No questions from the council
Nobody on the council said a word last night after the chief delivered her report on the investigation of the Elgin Police Department’s raid on the Granger house. I imagine that was because they were busy wiping egg off their faces.
I wouldn’t mention this except for the fact that I’m almost certain that the city council will make the same mistake it made last time, that is, confusing two separate issues of 1) the appropriateness of the raid and 2) the “customer service” issue of the Granger’s being unable to file a complaint.
What I think is going to happen is that now that they’ve heard from the chief that the raid was entirely appropriate and conducted according to standard procedures, they will just dismiss the whole issue, including the “customer service” issue. Questions however, remain about why exactly the Granger’s had to wait, and why they were told that there was no basis for complaint, as though there are only certain things that you are allowed to complain about.
The chief acknowledged that the Grangers had to wait an inappropriate amount of time, but was otherwise unapologetic. It’s clear that she’s behind her team. And it was no surprise when she said that no disciplinary action would be taken.
If the council acted responsibly, however, it would have asked, “Well you just said, the Grangers were forced to wait an inappropriate amount of time to file a complaint. Why did that happen? And why is disciplinary action not called for in this case where one or more officers did not follow the police department’s policies for handling complaints?”
Unfortunately, I think they were so embarrassed by their previous shoot-from-the-hip decision-making, that they were eager to put this behind them as fast as possible.
For a couple of members, it’s likely that was the last time they’ll have to deal with this issue. The election, of course, is next week, and a new council will be seated following that.
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