Politics
Under Pressure From City Council, Lawyers Settle 3 More Cases Tied to Disgraced Ex-CPD Detective: Records
(WTTW News)
As members of the Chicago City Council turned up the pressure on its attorneys to resolve lawsuits tied to disgraced former Chicago police Detective Reynaldo Guevara, city lawyers have agreed to resolve three more suits, federal court records show.
Those proposed settlements, which still must be approved by the City Council, come as a final vote looms Wednesday on a proposal that will resolve two separate lawsuits by paying $13.75 million to two men who spent a combined 38 years in prison after they were coerced into confessing to a gruesome double murder and kidnapping in 1998, records show.
Chicago taxpayers have paid an additional $6.2 million to defend both lawsuits, which were filed more than eight years ago.
The total cost to Chicago taxpayers to defend and settle 16 lawsuits naming Guevara is set to reach at least $206 million on Wednesday, records show.
The additional lawsuits city lawyers have agreed to settle were brought by three men who spent a combined 82 years in prison before their convictions were overturned, records show. Taxpayers have spent at least $3.2 million to defend those cases, according to records obtained by WTTW News through a Freedom of Information Act request.
One of those cases had been set to go to trial in January, which is now canceled, evidence a settlement has been reached, records show. All future court dates have been canceled in a separate case, indicating it has also been resolved.
In the final case, U.S. District Judge LaShonda Hunt was informed Friday a settlement had been reached, records show.
That represents a distinct change in strategy by lawyers for the city in the last several weeks, records show. As of Sept. 2, no settlement negotiations had taken place, according to a joint status report submitted to Hunt by lawyers for the city and the plaintiff, records show.
It is unclear how much lawyers for the city will recommend to the City Council that taxpayers pay to resolve the three separate lawsuits. Settlements of more than $100,000 must be authorized by the City Council.
Settlement negotiations in four separate cases are “progressing,” lawyers for the plaintiffs told the judges presiding over those cases. Taxpayers have spent at least $3.2 million to defend those cases, according to records obtained by WTTW News through a Freedom of Information Act request.
In all, 41 cases naming Guevara remain pending, records show.
Court records give no indication that the city has resolved or is close to reaching a settlement in 34 other cases.
A spokesperson for the Chicago Department of Law did not respond to a request for comment from WTTW News on Friday about the burst of activity in cases naming Guevara.
‘A Horrible Legacy’
During the meeting of the Finance Committee on Sept. 14, alderpeople bristled at being asked to approve one Guevara settlement after another.
“Why keeping going down this individual road?” Ald. Emma Mitts (37th Ward) asked. “See if we can save taxpayers’ dollars, look at how we could bundle this and do one mass settlement.”
Deputy Corporation Counsel Jessica Felker called that a good question.
“We are always looking for ways to resolve cases in the most economic and efficient manner,” Felker said.
As part of the city’s first-ever global settlement of lawsuits tied to a single Chicago police officer, the City Council agreed in September 2025 to pay $90 million to 180 people who spent a combined nearly 200 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted based on what they allege was fabricated evidence gathered by former Sgt. Ronald Watts, who was convicted in 2013 of taking bribes, and other officers.
That has prompted many alderpeople to suggest a mass agreement could be crafted to resolve the lawsuits naming Guevara and relieve the burden on taxpayers. But Felker warned alderpeople the cases are very different, echoing warnings from Richardson-Lowry.
“The Watts cases were a lot simpler in fact patterns,” Felker said. “These are a lot different with witnesses to the crimes, different involvement by different officers. So, they’re a lot more difficult to do in a mass settlement, but that doesn’t mean the city is opposed to something like that if it works out.”
Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th Ward) was the only member of the Finance Committee to vote against settling the lawsuits naming Guevara on Monday. Nevertheless, Lopez acknowledged the undisputed allegations of misconduct against the former detective.
“He has left us a very horrible legacy,” Lopez said.
A judge determined Guevara told “bald-faced lies” while under oath in 2017, a fact that will be presented to any future jury asked to determine whether the city should be held accountable for claims of misconduct.
Guevara has invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination hundreds of times during court proceedings, refusing to answer questions about whether he falsified police reports, framed suspects or coerced witnesses into identifying criminals.
That means Chicago officials have little hope of winning any of those cases at trial. Many of the people he helped convict who have sued the city have been granted certificates of innocence by judges.
Guevara, 80, now lives in Texas, and collects an annual pension of $91,000. Since Guevara retired in 2005, he has been paid approximately $1.5 million from the police pension fund.
Most of the people Guevara is accused of framing in the 1980s and 1990s are Latino and lived in Humboldt Park, which was home to many working-class Chicagoans long before the Northwest Side neighborhood began to gentrify.
City officials did not probe Guevara’s conduct until 2013, eight years after he retired and began collecting his pension. That report, which was commissioned by former Mayor Rahm Emanuel, cost the city $1.9 million but has never been released by city officials.
Several alderpeople asked Monday to see that report. Felker said it was protected by the city’s attorney-client privilege and could not be shared with members of the public or alderpeople.
Despite Guevara’s well-documented misconduct that sent 41 now-exonerated Chicagoans to prison for decades, any attempt to revoke his pension is sure to fail, since he was not charged with criminal wrongdoing, much less convicted, while a Chicago police officer.
‘A Stain on Our City’
Since the start of the year, taxpayers have paid nearly $246 million to resolve hundreds of lawsuits alleging police misconduct, records show.
By comparison, Chicago taxpayers spent nearly $259 million in all of 2025 to resolve police misconduct lawsuits, records show.
The City Council will consider whether to pay nearly $20 million to resolve four additional lawsuits, including the two claims naming Guevara, on Wednesday.
The city’s 2026 budget set aside just $82.5 million to resolve police misconduct lawsuits, records show. The City Council borrowed an additional $267.3 million this year to cover the cost of litigation triggered by allegations of police misconduct, records show.
Mayor Brandon Johnson’s budget forecast anticipates setting aside $401 million in the 2027 budget to resolve lawsuits, $226 million more than in 2026, records show.
The bulk of the city’s legal bills go toward resolving lawsuits that allege Chicago police officers committed misconduct.
In all, the city is facing an $882.5 million budget gap in 2027, Johnson said.
“The people of Chicago deserve the absolute maximum level of transparency around this matter because it has harmed so many different families and lives and has placed a stain on our city,” Johnson said.
Those funds will be used to resolve lawsuits alleging police misconduct dating back decades, and could be used to cover the cost of a new “global settlement” of claims relating to connected allegations of misconduct, according to the forecast.
“I’m prepared to have one of the most robust conversations around what we are actually dealing with, not just individual cases, but how it has had such a tremendous restraint on our budget,” Johnson said.
City officials declined to specify which lawsuits could be part of a new global settlement.
Lawyers for the city are negotiating a global settlement to resolve 17 lawsuits naming eight members of a Chicago Police Department tactical team repeatedly accused of improperly stopping and searching Black men downtown, WTTW News reported earlier this year.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
