• 01
  • February
    2012

Many Chicago parents don't expect police to be a threat to their children, especially since it is an officer's job to protect the public. That is why when a police officer is accused of causing a drunk driving crash it causes such a public outcry. While fatal drunk driving accidents are extremely tragic, it is especially horrific when a police officer, someone who is supposed to stop drunk drivers, is intoxicated behind the wheel. But, like any other drunk driving accident, the surviving family members may be able to collect from the officer for the numerous costs they were saddled with following devastating accident.

In this story, the 43-year-old man had been with the Chicago Police Department for 17 years before he hit a 13-year-old boy on his bicycle. Not only was the officer drunk while driving, but he also left the 13-year-old after hitting him and continued driving away.

Now, over two years after the fatal accident, the boy's family finally watched as the officer was found guilty of aggravated drunken driving, leaving the scene of an accident and reckless homicide in a hit-and-run crash. It took the jury nine hours before it came back with the guilty verdict.

When the police officer was pulled over, the officer who executed the stop was told by senior officers not to administer field sobriety tests. It took more than two hours and a trip to a restroom before police finally gave the drunk officer the field sobriety tests. It also took more than four hours after the accident before the officer took a breath test, during which he registered slightly below the legal limit of 0.08. A forensic toxicologist testified that the officer's blood alcohol content was closer to two times the legal limit at the time of the accident.

Source: Chicago Tribune, "Veteran Chicago cop guilty in fatal DUI," Jason Meisner, Jan. 18, 2012