Fired Des Plaines Cop’s Arbitration Outcome Received by City

The results from an arbitration hearing held to review the termination of Des Plaines police officer John Bueno were given to the city, Journal and Topics Newspapers reported. Des Plaines City Manager Michael Bartholomew did not comment on what the outcome was, according to the newspaper.

Bueno was fired in March 2012; City of Des Plaines officials did not make public the reasons for his termination.

in a parking garage while transporting him from Elmhurst to Des Plaines in a lawsuit filed by a DuPage man in July 2012.

Contreras was suspended and is now working at the Des Plaines Police Department. Des Plaines officials did not make the reasons for his suspension public. 

Des Plaines reached an out-of-court settlement with a woman who was suing three Des Plaines police officers for falsely arresting her and forcing her to sign a consent form to search her home in 2009, Journal and Topics Newspapers reported in October 2012. Bueno was one of three officers named in the complaint.

Bueno filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in which former Deputy Police Chief Richard Rozkuszka was accused of making discriminatory comments regarding Bueno’s Hispanic heritage in 2011.

which stated he was fired to cover up police brutality of Des Plaines police officers including Bueno.

Former Des Plaines Police Chief James Prandini abruptly retired without any public comment from the city at the end of 2011, and the city swore in Police Chief William Kushner in September 2012. Before and since the new police chief was hired, multiple top-ranked Des Plaines police retired without public comment.

Disciplinary measures involving Des Plaines police officers accused of submitting false records to attain grant funding for overtime were announced by Kushner in April.

Messages left for Bartholomew and Kushner to comment for this story were not immediately returned at publication time.

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