17 more Chicago cops bilked PPP loan program, including 8 facing firing, inspector general says

Chicago’s top watchdog is heading for the exit — but not before dropping one last fraud bombshell on the Chicago Police Department.

Inspector General Deborah Witzburg said Wednesday her office has nailed nine Chicago cops in the first four months of the year for allegedly scamming COVID-era relief funds.

Eight of the officers have been recommended for firing by the police department after investigators dug into their Paycheck Protection Program loan applications — cash meant to keep small businesses afloat during the pandemic in 2020 and 2021. Another cop quit while under investigation.

All told, the alleged ripoffs totaled $284,000, according to Witzburg’s first quarter 2026 report.

Eight more of the officers are waiting to find out whether the police department will move to fire them.

“This was a triage effort, and we are not done yet,” Witzburg said. “The reason we prioritized CPD cases is because they occupy positions of tremendous public trust and they land on the witness stand, so their credibility is of paramount importance.”

Back in 2023, Witzburg’s office flagged more than 1,000 potential instances of PPP fraud by city employees, including police officers, firefighters and others.

Her message to anyone who thinks they have slipped through the cracks?

“You don’t get to defraud the government and work for the government.”

Witzburg, who steps down at the end of the month, reported late last year that her office found two sergeants and another officer engaged in PPP fraud. The officer had snagged an $18,000 loan for an insurance business that didn’t exist. PPP loans were usually forgiven, meaning they didn’t have to be repaid.

The police department has agreed to seek the firing of the eight officers Witzburg identified in her latest quarterly report. Her office is waiting for the department to respond to eight other PPP fraud cases that Witzburg sustained.

She doesn’t name the suspected officers in her reports.

In a separate federal investigation, former officers Torrey Price and Aaron Price are facing criminal charges. They're accused of raking in more than $2 million by filing about 100 bogus loan applications tied to PPP and another federal aid program.

The PPP program was rife with fraud amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars. Even people behind bars — and their guards — were suspected of cashing in, saying they needed help for their phony businesses, the Chicago Sun-Times has found.

Court records show one Cook County jail guard, Jareli Reyes, was charged with PPP fraud but acquitted by a Cook County judge at a bench trial last year.