In 2015, Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke pleaded not guilty in the fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald. But a start date for the trial is likely still months away.

Voters this month will be tasked with electing Cook County Circuit Court judges. To help navigate the options, two Chicago bar associations screened and ranked each candidate. Here are their recommendations.

Bill Amor spent two decades behind bars for a murder he says he didn’t commit. On Wednesday, a DuPage County judge agreed – and acquitted him in a retrial of a 1995 arson case.

Thomas Sierra, 41, spent more than half his life in prison, convicted of a murder he has claimed from the beginning he didn’t commit. On Tuesday, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office dropped the charges. “It’s a bittersweet situation,” Sierra said.

Starting Thursday, Cook County probation officers will have a new place to refer some of the 20,000 people on probation. For many of them, finding work is critical to staying out of trouble with the law.

Jamie Kalven, the Chicago journalist who broke the story of Laquan McDonald’s shooting death, will not be compelled to turn over his sources or testify in open court, a judge has ruled. “To have it resolved, and definitive resolved, was a big relief,” Kalven said.

Should Jamie Kalven, the reporter who broke the story of the Laquan McDonald shooting, be forced, under oath, to reveal his sources? 

From 2011 to 2013, a LaSalle County physician prescribed hundreds of thousands of milligrams of controlled substances to a trio of opioid-dependent patients in exchange for sex, according to a plea agreement.

Local government is going after a major ride-sharing company for not only failing to protect customer and driver data during a massive 2016 data breach—but also for failing to disclose it, as required by law.

Reforms to Cook County’s bond system have led to a 15-percent decrease in the county’s jail population. “Our judges are in fact not setting bonds higher than people can afford,” said Chief Judge Tim Evans.

Former Northwestern professor Wyndham Lathem and his accomplice Andrew Warren, charged in the stabbing death of a Chicago hairstylist, will have their hearings scheduled together as their cases proceed.

Two former university employees charged in the brutal stabbing death of a Chicago hairstylist earlier this summer have pleaded not guilty to a half-dozen murder charges levied against them.

“Everything is unusual about this case until we hear more,” a Loyola University Chicago criminal justice professor said regarding Wyndham Lathem and Andrew Warren – two former university employees accused in the stabbing death of a Chicago hairstylist.

Wyndham Lathem and Andrew Warren each face six counts of first-degree murder in the July stabbing death of a 26-year-old man inside Lathem’s River North home.

A former CPS student says he was sexually abused by the head of a district mentoring program from 1988 until 1993. “I feel like it’s time for me to tell my story,” he said.

Tierney Darden was left paralyzed from the waist down after a bus shelter at O’Hare International Airport collapsed on her during a storm in 2015.