Posted on 03/20/2002 9:02:11 AM PST by nemo
March 20, 2002
BY FRANK MAIN, FRAN SPIELMAN AND ANDREW HERRMANN STAFF REPORTERS
Henry A. Wolk didn't like strangers.
He was 77 years old, lived in the same Northwest Side home since he was 2 and often spoke to visitors through a vestibule mail slot close to the floor.
This was the reclusive world that officer Donald J. Marquez walked into Monday night to arrest Wolk for failing to answer a housing court subpoena.
About 10 p.m., Marquez knocked on the door, then pleaded with Wolk to go peacefully. Finally, he broke down Wolk's apartment door with a sledgehammer. He was immediately greeted with gunfire, wounded and fell in the front vestibule. By the time it was over, both Wolk and the officer were dead.
"Officer Marquez was an honest, hard-working cop whose efforts made this city a safe place," Chicago police Supt. Terry Hillard said Tuesday, tears welling in his eyes. "He was another officer doing his job and tragically taken away from us."
Marquez and his partner were trying to arrest Wolk because he ignored a subpoena they served him Jan. 5 to appear in court for a housing case.
The plainclothes officers and an upstairs tenant spoke to Wolk through his apartment door for several minutes, urging him to give up.
"He made a comment to the neighbor that he was not going to go to court, no matter what," said Phil Cline, chief of detectives for the Chicago police.
Marquez, who identified himself as an officer, smashed Wolk's door and Wolk fired a handgun at Marquez, Cline said.
Marquez, 47, and a father of four, was shot three times in the chest and once in the head.
As the 20-year police veteran collapsed into a pool of blood near a pile of magazines outside Wolk's first-floor apartment in the 2400 block of North Avers, Marquez's partner and the tenant scrambled upstairs.
A gun battle raged for at least 10 minutes. No other officers were killed, but Wolk was found dead inside.
Cline said officers from the Grand Central District and the Special Operations Unit worked heroically under fire to remove Marquez from the house and put him into an ambulance that took him to Illinois Masonic Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
Wolk fired a total of 10 shots and officers fired 24 at him, hitting him several times, authorities said. Police recovered two .22-caliber pistols they said Wolk had used; another .32-caliber handgun was found in his apartment, Cline said.
A neighbor, Jaime Rodriguez, 40, said he was returning from dinner and shopping with his family when he heard at least three shots from Wolk's home. Rodriguez, who said he was looking for a parking spot for his van, pulled around the block and crouched while he listened to the gun battle.
"There were six rapid shots, then I heard on the police radio, 'He is down, he is down; we have him now!" Rodriguez said.
Marquez, who was detailed to the Chicago corporation counsel's office several months ago, was responsible for serving subpoenas for people to appear in court. Marquez was not wearing a bulletproof vest when he was shot, officials said.
The department policy is for officers on patrol or street duty to wear them, said John Thomas, first deputy superintendent. The department will review its policy on vests in light of Marquez's shooting, he said.
Marquez's job involved administrative work as well as the kind of enforcement duties he and his partner were carrying out Monday, Thomas said.
Earlier, they had arrested two other people for failing to respond to subpoenas, said Corporation Counsel Mara Georges.
"Don was the kind of police officer who dealt with his heart as well as his head," said his brother, Dan Marquez. "He was known as a compassionate officer even when making these kinds of arrests. He would bend over backwards to make sure there was no confrontation. But he did what the warrant said. He knew the situation could turn deadly. He was always prepared."
Wolk's case dates to July when the city found 29 violations of the housing code at his two-story brick home in the 2400 block of North Avers, records show. After neighbors complained to the city, inspectors found a rotting porch, missing stairs, missing gutters, torn siding, a collapsed porch and other dangers.
Wolk was fined $14,500 on Oct. 16. He failed to show up for six court hearings. On Jan. 15, a judge issued a "body attachment" calling for police to take him into custody and use force if necessary.
