U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang dismissed all eight counts of a lawsuit against the Arlington Heights Police Department and Arlington Heights police officer Mark Del Boccio. The judge ruled that the police officer “neither created nor increased the danger” of the anonymous female plaintiff in leaving her with the three males, “just as the officer found her.” Arlington Heights police responded to a public intoxication and teen smoking complaint call from a Mount Prospect apartment building manager on May 6, 2009 and arrived to find three males and a female, who was intoxicated and standing in the rain. The males appeared to be caring for the female, and told police officer Mark Del Boccio that they were taking her home. The police officer saw the subjects walk out of the rain toward an apartment building, closed out the call and announced the backup unit could disregard.
After the Arlington Heights police left the area, the building manager saw the same subjects walk into an apartment building laundry room at the Mansions of Mountshire, 1821 W Golf Rd, Mt. Prospect (near the border with Arlington Heights). The manager called 9-1-1 again, and Mount Prospect police responded to the call in their jurisdiction. They arrived to find the woman being raped by at least one of the male subjects.
Mount Prospect police arrested the three male subjects. Christopher Balodimas, 23, of Buffalo Grove was convicted July 2010 of criminal sexual assault. Balodimas is serving a six-year sentence and is up for parole in September 2014. Balodimas was on probation for robbery on the day of the incident — May 6, 2009. The suit claimed that Del Boccio did not investigate the male subjects, and violated the rape victim’s Fourth Amendment (involving probably cause) and 14th Amendment rights (involving the prohibition of the local government from depriving a person of life, liberty, or property without taking certain steps to ensure fairness).
“Plaintiff contends that her constitutional rights were violated when Del Boccio failed to properly investigate the 911 complaint and, instead, decided to ‘cover his trail’ by calling off the backup police officer and reporting to dispatch that the subjects of the complaint were not at the scene,” federal judge Edmond Chang wrote.
The judge wrote that “Plaintiff was already in a dangerous situation. The question is whether Del Boccio did anything to increase the danger to plaintiff. Increasing the danger means that the state did ‘something that turned a potential danger into an actual one, rather than that it just stood by and did nothing to prevent private violence.'” The judge also wrote that “… the plaintiff’s claim cannot advance under the governing law.”
The plaintiff’s attorney Steven Garstki plans on appealing the decision. Steven Garstki is listed as a personal injury lawyer
See also …
Courhouse News Service Cop Clear of Suit by Girl Raped After 911 Call
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