For the second time in a month, a Chicago Police supervisor is coming under fire for sending a memo that appears to set an illegal quota for cops to make stops.
In a recent note to his sergeants, a lieutenant in the Jefferson Park District on the Northwest Side praised his officers for outperforming last year’s activity by 30 percent, but asked the sergeants to focus on those cops “not contributing their fair share, meaning they’re not meeting the agreed upon ‘one good stop per documentation per day worked.’ ”
On Thursday, Fraternal Order of Police President Kevin Graham blasted the memo, saying, “The best way to increase productivity among our members is for the city to make a good faith effort to support police officers, which is not currently taking place.”
Kevin Graham, president of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police. | Sun-Times
In a written statement, Graham said the FOP is “opposed to quotas in any form, regardless if they are deemed official policy or guidelines.”
“They are legally questionable,” he said, “and a poor policy to use against officers.”
On May 1, the commander of the Grand Central District on the Northwest Side sent out a memo to lieutenants saying he wanted officers to conduct “a minimum of 10 documented stops” during two-hour missions targeting suspected gang members responsible for a flareup of violence.
At the time, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois said that memo was “concerning,” pointing to a 2015 state law that says, “A municipality may not require a police officer to issue a specific number of citations within a designated period of time.”
In response to the latest memo in Jefferson Park, chief police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said the department is “continuing to advance traffic safety initiatives,” including one to target motorists who text message while they drive. But he said “the department does not have arrest or enforcement quotas of any kind.”
“This is a single communication between a lieutenant and his patrol shift from one of the city’s 22 police districts and is designed to serve as guidance,” he said in a written statement.
