Crime & Law
Jury Rejects Lawsuit Filed by Uber Driver, Passenger Injured in Chicago Police Pursuit
(WTTW News)
A Cook County jury determined Chicago police officers were not liable for the injuries suffered by an Uber driver and his passenger who were struck in March 2023 by a man fleeing a traffic stop, officials said.
After a two-week trial, the jury determined that the injuries suffered by Bhuwan Rai, who was driving for Uber, and his passenger, Musherruddin Mohammed, were the fault of the driver who refused to stop for police.
“This verdict reflects the jury’s clear conclusion that the crash resulted from the fleeing offender’s own actions, and not from the city’s lawful pursuit,” Corporation Counsel Mary Richardson-Lowry said.
Mohammed and Rai were struck while stopped at a red light on March 3, 2023, by Juan Ochoa, who fled from police after being stopped on suspicion of drunken driving near Ashland Avenue and Flournoy Street, just outside Stroger Hospital on the West Side.
Ochoa pleaded guilty to felony drunken driving, according to the Chicago Department of Law.
The three-minute pursuit reached speeds of up to “100 miles an hour, through red lights, stop signs, in the opposite lanes of traffic, and through crosswalks while pedestrians were within the walkways,” according to the lawsuit filed by Rai.
The crash seriously injured Mohammed’s finger, left him scarred and suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, records show. Rai suffered broken bones, a traumatic brain injury, depression and anxiety, according to the lawsuit.
Through Jan. 9, Chicago taxpayers paid nearly $597,000 to private lawyers hired to defend the city and the two officers who engaged in the pursuit, according to records obtained by WTTW News through a Freedom of Information Act request. A final tally of how much the successful defense cost will not be available for several weeks.
A spokesperson for Rai’s attorneys did not respond to a request for comment from WTTW News.
More than three years after the crash, the pursuit is still under investigation by CPD’s Bureau of Internal Affairs, according to a statement from a CPD spokesperson on April 24.
A federal court order requires internal affairs complaints to be resolved in six months.
Officer Tobias Houston, who engaged in the pursuit with Officer J.P. O’Brien, participated in at least four pursuits that prompted lawsuits or complaints, including one that resulted in the death of a 55-year-old woman on Sept. 28, 2022, records show.
Houston has been suspended three times for a total of six days for engaging in pursuits that violated Chicago Police Department policy. One of those pursuits, which ended in a chain-reaction crash involving five cars, occurred just 10 days before Dominga Flores Gomez was killed after another pursuit, records show.
The City Council declined to follow city attorneys’ recommendation to resolve the lawsuit filed by Flores Gomez’s family by paying $8.3 million in February, sending that matter to trial.
Houston is named in two pending lawsuits, including the lawsuit filed by Flores Gomez’s family, triggered by those pursuits, officials said.
The Civilian Office of Police Accountability completed investigations of Houston in connection with two separate incidents in recent weeks, records show.
The agency better known as COPA found that Houston did not use excessive force on June 6, 2024, when he attempted to detain a man suspected of causing a disturbance at a New City convenience store and doused him with OC spray, better known as pepper spray, and tackled him, records show.
However, Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling agreed to suspend Houston for three days for failing to activate his body-worn camera during a police pursuit on August 16, 2024, records show.
That pursuit ended after Houston’s partner disabled the car they were pursuing by firing his gun into one of its tires, according to the probe. That shooting violated CPD policy, COPA determined.
After his car was disabled, the driver fled on foot, before Houston apprehended him. COPA determined that Houston did not violate CPD policy when he struck the driver in the face with a closed fist while attempting to handcuff him. Houston denied intentionally striking the man, telling investigators the contact was unintentional, records show.
CPD changed its vehicle pursuit policy in 2020 and then again in 2022 to require officers to “consider the need for immediate apprehension of an eluding suspect and the requirement to protect the public from the danger created by eluding offenders.”
Since January 2025, Chicago taxpayers spent at least $103.1 million to resolve 14 lawsuits brought by people who were injured or on behalf of those killed during police pursuits, according to an analysis of city data by WTTW News.
WTTW News coverage of policing and police reform is supported by The Joyce Foundation.
Contact Heather Cherone: @HeatherCherone | (773) 569-1863 | [email protected]
