Steve Mills

Cook County Judge William Hooks sharply assailed a Chicago police officer for his allegedly false testimony before throwing out the evidence. That prompted prosecutors to dismiss the charges against two drug suspects.

Chicago police officers’ credibility questioned by judges in at least 13 cases, defense attorneys told

June 10, 2018 at 3:12 p.m.

Cook County prosecutors recently notified defense lawyers in at least 10 criminal cases that a judge found the court testimony of a veteran Chicago police officer to be false, a...

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and former Chicago Public Schools CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett.

City Hall ordered to turn over emails to Tribune

May 23, 2019 at 3:12 a.m.

A Cook County judge on Tuesday ordered the Emanuel administration to turn over email chains sought by the Chicago Tribune related to the multimillion-dollar no-bid Chicago Public Schools contract that...

Adam Gray, shown in 2015 at the Hill Correctional Center in Galesburg, is hoping an evolution of fire science will prove his innocence in a 1993 fatal arson.

Citing advances in fire science, prosecutors seek new trial in fatal arson

May 23, 2019 at 3:09 a.m.

Adam Gray has long pinned his hopes of freedom on the chance that Cook County prosecutors one day would agree that an evolution in fire science raised too many troubling...

Cook County Judge William Hooks photogroahed atsharply assailed a Chicago police officer for his allegedly false testimony before throwing out the evidence. That prompted prosecutors to dismiss the charges against two drug suspects.

Chicago police investigate 6 officers over alleged false testimony

May 23, 2019 at 2:49 a.m.

Chicago police have begun an internal investigation into allegations that as many as six officers lied in their court testimony and are prepared to take at least one of the...

Judge William Hooks, shown in his courtroom at Chicago's Leighton Criminal Court Building, has complained publicly that false or misleading testimony from police officers tarnishes the criminal justice system.

Cops rarely punished when judges find testimony false, questionable

May 23, 2019 at 2:48 a.m.

Late last year, Judge William Hooks heard the kind of case that occurs at Cook County's main courthouse every day and that, in most instances, ends with a guilty verdict...

Prolific jailhouse snitch alleges he’s victim of wrongful conviction

June 11, 2018 at 7:03 a.m.

More than two decades ago, testimony by a jailhouse informant named Tommy Dye helped Cook County prosecutors obtain a death sentence for murder against a former Chicago cop who had...

A Free Matt Sopron sign greets drivers along the Stevenson Expressway on Jan. 5, 2016. Supporters of Sopron are trying to generate public interest in the case.

Inmates, supporters get creative in bid to bring attention to cases

June 11, 2018 at 8:34 a.m.

Amid the commercial billboards along the Stevenson Expressway, a smaller wooden sign sticks out: Free Matt Sopron, it reads. Supporters of another inmate who's in prison for the 1991 murder...

Melvin Moore is a paroled inmate being sued by the Illinois Department of Corrections to recoup the costs of incarceration.

Legislation would end lawsuits against prison inmates

May 15, 2019 at 8:24 p.m.

State lawmakers are seeking to end a little-known but controversial program that tries to recoup the costs of incarceration from current and former inmates, saying the state recovers little money...

Ex-federal prosecutor named in third-party review of city’s Law Department

June 11, 2018 at 12:53 p.m.

Less than a week after a federal judge harshly criticized the city's Law Department for how it had handled a police shooting case, the department announced Sunday that former U.S....

Laura De La Fuente holds poster boards filled with photos of her late boyfriend Esau Castellanos, who was shot to death in March 2013 by police who said he fired on them. "I want to know the truth," she said. "I know he had no gun."

FBI investigating another fatal shooting by Chicago police

February 5, 2020 at 1:32 p.m.

The account the two Chicago police officers provided about the fatal shooting of Esau Castellanos came to a dramatic conclusion. After following Castellanos' car as it sped at about 80...

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