Chicago police officers injured or killed off-duty highlight decision to provide on-duty benefits – Chicago Tribune

The Chicago Police Department and its pension board have each determined that former officer Danny Golden was performing official police duties shortly before he was shot and paralyzed outside a bar in the Beverly neighborhood nearly two years ago.

It’s a decision that came months after Golden filed for disability benefits in December. It highlights what can appear to outsiders to be a subjective process, with no hard and fast rules about how long it may take for that decision to be made, or which officials or which families are certain to receive it.

The meetings of the pension committee to decide on applications for incapacity for work are public. The CPD, meanwhile, will decide for itself whether an officer was injured “in the course of his or her dereliction of duty,” although the process is opaque. Superintendent Larry Snelling said last week that any officer, whether working a shift or not, can be injured in the line of duty as long as they are responding to “criminal activity.”

It was not known when police determined Golden’s injuries were service-related, but his retirement application was approved at the board’s March meeting. As the documents show, he applied for disability benefits approximately two months after his allotted sick leave period expired.

An officer does not have to be on duty and in uniform for his injuries – or death – to have occurred in the line of duty. Shortly after the killings of off-duty officers Luis Huesca last month and Aréanah Preston last year, the CPD announced that both had died in the line of duty.

Important facts often vary. For example, Golden had been at the bar where the altercation that ended in gunfire took place, while Huesca and Preston were both killed in attempted robberies as they returned home after a work shift.

When Snelling announced Huesca’s murder charge last Friday, he said the “line of duty” designation would be applied “based on the officers’ response” in off-duty situations.

“Any time an officer is confronted with criminal activity, is attacked, and that officer responds physically in any way, he is now behaving like a police officer,” Snelling said.

Huesca was killed April 21 near his home in the Gage Park neighborhood. He was still in uniform when he returned home from work and his gun was taken along with his car.

The police department announced just two days later that Huesca had died in the line of duty, making his family eligible for survivor’s death benefits.

Process questioned

The pension board’s disability awards came under scrutiny last year by Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza after the board rejected a request from Mendoza’s brother, a CPD sergeant who contracted COVID-19 on 17 consecutive workdays in 2020.

Last year, Gov. JB Pritzker signed a law that expanded service disability benefits for first responders who had contracted the coronavirus.

Injured officers receive 365 days of paid sick leave to recover from injuries. If more time is needed, the officer will be placed on unpaid leave.

An officer can then apply to the Policemen’s Annuity & Benefit Fund of Chicago – the pension board – for disability benefits.

As a result of the pension fund appointment, Golden will receive 75% of his CPD salary tax-free until he reaches retirement age, in addition to City-funded insurance cover for the rest of his life. When Golden reaches retirement age, he can apply for his pension.

City human resources records show Golden was paid $8,164 per month before being placed on no-pay status in October 2023.

The golden case

On Friday, July 8, 2022, hundreds of people from the Beverly, Morgan Park and Mount Greenwood neighborhoods gathered at Kennedy Park for an annual 16-inch softball tournament. After the tournament ended, as Friday turned into Saturday, Golden and other competitors headed north to Sean’s Rhino Bar and Grill.

The three men charged in the shooting entered the bar after 2 a.m. — later than the bar’s liquor license allowed. A fight soon broke out between the three and other bar patrons – not the Goldens – and spilled onto the sidewalk.

Although Golden was immediately identified as a CPD officer in the suspects’ arrest reports, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office did not charge any of them with aggravated assault on a peace officer.

“As in all cases, charging decisions are based on the available evidence, facts and the law,” prosecutors said in a statement. “We cannot comment on pending litigation.”

Records obtained by the Tribune show Golden detailing his version of what happened in his December filing.

“On July 9, 2022, I was a guest with my friends and family members at Sean’s Rhino Bar and Grill, 2428 W. 104th St., Chicago, IL,” Golden wrote. “While I was at Sean’s Rhino Bar and Grill, there was a violent fight between three men inside the establishment, with tables being turned over and glass bottles and cups being thrown. I was not involved in the argument.”

Golden noted that CPD determined he was injured in the line of duty.

“After I left the facility, I observed an acquaintance being hit by one of the three perpetrators and losing consciousness. I then reported my position, explaining that I was a Chicago police officer and that I was attempting to take the perpetrator into custody. A short time later several shots were fired and I was hit by a bullet that penetrated my spine. My brother John M. Golden also suffered a gunshot wound.”

Golden was paralyzed from the waist down. His lawyer did not respond to a request for comment.

After being chased out of the bar, one of the three men returned to his vehicle parked nearby and allegedly retrieved a handgun. The gun was passed to the other two men, who each fired several shots.

A day after the shooting, inspectors from the city’s Department of Business and Consumer Protection ordered the bar closed because it violated its liquor license by staying open after 2 a.m. The property was later put up for sale.

The Golden Brothers filed a lawsuit last year against the bar association and three men accused in the shooting. The lawsuit, which is still pending, accuses the bar association of negligence for failing to hire security personnel on the night of the shooting.

The only employees working that night, according to the Goldens, were “slightly built female bartenders” who continued to serve alcohol after it was banned and who “begged plaintiff Daniel Golden to de-escalate the altercation outside the Rhino Bar.”

Although the younger Golden was only 18 at the time, the brothers say they were both “as invited guests” at the bar – which regularly ignored occupancy restrictions and arguments often broke out among patrons.

In response to the lawsuit, the bar said the Goldens were responsible for their own injuries because they “failed to leave in a timely manner, engaged in a fight, failed to call law enforcement (and) pursued certain dangerous individuals when it happened.” “It was unreasonable to do this.”

Court records show that the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office filed a motion in March to quash a subpoena issued by state bar attorneys for the criminal records of the three men charged in the shooting. The judge in this case has yet to rule on this request.