Chicago mayor confident in city attorneys

The embattled mayor accused Governor Bruce Rauner with holding Chicago public school children “hostage” for refusing state aid to CPS unless the mayor agrees to pro-business, anti-union reforms.

Caption + Sharon Fairley, acting head of the Independent Police Review Authority, speaks at a news conference, Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, in Chicago.

The officers had said they stopped Pinex, who was black, because his vehicle matched a description they heard on their police radio of a auto suspected of involvement in an earlier shooting. It turns out the dispatcher actually described than the one on Pinex’s auto, and did not say the occupants were armed.

Marsh “intentionally withheld radio recordings from the night of the shooting leading up to the trial”, according to the Wall Street Journal. 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. “They need to know it is not worth it”.

Emanuel didn’t specify Tuesday what steps he’ll take in light of the accusations against the city attorney, Jordan Marsh, who resigned after Monday’s opinion was handed down. “The conduct outlined by the court…is unacceptable”.

CPS faces a $1 billion budget shortfall, due largely to increasing pension payments.

The ruling comes in the wake of protests following the November release of video showing a white police officer fatally shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald.

But the ruling in the Pinex case is yet another blow to public trust in the city as it copes with the fallout from a series of fatal police shootings.

Fifty-five-year-old Bettie Jones was killed when a police officer opened fire on a 19-year-old man after they responded to a domestic disturbance call.

Fairley said she hired a new chief of staff and chief investigator and was recruiting four lawyers to improve investigations. Pressed again, Emanuel said that step is not needed to give Chicagoans confidence necessary changes are being made.

Thousands of emails released last week showed close communication between Emanuel’s office, the police and the organization that investigates the police in the aftermath of deadly force incidents.

“The mayor recognizes that the Law Department is under scrutiny, just as the Police Department is under scrutiny”, Davis said. The furor over the shooting cast fresh attention on IPRA and police accountability issues.

The Jones’ wrongful death lawsuit, filed on Monday, follows similar litigation by LeGrier’s family. 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. Quintonio LeGrier was also killed in the shooting after allegedly threatening his father with a metal baseball bat. She added that the caller stated that his son was armed with a baseball bat.