City paying nearly $20 million to settle police-torture lawsuit

City paying nearly $20 million to settle police-torture lawsuit
By Gary Washburn Tribune staff reporter
4:59 PM CST, December 7, 2007

The city will pay $19.8 million to settle with four African-American men who allegedly were tortured for their confessions by former police Cmdr. Jon Burge.

The settlement total, which is expected to be considered by the City Council next week, exceeds the amount paid to the family of LaTanya Haggerty, who mistakenly was fatally shot by police in 1999. They received a record $18 million in 2001.

In typical City Hall fashion, the news of the big payout came on a Friday afternoon, and also while Mayor Richard Daley was out of town and unavailable for comment. The Daley administration insisted the timing was coincidental.

The City Council's Finance Committee is expected to consider the settlement when it meets on Monday, setting the stage for approval by the full council on Wednesday.

"I am euphoric," declared Ald. Ed Smith (28th), one of several mostly minority aldermen who for months have been calling for a settlement. "We have been pushing for a long time. . . . We have been pursuing it vigilantly, and it's about time it reaches fruition."

Officials must now find a way to bring criminal charges against Burge and strip him of his city pension, Smith said.

"These [victims] will have to live with what this man did to them for the rest of their lives, and he is living off the fat of the land."

Burge, who was dismissed, is now retired, collecting his pension and living in Florida.

A tentative $14.8 million settlement that reportedly was hashed out earlier this year by city attorneys and lawyers for Leroy Orange, Stanley Howard and Madison Hobley—all of whom won pardons and were released from Death Row—never was recommended for council approval by Daley. Attorneys for Aaron Patterson also had been negotiating with the city on a settlement.

Back in September, the City Council's Finance Committee met in a rare, closed-door session after aldermen demanded to know why a proposed settlement of the Burge cases was derailed.

When First Deputy Corporation Council Karen Seimetz said she was barred from discussing settlement information by a judge's order, an angry Ald. Howard Brookins (21st) declared: "We [the council] are the client. She cannot be precluded from telling us what happened in court. She represents us."

That's when Ald. Edward Burke (14th) adjourned the meeting behind closed doors, where committee members were briefed by attorneys for the city.

After emerging, aldermen declined to reveal the information they got, citing warnings they received not to violate the court order.

At the end of September, U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald said his office would look into whether any of the Burge case officers lied under oath or obstructed justice as part of the civil litigation resulting from the torture allegations. Fitzgerald also confirmed a surprise disclosure from the Daley administration's top attorney that federal prosecutors have launched an investigation into the fatal 1987 fire that led to Hobley's conviction in state court.

Rest of article HERE.

When discussing why African-Americans do not trust the PO-Lice, if you live in Chicago, and can go a minute and a half without saying the name Jon Burge as Example 1A, then you have made an effort. This animal tortured - and I do mean -TORTURED - OVER 200 BLACK MEN.Some of those men wound up on DEATH ROW. Yes, I said, DEATH ROW. Men, who were INNOCENT of the crimes that they were convicted of and sent to DEATH ROW. That he STILL gets his pension is utterly criminal.

There is a complicitness, by the media, who still don't publicize this story. This story was dropped onto the SATURDAY edition...I want to know why it couldn't have been above the fold in the SUNDAY editions. Just how many MILLIONS have the Chicago Police Department, as well as other Police Departments, had to pay out because of their abuse of the Black community?