Bond was set at $500,000 Sunday for an off-duty Chicago Police detective accused of killing two men when he allegedly plowed into a disabled car in a drunken-driving crash early Friday on the Dan Ryan Expressway.
After the hearing, a family member of one of the victims was taken into custody after a disturbance in the hallway that spilled out into the street, authorities said.
Joseph Frugoli, 41, of the Bridgeport area, was charged Friday with two counts of aggravated driving under the influence, two counts of reckless homicide and one count of leaving the scene of an accident, said Sally Daly, spokeswoman for the Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez.
Frugoli was ordered held on $500,000 bond at a Sunday hearing at the Cook County Criminal Courthouse at 3100 S. California Ave.
About 70 friends and family members of the two men killed in the crash became upset after bond was set and raised their voices in the courtroom hallway, Cook County Sheriff’s police spokesman Steve Patterson said.
Once outside the building, the group began telling strangers the bond was a travesty and Sheriff’s police took one of the family members into custody for his own safety, Patterson said. He was released without being charged.
Frugoli was taken into custody Friday after he drove his black Lexus into a red Dodge Intrepid that broke down in the southbound lanes of the Dan Ryan Expressway (I-90/94) near the 18th Street ramp, authorities said.
Frugoli, an 18-year-department veteran, was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where tests indicated his blood-alcohol level was about triple the legal limit of .08, sources said.
The officer was walking away from the crash scene when he was apprehended, police said.
A bystander, Marcus Copeland, said he tried to pull the victims from the burning Intrepid shortly before 4 a.m., but the flames were overpowering. “I couldn’t do anything,” he said.
One of the victims was Andrew Cazares, 23, of Summit, who attended Argo Community High School. Cazares worked construction and continued to live with his family in the 7700 block of West 62nd Place. Friends said he was a talented skateboarder and graphic artist.
Alexander Myles, 14, said he and a buddy were skateboarding one day when Cazares noticed their lack of skill.
“He said, ‘You guys want to learn some tricks?’” and gave the younger boys some lessons, according to Myles.
The Illinois State Police identified the other victim as Fausto Manzera, 21, of Chicago.
Manzera was a student at DePaul University, according to his friends, who said he was artistic, too. He and Cazares may have been on the way to Manzera’s father’s home in Bridgeport where Manzera stayed.
“He was just a wonderful friend. He will be truly missed,” said a friend, Claudia Godinez.
The Chicago Police Department released a statement saying Frugoli has been relieved of his police powers. In addition to the traffic investigation being conducted by the State Police, the Chicago Police Department launched a probe by its Internal Affairs Division.
Frugoli has been involved in other serious wrecks, including one not far from the scene of Friday’s fatal collision and another that injured two police officers.
Just last week, Frugoli was ordered to pay $7,100 to Joseph Cairo after a jury trial involving a 2005 accident.
Frugoli was driving a new BMW sedan that rear-ended Cairo’s Jeep Cherokee on the in-bound Dan Ryan near 31st. Cairo, 65, struck a median and suffered neck and shoulder injuries, while Frugoli went to the hospital for a head injury, records show.
Cairo’s lawyer, Benjamin Kelly of the Vrdolyak Law Group, said Frugoli gave two stories about the accident: he told the State Police at the accident scene that he did not know what happened. But in a legal deposition, Frugoli said Cairo slammed on his brakes, causing the crash. Kelly denied that Cairo caused the collision.
Both men live in the Bridgeport neighborhood near the site of their collision.
Frugoli’s other accidents include a collision near the intersection of 37th and Wallace in Bridgeport when he allegedly ran a stop sign and struck a Chicago police car, injuring two officers, records show.
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http://www.nwi.com/articles/2009/04/12/updates/breaking_news/doc49e252851f4b4251588990.txt
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