Two Chicago Police officers have been charged with stealing cash and drugs during searches after submitting false affidavits to judges to obtain warrants, the Chicago Sun-Times is reporting.
Sgt. Xavier Elizondo and Officer David Salgado, both assigned to a gang team in the Ogden District on the West Side, were charged with one count of conspiracy to commit theft and one count of embezzlement. Salgado is also charged with making a false statement to the FBI.
"(These) crimes, if proven, go against every fiber of what it means to be a police officer for this great city," Superintendent Eddie Johnson said. "You are only as effective as the trust that the people of this city have given you."
Johnson, speaking to a group of police recruits, spoke out strongly against the officers' alleged conduct, and said that he would not hesitate to dismiss the officers from the force if they were found guilty.
"If those implicated in today's case are found guilty, not only will they have lost the honor and respect of this profession, (but) they will be criminals who have abused the public's trust and violated the oath they took when they first received their stars."
Federal prosecutors allege the two “conspired to submit materially false information to state court judges to obtain search warrants that enabled them to enter various properties and seize cash and drugs,” according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
The feds allege the cops would share what they stole with the informants who tipped them off in the first place.
