A Cook County judge upheld the firing of a Des Plaines police officer accused of using excessive force, city officials announced on Monday.
The ruling last week by Judge Sophia Hall overturns an arbitrator’s decision this past May that stated Officer John Bueno could return to work in June of this year.
Des Plaines City Manager Michael Bartholomew applauded the judge’s reversal of that decision, and was quoted in a press release saying the facts surrounding Bueno’s firing in March of 2012 have “never been in dispute.”
“The issue has been how severe the discipline should be,” he said in the release. “We believe strongly that Mr. Bueno gave up the privilege of being a Des Plaines police officer when he violated the city’s use of force policy, failed to report his use of force on more than one occasion, and then fabricated a story when questioned about these incidents.”
Keith Karlson, an attorney representing the police union that challenged Bueno’s dismissal, said via email that “the city’s celebration is premature.
“The judge’s most recent decision is not final and the parties are still arguing the case before the court,” Karlson wrote. “The union still believes the arbitrator’s award is appropriate and should be affirmed.”
When reached by phone, Karlson said the judge vacated the arbitrator’s award, but he said she could still send the matter back to arbitration. A final court decision is likely not to come until February, he said.
In a 60-plus-page decision, the arbitrator ruled in May that Bueno used excessive force in two incidents, and was “untruthful” about one of them while being questioned under oath during a city investigation conducted in late 2011.
The most documented incident in the arbitration decision involves Bueno and another officer driving to Elmhurst in August of 2010 to pick up a suspect whom Des Plaines officers, including Bueno, had tried to arrest several months earlier in a drug-buy sting.
The suspect had driven off before police could make the arrest, nearly hitting a member of Bueno’s undercover narcotics unit, the ruling states.
After picking him up in Elmhurst, Bueno and the other officer drove the suspect — handcuffed in the backseat — to the Des Plaines police station. About 100 feet from the station’s rear door, Bueno stopped the car, opened the back door and punched the man in the face, according to the arbitrator’s ruling.
Bueno claimed in testimony that he delivered the blow to “distract” the man because he believed the suspect was trying to free himself, the ruling said.
The arbitrator found that explanation “not remotely credible,” and said it was “highly plausible” that Bueno acted in retaliation for the suspect nearly hitting another officer with his car, the arbitrator wrote.
Despite affirming the city’s findings about some of Bueno’s conduct, the arbitrator ruled that Bueno should be allowed to return to the department, saying the city lacked just cause to fire him because it didn’t investigate until a year after the last reported incident.
The arbitrator also stated that multiple members of the police department’s command staff were aware of Bueno’s actions and failed to investigate them.
Those actions, the arbitrator stated, “sent (Bueno) a message that his use of force would not be penalized. As a result, the department command staff is partly at fault for (Bueno’s) misconduct.”
City officials had immediately vowed to fight the arbitrator’s decision in court.
“This ruling sends the right message to those we serve,” police Chief Bill Kushner said in Monday’s release. “Officers that exceed our expectations deserve our praise. At the same time, we need to be decisive and firm in cases where officers fall short of the high standards we set for them.”
Neither Bueno nor his attorney could immediately be reached for comment.
Bueno filed a federal lawsuit against the city earlier this year in which he claimed a superior harassed and discriminated against him based on his Mexican heritage, a charge the city denies.
