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Justice Department will launch investigation into practices of Chicago police
Source: Washington Post
The Justice Department plans to launch an investigation into the patterns and practices of the Chicago Police Department, a wide-ranging review similar to those that scrutinized the police departments in Ferguson, Mo., and Baltimore, according to several law enforcement officials.
The civil probe, which the officials say could be announced early this week, comes as Chicago continues to grapple with protests after the release of a video showing the police shooting of Laquan McDonald, which prompted murder charges for the officer involved and the resignation of the city’s police chief. The Justice Department is already investigating the McDonald shooting, but this new investigation by the department’s civil rights division would focus on the police department’s practices broadly to determine whether any of them contribute to civil rights violations.
A spokesman for the Chicago Police Department said Sunday morning that he did not know anything about the possibility of a second, broader federal probe into the force. A Justice Department spokesperson did not confirm that a new probe into Chicago PD is imminent.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2015/12/06/justice-department-will-launch-investigation-into-practices-of-chicago-police/
It's a good thing that this police dept is finally being investigated.
21 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
despite a 6,000 page Senate torture report?
O.K. 
Guantánamo torturer led brutal Chicago regime of shackling and confession
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/18/guantanamo-torture-chicago-police-brutality?CMP=share_btn_tw
In a dark foreshadowing of the United States’ post-9/11 descent into torture, a Guardian investigation can reveal that Richard Zuley, a detective on Chicago’s north side from 1977 to 2007, repeatedly engaged in methods of interrogation resulting in at least one wrongful conviction and subsequent cases more recently thrown into doubt following allegations of abuse.
Zuley’s record suggests a continuum between police abuses in urban America and the wartime detention scandals that continue to do persistent damage to the reputation of the United States. Zuley’s tactics, which would be supercharged at Guantánamo when he took over the interrogation of a high-profile detainee as a US Navy reserve lieutenant, included:
• Shackling suspects to police-precinct walls through eyebolts for hours on end.
• Accusations of planting evidence when there was pressure for a high-profile murder conviction.
• Threats of harm to family members of those under interrogation used as leverage.
• Pressure on suspects to implicate themselves and others.
Threats of being subject to the death penalty if suspects did not confess.
When Zuley took over the Slahi interrogation in 2003 – his name has gone widely unreported – he designed a plan so brutal it received personal sign-off from then-US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/18/guantanamo-torture-chicago-police-brutality?CMP=share_btn_tw
In a dark foreshadowing of the United States’ post-9/11 descent into torture, a Guardian investigation can reveal that Richard Zuley, a detective on Chicago’s north side from 1977 to 2007, repeatedly engaged in methods of interrogation resulting in at least one wrongful conviction and subsequent cases more recently thrown into doubt following allegations of abuse.
Zuley’s record suggests a continuum between police abuses in urban America and the wartime detention scandals that continue to do persistent damage to the reputation of the United States. Zuley’s tactics, which would be supercharged at Guantánamo when he took over the interrogation of a high-profile detainee as a US Navy reserve lieutenant, included:
• Shackling suspects to police-precinct walls through eyebolts for hours on end.
• Accusations of planting evidence when there was pressure for a high-profile murder conviction.
• Threats of harm to family members of those under interrogation used as leverage.
• Pressure on suspects to implicate themselves and others.
Threats of being subject to the death penalty if suspects did not confess.
When Zuley took over the Slahi interrogation in 2003 – his name has gone widely unreported – he designed a plan so brutal it received personal sign-off from then-US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Bad lieutenant: American police brutality, exported from Chicago to Guantánamo
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/18/american-police-brutality-chicago-guantanamo
“From what I was told, General Miller thought he was the greatest thing since sliced bread,” Couch said. “Miller was amazed at the information he was getting. So apparently Zuley ratcheted up these techniques, with the backing of Miller, to go up the chain of command for approval.”
~snip~
Miller retired from the Army in 2006. He has disappeared from public view after invoking his right against self-incrimination when called as a witness in an Abu Ghraib-related trial that year. Emails seeking comment about Miller’s relationship with Zuley bounced back, and a spokesperson for the US Southern Command, which oversees Guantánamo, did not know how else to contact him.
~snip~
As the military intensified its treatment of Slahi, the FBI and Fallon’s task force, uncomfortable with torture, pushed back. But the military took full control of Slahi’s interrogation. On July 1, 2003, Miller approved a “special projects status” request for Slahi from the Defense Intelligence Agency, with Zuley placed in charge. By August 13 of that year, Rumsfeld personally signed off on the Slahi interrogation, already under way.