Ald. Vilma Colom (35th) said her office tried for more than a year to deal with Wolk. She said she tried to tell him about city programs that could have provided money for repairs.
"He wasn't very cooperative," she said. "He said we had no business telling him what he could or could not do. He wouldn't come out of the house."
Colom said she checked up on Wolk once, bringing him a fan.
"He grabbed it, said 'thank you' and slammed the door," she said. "It's sad."
Marvin Cruz, who owns other buildings in the neighborhood, said he offered Wolk $100,000 for the house and would let him live rent-free for the rest of his life.
At first, Wolk would only talk to Cruz through a mail slot in the door about a foot off the ground.
Cruz lay on the porch while Wolk crouched behind the storm door.
Eventually, he was allowed inside.
"It was a mess, with piles of paper. It smelled like old pizza," Cruz said.
Wolk was guarded, but Cruz eventually learned that he moved into the home when he was 2. After his parents died, they left Wolk the home.
He did not appear to have physical disabilities, Cruz said.
"I think it was more in the head," he said. "But this made me so sad. I was eating breakfast when I saw it on the news. My spoon just fell, and I started crying.
Cruz thought he and Wolk were close to a deal. He intends to continue with his plans to buy and rehab the property.
And when he sells the house, he plans to donate up to $50,000 to Marquez's widow, Maria, and the couple's four children.
"I don't want to make any money on this," Cruz said. "I just want a little good to come from this awful tragedy."
Hm. It would seem that the authority in this case is legally constituted according to your definition. At the very least, the Cook County housing court has been around for a long time, and its existence hasn't been struck down yet.
Nor, I suspect, are the rules "arbitrary." Health and safety rules tend to be rather well-codified, and it sounds like the condition of Mr. Wolk's house was a reasonable candidate for violation of any resonable set of standards.
We don't have the luxury of deciding which laws we will and will not obey. Having resisted and avoided the rulings of a duly constituted legal body, Mr. Wolk made himself subject to physical arrest. That's standard and acceptable legal practice, and it's why the cop was there in the first place.
Mr. Wolk chose to resist a legitimate arrest with a gun, and he murdered a man who was doing his job.
'cause this ain't "free" repairs. He wouldn't sign away any property rights for the "priviledge" of letting them make their "repairs"...
The fact the a law was arround for a long time without it being struck down is absolutely irrelevant to its constitutionality. I note there are many gun laws on the books that are patently unconstitutional. I also would remind you that according to the courts in the German Republic everything done by the Nazi Party was totally constitutional. Please cite the portions of the Illinois Constitution that allow for a housing court or laws governing the enjoyment of private property. You are the one arguing that it is constitutional wher I cite the fifth amendment to the US Constitution about taking of property without due process and the right to trial by jury both of which the fourteeth applied to the states.
Nor, I suspect, are the rules "arbitrary." Health and safety rules tend to be rather well-codified, and it sounds like the condition of Mr. Wolk's house was a reasonable candidate for violation of any resonable set of standards.
Really I saw nothing in the article taht supports your stand that the condition of his home in any way was a potential threat to the health and safety of neighbors or anyone else who was not tresspassing or invited onto his property. Pehaps you would cite some specific example of how he was endangering others as this would at least provide some justification for sending armed agents of the state to invade his home and when he resisted that invasion kill him.
We don't have the luxury of deciding which laws we will and will not obey.
Actually we do that every day. When we decide or decide not to obey speed limits and many other laws.
Having resisted and avoided the rulings of a duly constituted legal body, Mr. Wolk made himself subject to physical arrest.I am still awaiting the justification of that duly constituted legal authority. I guess thats sort of like saying duly elected Chicago mayor when there is absolutely no way anyone can claim Chicago's elections are any more free and fair than those in Zimbabwe.
That's standard and acceptable legal practice, and it's why the cop was there in the first place.
