By Frank Main
The Chicago Sun-Times
CHICAGO — The Chicago Police Department has eliminated “roundtables,” the controversial inquiries held immediately after police officers are involved in shootings.
At a roundtable, an officer would give a cursory statement to a gathering of officials -- including police commanders, a representative of the Cook County state’s attorney’s office, and a representative of the Independent Police Review Authority, the civilian agency that investigates shootings. Roundtable statements weren’t under oath, and the proceedings weren’t recorded.
Roundtables were intended to give law-enforcement officials a snapshot of the circumstances surrounding a shooting by an officer. But the inquiries have come under criticism in recent years because the conclusion of the roundtable almost always was that the shooting was justified -- even though some of those same shootings later resulted in millions of dollars in legal payouts.
Detectives will continue to conduct their own criminal investigations into police shootings of civilians. And IPRA will continue to investigate whether the officer properly discharged his or her weapon.
The Fraternal Order of Police agrees with the decision to do away with roundtables, but the union is at odds with IPRA over when an officer needs to speak with an IPRA investigator.
“Ideally, IPRA would like to speak to the officers as soon as possible,” said Curtis Tarver II, a spokesman for IPRA. “Our position is that the contract allows us to compel a statement from an officer if he refuses to give it.”
But the FOP says officers should have a “cooling-off period” before being required to speak to an IPRA investigator. Other law-enforcement agencies have cooling-off periods of 24 or 48 hours.
The FOP is asking for an arbitrator to resolve the dispute with IPRA. Until then, the union is recommending officers don’t speak to IPRA investigators at shooting scenes.
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