An exasperated Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer ordered the City of Chicago to gets its records in order in the next 24 hours, in a simmering police shooting case where defense attorneys have accused city lawyers of withholding evidence.
During a hearing Wednesday morning at the Dirksen Federal Building, Pallmeyer cut a city attorney off as he was attempting to explain the difficulty in getting an officer’s complete disciplinary history.
“You’re responsible to find out,” Pallmeyer said. “This is your client!”
The controversy has arisen in the case of Jaquise Evans, who was 16 when he was shot by Chicago Police officer Richard Salvador in August of 2015. Salvador maintained that Evans had pointed a gun at him. But those charges were thrown out by a Cook County judge, and now Evans is suing Salvador and the City of Chicago for his injuries.
Last week, Evans’ attorneys said they had just been made aware of a video showing Salvador cursing at a cuffed suspect 8 weeks before the Evans shooting. The late revelations of that video infuriated Pallmeyer, especially after she learned city attorneys had been aware of its existence last April, and that it had been written off by a supervisor as a mere episode where they officer might have used bad language.
“To call what happened on that video nothing more than use of profanity is just---nobody in this room believes that,” Pallmeyer said. “It was threatening violence on an arrestee!”
The day after that hearing, Evans’ lawyers said city lawyers revealed three complaints against the officer, known as CR’s, which had never been produced before. Those revelations prompted today’s hearing, where city attorney Scott Cohen described a cumbersome system where the city’s disciplinary agency COPA doesn’t always inform CPD, or even the officers themselves about complaints on a timely basis.
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Pallmeyer, well known for her friendly and gentle manner on the bench, made no effort to hide her anger.
“Let’s assume if an officer tells you he doesn’t have any, you follow up anyway,” Pallmeyer said. “A procedure will be put in place in this case within 24 hours---24 hours for there to be complete disclosure of everything!”
Defense attorney Michael Oppenheimer complained that the city had ample time to have turned over critical evidence.
“Now we know there are open CR’s where Salvador gave a statement---we don’t have that statement,” he said.
“Well, we’re going to have all of those within 24 hours,” Pallmeyer replied.
The judge set another hearing on the matter for Friday to gauge the City’s compliance. The case is set for trial later this month.
