Tony DeBois, Markham’s former deputy police chief, allegedly pocketed $4,500 in counterfeit cash seized from the target of an investigation, then coerced the man’s female associate, who was also in custody, into having sex in DeBois’ city office, according to an account witnesses gave authorities.
DeBois, who once ran the Markham department’s internal affairs unit, was charged in March in federal court with violating a detainee’s civil rights through aggravated sexual abuse. Officials provided no further details at the time, but court records, witness statements detailed in FBI affidavits and interviews provide a fuller picture of the investigation into DeBois, a controversial officer who nonetheless quickly rose to power in Markham.
He has pleaded not guilty, and his attorney, Terry Ekl, said prosecutors won’t be able to convict his client.
“The basic allegation that DeBois had sex with her in his office is not true, and it is not provable in a court of law,” Ekl said.
For nearly five years, DeBois appeared to rule the streets of the small south suburb, rolling up and down Kedzie Avenue in a city-owned black Dodge Charger. DeBois had an ally in Mayor David Webb Jr. and made a rapid rise from patrol to deputy chief even as he became a magnet for lawsuits.
Things started to unravel for DeBois, 41, over the last year as the FBI raided his Matteson house, his second wife filed for divorce and he resigned from the city a few months before federal agents returned to his home to arrest him in March. He is free on bail awaiting trial.
Lawsuits and criminal charges
The Tribune reported in 2010 that DeBois, a former Harvey police officer, had in six years been named in 13 pending or settled lawsuits, including cases alleging he was abusive and conducted house raids without cause.
At the time, he was the subject of twice as many lawsuits by himself as any officer in the Harvey Police Department, federal court records showed.
Lawsuits are not an exact measure of an officer’s performance, but attorneys who handle police misconduct cases said at the time that the number of lawsuits involving DeBois was remarkably high. From 2008 to 2012, DeBois was named in 10 lawsuits that cost at least $1.6 million to settle, according to figures provided by the city of Markham. The total cost doesn’t include two lawsuits settled under terms that barred the release of that information, the city said.
“He watched too much ‘Training Day,'” said Markham resident Clarence Allen, who settled an excessive-force lawsuit against the city involving DeBois. “He thought he was Denzel (Washington).”
Michael Haymer, who owns a security business that had a large contract in Markham, was paid $250,000 by the city last year to settle allegations that DeBois had him falsely arrested after he refused to give the deputy chief a kickback.
Officers pounded on the door of Haymer’s Hazel Crest home a few hours after DeBois allegedly called him and said, “I’m getting my money out of you one way or another,” Haymer’s lawsuit alleged. They then arrested Haymer on a battery complaint made by a Harvey alderman.
A judge dismissed the charges after no one but Haymer appeared in court.
“He walked around that city where you couldn’t say nothing to him,” Haymer said. “He ran it; he was the mayor. Whatever he said, that was law. And people didn’t talk back; they didn’t say nothing.”
The criminal charges against DeBois are linked to other allegations of wrongdoing in the Markham Police Department, according to FBI affidavits.
Last year, two Markham officers, Darryl Starks and Andrew Webb, the Markham mayor’s son, were charged with stealing money from a Dolton warehouse while searching for evidence. Their case is pending. After being questioned, one of the officers told authorities about what he’d allegedly seen happen in DeBois’ office in 2010, according to the FBI affidavits used to obtain search warrants for the investigation into DeBois.
DeBois pocketed $4,500 from the target of a counterfeit-cash investigation, handing over another $500 which the officer kept and later provided authorities, the affidavits allege. Then DeBois told the officer to bring the suspect’s female associate from a holding cell to his office, where he told her she was in trouble and needed to do something to get out of it, the affidavits claim.
She looked scared and asked what she needed to do, and DeBois said she could do something to him, the officer told the FBI, according to the affidavits. DeBois then told the officer to stand guard outside his office door, where the officer observed through partially opened blinds as the woman had sex with DeBois, the affidavits said.
The woman gave a similar account to state police, according to the affidavits.
‘Google me’
Last year, the FBI raided DeBois’ home in Matteson, seizing computers and a liquid-filled vial with a label identifying it as a brand of steroid, as part of an investigation into threats he’d allegedly made to kidnap his first wife, one of the FBI affidavits alleges. The couple have two daughters and divorced in 1999. He has not been charged in connection with that investigation.
“Google me if you think I’m playing,” DeBois allegedly wrote last year in an email to his ex-wife, the affidavit claims. “All it takes is me making one phone call and poof you’ll be gone and who will your cute little boys have to call mommy.” An FBI agent noted in the search warrant affidavit that a Google search of DeBois’ name returned a Tribune story about excessive-force lawsuits against him.
The affidavit alleges DeBois wrote a second email, making an apparent reference to former Bolingbrook police Sgt. Drew Peterson, who was convicted last year of drowning his third wife and is the sole suspect in the disappearance of his fourth wife.
“You think ol boy Peterson in bolingbrook was crazy,” the affidavit claims DeBois wrote. “You ain’t seen nothing yet.”
DeBois had taken out an order of protection against his first wife, saying he feared for his life after she told him she was “gonna kill your ass,” court records show. The protection order was entered by default after his ex-wife did not respond.
After the National Black Police Association objected to DeBois, who is African-American, being promoted to chief, the town in 2011 created a new position for him — inspector general — on a split vote with the mayor breaking the tie, city records show. His new job required DeBois to prevent fraud abuse in the city’s departments, handle residents’ complaints and other duties given him by the mayor, records show.
“He wasn’t qualified,” said Ald. Donna Barron, who voted against creating the inspector general job for DeBois, saying it was a role for an attorney.
Civil rights attorney Christopher Cooper, a police association delegate at the time who spoke about DeBois at a 2010 board meeting, said his commentary wasn’t received well.
“The mayor got very angry and told us to leave immediately,” he said.
Webb did not return phone calls.
Former police Officer Lionel Hess was fired by the city after taking a gun used in a slaying to a firearms shop to get the barrel swapped out, records show. He was later hired back, only to be terminated before his probationary period ended.
Hess said he had no problems with DeBois but said it was clear he operated on another set of rules.
“It was Tony’s city,” Hess said. “He did whatever he wanted to do.”
