Jon Burge to Take the Stand

This story came from the Chicago News Cooperative blog, Dateline: Chicago. I spent the day in court filling in for my co-worker, Katie Fretland. Early next week I will try to attend and cover the trial's verdict.

By RACHEL CROMIDAS
June 16, 2010

An attorney investigating allegations of police torture under former Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge gave testimony Wednesday that contradicts earlier statements from a Cook County Commissioner. The defense plans to call Burge to the stand Thursday.

Attorney Thomas J. Reed testified that Commissioner Larry Suffredin did not recall any abuse allegations when the two spoke in 2005. Suffredin, who was the public defender for alleged torture victim Anthony Holmes, testified earlier in the trial that Holmes told him he had been tortured.

“Mr. Suffredin told me he could not recall any allegations of abuse,” made by Anthony Holmes, Reed testified. Reed said that Holmes’ other former lawyer, William Murphy, did not recall any allegations of abuse during their interview. Reed did not keep any notes from the interviews.

On May 27, Suffredin testified that Holmes, a former high-ranking member of the Black Gangster Disciples, told him through sobs that he had been shocked with electricity and smothered with a plastic bag by Area 2 police trying to force a murder confession in 1973. Suffredin did not file a motion to suppress Holmes’ confession in the original case.

Reed interviewed Suffredin and Murphy as part of a special prosecutor’s investigation into claims of police torture, abuse and brutality under Burge’s watch from 1971 to 1983 Area 2.

The defense brought in two expert witnesses to address allegations that Andrew Wilson, convicted of killing two Area 2 police officers in February of 1982, was electrocuted and burned by a radiator in an Area 2 office while in custody.

Timothy Powell, an operating engineer for the City of Chicago, said the radiators on the second floor of the Burnside Community Center at 9059 S. Cottage Grove, which was once the Area 2 offices, are 2.5 inches apart. The marks on Wilson’s chest were closer together.

Michael Baden, a New York-based physician, forensic pathologist and medical examiner who was paid close to $27,000 to be an expert witness at the trial, said the marks on Wilson’s chest and face featured in the government’s photographic evidence could not have been caused by the radiator. The chest marks were too close together, too old and already scarring by the time the pictures were taken to have been caused within the previous three days, he said.

However, Baden did agree that the injury on Wilson’s thigh was a 2nd degree burn and could have been caused by contact with a radiator, even through the fabric of Wilson’s pants. Baden also agreed that Wilson’s ears exhibited puncture wounds that may have been caused be an alligator clip, but that it was not likely that the alligator clips had been electrified. “There would be burns on his ears,” he said.

Prosecuter David Weisman then had an alligator clip placed on his ear to demonstrate that such clips could stick to part of an individual ear without additional support after Baden speculated that it could not. Just “don’t hook it up to an electrical current,” Baden joked.

A Cook County State’s Attorney who took a homicide confession from an alleged police torture vicitim testified Wednesday that the man said he was treated well by police.

On October 30, 1983, shortly before 2 a.m., Dean Bastounes, now an attorney in private practice in Chicago, answered a police call to Area 2 to take a confession from Gregory Banks, who had been in custody since Oct. 28. (Police are allowed to hold a suspect in custody without charges for a maximum of 72 hours.) Banks testified earlier in the trial that he was tortured by Area 2 police.

“I asked him how he’d been treated by the police. Have you been treated well? ‘Yeah, I been treated well,’ he said.” Banks also said he was given coffee, according to Bastounes.

Bastounes then called a court reporter, Michael Hartman, to record Banks’ statements. According to the court report, which Bastounes read for the jury, Banks told him and Hartman that before the shooting happened, “We was gonna commit a robbery.” He and an accomplice crouched in bushes before Banks jumped a number of passersby and fired his gun. He then ran to 56 West 95th St. and hid the gun on the roof of the building. According to the report, Banks revealed where the gun was hidden to police officers when he was arrested. He told Hartman and Bastounes that he was not forced, coerced, or bribed by police officers to obtain his confession.

When asked if he trusted what the police officers had told him about the crime, Bastounes said his policy is, “Trust but verify. If the police told me something I couldn’t substantiate,” he said, he would ask for more evidence. Bastounes said he did not ask to see the gun or fingerprints as evidence in Banks’ case.

“I think it was fair to say that we [state’s attorneys in the felony review unit] would trust the police,” he said. Bastounes said he never “felt the need” to speak to Banks privately during the interview, and noticed nothing remarkable about Banks’ demeanor during the interview. Banks’ arms, back and legs were covered by a long sleeve shirt and pants.

“I guess common sense would tell me that if someone had been beaten I would tell them they had the right to remain silent. Maybe someone would blurt out ‘I’ve been beaten!’, maybe they wouldn’t.” Bastounes said no one had ever suggested to him that they had been the subject of police abuse.

The second witness of the day, Kathleen Warnick, who also worked as an Assistant States Attorney in the early 1980s’, testified that she visited Area 2 on Feb. 14, 1982 to assist her supervisors in obtaining a court reports on the shooting of two police officers. Warnick denied witnessing any violent acts or screams of horror while in Area 2. She said didn’t see Andrew Wilson or Jackie Wilson being taken out of the building.

Katie Fretland contributed reporting