Alexander Vroustouris in 1989 was named the city of Chicago’s first inspector general, and over the next 16 years went about the business of uncovering wrongdoing by city employees.
“It was a very difficult job, and he set the tone by doing thorough and detailed investigations and trying to hold city employees accountable,” said Jim Sullivan, who worked with Vroustouris in the city’s inspector general’s office before going on to serve as inspector general for the Chicago Public Schools.
Vroustouris, 69, died Feb. 8 in Melbourne, Florida, of injuries suffered in a fall, said his son, Peter. He had been a longtime resident of the Edgebrook neighborhood on the Northwest Side.
Born in Chicago, Vroustouris grew up in the Sauganash neighborhood and graduated from Von Steuben High School. He received a bachelor’s degree from Loyola University Chicago and a law degree from John Marshall Law School.
Vroustouris went to work with the Cook County state’s attorney’s office in 1980, prosecuting misdemeanors and felonies before working in the office’s narcotics unit, where he eventually became the supervisor.
“I don’t think there was a harder-working person that I ever met,” said John Gasiorowski, who worked with Vroustouris in the state’s attorney’s office. “And both as (an assistant) state’s attorney and as inspector general, one of his greatest traits was his ability to mentor and teach everybody how to work the right way — how to do things the right way.”
Among the cases Vroustouris prosecuted were antisemitic hate crimes against Jewish businesses and the murder of a Croatian radio-show host who had been found stabbed to death.
“He was a very organized and prepared prosecutor,” said Dave King, a colleague in the state’s attorney’s office who later worked with Vroustouris in private practice. “Through hard work and study and plain old common sense, he knew how to get cases ready for trial and to try cases.”
In 1989, newly elected Mayor Richard M. Daley named Vroustouris to the newly created post of inspector general to head an agency replacing the Office of Municipal Investigations. Daley touted the new office’s ability to investigate city employees with subpoena powers, saying its focus would be on official misconduct and ethics violations. A huge loophole was left, however, when a compromise hashed out before final approval exempted aldermen and their staffs from being investigated.
“It would be advantageous for the public to know that this is an agency to investigate all employees, but that is not how the ordinance is written,” Vroustouris said, shortly before the council confirmed his appointment.
Early on, Vroustouris uncovered a drug-selling ring at City Hall, followed by charges that Skyway workers pocketed tolls and that city workers in a Loop-area Streets and Sanitation office spent little time on their jobs.
“The only thing they did was disgrace the city,” Vroustouris told the Tribune in 1991, regarding the Streets and Sanitation workers. “They averaged only two hours a day, and that was for checking in and checking out, and I’m being conservative.”
Vroustouris made enemies as inspector general. A 1993 Tribune article quoted then-Ald. John Buchanan, 10th, complaining that with his investigative tactics, Vroustouris “is running around like a junior G-man, trampling on people’s rights and using tactics that shouldn’t be allowed.”
Throughout his 16 years on the job, Vroustouris investigated thousands of city employees.
“He helped to build, organize and supervise a group of dedicated men and women who worked hard and also to serve the public good, and I think he set a foundation of excellence for which subsequent IGs carried on the torch and also built upon and improved upon his commitment to the public good there,” King said. “He was a guy who worked with honor, honesty, integrity and ultimately with distinction.”
Gasiorowski recalled Vroustouris’ commitment to mentoring.
“Whether someone was like me — I was his deputy — or whether they were the newest investigator on staff, he always had time for everybody and was really good at explaining how they should do their job and how to get the most (out) of them,” Gasiorowski said.
In 2005, Vroustouris resigned under pressure amid scandals at City Hall and criticism that he had not targeted enough high-ranking city staff and had not acted on other tips about wrongdoing in city government, a mayoral aide at the time told the Tribune. The ouster took place in the midst of the federal probe into the city’s Hired Truck Program that had produced criminal charges against several dozen people, many of them city workers.
Sullivan said Vroustouris’ model of holding public employees accountable eventually was followed by other local government agencies, including Chicago Public Schools, the City Colleges and Cook County.
“I think people in the city all owe him a big debt of gratitude,” Sullivan said.
In 2006, Vroustouris returned to the Cook County state’s attorney’s office as an assistant state’s attorney.
After retiring from the state’s attorney’s office around 2010, Vroustouris joined King’s law firm, Kelly & King, where he represented clients in tort defense work. One of Vroustouris’ higher-profile clients was former Justice police Chief Robert Gedville, who was fired in 2012 after moonlighting as a consultant for a controversial red-light camera vendor that had done work in Justice. The courts eventually dismissed a wrongful termination lawsuit filed by Gedville.
A marriage ended in divorce. In addition to his son, Vroustouris is survived by a daughter, Alexandra Vucovich; another son, Gus; two sisters, Margot Touris and Dorothea Touris; and a grandson.
Services were held.
Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.