Crime & Law
State Law Allows Chicago’s Police Misconduct Agency to Investigate Fatal Police Shootings, Judge Rules
State law allows investigators with the Civilian Office of Police Accountability to probe fatal police shootings, a Cook County judge ruled Thursday, rejecting a bid by the city’s largest police union to limit the power of the agency charged with probing the most serious allegations of officer misconduct.
Cook County Circuit Court Judge Michael Mullen determined that the Illinois Police Training Act and the Police and Community Relations Improvement Act do not require investigators with the agency better known as COPA to be sworn law enforcement officers or undergo the same training as lead homicide detectives.
Mullen’s ruling, issued Wednesday after he determined a full trial was not necessary to resolve the dispute, is subject to appeal.
The Fraternal Order of Police, Lodge 7, has objected to COPA investigators probing police shootings since the agency’s creation in 2017, amid the outcry over the 2014 murder of 16-year-old Laquan McDonald by Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke.
In the less than nine years COPA has existed, its investigators have probed 138 deaths caused by Chicago police officers, records show.
Union President John Catanzara Jr. did not respond to a request for comment from WTTW News.
A spokesperson for Corporation Counsel Mary Richardson Lowry said “the Department of Law is reviewing the court’s ruling and is assessing next steps.”
COPA probes the most serious allegations against CPD officers, including claims of excessive force, bias-based verbal abuse, firearm discharges, deaths or serious injuries in custody, sexual misconduct and improper searches or seizures.
The agency’s job is to determine whether officers complied with CPD policies, and refers any evidence that officers may have committed a crime to the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office.
Chicago police officers who lead homicide investigations undergo 560 hours of training from the Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board. Since COPA investigators undergo 40 hours of training from a private vendor approved by the board, Mullen ruled that satisfied the law’s requirements.
Because COPA investigators do not investigate whether an officer should be charged with a crime in connection with a homicide, they are not subject to the requirements imposed on officers charged with leading homicide investigations by state law, Mullen determined.
In a separate part of the lawsuit brought by the police union, Mullen ruled that state law required the city to delete body-worn camera footage that has not been flagged for further review after 90 days, citing the “clear language” of the Illinois Law Enforcement Officer – Body Worn Camera Act, which took effect in 2016.
There are between 14 million and 20 million body-worn camera videos in CPD’s system, according to testimony provided to Mullen. Less than 1% of those videos have been flagged for further review, according to court records.
The city has never destroyed even a single video captured by a CPD officer’s body-worn camera, according to evidence presented to Mullen.
CPD must stop maintaining unflagged body-worn camera footage older than 90 days, and the city has until March 23 to destroy all body-worn camera footage older than 90 days, Mullen ruled.
Mullen ruled that it was illegal for the city to keep body-worn camera footage for longer than 90 days, since state law says that footage “must” be destroyed.
Despite that, city officials have “enacted their own policy of the indefinite retention” of the videos captured by the body-worn cameras and have disciplined officers based on footage older than 90 days that was not flagged for review, Mullen ruled.
“This ongoing practice is a blatant disregard of (the state law’s) clear command,” Mullen wrote.
There are seven grounds for body-worn camera footage to be flagged and retained, Mullen said.
The court order known as the consent decree, which requires CPD to overhaul the way it trains, supervises and disciplines officers does not require CPD to keep all body-worn camera footage indefinitely, Mullen determined.
In fact, the consent decree requires the city to follow the state’s body worn camera law, Mullen ruled.
Keeping those videos violates CPD officers’ right to privacy, Mullen ruled.
Mullen ruled in March 2024 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 police union has appealed that ruling to the Illinois Supreme Court, which is scheduled to decide that issue in the coming months.
Note: This article was published Jan. 22, 2026, and updated with video Jan. 26, 2026.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
