Man describes alleged beating by off-duty cop at N. Side bar
John Sherwood — sitting in a wheelchair with a fresh metal plate and screws holding together fractured bones in his right leg — said Thursday that he wished his life could go back to the way it was before the night he allegedly crossed paths with Chicago Police Sgt. Eric Elkins, a cop with a history of troubles with the law and his own department.
Sherwood was at @mosphere, a gay bar in Andersonville, with friends in late September where several visibly drunk people — including Elkins, who was off duty — were at an adjacent table, Sherwood said Thursday at a news conference at his attorney’s office in the Loop.
Sherwood’s attorney, Tim Cavanagh, filed a civil lawsuit last month against Elkins and three other men he was with who allegedly attacked Sherwood after a series of events that night. The lawsuit charges that the men carried out the attack “without provocation and without authorization.” It seeks unspecified damages.
“They were doing shots. They started throwing limes at us,” Sherwood recalled of the incident, which occurred around midnight Sept. 29.
“I tapped one of them on the shoulder and said, ‘Can you knock it off?’ ” Sherwood recalled. “Nothing happened, and then two minutes later, one of them fell into me. I pushed him off of me. That’s when words were exchanged. A scuffle ensued. I was punched in the face by one of the people.”
A bouncer stepped in and Sherwood, 53, and his partner, Tom Stacha, 44, made their way to the exit and onto Clark Street.
“I was the first one out the door, and then two seconds later Elkins was just in a fit of rage. There were people trying to keep him from coming out,” Sherwood charged.
“His eyes were, when he was coming out of the bar, his eyes were just crazy,” he alleged.
Sherwood said Elkins kicked him in the leg. He remembers hearing a snap and later — after enduring several kicks while he was in the fetal position — realizing a bone in his leg went through his skin.
Sherwood and Stacha were both punched and kicked during the assault, the lawsuit alleges.
Witnesses allegedly identified Elkins as being involved in the incident, Cavanagh said.
Cavanagh said he’s trying to recover video from inside the bar that he believes shows the initial confrontation. The bar, which is also named in the lawsuit, has not shared the video.
The incident at the bar is the subject of an internal police investigation, the Sun-Times has reported. No criminal charges have been filed in the case.
Elkins could not immediately be reached for comment.
The incident is not the first time Elkins has been called out for allegedly engaging in bad behavior. At the time of the attack, police brass were trying to determine what, if any, discipline should be doled out to Elkins for an unrelated matter. In 19 years with the force, he has been the subject of 35 internal investigations.
Anthony Guglielmi, a police spokesman, did not respond to a request for comment Thursday. The Cook County state’s attorney’s office also didn’t respond.
Elkins was accused three years ago of touching the penis of a teenager during a family reunion near Elkins’ boyhood home in rural Michigan. He ended up pleading guilty in 2016 to a lesser charge, avoiding prison and sex-offender registration.
Elkins completed his sentence — including a year of probation — last year. But the Chicago Police Department says its internal affairs bureau still hasn’t finished investigating whether Elkins should be disciplined or fired.
Elkins, 44, has been on desk duty since police learned of the Michigan incident three years ago.
Fifteen years ago, Elkins was charged with having sex with a 16-year-old boy he befriended while moonlighting as a high school security guard — a case for which he was cleared by a Cook County judge and never faced any punishment by the police department. In a previous interview with the Sun-Times, he denied the charges.
On Thursday, Cavanagh criticized the CPD for failing to effectively police their own, leaving officers with a sense of impunity.
Elkins wasn’t the only cop alleged to have taken part in the assault last month.
Oak Park police officer Dwayne Jones is also named in the lawsuit. Jones is an acquaintance of Elkins, according to Cavanagh.
David Powers, a spokesman for Oak Park, said Thursday that Jones was put on paid leave Oct. 18 pending the outcome of an internal investigation. Jones is a probational officer who began work at the department Jan. 5, he said.