CHICAGO — A federal judge ordered a retrial in a civil lawsuit over a 2011 fatal shooting by Chicago Police officers on Monday after determining that a city of Chicago lawyer deliberately withheld critical evidence from the attorney representing the slain man's family.
The ruling comes as a cloud hangs over the Chicago Police Department and Mayor Rahm Emanuel over the handling of a series of controversial police involved shootings, including the 2014 death of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, who was shot 16 times by Officer Jason Van Dyke, and last month's fatal shooting of 55-year-old Bettie Jones and 19-year-old Quintonio LeGrier.
Judge Edmond Chang overturned a jury's April verdict in a wrongful death suit that cleared Officers Gildardo Sierra and Raoul Mosqueda for the death of Darius Pinex in January 2011. But Chang ruled that one of city's lawyers for the officers, Jordan Marsh, wrongly withheld police dispatch recordings from the night of the incident from the plaintiff's attorney and then mislead the court about it.
The officers said they stopped Pinex because his Oldsmobile Aurora fit the description of a car that other officers attempted to stop a few hours earlier after a shooting, an incident the officers said they heard about on police radio. Officers said they shot Pinex when he attempted to drive away.
But the dispatch recording that was broadcast "did not mention that the Aurora had a gun or that the car was wanted for a shooting," Chang wrote in his ruling.
Chang wrote that Marsh learned about the recording before trial, but "intentionally concealed" its existence until days into the trial. Marsh's co-counsel, Thomas Aumann, also failed to make "reasonable inquiry" as required by discovery rules into the recording after it was requested by the plaintiff, Chang concluded. The judge added that Marsh hid his knowledge of the recording's existence "despite there being numerous times when the circumstances dictated he say something about it."
"The federal-court system cannot achieve its goal of fair, just, and accurate judgments without requiring that good faith be instilled into the discovery decision-making of every attorney," Chang wrote in his 72-page opinion. "Attorneys who might be tempted to bury late-surfacing information need to know that, if discovered, any verdict they win will be forfeit and their clients will pay the price. They need to know it is not worth it."
In addition to ordering a retrial, Chang ruled that the city and Marsh were liable for the plaintiff's attorney's fees.
Marsh resigned from his post on Monday, Aumann left his job with the city in August.
The city in a statement called the attorneys' conduct "unacceptable."
"The Law Department holds its employees to the absolute highest professional and ethical standards and does not tolerate any action that would call into question the integrity of the lawyers who serve and represent the City of Chicago," the city said in a statement.
The embarrassment comes as the embattled Mayor Emanuel is trying to repair his administration's image that has been battered over the city's handling of police-involved shootings.
The head of the city's agency tasked with investigating police-involved shootings said on Monday she was overhauling her office's staff.
Sharon Fairley, the acting administrator of Chicago's Independent Police Review Authority, made the personnel moves at IPRA less than a month after Emanuel appointed her to overhaul the agency that has been in the spotlight since the court-ordered release of police video in November that showed Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting McDonald 16 times on a city street.
IPRA has ruled only two of more than 400 police-involved shootings unjustified since the agency was established in 2007, and has been criticized by activists, who have held dozens of protests in the city over the last six weeks, as a feckless watchdog of the city's more than 12,000 police officers. Anger only grew after another police-involved shooting on Dec. 26 left 19-year-old LeGrier and 55-year-old Jones dead.
In the most recent incident, police said that the unidentified officer shot LeGrier, a college student who authorities say was involved in a domestic disturbance, and also "accidentally" killed his neighbor Jones.
Fairley on Monday named a new chief of staff and chief investigator, while also detailing plans to bolster the agency's legal team. She also said she will establish a dedicated community outreach manager, whose role will be to work directly with complainants, witnesses and community members.
"I realize that trust in this agency can't be rebuilt overnight," Fairley said. "But I believe restructuring the staffing, adding to the capabilities and refocusing ourselves on the mission and our core values...we can rebuild Chicagoans trust in IPRA going forward."
Emanuel, who has faced repeated calls for his resignation from activists angered by police conduct during his time in office, last week announced an overhaul of the Chicago Police Department's lethal force policy. As part of the reforms, Emanuel said the the number of department Tasers will be doubled, to 1,400, to ensure that every car on patrol has one.
Police and IPRA have revealed few details about the fatal shooting of LeGrier and Jones.
Fairley said Monday that both LeGrier and his father both called 911 prior to the shooting. She said that younger LeGrier, who identified himself as "Q," first called emergency dispatchers and said that someone was threatening him. At times during the two minute call, she said that the LeGrier refused to answer the dispatcher's questions and sounded as if he was also talking to someone else.
Minutes later, a man who identified himself as Quintonio's father, Antonio LeGrier, called 911 and requested help, saying that his 19-year-old son was attempting to break into his bedroom, Fairley said. She added that the caller stated that his son was armed with a baseball bat.
