Crime & Law
CPD Officer Suspended for Third Time for Violating the Rights of Black Chicagoans Downtown
(WTTW News)
A Chicago police officer repeatedly accused of improperly stopping and searching Black men downtown should be suspended for a third time in less than four months, Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling and the agency tasked with investigating police misconduct agreed, records show.
Officer Richard Rodriguez Jr., who was a member of the Near North (18th) Police District tactical team until he was stripped of his police powers in February, was suspended for 15 days for his conduct while stopping and searching a Black man near Chicago Avenue and Rush Street at 8 p.m. July 25, 2022, according to documents published March 26 by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability.
In all, Rodriguez has been suspended for at least 83 days in connection with eight incidents of misconduct, records show.
Investigators did not begin probing the July 25, 2022, incident until January 2024, when a Chicago police sergeant reviewing body-worn camera footage of a separate traffic stop raised concerns about the conduct of Rodriguez and Officer Crystina Kittrell, another member of the 18th District Tactical Team, records show.
After Rodriguez and Kittrell stopped and searched the man in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood, three other officers arrived at the scene to assist them, according to the probe. While Kittrell did not have a body-worn camera because she had recently changed assignments, Rodriguez did not activate his as required by CPD policy, according to the probe by the agency better known as COPA.
However, the aftermath of the initial stop and search of the man was captured by another officer’s body-worn camera, which recorded the man alleging that Rodriguez and Kittrell were “harassing him, by stopping him for no lawful reason just because he is Black,” according to the probe.
The man, who was not identified by COPA, in keeping with its rules, repeatedly asked officers to tell him why he had been stopped and searched and to identify themselves by badge number and name.
Although CPD policy requires officers to provide that information when it is requested, none of the officers did so, according to the probe.
Once officers checked CPD databases to determine the man did not have any active warrants for his arrest, he was released without citation or charge, according to the probe.
None of the officers documented the stop and search of the man, the use of force against him or completed the required form documenting an incident involving someone experiencing a mental health crisis, according to the probe.
Neither Rodriguez nor Kittrell responded to a request for comment.
Neither Rodriguez nor Kittrell could remember for certain why they stopped the man when they were interviewed by COPA investigators.
Rodriguez told investigators he likely stopped the man “because he saw a cannabis bag as well as the scent of cannabis on (the man) and stated that the area where the stop was conducted is known for being a narcotics and gang hotspots.”
The incident took place less than a block from Michigan Avenue in the heart of Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood.
During the incident, the man repeatedly told officers that it was legal for him to consume marijuana in Illinois, according to the probe.
While that is true, public consumption of marijuana is illegal, and if officers had a reasonable suspicion that that the man was consuming the drug on the street “an investigatory stop and the corresponding search would be permissible,” according to the probe.
COPA determined it could not be proven whether the decision by Rodriguez and Kittrell to stop and search the man was unjustified, according to the probe.
Snelling agreed with COPA’s recommendation that Kittrell receive a reprimand for violating six department rules, including her failure to identify herself and to properly document the stop and search of the man.
COPA recommended Rodriguez be suspended for at least one day and no more than 29 days for violating six department rules, including his failure to activate his body-worn camera, identify himself and properly document the stop and search of the man.
The incident was part of what COPA identified as a troubling pattern of 50 undocumented and unprofessional stops of Black people in Lincoln Park, West Town, Old Town, River North, Streeterville, the Gold Coast and parts of Logan Square in 2024, records show.
More than 90% of the complaints investigated by COPA were sparked by officers’ decisions to pull over Black people, according to a letter sent by COPA to the district’s commander.
The complaint about the July 2022 stop is the second of those complaints to be fully resolved by COPA, records show.
Rodriguez, who earns $115,158 annually, was stripped of his police powers in the middle of a court-ordered deposition as part of a lawsuit filed by Jovan Streeter and Marquita Beecham, who claimed Rodriguez pulled them over twice without justification between May 2023 and August 2023.
In March, Rodriguez was suspended for at least 30 days after improperly searching another Black man just after 10 p.m. Sept. 25, 2023, by ripping the man’s pants and exposing his underwear less than a block away from where the July 2022 incident occurred, records show.
In December, Rodriguez was suspended for 20 days after agreeing with COPA investigators that he improperly searched another Black man and his car on Sept. 1, 2024, near Bellevue and Michigan avenues.
Kittrell, who earns $111,252 annually, was suspended for seven days in connection with that stop, records show.
Rodriguez, who is facing more than two dozen other complaints, is also named in eight pending lawsuits, court records show.
Five other complaints against Rodriguez have been sustained, resulting in suspensions totaling an additional 18 days, records show. One of those complaints involved an improper search of a pedestrian after an investigatory stop, resulting in “substantial prior findings of misconduct,” records show.
Rodriguez is the fifth member of the Near North (18th) Police District tactical team to be stripped of his badge and gun after COPA identified a pattern of undocumented and unprofessional traffic stops of Black Chicagoans.
Rodriguez was identified by a database published by Inspector General Deborah Witzburg designed to identify “hot spots” of alleged misconduct as having the most complaints of any other officer beside Officer Joseph Vecchio, another member of the 18th District tactical team.
Vecchio has also been stripped of his police powers.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
