Police torture probe was a sham: groups
BURGE CASE | 'Riddled with omissions, half-truths'
That's the conclusion legal and nonprofit groups make -- in a report to be released Tuesday -- about a special prosecutor's probe of alleged police torture under former Chicago Police Cmdr. Jon Burge.
Former Appellate Judge Edward Egan and attorney Robert Boyle spent four years investigating 148 cases in which defendants claimed they were tortured by Burge and his men into giving false confessions. The two prosecutors concluded torture occurred in at least three cases but said it was too late to bring charges.
Egan and Boyle offered only mild criticism of then-Cook County State's Attorney Richard M. Daley and then-First Assistant Dick Devine.
Transcripts of Egan and Boyle's interview of Daley show they were deferential to him, prompting a federal magistrate to write, "The statement taken by the special prosecutor from Mr. Daley contains little useful information. It consists almost entirely of leading questions posed by the counsel for the special prosecutor, often prefaced by long, factual recitations."
The report -- by a coalition that includes Northwestern University's Center On Wrongful Convictions, Amnesty International and lawyers representing the alleged torture victims in civil suits against the city -- recommends the Cook County Board hold a hearing into "questions concerning the special prosecutors."
The report cites a Sun-Times story revealing Egan's family ties to the Police Department, including a nephew who worked under Burge and was the arresting officer in one of the cases investigated.
"The record strongly suggests that the Special Prosecutors' investigation and resultant report, which cost the taxpayers of Cook County $7 million, were driven, at least in part, by pro-law-enforcement bias and conflict of interest, were riddled with omissions, inconsistencies, half-truths and misrepresentations, and reflect shoddy investigation and questionable prosecutorial tactics and strategies," the report concludes.