Police Superintendent Moves to Fire Troubled Officer

By: Rebecca AndersonChicago Police Sgt. Patrick J. Minogue, whose checkered career was documented by The Chicago Reporter in September, is facing the ultimate penalty his department can impose for misconduct.

On Dec. 1, Police Superintendent Terry G. Hillard filed charges against the 14-year police veteran with the Chicago Police Board and recommended that he be fired. The board has scheduled a March 16 status hearing on the case.

Minogue refused to speak on the record about the charges against him, but told the Reporter he has been on disability leave for a heart condition since Nov. 9.

Joseph Roddy, an attorney representing Minogue in his case before the board, said Minogue "was surprised to find out that the superintendent had filed charges. He is unequivocally going to fight. He’s not going to resign."

Advocates for greater police accountability say Minogue should have been ousted long before the superintendent acted on the current complaint against him. It was filed by 15th District Police Officer Laura Yukawa-Brancher, a former girlfriend. Among other charges, Minogue is accused of firing his gun during an argument inside Yukawa-Brancher’s North Side apartment on May 3, 1998.

Mary Powers, coordinator of Citizens Alert, a nonprofit police watchdog group, has followed the various charges against Minogue for four years. "Thank God it’s reached the point that he’s being relieved of his duties," she said.

In a September story, "Policing Their Own," the Reporter uncovered at least eight complaints against Minogue—including run-ins with two other female officers. The investigation raised questions about the Chicago Police Department’s ability to identify troubled officers, relieve them of their duties or provide them with counseling and other services.

Powers said the police department is slow to deal with troubled officers. "The endangerment of not only the community at large but of other police personnel is completely unacceptable," she said. "Justice delayed is justice denied."

Officers and other department members charged with misconduct face a multi-layered disciplinary process. Complaints are investigated by the civilian Office of Professional Standards or by the department’s Internal Affairs Division.

This year, OPS began using a computer system to track complaints internally, said police spokesman Patrick Camden.

After an investigation, the superintendent can impose penalties that include suspensions of up to 30 days. Longer suspensions or firings must be approved by the nine-member, mayor-appointed Police Board. But few cases make it to the panel, board records show.

The police department received 8,221 complaints in 1999; 20 department members were fired. The superintendent suspended another 992 police personnel for up to 30 days each, the records show.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Few Get Fired

During 1999, Chicago police received 8,221 complaints. Department Superintendent Terry G. Hillard recommended that 57 department members be fired and 992 be suspended for up to 30 days each. Another 300 received reprimands. The Chicago Police Board, which reviews all recommended firings and suspensions of at least 30 days, held 28 hearings that resulted in 20 firings. In addition, the board found four department members guilty but reduced their firings to suspensions.


Sources: Chicago Police Board and Chicago Police Department.
Graphic by Desktop Edit Shop, Inc.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hillard decided to fire Minogue after OPS sustained Yukawa-Brancher’s complaint against him. In addition to firing his weapon, Minogue is charged with failing to report the incident immediately and then denying it occurred in a report he filed on April 19, 1999. He also failed to report he had been served with an order of protection filed by Yukawa-Brancher against him on Jan. 19, 1999, as department policy dictates.

In his response to the order of protection, Minogue denied Yukawa-Brancher’s charges of harassment and said she had maintained contact with him throughout January 1999. Cook County Circuit Court Judge Francis A. Gembala ruled in Minogue’s favor and dismissed the order of protection on March 26.

Minogue also is accused by Hillard of sending Yukawa-Brancher threatening letters from September 1998 to January 1999. On Jan. 17, 1999, he sent e-mails to Yukawa-Brancher from the computer in his police car, Hillard charged.

Minogue’s actions violated police department rules, "impeding the Department’s efforts to achieve its policy and goals and bringing discredit upon the Department," Hillard stated in his report to the Police Board.

Complaint File
Minogue was born in Chicago on March 4, 1953. He became a police officer in 1985 and was promoted to sergeant in 1996. He served in the 15th, 18th and 24th districts, police and court records show.

From 1993 to 1997, OPS received at least seven complaints of misconduct against Minogue. In addition to the Yukawa-Brancher charge, he was cleared in one case, and five others were unsustained, a murky category that means the complaint could not be proved or disproved.

