Holding Chicago homicides to 300 a year a ‘noble’ goal, but unrealistic, new FOP president says

Chicago Police Supt. David Brown’s goal of holding homicides under 300 this year won’t happen, says John Catanzara, the new police union president, without Mayor Lori Lightfoot demanding parental responsibility.

SHARE Holding Chicago homicides to 300 a year a ‘noble’ goal, but unrealistic, new FOP president says
Catanzara_XXXX20_01.jpg

John Catanzara was elected president of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police earlier this month.

Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times

Newly-appointed Police Superintendent David Brown’s goal of holding Chicago homicides under 300 this year is “noble,” but “unrealistic,” the new police union president said Thursday.

John Catanzara said he came away from his first meeting with Brown “hopeful” about forging a productive relationship with the former Dallas police chief, but skeptical of Brown’s aspirations and ideas.

Chief among them is Brown’s homicide goal; Chicago hasn’t had under 300 a year since 1957. Catanzara essentially called it a pipe dream until Mayor Lori Lightfoot uses her bully pulpit to demand parental responsibility in high-crime areas.

“These aren’t aliens coming down from space committing these crimes. These are … kids in the neighborhoods as young as 11, 12 years old — sometimes even younger. … At the end of the night, they’re putting their head down on the pillow in someone’s house who is looking the other way. They’re not asking where that $300 on the table came from. That’s where it needs to start. Until that dynamic changes, no amount of police is ever gonna stop” the violence, Catanzara said.

“I told the superintendent, ‘Even as a man and a black man at that, you are now considered the police. For you to even approach that subject, you would be considered a sell-out.’ The only person who can make that argument with any effective results would be the mayor. And mayors in this city have obviously avoided that at all costs. … They consider it a third rail. They’re deathly afraid of the results of telling people, ‘You need to look in the mirror.’”

Two years ago, candidate Lightfoot accused then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel of “victim shaming” for citing an absence of “values” and “character” in the African American community after a weekend bloodbath that left 71 people shot, 12 of them fatally.

At the time, Lightfoot called the timing of Emanuel’s moral lecture breathtaking in its insensitivity — and she essentially made that same argument about Catanzara on Thursday.

“It’s a misguided and potentially racist notion that the absence of parents somehow is the problem. … Many of these homes have parents. But when a parent doesn’t have a good job, doesn’t have a hope, doesn’t have access to health care, can’t take care of their kids — that’s not a parenting problem. That’s a societal problem. That’s a fail of the … city to not provide the kind of investments and supports that those parents need to be able to raise their children in a safe environment,” Lightfoot told the Sun-Times.

“It’s easy to sit and blame someone. But the reality is, these parents are living in unbelievably, astonishingly difficult circumstances. I’m all about personal responsibility. But we’ve got to set them up for success and the city has not done that. We’ve failed them. And we have to do better.”

During his first meeting with the superintendent, Catanzara said Brown also talked about his proposal to create a “specialized patrol unit” of uniformed officers to roam the city tamping down violent crime “hot spots.”

The superintendent called it a long-term replacement for the “surge strategy” that infuriated some aldermen by requiring officers from lower crime districts to be reassigned for two hours at a time to higher crime districts on the South and West Sides.

Once again, Catanzara believes the idea is unrealistic.

Fran Spielman Show promo

The Fran Spielman Show


Now available as a podcast, don’t miss the veteran City Hall reporter’s weekly interviews with Chicago’s movers and shakers.

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Luminary | Spotify | Stitcher

He pointed to the fact that roving units have come and gone in the Chicago Police Department and end up getting disbanded after becoming overly aggressive and embroiled in scandal.

“I’m holding my breath. I hope it works. … I don’t think anybody doesn’t want to see the homicide numbers plummet to record lows,” he said.

“But I’m also realistic that a lot of these things have been tried in various forms in the past, unsuccessfully. I don’t know how it’s gonna change now,” Catanzara said. “There’s been very repetitive failures about these units, I don’t know how you re-invent that wheel.”

Catanzara also took aim at Brown’s decision to crack down on police overtime at Lightfoot’s behest by requiring approval from deputy chiefs and above.

“The weather’s gonna warm up. We’re gonna be back to the same-old, same-old — stay-at-home order or not. There’s gonna be masses of people everywhere. There’s gonna be shootings. There’s gonna be conflicts. Let’s see how this pans out once the weather warms up. Overtime will definitely be something that’s going to be needed. I don’t see everybody calling the deputy chief specifically for overtime approval,” he said.

“If you have a detective who’s working a homicide case or even a robbery, are you gonna sit there and tell him, ‘You have to notify the deputy chief to get approval to stay here because your tour is up in a half-hour?’ Or, ‘Stop everything you’re doing. Come back and pick up the ball in 15, 16 hours?’”

Interim Supt. Charlie Beck, over the objections of African-American aldermen, abolished merit promotions, which were used to diversify CPD’s overwhelmingly-white supervisory ranks.

Brown has vowed to “aggressively pursue a replacement” for merit promotions without re-opening the controversy about political influence.

Once again, Catanzara strongly disagreed.

“Any attempt to diversify intentionally is wrong. If we’re going to have a fair and even system, then it has to be a scoring system. ... The department needs to create the opportunities — not slant the results or have a bell curve. It’s not gonna happen on my watch,” he said.

Catanzara is one of the most frequently-disciplined officers in the history of the Chicago Police Department. He is believed to be the first police union president ever elected while stripped of his police powers.

On Thursday, Catanzara made no apologies for that checkered past.

“If you look at those 50 complaints, I would venture to guess that 30 to 35 of them were inter-department violations and complaint numbers. They are not citizen complaints. I am not accused of being out there wrongfully locking people up or beating the hell out of people. That’s never been who I am. I’ve never been accused of it,” Catanzara said.

“It’s easy to highlight that 50 number. It’s because I refuse to just shut up with the hypocrisy in the department. It has been the good ol’ boys network of ‘Do as I say and not as I do.’ The higher you go up in rank, the more flexibility you have to do whatever the heck you want and there’s no repercussions for your behavior. … I will continue to speak out against it as long as I have breath in my lungs.” 


The Latest
Enbridge’s Line 5 oil and gas pipeline trespasses through sovereign tribal lands, is an environmental disaster waiting to happen, Ben Jealous writes.
A long primary campaign season reaches its crescendo Tuesday. Here’s a final look at the top races on the ballot.
Four from North Central have combined to capture six national titles since the program’s inception, and six are scheduled to compete next month in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials at Penn State.
The Bulls have 13 games left in the regular season and an opportunity to break even when they visit the Rockets on Thursday.