When he announced his candidacy for Cook County judge, Chicago Police Lt. John D. Poulos touted the opportunity to “continue my public service, which spans 23 years.”

It’s a career mired in controversy and allegations of dishonesty from the start, an Injustice Watch investigation shows.

An analysis of thousands of documents from internal police investigations, lawsuits, and county and federal court records reveals a man whose credibility was repeatedly called into question — and a police department’s repeated failures to discipline him.

Poulos’ tarnished track record includes two fatal shootings, omitting previous arrests on his application to become a police officer, inappropriate business dealings while he was on an extended leave of absence from the police department, and blocking undocumented domestic violence victims from applying for legal status.

Police officials tried to fire Poulos in 2017 but failed primarily because they took more than a decade to file the charges.

“This background that adversely goes against (his) fundamental credibility should not be hanging over a judge under any circumstances,” said Joseph Ferguson, a former federal prosecutor who until 2021 was Chicago’s inspector general.

“It’s hard to imagine he would even be in this position but for the fact that CPD’s management of disciplinary matters back in the 2000s resulted in the dismissal of misconduct charges against him,” Ferguson said.

Despite his missteps, Poulos, 52, moved up the ranks. He was granted a merit promotion to sergeant in 2015 and became a lieutenant earlier this year.

In two weeks, he’ll face off with three other attorneys for the Democratic Party nomination in the 20th Subcircuit, which covers Chicago’s northern lakefront from Edgewater to Streeterville. Poulos was admitted to the Illinois bar in 2007 while on leave from the police department. He returned to the force full-time in 2010 and has moonlighted as a real estate attorney since, records show.

But even his limited legal career has prompted a state investigation, records show.

Poulos is an Illinois notary public, authorized by state law to authenticate and witness the signing of official documents.

Last month, Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias — whose office oversees the state’s 140,000 notaries — opened a misconduct investigation into Poulos after he notarized documents in a case in which he had a personal stake. If true, it would be a violation of the state’s Notary Public Act, which says notaries “shall not acknowledge any instrument in which the notary’s name appears as a party in the transaction.”

In 2022 and 2023, Poulos notarized documents granting him power of attorney for properties owned by three of his clients, Injustice Watch found. One of those clients was Jose Tirado, former Chicago Police counterterrorism chief and Mayor Brandon Johnson’s head of the Office of Emergency Management & Communications, records show.

Tirado did not respond to requests for comment.

Giannoulias’ office initiated its investigation following inquiries from Injustice Watch about the records, obtained from the Cook County Recorder of Deeds’ online database.

In a statement, a Giannoulias spokesperson said Poulos could face a warning, a suspension, or a revocation of his notary status if the investigation finds proof of misconduct. Poulos remained an active Illinois notary as of publication, records show. His commission expires in the fall.

Poulos’ judgment has also been called into question in his current role in the records division at police headquarters.

Part of his job includes certifying U visa applications from undocumented crime victims. The visa provides legal status to victims of certain crimes such as domestic violence and felony assault who cooperate with police. To apply for the visa with federal authorities, victims must first get local law enforcement to certify their applications.

An Injustice Watch investigation revealed in 2022 how Poulos and another sergeant refused to certify scores of U visa applications, even if they met the requirements.

A law professor and co-author of the federal bill that created the U visa said Poulos and his colleague were “doing things that are dead wrong on the law.”

The day after Injustice Watch published its article, an attorney with Chicago’s Office of Inspector General formally requested police internal affairs open an investigation into Poulos and his colleague.

But records show internal affairs closed the file without investigating.

In a May 2023 memo to internal affairs chief Yolanda Talley, the police agent assigned to the case said he couldn’t move forward with his investigation because Injustice Watch failed to include “objective verifiable evidence of misconduct.” The investigator makes no mention of police files embedded in the article which showed Poulos rejected U visa applications on spurious grounds.

Talley did not respond to requests to comment.

The Illinois Attorney General’s office opened its own probe into the Chicago Police Department’s handling of U visa applications following Injustice Watch’s reporting. In December, records show an attorney with the office’s civil rights bureau sat down with Poulos.

The state attorney general’s investigation remains ongoing, a spokesperson said.

