...We have made the judgment that the admissible evidence would justify our asking a grand jury to indict in three cases: they are the cases of Andrew Wilson, Phillip Adkins and Alfonzo Pinex. There are many other cases that raised the belief that the claimant was telling the truth, e.g. Michael Johnson, Melvin Jones and Shadeed Mumin, but their testimony would not be sufficient to establish proof beyond a reasonable doubt. And there are some cases we have concluded that the claimant was not telling the truth, e.g. Leroy Orange and Leonard Kidd.
In our judgment, the evidence would support an indictment and conviction of Jon Burge in the case of Andrew Wilson. We believe that he also mistreated Michael Johnson and Melvin Jones. He was the commander of the unit. Common sense compels the conclusion that those who worked for him would not be concerned about their own mistreatment of prisoners, if their commander mistreated them. We have said in another part of this report that if some action had been taken against Jon Burge at the time of the Andrew Wilson case, or even shortly after, our appointment would not have been necessary.
For reasons we explain in another part of this report, we conclude that the statute of limitations bars any prosecution of any officers...
...We have found no evidence that would support a charge beyond a reasonable doubt of obstruction of justice (or "cover-up") by any police personnel. There is insufficient evidence of wrongdoing by any member of the State's Attorney's Office, except one person.
The evidence supports the conclusion that [Police Department] Superintendent Brzeczek was guilty of a "dereliction of duty" and did not act in good faith in the investigation of the claim of Andrew Wilson. Despite the fact that Brzeczek believed that officers in the Violent Crimes unit of Detective Area 2 had tortured Andrew Wilson, he kept that belief to himself for over twenty years. He also kept Burge in command at Area 2 and issued a letter of commendation to all of the detectives at Area 2....
[Anthony] Wilson testified that he was beaten by several officers who began kicking him, slapping him and hitting him with their fists. They put a plastic bag over his head and burned him on the arm with a cigarette [...] Wilson testified that Burge later came into the room and told the officers that if it had been him, he would not have messed up [Wilson's] face." [...] Wilson testified that O'Hara took him out of the room to see Assistant State's Attorney Lawrence Hyman. Wilson said he told Hyman about being mistreated, and Hyman told the officers "take that jagoff out of here." (In his testimony on a number of occasions, Hyman has denied this testimony of Wilson. We will refer to Hyman in more detail later.) [...]
At a room in Area 1, Burge put a gun in Wilson's mouth and clicked it. Burge told Wilson that he would not be mistreated again if he confessed to the murders. Wilson agreed to make the statement to keep from being shocked again.
[...] We sought to interview Hyman, as we have interviewed over 25 former assistant state's attorneys. We were informed by his attorney, Michael Ficaro, that Hyman would invoke his constitutional right against self incrimination if we called him as a witness. He is the only former assistant state's attorney that has refused to be interviewed by us. [...] We still have not interviewed Lawrence Hyman. We base our judgment of his credibility on the undisputed fcts, his own testimony, our analysis of the testimony of Andrew Wilson and other witnesses and our own experiences as former prosecutors. We do not rely on his refusal to speak to us.
In our judgment, Hyman did not tell the truth when he denied that he had been told by Andrew Wilson that he had been tortured by detectives under the command of Jon Burge. HIs false testimony stands as corroboration of Andrew Wilson...
Mayor is untouched, but ex-police chief is berated
chicagotribune.com
By Matt O'Connor and Carlos Sadovi
Tribune staff reporters
Published July 19, 2006, 11:29 PM CDT
Mayor Richard Daley told special prosecutors that he could not remember much about the police torture case that ultimately got Cmdr. Jon Burge fired. Though Daley was state's attorney in 1982, his staff did most of the work on the Andrew Wilson case, he told the special prosecutors when they interviewed him in recent months. Nobody informed him of key pieces of information, and he couldn't specifically remember what happened to a letter about the Wilson abuse addressed to him, according to the report issued Wednesday.