It was acceptable in 1939 to rob from Jews in Germany, it was also legal and standard practice accordingto the courts at the time subsequently other courts found differently. The argument you advance has little to do with right or wrong or constitutionality. It has much to do with moral expediencey. I clearly would have retained counsel and fought this every step of the way had I been in Mr. Wolk's position but the again I would have been maintaining my home better. In short two people are dead and you are the one justifying the dynamic entry into someone's home in the nightime. You rely on words like "duly constituted" without any support for those words. Mr. Wolk chose to resist a legitimate arrest with a gun,
Once more you are asserting something as legitimate when the orders of a housing court are at best questionable and the means of carrying out that order via a nightime service on his front door with a sledge hammer something more akin to a Gestapo raid than what professional police procedure should be.
and he murdered a man who was doing his job.
Mr. Wolk killed a man doing his job. Murder is a judgement that in this case only God will be able to hand down against Mr Wolk. However, I was only doing my job is not an acceptable excuse for commiting a wrong. Clearly the tials of Henry wirtz and the trials of many lower level Nazis were based upon that principle.
BULL$HIT!!! What he does with his property is not his neighbors/gumbents' business. They didn't like the looks of his property, complained, got the gubment to infringe on his rights for them and now two people are dead. End of story.
And there will be none of that "he lived in a comunity" crap here either. He outdated the comunity and most of it's occupants.
EBUCK
Cooler heads should have prevailed downtown on this one. Sad.
Killing a police officer who is serving a legally issued warrant is murder.
You have your libertarian blinders on here. There's no point in discussing this further.
BS. You have the "right" to move away if you don't like it. You have "no right" to tell someone what to do with their property in rural or suberban situations unless the activity is actually infringing on your individual rights. As we can all see, property has no rights, by way of civil forfeiture laws.
EBUCK
Well then, as we can see here, the State was willing to rob us to pay for his repairs. Perhaps they are willing to do so in your neighbors case as well.
EBUCK
1. refusal to submit.
2. owned property
Strike 3, he was armed.
That's three strikes buster, you're out!!!
EBUCK
Had this entry to Mr. Wolk's home taken place during the daytime with an attempt at negotiation conducted before the fact I would be much more disposed to look favorably on the officer's behaviour. As it is his decision to serve this arrest warrant at 10:00PM is egregious and unreasonable. The fact that he was willing to resort to dynamic entry for a housing court order is even more outragous. Your attempt to dismiss me as a libertarian as though that meant the arguments I was advancing are also irrelevant.
I was not dismissing you as a libertarian. Rather, I was dismissing the extreme libertarian aspects of your argument, which admit to absolutely no possibility of a legitimate government role in matters of private property.
The basic facts remain:
Whether or not you agree with the law in question, the law exists. Members of a civil society cannot pick and choose which laws they will or will not obey.
The officer was serving a legal warrant to arrest Mr. Wolk for his flouting both the law and the courts.
Mr. Wolk killed him in the course of resisting arrest.
EBUCK
That presupposes Chicago is a civil society. Please see my comments re: Germany in the late 1930's. The law exists my question was regarding the duely constituted nature of the law and the court. In point of fact two men are dead because of the housing court in Chicago needlessly invading this man's private property.
The officer was serving a legal warrant to arrest Mr. Wolk for his flouting both the law and the courts.
Here I would disagree still. The officer was serving a warrant from the housing court which the City's corporation counsel told him was a legal warrant. The officer chose the time and manner of service. The choice of 10:00 Pm and thedecision to utilize dynamic entry escalated a situation which did not need to be escalated. The actual legality of the warrant may still be considered doubtful.
Mr. Wolk killed him in the course of resisting arrest.
A person does have a right ro resist an illegal arrest. Did the service of this warrant at this time of night thereby make the arrest illegal. Manny states had civil arewst warrants limited in their service between 07:00AM and 07:00 PM. I do not know if that is the case in Illinois.
See "land rents" of merry ole England. Same thing.
Stay well - stay safe - Stay armed - Yorktown
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