Ex-Riverside Top Cop Named To State Panel

RIVERSIDE, IL — Former Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel was appointed last week to a state domestic violence panel.

In August. Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed legislation that established the Illinois Domestic Violence Fatality Review Commission. The bill passed unanimously in the Legislature.

The commission is to provide guidance on setting up a statewide resource for addressing domestic violence-related fatalities and near fatalities, as well as other forms of abuse connected to domestic violence.

Weitzel was nominated to the commission by Mitchell Davis, Hazel Crest's police chief and president of the Illinois Association of Chiefs of Police.

"It is my hope that I will serve in a capacity that will help better facilitate police agencies throughout the state with their investigative techniques and administrative processes that go into investigating fatalities and near fatalities of domestic violence victims," Weitzel said in a news release.

Weitzel retired from the Riverside Police Department last year after 37 years in law enforcement, 13 years as the police chief.