Champaign Police Department Fails to Investigate Complaints Against Officers

Check CU recently received a full denial from the City of Champaign, Illinois in response to a public records request seeking complaints that had been made against police officers in 2021 and 2022.  According to the denial issued by City Clerk Shannon Myers on March 24^th, 2022, investigations have not been completed by the Police Department for any of those complaints.

In 2019, in response to pressure from residents to eliminate the 30 day police complaint filing deadline, Police Chief Anthony Cobb claimed that complaints needed to be submitted that quickly because it was vital to perform the investigation immediately, before evidence and the memories of witnesses became compromised. 

Then, Chief Cobb flip-flopped; in an apparent snub to Champaign’s Citizen Review Subcommittee (CRS), Cobb changed the civilian filing deadline to 60 days, but increased the Police Department response time to a complaint from 45 to 180 days. 

Given the City’s denial for all 2021 and 2022 police complaints, it seems some of the complaints may now be more than a year old and still have not been investigated.

In January 2020, Police Chief Anthony Cobb tasked Officer Kevin Olmstead with performing complaint reviews (replacing Officer Bruce Ramseyer).  It seems there was a brief expectation that a different officer (Nathan Rath) would take over complaint reviews in mid-2021, but Olmstead was ultimately reaffirmed to the role in September 2021.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) denial for the 2021-2022 police complaints, along with the explanation issued by Records Manager & Acting City Clerk Shannon Myers, is provided below.