Lawyers say lawsuit over Chicago arrest will win

A high-ranking Chicago police officer accused of shoving his gun down a suspect’s throat while on duty in 2013 was found not guilty Monday of official misconduct and aggravated battery by a Cook County judge.

Watroba and her partner, Lauren Freeman, repeatedly emphasized in their closing arguments that DNA evidence “buries” Evans, 53, whose encounter with Rickey Williams occurred on January 30, 2013.

An African-American officer who’s been with the Chicago police for 29 years, Evans says he confronted Williams because he saw him holding a gun.

Evans also had been accused of holding a Taser to Williams’ groin during his arrest for reckless conduct.

But Officer Sheila Jackson testified that if Evans was ever to take a Taser from the radio room if she was in charge, she would make him sign out for it.

Morask slammed Williams’ testimony last week – claiming Williams has “five million reasons to lie”, referencing a pending civil suit Williams’ attorneys filed against the city that seeks $5 million in damages.

Williams’ DNA on Evans’ service weapon is not only a smoking gun, “it’s a smoking, freaking cannon”, Freeman said.

Judge Diane Cannon also played up the inconsistencies in Rickey Williams’ account of the on-duty 2011 incident over the years, saying his testimony at the trial last week “taxes the gullibility of the credulous”.

Williams may not be the most intelligent man, but he had no reason to lie, Freeman said. Williams later changed his story when the state’s attorney’s office informed him of photos showing Evans wearing his gun holster on his right side. And she dismissed evidence thought to be among the most damning – Williams’ DNA on Evans’ gun – suggesting it was collected so sloppily that that it was of “fleeting relevance”.

The trial comes at a time when the Chicago Police Department is under intense national scrutiny amid allegations of cover-ups and police misconduct.

Earlier Thursday, now ousted IPRA chief administrator Scott Ando testified that he asked at least three supervisors to ensure that whoever ended up investigating the Evans matter would check on whether the commander was right-or left-handed.

“My ruling does not pertain to misconduct”, the judge said.

A WBEZ investigation of Evans’ record showed the city paid out $325,000 on seven lawsuits in which Evans was accused of police brutality.

The amount of force that can be used by police officers has become a focus of national debate due to a series of high-profile police killings of black men by mainly white officers in US cities.

Cmdr. Glenn Evans also is accused of pressing a stun gun to the suspect’s groin. “In what world is putting a gun barrel down someone’s throat doing police (work)?”

But Cannon said that the DNA evidence only established that Evans had contact with Williams, something that was not in dispute.

In an unexpected twist, Servin was found not guilty in May after Cook County Judge Dennis Porter said prosecutors should have charged the officer with a more serious offense than involuntary manslaughter.