During the first six months of 2024, Chicago taxpayers paid $40.5 million to resolve lawsuits alleging police officers committed misconduct, records show.

In all, it has already cost Chicago taxpayers more than $98 million to defend former Chicago Police Detective Reynaldo Guevara, investigate his conduct and resolve lawsuits that allege he violated dozens of Chicagoans’ civil rights, according to WTTW News’ analysis.

The former Chicago detective has banked more than $1.4 million in pension payments since he retired, according to records obtained by WTTW News through a Freedom of Information Act request.

The cost to taxpayers of the settlements approved without debate by the City Council on Wednesday is equivalent to more than a third of the city’s annual $82 million budget to cover the cost of police misconduct lawsuits.

If approved, the settlement would bring the total amount paid by Chicago taxpayers to resolve lawsuits naming former Chicago Police Detective Reynaldo Guevara to $62.5 million, records show.

Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx on Monday released her office’s “Do Not Call List” — which she said includes a collection of “disreputable” law enforcement officers who have “propelled Cook County’s reputation as the wrongful conviction capital of the country.”

For nearly two decades, Chicago Police Detective Reynaldo Guevara was an infamous presence on the city’s Northwest Side. More than 50 people have accused Guevara of framing them for murders, coercing false confessions and engaging in other misconduct from the 1980s to the early 2000s.

Prosecutors won't oppose post-conviction litigation for eight people with murder convictions tied to ex-Detective Reynaldo Guevara because the state’s attorney “no longer believes in the validity of these convictions or the credibility of the evidence.”

Geraldo Iglesias spent 16 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit. Now he’s suing the city of Chicago and a disgraced former police detective who he claims set him up.

After spending 22 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, Thomas Sierra is suing the city of Chicago and the detective he claims framed him for a 1995 murder.

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.