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Subpoena catches up with Burge
Chicago Sun-Times,  Sep 2, 2004  by Natasha Korecki
After allegedly eluding authorities for more than a day, former Area 2 Police Cmdr. Jon Burge was slapped Wednesday with a subpoena ordering him to testify before a grand jury in an ongoing criminal investigation of police torture.

Burge, who now lives in Florida, allegedly had evaded prosecutors since arriving in Chicago on Tuesday but was served with the subpoena while at his attorney's downtown office for depositions in civil lawsuits.

He spent about four hours refusing to answer questions in those suits. They allege Burge and detectives routinely tortured suspected criminals while prosecutors and the city let it go on.

Burge invoked the Fifth Amendment to nearly every question except to give his own name and that of his boat -- Vigilante -- and to say that he still receives about $30,000 annually in a Chicago Police pension, plaintiffs' attorneys said.

Former Death Row inmates sue

Outside his attorney's office, a small group of protesters carrying signs chanted "Jail Jon Burge."

Burge is being sued in separate lawsuits by former Death Row inmates Aaron Patterson, Madison Hobley, Stanley Howard and Leroy Orange. He was also questioned in a parole revocation case.

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Separately, Special Prosecutor Edward J. Egan was appointed more than a year ago to investigate torture allegations within the Police Department.

Burge was subpoenaed in that matter. Authorities would not say when he is scheduled to testify before the grand jury.

His attorney, Richard Sikes, said he instructed his client to invoke the Fifth Amendment in the civil cases Wednesday, arguing that by answering questions, Burge could trigger new charges of "furthering a conspiracy" in the criminal case.

Asked if prosecutors wanted to talk to Burge regardless of what he said in his civil depositions, Assistant Special Prosecutor Robert Boyle said: "You bet we are."

Burge was fired from the Police Department in 1993 for the torture of Andrew Wilson, who was convicted in a double police murder. But the city is still bound by a court ruling to pay for Burge's legal fees, which have surpassed $1 million, said Chicago Law Department spokeswoman Jennifer Hoyle.

"We feel that we have finally in some way brought to the stand and brought to public questioning a police criminal," said plaintiffs' attorney Flint Taylor. "A criminal we felt we had to hunt down, not unlike a Nazi war criminal."

Taylor and another plaintiffs' attorney, Jon Loevy, criticized Burge for initially dodging the subpoena. But Sikes said Burge wasn't dodging.

Nevertheless, he somehow slipped into his lawyer's office despite a team placed there before dawn to intercept him.

Eventually, they were let in after 4 p.m.

On Tuesday, authorities had staked out Midway Airport. As one process server said, they were "checking every bar in the airport for him."

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