The officer serving an arrest warrant was doing his job, the courts were doing their job and two men are dead unnecisarily becuase of a system that is in total disregard of the fundamental law of the land.
A housing court should not have any power over non rental property. It was his private property and the inspectors and courts levied fined against him totaling iver $14,000 without benefit of a jury trial. That house we may presume was held in fee simple by Mr. Wolk. How he maintained or did not maintain his property was nobody's business but his. He was not directly harming any of his neighbors and since he did not like strangers on his property they should have kept the H#ll out. Like I said two men are dead. Two people dead over 29 housibng code violations found last July.
"[I]nspectors found a rotting porch, missing stairs, missing gutters, torn siding, a collapsed porch and other dangers." Given the conditions in much of Chicago's less pleasent neighborhoods where landlords have a duty to tennants to maintain rental housing on the market (a case for the state regulation of commerce and a case of acting upon a tennant complaint) there is much more to this story than meets the eye. There is also a cse that can be made about excessive fines and unreasonable time limits imposed on Mr. Wolk. Of couse his greatest crime was he just wanted to be left alone by stangers. We can not have that after all it takes a village.
That's o.k. in a rural setting where you can't see the next neighbor down the street, or can't see the house from the street. Let his place rot and fall down for all I care. But in a normal urban/suburban setting he is adversely affecting the property values of all of his neighbors. He does NOT have a right to do that!
I don't forgive a cop just cause he was "dooing his job". Everyone man follows his conscionce and every man is responsible for his actions. How much evil do we allow into the world in the name of just doing your job?
I do not see how you can conclude this from the information in the story.