By Maudlyne Ihejirika
Chicago Sun-Times
CHICAGO — With the reward for information leading to the killer of Chicago Police Officer Michael Bailey this past weekend reaching $130,950, the question arises whether cash incentives are enough to break the so-called code of silence that leaves so many murders unsolved in the inner city.
They do sometimes, according to groups like Crime Stoppers and the Rev. Michael Pfleger’s St. Sabina Church, which last year glommed on to the tool as one more salvo in its anti-violence campaign.
“I can testify that they work,” says Willie Williams Sr., whose son Willie Williams III, 17, a college-bound Robeson High School student, was gunned down April 1, 2006, outside the Ford City Theaters at 76th and Cicero.
After nearly three years and no progress in the case, St. Sabina’s offer of a $5,000 reward in March 2009 in that particular case seemingly opened the flood gates for information to start flowing in to the Chicago Police Cold Case Squad, Williams recounts.
His son’s alleged killer was apprehended within a year. Denied bond, Eddie Fenton, 24, a known member of the Black P Stones street gang, currently awaits trial in the case.
However, in the three weeks since the 62-year-old Bailey was gunned down as he cleaned his car, in uniform, outside his home in the 7400 block of South Evans, a cash carrot for help in solving the July 18 murder has continued to rise, seemingly to no avail.
According to Police Supt. Jody Weis, only tips of a generic nature have come in about the case, which was the third killing of an officer in two months. Quickly apprehended, the alleged killers of Officers Thomas Wortham IV and Thor Odin Soderberg are awaiting trial.
“That the reward has reached this amount, and still no one has come forward, speaks to just what a low we’ve dropped to in society. It’s a cross between fear and just don’t get involved,” Pfleger said.
“It’s not only those who saw it happen, but those who’ve heard something, or think they know, because nobody ever does these things and never speaks of it to another. How do you see a picture of Bailey, or of one of these youth who have been murdered, and do nothing?” he said.
“In my mind, if you do not come forward in some way -- to a faith-based organization, through an anonymous tip -- if you don’t do something, you’re a co-conspirator of any other crimes this person perpetrates, and you should be prosecuted. It’s gotten just that desperate.”
Last November, St. Sabina erected 20 billboards offering $5,000 rewards in high-crime neighborhoods where Chicago Public Schools children had been killed, their murderers uncaught. The church had used them before but was able to expand the effort based on support and funding from John Rogers of Ariel Capital Management.
In their wake, the billboards’ cash carrots have helped crack at least two cases.
In the Bailey case, three teens were brought in for questioning and released. And police have issued a vague description of an individual seen fleeing the scene: a black male, 6 feet tall, medium to light complexion, short hair, about 160 pounds, age 18 to 24. Anyone with information is asked to call Area 2 Detectives at (312) 747-8272.
You hope people would do the right thing, reward or not, said a parent, Tonya Burch, who last week erected three billboards offering $10,000 for information in the Aug. 1, 2009, killing of her son Deontae Smith, 19, at a block party at 61st and Green.
“But you know that money helps,” said Burch. “I’ve been out there passing out fliers for a year, and recently, one of the kids said to me, ‘Maybe if you offer some money, you’ll get something.’ Well, now it’s out there. I’m hoping he’s right.”
Copyright 2010 Chicago Sun-Times, Inc.