Windy City's lawsuit lottery: How suing Chicago Police has become a billion-dollar racket enriching criminals and trial lawyers alike — and the reforms we desperately need
Suing the City of Chicago for alleged police misconduct has become a mind-bendingly, lucrative enterprise — one that ravages public coffers, bankrolls offenders, and hamstrings law enforcement. The city’s recent decision to borrow $283.3 million to cover legal settlements is merely the latest evidence of a system in freefall. Chicago can and must protect both civil rights and public safety, but that cannot be achieved while we continue indulging the fiction that police litigation and mass exonerations are risk-free entitlements. Real reform demands accountability from every player in the process — including prosecutors and trial lawyers who have turned criminality, and the narrative of perpetual police misconduct, into massive paydays.
Since 2008, Chicago has paid more than $1.1 billion in police related settlements and verdicts, with recent annual payouts more than doubling the city’s budgeted outlays and forcing officials to contemplate borrowing just to keep pace with litigation. The city spent over $140 million on such payouts in 2024 alone and has already blown through a roughly $80–90 million settlement budget for 2025, necessitating that it borrow another $283.3 million.
What began as a sincere effort to correct miscarriages of justice has morphed into an enormously profitable cottage industry that funnels massive payouts to academics, activists, attorneys, and political actors whose income and lifestyles depend on a constant pipeline of lawsuits and “exonerations.” Trial lawyers have transformed exonerations — many involving individuals who were, in fact, guilty of the underlying crime — into a billion-dollar business in which law firms routinely collect eight-figure contingency fees — again, not a typo — while taxpayers foot the bill and neighborhoods bear the consequences when dangerous offenders are released back onto the streets.
The Kim Foxx era was one of mass exonerations. Under former State’s Attorney Foxx, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office reoriented itself toward advocacy for criminal defendants in high profile wrongful conviction claims, expanding the Conviction Integrity Unit and collaborating with outside law firms that specialize in suing the police. This invited an inherent conflict of interest, blurring the line between seeking justice and manufacturing future civil claims.
Mass exonerations became common in cases linked to certain detectives or units, with convictions vacated en masse and “Certificates of Innocence” routinely issued based more on allegations of police misconduct than on rigorous, case-specific proof of innocence. Former Mayor Lori Lightfoot warned these certificates were being handed out “like candy,” often without meaningful factual findings and directly fueling staggering civil payouts.
Chicago recently committed nearly $90 million to resolve an astonishing 176 civil suits tied to disgraced former Sergeant Ronald Watts — cases overwhelmingly involving drug-related crimes. The city appears poised to repeat the pattern with more than 40 Guevara-linked cases — a move that will cost several hundred million dollars because most of those cases involve murder convictions. A similar wave of mass exonerations was being pursued in cases involving former Chicago Police Sergeant Brian Forberg, until the initiative was wisely halted after the election of Judge Eileen O’Neill Burke.
The new State’s Attorney has signaled a decisive break from prosecutor-driven mass exonerations, appropriately insisting that claims of innocence be litigated and proven on a case-by-case basis in court rather than swept through in bulk administrative deals. Burke’s core message is clear: Justice must be grounded in evidence and due process, not in blanket assumptions that every conviction connected to a criticized officer is automatically invalid.
If Burke’s reversal of the Fox era of mass exoneration policies holds, Chicago can finally slow the torrent of future suits. However, hundreds of cases already in the pipeline stand to drain well over $1 billion from Chicago taxpayers if allowed to roll forward unchecked. Meanwhile, broad “reform” measures like the SAFE-T Act and strict consent decree mandates have stacked layer upon layer of rules that expand the opportunities to sue the police and escalate costs of defending officers, while doing little to curb massive payouts driven by a relatively small number of officers and historical scandals.
Chicago’s leaders and their state legislative allies must act decisively to restore equity, contain costs, and ensure victims receive authentic justice. What can be done?
Policy step #1: End mass exonerations
Chicago’s political leaders must fully support Eileen O’Neill Burke’s departure from mass exonerations and protect her from political retaliation. Innocence claims should be adjudicated individually, in open court, where evidence can be fully vetted and where victims and the public can see the factual basis for nullifying a criminal conviction.
Step #2: Educate courts and the public
Chicago’s elected officials and legal leadership should regularly disclose the cumulative cost of police-related verdicts and settlements, distinguishing clearly between cases with strong evidence of innocence and those driven by legal technicalities or disputed claims. Greater transparency on the fiscal and evidentiary realities would significantly limit the ability of special interests to use vague “reform” rhetoric to push policies that bankrupt the city and endanger neighborhoods.
Step #3: Federal damages caps
Chicago’s congressional delegation should lead an effort to establish reasonable caps for federal civil rights suits against municipalities, allowing fair compensation without fiscal devastation. Without such guardrails, blockbuster verdicts will continue to divert resources away from improved training, technology, and community-based crime prevention.
Step #4: Pursue fraud and abuse
When “exonerations” and related civil suits rest on fabricated evidence, coordinated perjury, or manipulated processes, they do more than drain the budget — they attack the legitimacy of the justice system. Chicago must aggressively investigate fraud in wrongful conviction petitions and related lawsuits and pursue civil recovery or criminal charges when misconduct is proven.
Step #5: Review rules that hobble police
City and state leaders should commission a comprehensive review of recent mandates, consent decree provisions, and local ordinances that hinder effective policing, with the goal of protecting both civil liberties and officer safety. Clearer, more practical rules would reduce misunderstandings, strengthen documentation, and curtail the space for baseless claims.
Step #6: Build a dedicated litigation defense team
Chicago needs a specialized litigation division within the Law Department focused solely on police-related cases, staffed by seasoned trial lawyers who understand both civil rights law and urban policing. This team should rigorously test claims, resist reflexive settlement when the facts and law favor the city, and use outside counsel only when it adds real value.
By ending mass exonerations, halting the arbitrary awarding of Certificates of Innocence, pursuing reasonable federal damages caps, prosecuting fraud, revisiting rules that hamstring police, and building a more robust litigation defense, Chicago can restore balance to a system that has veered badly off course, without sacrificing justice for the wrongfully accused. That will require political courage, but the alternative is a city where the loudest voices in the “reform” industry keep getting richer while public safety erodes and the fiscal time bomb ticks ever louder.
