin at first dismissed the allegations. But ultimately he ordered hearings that resulted in Burge’s dismissal in 1993.
Martin is also survived by two sons — Cook County Circuit Judge LeRoy Martin Jr. and Ronald Martin, a Chicago cop — and a daughter, Dawn Martin, an administrative assistant at the Cook County Juvenile Detention Center.
Martin’s grandchildren said the man they called “Papa” had a no-nonsense approach to education and making something of yourself. But his oldest granddaughter, Brittany, said “he very rarely told us no. Chicago’s top cop had a soft spot.”