Poulos declined several interview requests.

In a recent statement to the Chicago Tribune, Poulos said he’s running for judge “to help restore some sense and sensibility to the bench and to our criminal justice system.”

“A select few have made it clear that the interests of criminals are their paramount concerns; they don’t consider the interests of ordinary citizens, especially their health, welfare, and safety,” he said. “I do care. That’s why I seek to continue to serve.”

‘I respectfully decline to answer your question’

By the time he applied to become a Chicago police officer in his late 20s, records show Poulos had graduated from Eastern Illinois University with a business degree, worked as a manager at a Jewel-Osco grocery store, moved up to the stores’ corporate offices until he was laid off amidst a merger, and later became a doorman at a sports bar. 

He had also been arrested at least four times, according to police records disclosed in a federal court case over one of his two fatal shootings.

At age 18, he was arrested for disorderly conduct twice in the same week for allegedly refusing to leave a South Side police station after he was “loud and abusive” to a district sergeant, and four days later for “continually yelling and screaming near a local business.”

His third disorderly conduct arrest came when he was 20 after he allegedly “caused a crowd to gather on a street corner while (responding officers) were conducting an investigation.”

That same year, Poulos was also convicted of a misdemeanor for tampering with a vehicle; police arrested him for removing tires off a car he said belonged to someone who owed him $500, court records show.

Poulos’ arrests had been expunged by the time he submitted his final application to the police department in 2000, records show. In that application — his third in a year — Poulos says he had never been arrested, a clear violation of department policy, which requires applicants to disclose their expunged arrests.

Poulos got the job anyway in March 2001.

Just a year into his new career, a driver hit Poulos’ left hand with their side mirror while he directed traffic downtown, records show. Prosecutors dropped the charges against the driver, and doctors would clear him to return to work, but he wouldn’t go back for eight years. Instead, Poulos applied for disability status with the police pension board, claiming his hand needed surgery to properly fire his weapon, records show. 

Poulos exhausted his paid medical leave and started an unpaid leave of absence in 2003. That year, Poulos purchased a 10% stake in a company that owned Gamekeepers Tavern & Grill, the bar where he had previously worked. Poulos signed official state records as the company’s president in December 2003, records show.

The police department prohibits officers from owning liquor-serving establishments even if they’re on unpaid leave. At a hearing about his request for disability benefits in March 2004, Poulos admitted to co-owning the bar and said its liquor license was under his name but he didn’t know if he was breaking any rules.

“It was my belief — and maybe you can correct me because maybe I’m wrong. I thought that police officers were not able to have liquor licenses or have a liquor license issued in their name,” said David Krugler, attorney for the retirement board of the Policemen’s Annuity and Benefit Fund of Chicago.

“I’m not sure about that,” Poulos responded, according to a transcript of the hearing. 

The board granted Poulos six months of disability payments, records show. 

Chicago police internal affairs investigators issued formal complaints against Poulos in December 2004 alleging he owned a bar, “knowingly placed a false statement” in his police application, and “knowingly made a false statement” during a background check.

“I did not believe the law required me to disclose expunged information,” Poulos told investigators a year later, according to a transcript of the interview. 

“I did not know that while on a leave of absence, I was still considered by the city of Chicago to be a police officer.”

During the interview, Poulos at first refused to answer questions about his past arrests until ordered to do so under threat of further disciplinary action. “I believe it is against the law for you to inquire about my arrest history, and I respectfully decline to answer your question unless I receive a direct order to do so from a superior officer,” he said.

But even then, Poulos only admitted to the arrest in the tampering case and not the ones for disorderly conduct. “No, I don’t believe that was me,” he said.

In February 2007, internal affairs investigators recommended Poulos be fired. 

They were ultimately overruled by Debra Kirby, then-head of internal affairs, who instead recommended a 60-day suspension. 

But two other police officials — the head of patrol and Area One deputy chief — implored then-interim Superintendent Dana Starks in a memo to follow the original recommendation and file charges to fire Poulos.

“There appears to be a pattern of deception by the accused,” the memo states.

