A former Chicago Police Department investigator who had been tasked with reviewing officer-involved shootings says he was fired from the force for refusing to justify incidents in which he claims civilians were wrongly shot and sometimes killed.
Lorenzo Davis told reporters in the Windy City this week that his recent firing from the Independent Police Review Authority, an autonomous oversight board of the CPD, was the result of arguments he had within law enforcement regarding whether or not to find fellow cops at fault for shootings that he didn’t believed were justified.
Mr. Davis told WBEZ News that he was fired from the IPRA earlier this month because he wouldn’t clear six officers who had been under investigation despite urgings from higher-ups.
“Supervising investigator Davis is the only supervisor at the Independent Police Review Authority who resists making requested changes as directed by management,” the retired CPD commander was informed in his termination letter.
Mr. Davis told local reporters that he couldn’t comment on the specific incidents he says he was told to justify, but insisted that his refusal to reverse his findings is what cost him his job.
“They told me to change it,” Mr. Davis said. “Change it. And if I did not change it, I was insubordinate and I would be disciplined.”
Mr. Davis served 23 years in law enforcement before joining the review board in 2008. The IPRA has reviewed nearly 400 officer involved shootings since its inception in 2007 but has only found a single case to be “not justified.”
Two weeks before being fired, according to Mr. Davis, his superiors determined during a job review that he had been displaying “a clear bias against the police.”
“If the public has no trust in police officers, many of the loved ones of those shot or killed by a police officers say that the police are no better than the gang bangers who are shooting and killing people,” he told a local Fox News affiliate.
“IPRA is committed to conducting fair, unbiased, objective, thorough and timely investigations of allegations of police misconduct and officer-involved shootings,” an official with the review group responded in a statement to WBBM Newsradio.
According to Mr. Davis, however, it’s the IPRA that’s worthy of an investigation. Speaking to WLS News, the retired cop says he wants the Department of Justice to look into the actions of his former employer.
“The agenda is to not embarrass the city. The agenda is, so far, the agenda has been to justify all of the shootings,” he said.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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