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Jon Burge, the ringleader of the Chicago Police Department’s history of Abu-Ghraib sytle torture from the 1970’s to the 1990’s, has been arrested and charged with perjury and obstruction of justice.  (I have embedded the trailer to Shielded Brutality below, which is the documentary I’ve been producing documenting this history.)

From chicagobreakingnews.com:

Retired Chicago police Cmdr. Jon Burge was arrested at his home near Tampa, Fla., today on charges of lying in a civil case about whether he and other officers under his command tortured and physically abused suspects in police custody dating back to the 1980s, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.

Burge was charged with two counts of obstruction of justice and one count of perjury in a three-count indictment unsealed today following his arrest.

The charges alleged that Burge lied and impeded court proceedings in November 2003 when he provided false written answers to questions in a civil lawsuit alleging that he and others engaged in torture and abuse of suspects.

Burge, 60, now living in Apollo Beach, Fla., near Tampa, was expected to appear later today in U.S. District Court in Tampa.

“There is no place for torture and abuse in a police station,” said U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald in a news release. “There is no place for perjury and false statements in federal lawsuits. No person is above the law, and nobody–even a suspected murderer–is beneath its protection.”

Click here for the rest of the story.