Poulos was neither fired nor suspended. Because he was on leave, his disciplinary file was shelved. When he returned from his leave of absence in June 2010, records show the department failed to move on the findings from years past.

His disciplinary case would remain open and collecting dust for years until Poulos was again under investigation, only this time for much deadlier circumstances.

‘I don’t know if I want to go back to the street’

The night Poulos shot and killed 28-year-old Rickey Rozelle in August 2013, records show only one of them had a gun.

Poulos was off duty and walking home from Gamekeepers when he saw Rozelle on the rear porch of a vacant building next to his, records show. (Poulos and his partners sold the bar to Poulos’ dad years earlier; Poulos and his wife bought a $1.15 million three-story Victorian house down the street in 2011, records show.)

Poulos told police he thought Rozelle was robbing the building. Rozelle then allegedly threatened to kill him but tried to flee through a gangway before hitting a brick wall, at which point he turned and revealed a “shiny metallic object.” Poulos fired two shots and hit Rozelle once, killing him. The shiny object? Rozelle’s chrome watch, records show.

Detectives determined the shooting was justified, records show. A year and a half later, the Independent Police Review Authority, the city’s civilian agency that investigated police misconduct, also cleared Poulos of wrongdoing.

From 2010 through 2014, IPRA found only one police shooting to be unjustified out of hundreds – an era when Chicago police killed more people than officers at any other police department in the country, according to the Better Government Association.

Police officials were made aware of Poulos’ unserved suspension during the two concurrent investigations following the shooting, but nothing came of it.

Instead, Poulos moved up the ranks through the merit system, a process originally designed to diversify police leadership, but which many officers saw instead as a “reward for cronyism,” according to the Justice Department’s scathing report on the Chicago police prompted by footage of Laquan McDonald’s murder in 2014.

Records show Poulos became a sergeant in 2015 thanks to a nomination from his 7th District Englewood commander, Kevin Navarro.

The following year, in November 2016, Poulos requested a transfer from the 7th District to the Bureau of Internal Affairs — yet another instance when his open disciplinary file came to the attention of supervisors, records show.

Three weeks later, Poulos was still on active duty when he shot and killed 19-year-old Kajuan Raye in West Englewood.

Poulos pulled up to Raye at a bus stop in his police car because he allegedly matched the description from a 911 caller who said a man was choking a woman in an alley. Raye fled when Poulos approached him, and Poulos ran after him. Poulos told investigators Raye turned around twice during the chase to point a gun at him, and Poulos let out a shot each time. His second shot hit Raye in the back and killed him.

Police failed to recover a gun at the scene that night. In a lawsuit filed by Raye’s family, forensics experts hired by both sides agreed Raye was armed, but his handgun was tucked into his jacket breast pocket — not in his hands — when Poulos shot him.

Three days after killing Raye, former Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson stripped Poulos of his police powers, saying he had “concerns” about the shooting. But in a deposition, Poulos said Johnson didn’t relay concerns when they met that day.

“The superintendent told me that … you know, ‘We’re going to get through this,’ and you know, ‘This is the optics of it at this point, we just — we — we need to finish our investigation,’” Poulos said, according to a transcript.

Johnson’s deposition for the civil suit remains sealed, court records show.

The Justice Department released its sweeping report on the police department seven weeks after the Raye shooting. In the report — which paved the way for ongoing court-ordered reforms — Poulos is cited as an example of how Chicago cops “engage in problematic behaviors with impunity.”

In June 2017, Johnson filed charges with the Chicago Police Board to fire Poulos after an internal affairs investigator went over the evidence compiled against him a decade earlier and agreed with the original recommendation of separation.

“Poulos had an obligation to be truthful and forthright. … He instead sought out ways to prevent himself from acknowledging and clearly disclosing his past,” the investigator concluded, according to police board records.

Police officials said the renewed charges to fire Poulos arose from his transfer request and not because he killed Raye. His attorney cast Poulos as a decorated officer who deserved a second chance. 

“Seventeen years is a long time. … Too long to resurrect ancient charges today, just to satisfy a political agenda fueled by anti-police media,” attorney James McKay wrote in his motion to dismiss the case. “Fundamental fairness and due process must prevail in this case.”

