A fired Melrose Park police officer has sued the village, its mayor and other village officials, accusing them of terminating him unlawfully in retaliation for his father’s actions to oppose the village’s alleged mistreatment of its sole African American cop.
On Jan. 24, John Scatchell Jr. filed suit Cook County Circuit Court against the village of Melrose Park, as well as village president Ronald Serpico, police director Sam Pistani and deputy chief Michael Castellan.
Scatchell is represented in the action by attorneys Gianna R. Scatchell, of Chicago, and Cass Casper, of Talon Law LLC, of Chicago.
Melrose Park Village President Ronald Serpico
| Village of Melrose Park
According to the complaint, Scatchell is the son of John Scatchell Sr., who serves as president of the union representing Melrose Park’s rank and file police officers, the Fraternal Order of Police.
The complaint centers on the alleged fallout to the alleged discriminatory mistreatment of its first black police officer, Kyll Lavalais. The complaint alleges the village discriminated against Lavalais through 22 years of service, allegedly improperly transferring him and denying him promotions.
According to the complaint, the village then engaged in “selective enforcement” of its ordinance requiring employees to live in the village.
The complaint asserts Lavalais should have been considered exempt to that policy under a federal court decree against the village. That decree had been in place since the 1980s, and had come in response to the village’s hiring policies, which were allegedly designed to prevent racial minorities from obtaining jobs as police officers in Melrose Park.
Despite the decree, the complaint asserts the village sought to force Lavalais to live in the village or face discipline, including termination. At the time, the complaint notes, Lavalais was two years away from being able to retire “with maximum pension benefits.”
The village, however, took no similar action against other, white officers who live outside Melrose Park, the complaint states.
When the police union, led by Scatchell Sr., opposed the action against Lavalais, the complaint asserts village officials retaliated against Scatchell Sr., scuttling a promotion to deputy chief; demoting him to “station supervisor;” launching investigations into Scatchell Sr. based on anonymous letters; and attempting to “pin a false excessive force case” on him, among others.
The alleged retaliation prompted Scatchell Sr. to file a complaint against the village with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the complaint states.
The complaint asserts that, in turn, prompted further retaliatory actions against Scatchell Sr. by village officials, including further investigations into Scatchell Sr.’s conduct; actions allegedly against a plumbing company owned by Scatchell Sr.; and enacting a village ordinance forcing police officers to retire at the age of 62. According to the complaint, the ordinance was passed in December 2017, the same month during which Scatchell Sr. would turn 62.
"Political loyalty to Defendant Serpico and his administration is, as a matter of long-established custom and practice having the air of official policy, a requirement for employment at the (Melrose Park Police Department)," the complaint alleges. "Defendants blacklist and retaliate against officers who question leadership, oppose or report misconduct, or do anything that goes against Mayor Serpico’s will."
The complaint accuses the village of also retaliating against Scatchell Jr., beginning about three weeks after village officials allegedly learned about Scatchell Sr.’s EEOC filing.
The complaint asserts the village officials “set upon a concerted course of unlawful conduct seeking Scatchell Jr.’s termination based on ginned-up, trumped-up, trivial bases that were pretextual litigation figments to justify firing him as retaliation against Scatchell Sr.”
Specifically, the complaint asserts an anonymous letter writer accused Scatchell Jr. of going “hunting” while allegedly on sick leave for a work-related injury.
According to the complaint, a Melrose Park detective used “at least 219 hours of overtime conducting ‘surveillance’ on Scatchell Jr.” The complaint asserts, “by comparison” that detective “spent only 16.5 hours investigating a murder.”
The complaint accuses the village of using law enforcement resources to then build an administrative case against Scatchell Jr. to justify his termination.
According to the complaint, the village eventually fired Scatchell Jr. in December 2018. But the complaint asserts the alleged retaliation continues, with village officials allegedly attempting to “blacklist” Scatchell Jr. from obtaining further police work by reporting him to the state’s “police officer misconduct database.” They allegedly further cleaned out his locker at the Melrose Park Police Department without consent, and have allegedly refused to pay him for his unused vacation and compensatory time, among other alleged actions.
The complaint asserts the village took all of these disciplinary actions, despite allegedly allowing other officers to remain with the department and even promoted for allegedly worse misconduct, some of which was detailed in the complaint.
The lawsuit asks the court to order the village to either reinstate Scatchell Jr. or order the village to pay him “front pay including benefits and creditable pension time.”
The complaint asks the judge to order “an audit of sick leave and overtime records” at the Melrose Park Police Department.
And the complaint asks the court to order the individual named defendants to pay unspecified actual and compensatory damages, plus punitive damages
A spokesman for Melrose Park declined comment, saying the village does not comment on pending litigation.