No disciplinary action was taken during those years, according to an October 1997 report from the Internal Affairs Division.

One unsustained complaint came from Police Officer Karen McCullough, whose sergeant filed a complaint on her behalf. He reported that Minogue threatened McCullough and her family in July 1997. McCullough, who had been dating Minogue, said the incident was a mistake and refused to cooperate with police investigators.

Minogue also was at the center of the much-publicized July 10, 1997, beating of 11th District Police Officer Eric Holder, an African American, by four white officers.

Holder, who was off-duty, was visiting his fiance, Theresa Green, at her home in the Austin neighborhood. Her brother, Ryan Green, was shot in the alley behind her house, according to court records and police reports. Minogue was the officer in charge at the scene.

Holder said the officers pushed him to the ground, even though he identified himself as a police officer. The officers said he was leading a belligerent mob toward a police witness.

OPS investigators sustained claims that Holder interfered with the police investigation "by becoming loud and boisterous" and not following orders. But they also sustained charges that Minogue swore at Holder, and that Minogue and other officers pushed Holder to the ground, then kicked and punched him.

In a 1997 memo to the police superintendent, then-OPS Chief Administrator Gayle Shines recommended the officers be disciplined. Hillard has not made a decision in the case, Camden said.

In January 1998, Holder was found guilty of resisting arrest and acquitted of battery. He is appealing his conviction to the Illinois Supreme Court and has filed an $8 million civil rights lawsuit against Minogue, the other officers and the City of Chicago. The case is pending.

A 2-year-old U.S. Department of Justice investigation into the incident also is ongoing, said Christine DeBartolo, press officer for the department’s Civil Rights Division.

Holder, who took a one-year leave of absence from the police department, returned to work as a police officer in April. He said he was glad the department has taken action against Minogue, even if it wasn’t for his case. "I don’t feel sorry for him, and he’s getting what he deserved, because there’s no telling how many people he’s done this to."

Career Options
Despite the charges pending before the Police Board, Minogue’s fate remains uncertain. The board could accept the superintendent’s recommendation and fire him or find Minogue not guilty of the charges and reinstate him as a sergeant. The board also could find Minogue guilty but reduce his punishment to a suspension.

Resignation is also an option for Minogue. It is preferable "to not have that stigma of being discharged in case [an officer] wants to go into law enforcement in another jurisdiction," said Richard Riemer, attorney for the Sergeants Association, a union representing 1,260 Chicago police sergeants.

And Minogue will keep his pension even if he is fired, said James B. Waters Jr., executive director of the Police Pension Fund. Police officers cannot lose their pensions or other benefits unless they are convicted of a felony related to their actions on the job, he said.

Regardless of the outcome of his case, one incident involving Minogue remains unresolved: the death of 32-year-old Police Officer Eve M. Daly, who had a romantic relationship with Minogue for 51/2 years before her death.

Daly was found on Jan. 3, 1996, with a gunshot wound to the mouth in her condominium at 6771 N. Olmsted Ave., police reports show. On Jan. 4, the Office of the Medical Examiner ruled her death a suicide, and Area 5 Detective Kenneth Berris closed the investigation, reporting no foul play.

But Eve’s sister, Beth Daly, wasn’t satisfied and has spent the last four years demanding that the police department look into Minogue’s involvement in the incident. Minogue and Daly once worked together in the 24th Police District and had what relatives and coworkers called a turbulent relationship.

Six months before her death, Daly changed the locks on her door, her phone number and her pager number, trying to break off contact with Minogue, said Lorraine Daly, Eve’s mother.

The police did reopen the case at Beth Daly’s request but closed the investigation in May 1996 after finding no evidence of wrongdoing, Camden said. A gunpowder residue test showed that Daly fired the gun that killed her, he added.

But Beth Daly said she still believes her sister’s life ended because she could not cope with the stress of her relationship with Minogue. And she is relieved that he could soon be without police powers.

"The main thing is the fact that he’s not on the department, and he’s not able to do this ever again," Daly said.

"I wish they would have gone further with Eve’s case, and this whole thing won’t bring Eve back, but now there’s some much-needed closure."