Crime & Law
Suspend CPD Officer for 89 Days for Using His Radio to Strike Man in Head 3 Times: Top Cop
An image captured by a Chicago Police Department officer’s body-worn camera shows Officer Michael Donnelly pointing his gun at a man’s head while he is being restrained by other officers. (Civilian Office of Police Accountability)
A Chicago police officer who used his department-issued radio to strike a man in the head three times in July 2024 should be suspended for 89 days, Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling and the agency tasked with investigating police misconduct agreed, records show.
Officer Michael Donnelly, who was a member of the Near North (18th) Police District tactical team until he was stripped of his police powers last fall, used excessive force against a Black man he and several other officers were trying to detain near Cambridge Avenue and Chestnut Street in Cabrini-Green, a complex operated by the Chicago Housing Authority that sits just west of the Gold Coast.
Five former members of that tactical team have been stripped of their police powers.
Donnelly also violated CPD policy when he pointed his gun at the man’s head and repeatedly used profanity, according to documents published Thursday by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability.
The agency better known as COPA recommended that Donnelly be suspended for at least 30 days and no more than 89 days. Snelling imposed the maximum discipline allowed, records show.
Donnelly, who has the right to challenge Snelling’s decision, did not respond to a request for comment from WTTW News.
The incident began just before 7 p.m. on July 30, 2024, when officers monitoring police cameras observed a man with an item they believed to be a gun tucked into his jeans, according to COPA’s report. The man was not identified by COPA, in keeping with its rules.
Officers were dispatched to the 800 block of Cambridge Avenue and instructed to stop and search the man, whom officers identified as a convicted felon who was not permitted to possess a weapon, according to COPA’s report.
When officers attempted to stop and search the man, he “ran forward into the street” before he fell and officers attempted to restrain him. The incident drew a crowd of onlookers, prompting more officers, including Donnelly, to be sent to the incident, according to COPA’s report.
After Donnelly exited a police vehicle, he yelled “I’ll f------ shoot you!” and “I will f------ smoke you!” and pointed his gun at the man who was on the ground as officers attempted to restrain and search him, according to COPA’s report.
Donnelly holstered his weapon and “attempted to place his foot” on the man’s shoulder, but his foot “appeared to slide off” the man’s shoulder before “briefly making contact with” the man’s “neck before reaching the ground,” according to the report.
While another officer held the man’s head on the ground by his hair and ordered him to stop resisting, “Donnelly struck (the man on the) left side of head three times with a police radio,” according to COPA’s report. “Officer Donnelly unholstered his firearm a second time and leaned over (the man.) Officer Donnelly pointed his firearm at (the man’s) head from a very close distance and told him he was ‘going to get f------ shot.’”
Shortly after Donnelly’s actions, the other officers were able to handcuff the man and pull a loaded gun from his pants, as “a large number of CPD personnel, including supervisors, were present at the scene,” according to COPA’s report.
After the man had been placed in a police vehicle, Donnelly confronted several members of the crowd that had gathered to watch the confrontation, according to COPA’s report.
“Officer Donnelly stood up, yelled ‘Shut the f--- up and get the f--- back!’ and pointed his finger to an unknown woman in the crowd,” according to COPA’s report. “Officer Donnelly can be heard referring to one bystander as a ‘b---- ass mother------.’ Then, Officer Donnelly approached an unknown man who appeared to be recording him and yelled at him. Other officers separated Officer Donnelly and the bystander.”
CPD policy directs officers to “avoid the use of flashlights, radios, firearms, or any items not specifically designed as an impact weapon, unless reasonably necessary and no other practical options are available.”
While the man was actively trying to resist arrest, he was not attempting to assault officers, according to COPA’s conclusion. Video captured by officers’ body-worn cameras “depicts many officers involved in comprehensively immobilizing (the man) and forcing his head into the pavement,” according to COPA’s report.
Although Donnelly told investigators the man was attempting to use his gun against officers, video captured by officers’ body-worn cameras shows no evidence of that, according to COPA’s report.
Donnelly also violated CPD policy by verbally abusing the man who officers arrested as well as bystanders, according to COPA’s report.
“Members of the public benefit from a blanket entitlement to exercise their First Amendments rights when addressing public servants, even when their comments are critical, unkind or even abusive,” according to COPA’s report.
Donnelly’s actions “brought significant negative attention and discredit upon the department” and “exposed CPD to civil liability,” COPA concluded.
“In this case Officer Donnelly demonstrated an unprofessional inability to regulate his behavior when dealing with members of the public as well as a lack of self-control and discipline in utilizing the correct amount of force,” COPA concluded. “Although Officer Donnelly admitted using profanity against (the man who was arrested) and members of the public at the scene, he did not show remorse and sought to excuse the misconduct.”
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 stop Black people, according to a letter sent by COPA to the district’s commander.
The complaint about the July 2024 stop is the third of those complaints to be fully resolved by COPA and find multiple rule violations, records show.
Donnelly, who earns $115,158 annually, has been suspended three other times, records show.
In 2017, Donnelly was suspended for five days for failing to properly announce his presence before entering private property for a search, records show.
And in 2019, Donnelly was suspended twice for a total of six days after investigators concluded he improperly stopped a pedestrian, improperly searched two vehicles, twice failed to activate his body-worn camera and failed to document an investigatory stop, records show.
Donnelly is appealing a five-day suspension in connection to a 2024 incident. In that case, he is accused of verbally abusing an individual during a traffic stop that also occurred on Cambridge Avenue.
Donnelly is named in six pending lawsuits filed by Chicago drivers who said they were improperly stopped and searched by the 18th District tactical team because they are Black, according to an analysis of court records by WTTW News.
Donnelly is also facing at least six other misconduct complaints, COPA records show.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
