A federal lawsuit filed against the city of Chicago and its local law enforcement agency alleges that two police officers sodomized a man with a revolver while he was illegally detained for several hours last year.
Delivery driver Angel Perez says in recently filed legal
documents that he was assaulted repeatedly by Chicago Police
Department Officer Jorge L. Lopez and another cop during a
traumatizing experience last October that has prompted him to sue
the city and those involved for excessive force, failure to
intervene and emotional distress.
According to the lawsuit first reported Monday by Courthouse
News, Lopez and a colleague locked Perez in a cell for several
hours and sexually abused him with a handgun during the second of
two days he spent in the custody of the Chicago PD.
The ordeal started for Perez on October 22, 212 when he was
allegedly picked up by Lopez and another officer and taken in an
unmarked police car to the city’s Harrison Street Police Station
for interrogation.
“Two officers began assaulting the plaintiff with questions
regarding robberies and drug dealers in the Taylor Street
area,” the complaint states. “Plaintiff responded that he
did not know anything about robberies or drug dealings in the
Taylor Street area and again and repeatedly requested that the
officers call his lawyer. Plaintiff’s lawyer was never contacted
and the questioning continued. The officers were particularly
interested in why the plaintiff had the telephone number of an
individual by the name of ‘Dwayne’ in his telephone.”
According to Courthouse News, Perez was released from police
custody after two hours. One day later, however, he received a
phone call from Lopez instructing him to meet at a nearby parking
lot in order to sign some paperwork. Once again, Perez says he
was assaulted and taken back to the police station where he was
handcuffed to a bar and placed in ankle shackles by Lopez and
another man identified only as “Sergeant.”
“Plaintiff was held against his will in the room for several
hours handcuffed and shackled, and not free to leave the custody
of the defendants,” the complaint continues. There Perez was
allegedly in the presence of upwards of six officers who told him
he’d be moved to another facility “to be raped by gang
members” if he didn’t assist them.
The officer, it continues, “would plant evidence on him and
his family members if he continued to refuse to cooperate with
them. Still, further that if he did not cooperate they would
charge him a conspiracy to obstruct justice.”
Perez then says he was told to make contact with the man named
Dwayne that was brought up during the previous day’s
interrogation. When he refused to make the phone call, the
officers reportedly got violent.
“After a period of time refusing to call or text Dwayne, the
officers began to pull and contort the plaintiff’s body while he
was handcuffed to the wall and shackled at his ankles, causing
the plaintiff severe pain. At one point, the Sergeant sat on the
plaintiff’s chest and placed his palms on the plaintiff’s eye
sockets and pushed hard against them, causing plaintiff severe
pain. The Sergeant also drove his elbows into plaintiff’s back
and head causing severe pain. Defendant Lopez was in the room at
the time and did not intervene.”
Lopez eventually called up his acquaintance and attempted to
initiate a drug deal, but only after things escalated between him
and the officers.
“After several hours of verbal and physical torture, defendant
Lopez and the Sergeant were alone in the room with the
plaintiff,” the complaint continues. “The officers told
plaintiff that if he refused to cooperate with them that they
were going to give him a ‘little taste’ of what he would be
getting at the Cook County jail. They put plaintiff over a chair
and pulled down his pants and defendant Lopez said, ‘I hear that
a big black nigger dick feels like a gun up your ass.’”
“Then defendant Lopez and/or the Sergeant, knowing their
actions created a strong likelihood of great bodily harm and
mental anguish, inserted a cold metal object, believed to be one
of officer’s service revolvers, into the plaintiff’s rectum,
causing the plaintiff severe pain and humiliation. The two
officers laughed hysterically while inserting the object into the
plaintiff’s rectum.”
“The Sergeant then said ‘I almost blew your brains out.’ The
officers told the plaintiff that they would continue to insert
the gun into his rectum until he cooperated with them.”
The complaint attests that Lopez soon began crying and agreed to
cooperate with the officers. He then made the drug deal and broke
off all contact with the officers while attempting to file a
report with the Independent Police Review Authority.
“At no time on either October 20, 2012 or October 21, 2012,
prior to plaintiff’s seizure and torture, did the plaintiff
commit a crime,” Perez says in the complaint.
This article originally appeared on: RT