Chicago police supervisors did not properly monitor body cameras: IG

Supervisors in seven Chicago police districts failed to properly review footage captured on officers’ body cameras over a five-month period, according to an inspector general’s report released Tuesday.

Watch lieutenants on all three daily shifts are required to review one body-camera recording per shift under the Chicago Police Department’s consent decree. But between November 2017 and March 2018, lieutenants in seven Chicago police districts — primarily on the South and West sides — failed to meet that requirement, according to the Office of Inspector General.

“Given the context of strained relations between the Department and the community in recent years, it is essential that CPD establish and reinforce a culture of compliance within its BWC (body-worn camera) program to ensure that police encounters are video- and audio-recorded for subsequent investigation and review,” Joseph Lipari, deputy inspector general for public safety, wrote in the 53-page report.

The seven districts:

• Wentworth District in Bronzeville and Kenwood
• South Chicago District in Hegewisch and South Chicago
• Gresham District in Chatham and Auburn Gresham
• Deering District in Bridgeport, McKinley Park and Back of the Yards
• Ogden District in Lawndale and Little Village
• Shakespeare District in Wicker Park, Bucktown and Logan Square
• Austin District in Austin

Lipari’s report stated the department “failed to implement” a process that would randomly select a recording to view during each shift. The department also did not “provide guidance, standards or training” to the watch lieutenants.

In its response letter to the OIG, also released as part of the report, the police department said it planned to incorporate the footage review process into the training curriculum for new lieutenant classes. The department will also update the body camera policy “to make it abundantly clear that the random review requirement applies during each tour of duty.”

Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi added compliance with body camera footage reviews will also be addressed during the department’s Compstat meetings, in which CPD leadership discusses and analyzes crime trends and strategies.

Lipari said his office was “encouraged by the steps CPD has identified to improve compliance.” He noted, though, that the CPD did not provide a timeline for “implementing the automation of its random review process.”

The OIG also pointed to several incidents in which officers’ cameras were not working properly as detrimental to the department’s efforts to improve relations with communities of color.

“Compliance with conducting random (watch operations lieutenant) reviews of BWC recordings may reduce the risk of such incidents not being recorded in the future and increase public confidence in CPD’s commitment to capturing BWC recordings for all qualifying police encounters,” Lipari wrote.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Chicago Police Supt. Eddie Johnson responded to the inspector general’s report after their weekly meeting to discuss another violent summer weekend in Chicago.

“As part of the questions that commanders will get asked, they’re gonna be asked now specifically about their compliance with this particular directive,” Lightfoot, a former police board president, said Tuesday.

“I know that the superintendent is concerned about the fact that the lieutenants who had a responsibility to make those checks didn’t do it. They’ll be handling that internally to make sure that gets done and that there’s a level of accountability for those who failed to fulfill their obligation to make sure they were doing those inspections.”

Johnson acknowledged “a few of ’em weren’t doing it.” But he stressed two-thirds of the lieutenants covered by the inspector general’s report were fulfilling their oversight responsibilities.

“For those individuals that weren’t in compliance, then there’ll be some accountability,” the superintendent said.

Johnson was noncommittal when asked whether “accountability” meant suspensions, written reprimands or just a simple reminder.

“We’ll see going forward,” he said.