A former police chief in south suburban Robbins is facing multiple felony charges in connection with the alleged attack of a man who went to the village's police station earlier this summer to file a complaint.
Carl Scott, 47, was charged with aggravated battery, official misconduct and theft after an investigation by the Cook County sheriff’s office.
Scott appeared before a judge Friday morning in Markham and was released with orders not to have contact with witnesses in the case and to stay away from the Robbins Police Department, court records show.
Scott was named Robbins police chief in 2022 and resigned six days after the incident, prosecutors said. He had no other criminal background.
A message left with the village administrator’s office was not immediately returned.
The 43-year-old who was attacked went to the police station on July 1 and began recording, leading Scott to use his cellphone to film the man and calling two police officers to the lobby to assist him, prosecutors said.
Scott allegedly asked the man for this personal information so he could cite him with being a public nuisance, and the man refused. Scott then told him he would have to be brought to the back of the station for fingerprinting, prosecutors said.
While walking into the back, Scott allegedly knocked the man’s cellphone from his hand, shoved him into a doorframe and then pushed him into an interview room.
Scott told the officers with him to turn off their body-worn cameras and then struck the man with an open hand and then with a closed fist, prosecutors said. He also allegedly took the man’s wristwatch and threw it on the ground.
Scott left for a time but returned and struck the man again while yelling at him until he gave his name, prosecutors said. When an officer went to confirm the man’s name, Scott allegedly asked for his officers’ batons, but both refused to give them, prosecutors said.
The man suffered bruising to his face and neck and was released with a citation, prosecutors said.
A village employee allegedly saw Scott pick up the man’s cellphone and throw it into a sewer behind the police station, where it was later recovered.
Village spokesman Sean Howard said the other two officers allegedly involved were placed on unpaid leave pending an internal investigation. A spokeswoman for the sheriff's office declined to say if investigators sought charges against anyone other than Scott. A spokeswoman for the state's attorney's office declined to comment on the case.
In an interview with CBS 2 news in July, the man told reporters that he was at the station to file a complaint over an incident in March when he was recording in the police station. The report identified him as the owner of a YouTube account that documents so-called First Amendment audits.
“Auditors” film encounters with police and public officials to test whether authorities will violate the person’s constitutional rights, which they said is necessary to ensure government transparency and that authorities are upholding their duty to protect the civil rights of their citizens.
Critics say the people involved sometimes use harassing and threatening tactics to get a rise out of the people they are filming to gain exposure on social media.
The Sun-Times reached out to the man on YouTube for comment.