Though the question of Daley's knowledge has been a persistent theme in the scandal surrounding police torture under Burge, the special prosecutors devoted just three of their 290 pages to what Daley knew. And they limited themselves almost exclusively to reporting his answers, without any broader assessment of his role.
The four-year investigation found insufficient evidence of wrongdoing to prosecute any member of the state's attorney's office, with the exception of one prosecutor who claimed to have held off questioning murder suspect Andrew Wilson for reasons of strategy. In the ensuing hours that day in 1982, Wilson was tortured at the hands of police and confessed to the murders of two Chicago police officers. Daley told the special prosecutors he has no memory of a letter that year in which Police Supt. Richard Brzeczek passed along allegations of abuse in the Wilson case. [...] In identifying possible missteps, Boyle touched only obliquely on the performance of Daley's team. "We reflect in the report on what we believe was a bit of a slippage in the state's attorney's office at the time of the Wilson case," he said....
Our Town: Doe in the Headlights
chicagoreader.com
By John Conroy
July 19, 2006
JOHN DOE HAS been unmasked. Last month the Reader reported that Doe, a former assistant state’s attorney, had gone to the Illinois Supreme Court in an attempt to derail the release of the special prosecutor’s report on Chicago police torture—or at the very least keep his name out of it. But the court rejected Doe’s emergency motions, and the report was released Wednesday.
On June 26 the court lifted the seal on the motions filed in Doe’s battle. The documents confirmed that he’s Lawrence Hyman, as the Reader and the Daily Law Bulletin had surmised in print. Hyman’s attorneys argued that by trying to keep his identity secret and the report from being published, the former prosecutor was exercising his constitutional rights. If the mask were lifted, they said, “undoubtedly the public would draw the inference that Doe had something to hide. Such an inference would be unjustified and unfair.” In other words, Hyman concealed his identity and tried to derail the report because he had nothing to hide. [...] Hyman, a supervisor in the State’s Attorney’s Office, took the Wilsons’ confessions. Andrew later testified that the first time he was brought before Hyman he said, “You want me to make a statement after they been torturing me?” and Hyman responded, “Get the jagoff out of here.” Though Wilson was bleeding from one eye when he eventually gave his confession, Hyman didn’t ask if he’d been offered medical treatment, something a prosecutor would normally do to safeguard the confession from a subsequent claim of brutality. More significant, he didn’t ask Andrew if he was giving his statement voluntarily.
Asking this question is standard operating procedure. Not asking it is an omission so stunning that 14 criminal defense attorneys I polled—a group with 213 years of criminal practice and more than 950 murder cases among them—had never heard of another instance. Ralph Meczyk, a criminal defense lawyer for 30 years and one of four lawyers representing Hyman in the John Doe battle, said he was “incredulous” at the idea that his client skipped the question. He was sure Hyman hadn’t—“I mean it is just not something that is overlooked.”
But that’s what happened, and that day it happened twice. Hyman took Jackie’s statement and didn’t ask if his confession was voluntary, then took a witness’s statement and asked the question, and finally took Andrew’s confession and didn’t ask it.
Hence the special prosecutors’ particular interest in Hyman. If someone decided the question shouldn’t be asked, was it Hyman, or was Hyman following orders from someone higher up? At that point, Richard M. Daley was the state’s attorney and Dick Devine was first assistant. Did they, or anyone else in the office, ever ask Hyman why he didn’t ask the question? And what did they do—or not do—about it? [...]
(PDF, Adobe Reader required) Legal Costs of the Investigation to Date
And so, four years, several million dollars, and 292 pages later, we're left with a big: so now what? The civil suits will proceed, of course, and this report will be cited as further evidence of wrongdoing. A few of those who committed these crimes have died; a few, as long as they continue to live outside the state, are essentially beyond the reach of anything except a federal verdict, either criminal or civil, against them. I'm not saying that this shouldn't have been done, of course; it's best that we know.
But still ... So now what?
Posted by iain at July 20, 2006 10:26 AM
