Nov. 14--The Chicago Police Board will decide the fate of a police officer who is accused of lying about his role in an off-duty shooting four years ago, the board said Friday.
Administrative charges were filed against Officer Francisco Perez on Oct. 30 by police Superintendent Garry McCarthy. Perez, who has been stripped of his police powers since April, has been charged with making a false report, inattention to duty and bringing discredit upon the police department for shooting a man outside a Mexican restaurant in the East Ukrainian Village neighborhood.
Max Caproni, the police board's executive director, said no hearing date has been set yet in the case, which will be heard by a Police Board hearing officer before the nine-member, mayor-appointed board decides whether Perez should lose his job. If the board decides to fire the 16-year Police Department veteran, Perez can appeal the decision to Cook County Circuit Court.
Earlier this year, McCarthy and the Independent Police Review Authority, which investigates shootings involving Chicago police officers, recommended that Perez be fired for the shooting.
IPRA found Perez was "inattentive to duty" when he fired 16 shots at the wrong car moments after a drive-by shooting outside La Pasadita restaurant, near Division Street and Ashland Avenue, in the early morning hours of Nov. 5, 2011. The officer was working security at the restaurant.
The case hinged largely on video footage obtained from a surveillance camera at the restaurant that the IPRA said clearly showed a red Mitsubishi Galant involved in the drive-by shooting had sped away by the time the officer opened fire at a blue Chrysler 300M, wounding its driver.
Even after viewing the video this year, Perez stuck with earlier statements he had made to an IPRA investigator that he had fired at the red car, which prompted the IPRA to recommend that he be fired as well for making false statements to investigators.
It was the first time since IPRA was created in September 2007 that the agency recommended that an officer who shot someone be fired.
After reviewing IPRA's recommendation, McCarthy in July also decided that Perez should be fired for lying about what happened during the shooting -- but not for shooting someone.
