Cops off streets after video raises questions

Three police officers have been stripped of their badges and assigned to desk work following a published report that surveillance video of searches at a bar contradicted the official version of how an arrest was made.

The three officers have been relieved of their police powers and assigned to desk work, Chicago police spokeswoman Monique Bond said. The 2004 bar search involved an elite police unit now under state and federal investigation.

The Chicago Tribune reported Saturday that the questionable police report was filed by Special Operations Section Officers Eric Olsen and Greg Insley. Bond, however, would not name the three officers, citing a pending investigation, and did not confirm that Olsen and Insley were among them.

A call placed to the police union, the Fraternal Order of Police, was not immediately returned Saturday evening. A phone message left with an Eric Olsen listed in Chicago also was not immediately returned. No published listing could be found for Greg Insley in Chicago.

At issue is the accuracy of the police report, which claims officers arrested Raymundo Martinez outside a bar after finding drugs on him and he threw a beer bottle. But video shows about 30 officers raiding the bar on March 27, 2004, searching patrons and arresting Martinez inside the bar.

Seven members of the same unit already face state charges, including armed robbery and aggravated kidnapping. All have pleaded not guilty. U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald last week revealed a federal investigation of the unit on the same day that a former SOS officer was charged with planning the murder-for-hire of another officer.