Promoting Predators

Over our nearly thirty years, we saw boatloads of persons promoted, many of whom shouldn't have ever been near a promotional opportunity. Many were assholes. A few were criminals. Others were just scumbags.

• Chicago’s system of promotions remains out of step with other big cities. Police departments in New York City and Los Angeles consider disciplinary records before promoting officers, seeing their past actions as a critical factor in determining whether they’re fit to supervise others. A survey conducted for the Chicago Police Department of more than a dozen major departments found that only one did not consider discipline in promotions.

  In New Orleans, the police department created a promotions policy that considers an officer’s disciplinary history after it fell under a federal consent decree stemming from decades of corruption and misconduct. The department took nearly four years to create and launch its new policy.

  Chicago is nearly seven years into a state consent decree intended in part to address issues with the police department’s promotions system. Between November 2023 and this April, the city has paid a consulting firm at least $430,000 to study personnel policies, including making recommendations on how to incorporate disciplinary histories into the process.

  But the problems remain unaddressed by the department.

The article relies way too much on the Invisible Institute for solutions, an overly lib-tarded anti-police organization with a giant axe to grind. We wouldn't piss on them if they were on fire.

But we had a lot of discussions over the years with other cops who thought there ought to be some way that the Department could "tap the brakes" on promotions as it were - until an investigations was concluded. What we came up with years ago hasn't changed:

• if you're up for promotion by score, you can go to class with everyone else, but you don't get to walk the stage, shake the hands, or get the star/salary until the complaint is resolved. If it is resolved favorably, you get the same seniority date as your fellow promotees. If it's unfavorable, you serve your suspension time at the appropriate rank, then move forward. This would also encourage the Department to resolve these cases in a timely manner instead of dragging them out for years and years and years.
• if you're up for "meri-clout-orious" promotion, you're shit out of luck, and you wait for the next opportunity. If it's resolved in your favor, you're automatically in the next class. If it's an unfavorable finding, you're out of the process for a five or ten year period AND whoever recommended you isn't allowed to ever submit a "merit" nomination again, because they're obviously bad at it.

You want to have some fun? Get a list over the past three decades of all the promoted people who got fired or (even more fun) went to jail. Then compare how many of those promotions were by score and how many by "merit." 

You'll be amazed. We used to have a list and it was a constant source of amazement.