WBEZ | Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart

Unknown Gacy victim identified

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:38:00 -0600

New DNA evidence has helped Cook County investigators identify another victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy.

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart announced Tuesday that William George Bundy has been positively identified as one of Gacy's victims. Bundy was reported missing in 1976, and was possibly lured to Gacy with the promise of construction work. He was 19 at the time of his murder.

Bundy had previously been identified as Victim #19 - the nineteenth body to be removed from the crawlspace beneath Gacy's Northwest Side home, three days after Christmas in 1978.

Two of Bundy's surving siblings submitted to DNA tests after Dart's office launched a national campaign in October to put names to eight of Gacy's unidentified victims. Investigators had exhumed remains from each of the victims, and were looking for family members who could help make a DNA match. DNA from the cheek of Bundy's siblings helped positively identify him as a victim, Dart said.

"I know that the sorrow will eventually go away, and I'll have a place to visit him," said Laura O'Leary, Bundy's sister.

Bundy was a talented gymnast with lots of friends and female admirers, O'Leary said. She last saw him in 1976, when he left home to go to a party but never returned.

Twenty-six of Gacy's 33 victims have now been identified.

In October investigators discovered that 53-year-old Harold Wayne Lovell, thought to have been a Gacy victim, is alive and has been living in Florida.

Gacy was executed in 1994 for the murders.

Preckwinkle and Dart hoping to cut costs, not safety services

Tue, 08 Nov 2011 14:36:00 -0600

The proposed 2012 Cook County budget would help plug a projected $315 million dollar deficit but it also reflected lots of tough decisions by Board President Toni Preckwinkle. The budget involved layoffs, new taxes and new fees; and there were quite a few proposals that could affect public safety. A task force will take a deeper look at a measure to share costs for Cook County’s policing services with unincorporated areas. Also, prison populations would go down – as many as 1,000 inmates would get out of jail over the next year. Eight Forty-Eight asked two people intimately involved in the plans, President Preckwinkle and Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, to explain what the budgetary moves would mean for public safety.

Music Button: Justice, "Brainvision", from the album Audio Video Disco, (Elektra)

Cook County cracks down on cigarette-tax dodgers

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 18:05:00 -0500

Cook County has found a new way to make money: by cracking down on stores that aren't paying cigarette taxes. At the urging of Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle's office, the sheriff's office has fined retailers almost $400,000 in the first three weeks of the project. In 2010, the county collected $1.6 million for the entire year.

Sheriff Tom Dart said Friday that in 2006, the county made $200 million from cigarette taxes. But in 2010, that number was down to $126 million. That $74 million decrease can't just be attributed to factors like the struggling economy and tighter regulations on smoking, reasoned Preckwinkle.

"This is not insignificant money," said Dart. "So for those who might think, oh we've grabbed a couple of cigarettes here, not a big deal. The numbers are somewhat staggering."

Though the Department of Revenue upped their investigations into those avoiding the Tobacco Ordinance by starting the Tobacco Investigation Unit in 2009. But it was the addition of five officers from the Sheriff's office that has led Preckwinkle to express confidence that fines could bring in money for the cash-strapped county. They plan to up that number to 10 officers by 2012.

"Two-thirds of our budget is healthcare and criminal justice, public safety," said Preckwinkle. "So, to the extent that we're able to increase, and hopefully increase dramatically, compliance in this area, it'll have an impact on our ability to deliver services in those two critical areas that are our responsibility."

The Sheriff's office has also received a grant of $25,000 in "seed money" from various cigarette companies to help them pinpoint those illegally counterfeiting cigarettes.

Dart said smaller, less established convenience stores are typically the retailers that charge the full price for cigarettes, including taxes, and pocket the difference. Tax on a pack of cigarettes in Cook County in $2.

Because the county hasn't collected the money yet, Preckwinkle said it's too early to consider it viable for her new budget plan, due in October.

