Three more Chicago Police Department employees, including a sergeant, face firing for fraudulently obtaining federal Paycheck Protection loans during the pandemic.The new actions bring to eleven the number of sustained PPP fraud cases culminating from internal investigations conducted by retiring In spector General Deborah Witzburg.She's accusing the sergeant of obtaining a pair of PPP loans totaling nearly $40,000, along with a separate small business loan for $6,000. The sergeant's former partner also obtained a PPP loan after submitting a loan application with identical information. The third employee is a police civilian.Three more cases are awaiting responses from city department heads. Four other “completed sustained cases” will be going out in the next few days, and Witzburg said she is “on track to close at least” a dozen additional cases over the next 60 days.After repeated clashes with Mayor Brandon Johnson on a host of ethics issues, Witzburg decided not to seek another term. Her four-year term expires in April.That means that she will leave office long before 80 additional PPP fraud cases in various stages of investigation have been brought to a close. Witzburg said there’s are reasons for the slow pace of investigations from the universe of 1,000 pandemic relief loans issued to city employees under her jurisdiction.“Whenever we are dealing with issues of public benefit fraud, it is really important that we reach our conclusions with a really high level of confidence,” said Witzburg, who reported the new firings Thursday in what will be her final quarterly report.“We cannot punish people for using public benefits. We absolutely must punish them for stealing public benefits. So, we really got to get this right. We can’t chill the use of public benefit programs.”Among the Chicago police officers who have been accused of defrauding the federal Paycheck Protection Program are the son of two former Chicago police superintendents: Terry Hillard and Fred Waller. Waller still serves as a full-time civilian adviser to current Police Superintendent Larry Snelling. Related Cops accused of PPP fraud, domestic violence are the sons of two former Chicago police superintendents Federal criminal charges are pending against two former cops — Torrey Price and Aaron Price — who have been accused of bilking the PPP program out of $2 million.Witzburg said it is easier to build a case of PPP fraud against city employees who are required to report their secondary employment to the city because it becomes clear there is a business on the side that could have applied for a loan.Rank-and-file Chicago police officers are not required to report secondary employment. Only police supervisors have that mandate.“We have thousands of city employees who have [an] obligation to report outside businesses,” she said.Witzburg’s fellow watchdogs in Cook County and state government have found hundreds of cases of PPP fraud, often after learning that the loan applications included businesses that did not exist and that the government employees who made those applications never reported having a secondary job.Last year, the Sun-Times reported that Illinois Executive Inspector General Susan Haling said her office found 373 people, most of them state employees, were engaged in PPP fraud.On Thursday, Cook County’s inspector general, Tirrell Paxton, reported closing 18 additional PPP fraud investigations in the last quarter of 2025. He found county employees obtained a combined $315,000 in bogus loans. Those cases were referred to criminal authorities.The PPP program was launched by President Donald Trump during his first term to help businesses across the nation survive the stay-at-home shutdown triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.But President Joe Biden’s administration doled out most of the loans, many of which were fraudulent. The massive fraud occurred with little or no oversight and ended up costing taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars.The Sun-Times found that even inmates at Cook County Jail were cashing in on loans while serving time.Witzburg’s final quarterly report includes other findings, including a contractor accused of lacking proper certification, even though the company was hired to maintain and inspect emergency medical equipment, train city employees and respond to medical emergencies at O’Hare and Midway Airports. The contractor in question was also accused of overbilling the city.The report also accused a city hoisting engineer of frequenting a social club with illegal video games on city time and a Chicago Department of Transportation foreman of “fabricating an on-duty injury” to fraudulently obtain worker’s compensation benefits.Witzburg also reported investigations that culminated in the return of $180,000 worth of illegal campaign contributions after spending the last few years building capacity to enforce campaign finance rules."This is how we have worked to combat the impression that — perhaps the reality — that there is a `For Sale' sign on the door to City Hall," Witzburg wrote in her cover letter. ...read more read less