In February 2018, the police board unanimously granted McKay’s motion, ruling the department’s failure to bring timely charges against Poulos violated his due process rights. A year later, the Civilian Office for Police Accountability ruled Poulos was justified in shooting Raye.

Despite those rulings, a federal jury awarded Raye’s family $1 million in damages in March 2020. The family’s attorneys leaned on Poulos’ track record, arguing in court documents he “consistently lied, deceived, and manipulated his way throughout his career as a Chicago police officer.” Meanwhile, the Chicago City Council approved a $950,000 settlement for Rozelle’s family in July 2018.

After failing to fire him, Johnson assigned Poulos to the records division at police headquarters, where he remains. Since killing Raye, records show Poulos was never assigned to the street again. In his deposition in the lawsuit filed by Raye’s family, Poulos said he preferred working behind a desk.

“I don’t know if I want to go back to the street,” he said. “The possibility that you lose a little bit of your humanity every time you go out on the street, because you may be forced to take a life or things that we see. I’ve done that.”

A crowded field of candidates

Poulos’ path to victory in the race for Cook County judge in the 20th Subcircuit is steep, but not impossible, judicial election experts said.

Any of the four candidates need only a plurality of votes to win, which technically could mean less than 26% of ballots. In an area of the city where voters split between Brandon Johnson and Paul Vallas in last year’s mayoral runoff, Poulos — whose statement to the Tribune indicates he’s running as a tough-on-crime candidate just as Vallas did — could end up on top if his opponents split liberal voters, said Albert Klumpp, a researcher and expert in Cook County judicial elections.

“I think the biggest advantage he has is that he’s facing three opponents instead of one,” Klumpp said. Even if voters are sensitive to Poulos’ controversies, “they’re probably not all going to vote for the same candidate,” he said.

His opponents include:

• Housing and eviction attorney Michael J. Zink, a self-styled progressive endorsed by most of the area’s elected officials, as well as the Chicago Federation of Labor and Independent Voters of Illinois.

• Nadine Wichern, chief of civil appeals at the Illinois attorney general’s office, who is endorsed by Stephanie Skora, author of the popular “Girl, I Guess Progressive Voter Guide.” As the only woman in the race, Wichern should expect to receive by default at least 10% of the vote, Klumpp said.

• Uptown attorney and former Cook County prosecutor Nickolas Pappas, who won the lottery to have his name appear at the top of the ballot, which historically gives candidates a bump of at least a few percentage points, Klumpp said.

All three received positive reviews from the county’s bar associations — Poulos did not participate in the bar evaluation process — and all three also share an endorsement from Personal PAC, an influential abortion-rights political action committee.

No Republicans are running in the primary, which all but guarantees the winner of the Democratic race will go on to win in the November election.

Poulos has the deepest war chest in the race, thanks to a $500,000 loan from his wife, Marjorie Schwartz Poulos, an executive at a Wisconsin-based consumer lender.

But even though he has more campaign cash than his opponents combined, Poulos had only spent about $15,000 as of December, with most of it going to a consultant he hired to get the signatures he needed to be on the ballot. 

And unlike his opponents, Poulos didn’t have a campaign website or social media accounts promoting his candidacy as of publication.

Poulos’ campaign manager Tim Egan, the Cook County Democratic Party’s main political operative in the 2nd Ward, did not respond to texts or voicemails.

Egan is also president and chief executive of Roseland Community Hospital on the South Side. Egan is accused in two ongoing federal lawsuits of green-lighting a scheme to bilk the federal government during the Covid-19 pandemic and retaliating against the whistleblower who brought it to the government’s attention, court records show.

Roseland’s attorneys have denied the allegations.

The most recent primary election could hold clues on how this year’s primary will shake out in this part of the North Side. In what was then known as the 8th Subcircuit, which covers much of the 20th Subcircuit in this year’s race, former Chicago cop Pat Casey and former Cook County commissioner John Fritchie lost to Bradley Trowbridge, the candidate with the least campaign donations but with the best bar ratings.

Ultimately, the race will come down to who comes out to vote, said Mary Kay Dawson, a veteran Cook County judicial campaign consultant.

“Races along the lakefront come down to turnout,” she said.

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