Offenders have the choice of attending an administrative hearing, or simply paying the fine upfront. The county has also started a Cigarette Tax Reward Program, which asks Chicagoans to report retailers they believe aren't paying their taxes, denotable by the abscence of a Cigarette Tax Stamp on the bottom of packs. Successful tips can yield up to $1,000.

Suburban mayor criticizes Cook County immigration policy

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 18:29:00 -0500

A Northwest suburban mayor is criticizing a new Cook County policy for being weak on illegal immigration.

On September 7, the Cook County Board of Commissioners approved a measure that allows the sheriff to release undocumented immigrants on bond from jail. The federal government asks local jails to hold undocumented immigrants that are accused of a crime, until immigration agents can detain them, and possibly deport them.

Hanover Park mayor Rod Craig argues that policy puts criminals back on the street.

"Some are born in this county, some aspire to become citizens, and some just want to come here and create mayhem, and I'm not going to stand for that," said Craig. "And we need the support of our county government to come to some clarity on what it is they really want."

Sheriff Tom Dart has said he doesn't like detaining undocumented immigrants in jail until the federal government can pick them up, because it makes it harder for local police to fight crime. Craig has written letters to both Dart and the Cook County board asking them to reform these immigration policies. He's worried about a repeat of an incident that occurred a few months back, when a group of suspected illegal immigrants accused of assaulting police officers were released from jail without being detained because an immigration agent couldn't come in time.

But Steve Patterson, a spokesman for the sheriff's office, sees the situation differently.

"I just think it's a case where the mayor doesn't understand what happened, that's all," he said.

According to Patterson, the sheriff's office released 1,665 detainees into the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) last year.

Craig said he's spoken to his Hanover Park's local Cook County commissioner Tim Schneider about a potential resolution to amend the ordinance. According to Craig, Schneider was optimistic about working out a new solution.

Local law enforcement struggles with unclear reach of federal immigration policies

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 13:15:00 -0500

Cook County moved to center stage in the fight over national immigration policy. Sheriff Tom Dart recently suggested that he may no longer comply with federal requests to detain inmates wanted for immigration violations. Then, earlier this week, County Commissioner Jesus Garcia proposed an ordinance that would write noncompliance into an actual ordinance. At a meeting Wednesday, Garcia withdrew his proposal. The moves came as many states and local governments took stands on immigration policy.

So are there some jurisdictional loopholes? And how much room do Chicago and Illinois have to define immigration policy?

For answers, Eight Forty-Eight turned to Anna Law, an associate professor of political science at DePaul University who writes on immigration law.

Illinois Senate votes to undo cemetery regulations

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 18:01:00 -0500

Legislators in Springfield are considering a measure that would undo some cemetery regulations in the state.

The Illinois Senate approved legislation that would cut back on a statewide task force designated to oversee cemeteries. The bill would also draw back a new requirement that cemeteries must submit burial records into a state database.

Those procedures were enacted after an investigation into Burr Oak Cemetery in 2009, where Cook County Sheriff's police uncovered an alleged scheme to re-sell burial plots.

State Sen. Emil Jones III, D-Chicago, said Burr Oak was one bad apple out of a state of compliant cemeteries.

"Nothing could've prevented any wrongdoing from what happened at Burr Oak Cemetery," Jones said.

Meanwhile, Steve Patterson, spokesman for the Cook County Sheriff, said his office is still receiving new complaints about conditions at other cemeteries around Chicago.

"(The legislation) sort of goes back to a Wild West days where anything goes, including double burials and dumping bodies in the back of a cemetery and we just don't want to see it go back to that," Patterson said.

The bill still needs approval in the Illinois House.

Proposed state law: three caskets to one grave

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 18:52:00 -0600

An Illinois lawmaker is pushing a bill that would allow cemeteries to bury some people three to a grave. State Rep. Bill Cunningham, D-Chicago, is proposing a bill that would limit cemeteries to burying indigent or unidentified bodies to three caskets in one grave.

