Court rejects ex-Chicago officer's efforts to get job back

CHICAGO (AP) - A court has rejected an effort by a former Chicago police officer to get his job back after he was fired for his role in the fatal shooting of a bystander.

The Illinois Appellate Court ruled Friday that the disciplinary process was fair and that there was cause for the firing, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Saturday.

Quintonio LeGrier was having a mental breakdown in 2015 when then-Officer Robert Rialmo and his partner arrived at the scene of the disturbance. Bettie Jones, 55, admitted police into the apartment building where the 19-year-old LeGrier was in a dispute with his father.

Rialmo claimed LeGrier was attacking him with a bat when he fired, killing him and Jones. Investigators cast doubt on whether LeGrier swung the bat. The Chicago Police Board determined Rialmo could have repositioned himself to avoid shooting Jones.

Rialmo was fired in 2019. His attorneys filed a lawsuit in Cook County Circuit Court contending that the board's decision was arbitrary and capricious. The lawsuit asked that the decision be reversed and for Rialmo to be reinstated with back pay.

A Cook County judge rejected that lawsuit in 2020, upholding Rialmo's firing, according to the newspaper.

In 2018, a Chicago City Council committee gave the go-ahead for a $16 million payment to Jones' family. A jury had awarded $1.05 million to LeGrier's family in a wrongful death lawsuit, but a judge reversed it, noting jurors also found Rialmo feared for his life.