Crime & Law
2 CPD Officers Suspended for 1 Year Each After 2019 Drunken Wrigleyville Brawl, Records Show
An image included in the Civilian Office Police Accountability’s probe of Officers Moises Diaz and Salvador Perez shows Diaz, left, unconscious outside a Wrigleyville pizzeria and Perez grabbing a person by the throat after they attempted to check on Diaz. (Provided)
Two Chicago police officers who attacked members of the public and the staff of a Wrigleyville pizzeria after a Chicago Cubs game during a 2019 drunken brawl they started, will be suspended for one year each, according to documents obtained by WTTW News.
The Civilian Office of Police Accountability, the agency charged with investigating police misconduct, urged in 2021 that both Officers Moises Diaz and Salvador Perez be fired for their actions on May 23, 2019. Former Chicago Police Supt. David Brown agreed several months later.
However, Diaz and Perez challenged their terminations, and before the Chicago Police Board could decide the officers’ fate, city officials agreed to allow Diaz and Perez to serve suspensions of 365 days each, according to records published by the agency better known as COPA.
Diaz and Perez did not respond to a request for comment. Diaz, who earns $108,012 annually, remains an active member of CPD, according to a department spokesman. Perez is listed as an inactive member of CPD.
Both officers have served their suspensions, a CPD spokesperson told WTTW News.
The incident began just after 7 p.m. at Dimo’s Pizza, 3463 N. Clark St., after Diaz and Perez, who were off-duty, “had attended a Chicago Cub’s game earlier that day and had consumed alcohol at several bars,” according to COPA’s probe. At one bar, the officers were “loud and belligerent” as they complained about the cost of beer, according to the probe.
Diaz asked to use the bathroom in the restaurant’s kitchen area, and began to urinate with the door open. Diaz did not close the door when staff members asked him to, and a “struggle ensued” after the employees attempted to close the door themselves.
Three staff members attempted to eject Diaz from the restaurant, according to the probe, and staff asked both Diaz and Perez to leave.
Both Diaz and Perez “pushed, shoved, grabbed, grappled with, and yelled at the staff members,” according to the probe.
After staff members pushed Diaz out of the restaurant and into a vestibule, Perez displayed his CPD badge and demanded his pizza, according to the probe. At the same time, Diaz punched one person and grabbed another person by the throat, according to the probe.
As the brawl spilled onto Clark Street, Diaz was knocked unconscious, according to the probe. Perez attacked two passersby who attempted to check on Diaz, who was sprawled in the street, throwing two people “several feet down the street” after pushing one and grabbing the other by the throat, according to the probe.
Perez attempted to force his way back into the restaurant, striking another woman in the face with his arm as he “continued to demand the pizza he had ordered” while displaying his badge.
Dimo’s staff demanded that Diaz and Perez leave the restaurant more than two dozen times, according to video footage reviewed as part of the investigation.
Even after other Chicago police officers arrived at the scene, Perez continued to demand the pizza he ordered, which he got before he was taken to the hospital with Diaz, according to the probe.
At 11:42 p.m., nearly five hours after the brawl, a breath test indicated Perez’s blood-alcohol content was 0.184%. At 12:16 a.m. the next day, a breath test indicated that Diaz’s blood-alcohol content was 0.146%, according to the probe. That is nearly twice the legal limit to operate a motor vehicle.
“Officer Diaz told COPA he has no memory of the incident from the time he walked into the restroom at Dimo’s until he awoke in the hospital hours later,” according to COPA’s probe. “Multiple witnesses to the events at Dimo’s stated both officers appeared to be extremely intoxicated, with slurred speech, impaired coordination, and an apparent inability to process the situation in a clear or rational way.”
Perez “consistently attempted to minimize his culpability by portraying himself and Officer Diaz as the victims in the incident, and the Dimo’s staff members as the sole aggressors,” according to COPA’s probe.
It is unclear why it took six and a half years to resolve the probe of Diaz’s and Perez’s conduct.
The Chicago Police Board has been unable to rule on whether to terminate an officer for more than a year and a half after the city’s largest police union challenged the system Chicago officials used for 60 years to hold to account officers accused of the most egregious misconduct.
The Illinois Supreme Court is expected to decide this month whether to uphold an appellate court ruling that CPD officers accused of serious misconduct have the right to ask an arbitrator — and not the Chicago Police Board — to decide their fate, but those proceedings must take place in public.
The ongoing legal fight means 25 cases pending before the Police Board remain in limbo — including three that seek to terminate officers accused of killing Chicagoans without justification, including the officer who shot and killed 13-year-old Adam Toledo in 2021.
Five other officers face lengthy suspensions or terminations for using excessive force against members of the public, Police Board records show.
Another five officers face termination after being accused of committing domestic violence, Police Board records show.
Three other officers are facing charges of violating department rules by failing to get vaccinated against COVID-19, Police Board records show.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