"We just thought that three was sort of reasonable," Cunningham said. "That was probably expecting too much financially and space-wise to say just one."

Cunningham said burying one casket in one grave would be ideal, but it's expensive. The measure is currently in the Rules Committee of the Illinois House of Representatives.

Cunningham is the former chief of staff for Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart. Dart said he's disturbed by the conditions at Homewood Memorial Gardens, a cemetery in Chicago's south suburbs.

But Cook County Commissioner Larry Suffredin says he thinks Dart may have exaggerated about the conditions at Homewood Memorial Gardens to drum up support for legislation in Springfield.

"The sheriff was maybe a little more dramatic than maybe he needed to be to gain support for this bill. We're all in favor of the bill," Suffredin said.

Dart said Thursday the workers the cemetery have buried bodies as much as eight caskets high, one on top of another. He also said that up to 26 babies were buried together in the same box earlier this month and there are some instances in which babies were buried in the same box as animal parts or with arms and legs of other humans.

"Money is not the issue here," Dart told reporters. "What it is, is that we collectively treat these people as if they are refuse, and we can't do that."

Dart said there are virtually no records of where specific bodies are buried at the cemetery.

"It is not anything that our county or society should ever sit there and say is acceptable," Dart said.

He said Homewood Memorial Gardens is the only cemetery to have a contract with Cook County to bury indigent people.

Dart said he doesn't think he can bring criminal charges against anyone with the cemetery, but the county board should re-examine its contract with the cemetery. His office estimates 8,000 bodies have been buried at the cemetery.

Meanwhile, Homewood Memorial Gardens President Tom Flynn said the cemetery has a system for tracking bodies. He said he favors the state legislation that would limit the number of indigent bodies buried in one grave space to three caskets. Flynn said the cemetery does stack caskets, sometimes six at a time, but that's what the county pays for.

"We think that we're doing the best we can under the restrictions that we have," Flynn said.

Flynn said Homewood Memorial Gardens has been the only cemetery to bid for a contract with Cook County to bury indigent residents for the past several years. He said the cemetery has had the contract for 26 of the past 30 years.

Flynn said he has seen instances of multiple infants being buried in the same casket, but that was done before the caskets arrive at the cemetery. He said it would have to happen at the Cook County Medical Examiner's office.

In a written statement, Cook County's Medical Examiner Dr. Nancy Jones said the cemetery is in violation of its contract. She said her office treats fetuses and stillborns with respect and does not put multiple bodies in the same coffin.

"It is our responsibility to make sure that these remains are interned," the statement said. "They are handled respectfully and placed in an adult-sized burial shell, which is sealed and placed in the grounds of the cemetery. There are no other types of remains present in the burial shell. In every other situation, remains are interned in individual burial shells.”

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle said Friday the sheriff's office and the medical examiner's office will be holding a meeting soon.

"I think that remains to be determined whether there are errors on the part of the medical examiner or whether this is something that is simply under the purview of the cemetery itself," Preckwinkle said.

Preckwinkle said she has been more focused on finalizing the county's budget more than the conditions at the cemetery. She said she found the accounts at the cemetery disturbing.

Dart’s investigation of Homewood Memorial Gardens comes less than two years after his office uncovered alleged mismanagement at Burr Oak Cemetery in south suburban Alsip. In 2009, Dart said his investigators found some corpses thrown in a pile at the back of the cemetery, while others were stacked into existing graves. He also said Burr Oak Cemetery employees were allegedly reselling grave sites to bury new caskets.

Dart also said one worker embezzled money intended for a museum in honor of civil rights-era lynching victim Emmet Till.

Four employees of Burr Oak Cemetery were charged with desecrating human bodies at the graveyard. They pleaded not guilty.

The company that manages Burr Oak Cemetery has been trying to sell the facility, but it’s going through bankruptcy court proceedings.

Alex Keefe contributed to this report.