Carmen Cortez, a Cicero grocer, knows something about crime. Standing in the shade of a tree outside her shop, she matter-of-factly explains that illegal drugs are sold just beyond her awning and that a gang-related fight recently broke out across the street.
But Cortez never thought of herself as a criminal–until last week, when she was arrested by a town police officer for selling Fourth of July sparklers in violation of a local ordinance.
She contends her arrest had less to do with fireworks than with her refusal to buy a $100 ticket to the annual Republican golf outing. The arrest was ordered by a Cicero police lieutenant who also happens to be a top precinct worker for Town President Betty Loren-Maltese’s Republican organization, the group selling the tickets, the Tribune learned.
Cortez’s arrest follows a litany of complaints from Cicero business operators that town officials use strong-arm tactics to solicit political contributions. In late April, a former town building commissioner was indicted for allegedly trading a building permit for a $1,000 contribution to the Cicero Republican Party. And others have complained publicly or in lawsuits that they have suffered acts of retribution for declining to make donations.
David Donahue, a town spokesman, denied that Cicero officials have pressured anyone to buy tickets to the July 15 golf event.
“There are hundreds of businesses that don’t support the Republican Party, that have actually opposed it, and they have had no problem with government whatsoever,” Donahue said. As for Cortez, “This lady obviously violated the law,” he said.
Cortez, 56, who has two grown children, said she had no idea that sparklers are illegal in Cicero. Unlike most other fireworks, sparklers are allowed by Illinois law.
She found out about Cicero’s rules only after she declined to buy a ticket to the golf outing, she said. In other years, Cortez said, she had simply acquiesced when she was solicited by town health inspectors.
Her arrest was ordered by Lenny Rutka, a Cicero police lieutenant who is a top precinct worker for Loren-Maltese.
“I am telling you this is extortion,” Cortez said. “If I don’t pay the ticket or give the money, you think they will be friendly with us?”
A Tribune spot check on Tuesday found that the ban on sparklers is being enforced haphazardly. A reporter found sparklers for sale at two discount stores on Cermak Road.
The owner of one of the stores said that he has donated generously in the past to town Republicans, buying as many as eight tickets to the organization’s annual fundraiser.
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This year, however, he said he hopes to avoid making a donation by dodging inspectors when they come to sell tickets. “There’s always lots of pressure every year,” he said.
Cortez said her troubles began when two town health inspectors came to her store in early June and dropped a ticket on her counter.
She decided not to buy it because the $100 price–up $25 from last year–was more than she could afford, she said.
Two weeks later–and a day after she began selling sparklers for the first time–Ken Lyons, a town police officer, appeared at her store and asked if she was selling fireworks. She showed him the sparklers, she said, and tried to explain that they weren’t dangerous.
“He didn’t want to listen to me,” she said. “He asked me if I had somebody else to work at the register. He said, `You have to go with me.’ “
Rutka said in an interview he was unaware that Cortez had declined to buy the political tickets. He said he sent Lyons to arrest Cortez after a resident, whom he declined to identify, complained that her child had purchased sparklers in the store.
Rutka acknowledged that Lyons initially was reluctant to make the arrest because Lyons argued that sparklers were legal in Illinois. Rutka said he assured him that the local ordinance took precedence.
Cortez was driven to the town’s police station, where she was questioned and then left to wait in a small, locked room. Before being released, she had to post a cash bond of $75.
Cortez said she would have thrown the sparklers away if the officer had told her they were illegal. Instead of arresting her, “I think it’s better for them to send in the rules,” she said.
Lyons declined to comment on the arrest.
Illinois State Police Lt. Col. Robert Johnson, who was brought in as acting chief of the troubled Cicero Police Department in May by Loren-Maltese, said the decision was Rutka’s and “I’m not going to second guess him for it.”
Rutka said once a resident complained about the sparklers, he had no choice but to order Cortez’s arrest.
“All officers have big latitude and discretion, but when a citizen complains, discretion goes down to zero,” he said.
Loren-Maltese promoted Rutka to deputy superintendent after her re-election last year. He was demoted by David Niebur, the former police chief pushed out by Loren-Maltese in April after he cooperated with a federal investigation into alleged Town Hall corruption.
Despite the arrest, Rutka said Cortez was treated well by police. “She came in the back door (of the police station). She wasn’t handcuffed. She posted bond. She was driven back to her place of business. She wasn’t treated harshly or anything,” he said.
Johnson said he doesn’t know how many arrests have been made in Cicero for selling sparklers. At least one other grocery store owner, however, said he had an experience similar to Cortez’s.
The grocer, Roberto Garza, was a high-profile supporter last year of Loren-Maltese’s Democratic opponent, former Cicero Police Lt. Charles Hernandez.
After Loren-Maltese won by a landslide in April 1997, Garza said his supermarket was closed for 10 days by health inspectors for violations.
He was subsequently arrested for selling sparklers, he said, although he had previously sold them for several years.
Garza said he went to court in Maywood several times and spent more than $600 on attorney fees before prosecutors dropped the case. A spokesman for the Cook County state’s attorney’s office had no immediate comment on why the case was abandoned.
Now Garza is trying to sell his store and has made plans to move out of Cicero. “I want nothing to do with Cicero,” he said.
“Either you’re part of the team, or you’re not,” he said. “You can’t be neutral here.”