In addition to using stress positions, sleep deprivation and auditory bombardment against him, Zuley intended to make Slahi think he was taken somewhere else, somewhere more dangerous for him. He would be placed on a boat, and taken around the bay to disorient him, though they would never actually leave Guantánamo. Dogs would be used during the transport, Zuley wrote in a memo uncovered by a Senate committee, to “assist developing the atmosphere that something major is happening and add to the tension level of the detainee.”
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/18/american-police-brutality-chicago-guantanamo
“From what I was told, General Miller thought he was the greatest thing since sliced bread,” Couch said. “Miller was amazed at the information he was getting. So apparently Zuley ratcheted up these techniques, with the backing of Miller, to go up the chain of command for approval.”
~snip~
Miller retired from the Army in 2006. He has disappeared from public view after invoking his right against self-incrimination when called as a witness in an Abu Ghraib-related trial that year. Emails seeking comment about Miller’s relationship with Zuley bounced back, and a spokesperson for the US Southern Command, which oversees Guantánamo, did not know how else to contact him.
~snip~
As the military intensified its treatment of Slahi, the FBI and Fallon’s task force, uncomfortable with torture, pushed back. But the military took full control of Slahi’s interrogation. On July 1, 2003, Miller approved a “special projects status” request for Slahi from the Defense Intelligence Agency, with Zuley placed in charge. By August 13 of that year, Rumsfeld personally signed off on the Slahi interrogation, already under way.
In addition to using stress positions, sleep deprivation and auditory bombardment against him, Zuley intended to make Slahi think he was taken somewhere else, somewhere more dangerous for him. He would be placed on a boat, and taken around the bay to disorient him, though they would never actually leave Guantánamo. Dogs would be used during the transport, Zuley wrote in a memo uncovered by a Senate committee, to “assist developing the atmosphere that something major is happening and add to the tension level of the detainee.”
The disappeared: Chicago police detain Americans at abuse-laden 'black site'
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-police-detain-americans-black-site?CMP=share_btn_tw
Alleged police practices at Homan Square, according to those familiar with the facility who spoke out to the Guardian after its investigation into Chicago police abuse, include:
Keeping arrestees out of official booking databases.
Beating by police, resulting in head wounds.
Shackling for prolonged periods.
Denying attorneys access to the “secure” facility.
Holding people without legal counsel for between 12 and 24 hours, including people as young as 15.
At least one man was found unresponsive in a Homan Square “interview room” and later pronounced dead.
The secretive warehouse is the latest example of Chicago police practices that echo the much-criticized detention abuses of the US war on terrorism. While those abuses impacted people overseas, Homan Square – said to house military-style vehicles, interrogation cells and even a cage – trains its focus on Americans, most often poor, black and brown.
Unlike a precinct, no one taken to Homan Square is said to be booked. Witnesses, suspects or other Chicagoans who end up inside do not appear to have a public, searchable record entered into a database indicating where they are, as happens when someone is booked at a precinct. Lawyers and relatives insist there is no way of finding their whereabouts. Those lawyers who have attempted to gain access to Homan Square are most often turned away, even as their clients remain in custody inside.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-police-detain-americans-black-site?CMP=share_btn_tw
Alleged police practices at Homan Square, according to those familiar with the facility who spoke out to the Guardian after its investigation into Chicago police abuse, include:
Keeping arrestees out of official booking databases.
Beating by police, resulting in head wounds.
Shackling for prolonged periods.
Denying attorneys access to the “secure” facility.
Holding people without legal counsel for between 12 and 24 hours, including people as young as 15.
At least one man was found unresponsive in a Homan Square “interview room” and later pronounced dead.
The secretive warehouse is the latest example of Chicago police practices that echo the much-criticized detention abuses of the US war on terrorism. While those abuses impacted people overseas, Homan Square – said to house military-style vehicles, interrogation cells and even a cage – trains its focus on Americans, most often poor, black and brown.
Unlike a precinct, no one taken to Homan Square is said to be booked. Witnesses, suspects or other Chicagoans who end up inside do not appear to have a public, searchable record entered into a database indicating where they are, as happens when someone is booked at a precinct. Lawyers and relatives insist there is no way of finding their whereabouts. Those lawyers who have attempted to gain access to Homan Square are most often turned away, even as their clients remain in custody inside.
