Chicago’s top watchdog pushed to add ex-Police Supt. David Brown to city’s do-not-hire list

Chicago’s independent watchdog pushed to bar former Police Supt. David Brown from being rehired by the city after he refused to cooperate with an investigation stemming from a drug bust involving a police chief’s car.

Police officials ultimately rebuffed the request to add Brown to the do-not-hire list because it “seemed severe” and Brown had already resigned, according to a report issued this week by Inspector General Deborah Witzburg’s office.

Brown is identified only in the report as “a former high-ranking CPD official.”

Sources said he dodged an interview after a man was caught tossing heroin from Internal Affairs Chief Yolanda Talley’s car in February 2022. Talley’s niece was driving, but Talley wasn’t there.

Brown's 'failure to cooperate significantly impacted' the probe

As former Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s handpicked superintendent, Brown’s tenure was defined by surging violent crime, faltering reform efforts and sharp criticism from within the ranks. Lightfoot announced that Brown was stepping down just a day after she lost her reelection bid in February 2023.

The new report notes that the Office of the Inspector General found that Brown “possessed information relevant to an OIG investigation and provided the official with a notice of interview, which the official signed.”

“The official failed to appear for their OIG interview, and subsequently left their city employment without ever cooperating with OIG’s investigation,” the report states. “The official’s failure to cooperate significantly impacted OIG’s investigation.”

Investigators concluded that Brown had flouted a city ordinance that requires officials to cooperate with such investigations. He also violated four departmental rules, including prohibitions against violating a law or ordinance and failing to perform an official duty.

Witzburg’s office moved to add Brown to the do-not-hire list based on his “high-ranking position,” the report says. Police officials refused, arguing that Brown “was not the subject of the investigation at the time he resigned” and that the recommendation “seemed severe” because Witzburg’s office didn’t attempt to reschedule the interview.

Brown and Witzburg wouldn't talk about the report.

Former Supt. Eddie Johnson was previously placed on the list after he was fired following an embarrassing night of drinking in October 2019.

A report issued by former Inspector General Joe Ferguson found that Johnson was found asleep in his running vehicle after he and his female driver drank large quantities of rum at Ceres Cafe, a downtown restaurant well known for pouring stiff drinks.

Lightfoot axed Johnson and said he lied to her about the incident, and he was barred from getting another city job under her watch.

At the time, Johnson’s attorney Tom Needham said the move was “completely unnecessary, mean-spirited and serves no purpose other than to demean and hurt a good man who had a fine career.”

Case closed

The new report from the inspector general's office offers some additional information about the investigation that was launched after Talley’s car was seized.

Talley’s niece was behind the wheel when narcotics officers saw her passenger, 36-year-old Kenneth Miles, throw dozens of baggies of heroin from Talley’s Lexus in the 500 block of North St. Louis Avenue, according to police reports.

Body camera footage showed that Talley’s niece told officers that her “auntie’s probably your boss” when they took possession of the car.

The officers who arrested Miles were placed on desk duty without explanation, the Sun-Times has reported. The Lexus was taken to the police department’s Homan Square facility after the arrest but was never impounded.

The car was returned to Talley’s niece after investigators determined she “did not have any knowledge of said narcotics being inside the vehicle,” a police report shows.

Witzburg’s office investigated allegations that officers in the case “improperly returned” the car without impounding it, according to the report. But investigators said they were “unable to find any directive, policy, or procedure for CPD members to follow when seizing a vehicle and then returning it without impounding the vehicle.”

“OIG recommended that CPD amend its policies to ensure the proper tracking of vehicles seized, but not impounded, by CPD, both to protect the city and CPD members from potential liability and to mitigate risk to the city arising from accidents or other incidents involving those vehicles,” the report states.

The police department proposed a series of potential remedies, including sending a memo to watch lieutenants “on the proper way to release vehicles and document the applicable vehicle actions.”

A police spokesperson said the outside investigation had been closed without any finding of wrongdoing against active department members.