Chicago City Wire

Lawyers representing the city of Chicago are asking a federal judge to reject the plaintiffs’ motion in a wrongful case not to bifurcate, or separate, claims that the city violated the plaintiffs constitutional rights (Monell claims) from claims that police framed brothers Sean Tyler and Reginald Henderson for the 1994 murder of a ten-year-old.

In their motion, city attorneys insisted that bifurcation of the claims is the correct path forward since “if Plaintiffs do prove that Defendant Officers violated their constitutional rights, there is still no need to litigate their Monell claims. As a matter of law, Plaintiffs are not entitled to additional compensatory damages if they prevail.”

In addition, the attorneys asked for a stay on Monell discovery, a time consuming, costly look into the city’s policies and practices regarding police oversight.

“[Plaintiffs’ Monell document production requests (“RFPs”) are categorically overbroad in time and subject matter and concomitantly unduly burdensome. For example, RFP Nos. 41-43 ask for “[a]ll documents between March 29, 1994, and the present day”; RFP Nos. 47-48 request “[a]ll documents related to homicide investigations in the period from 1983…through 1996”; and RFP No. 49 asks for “[a]ll documents related to any Complaint against any Chicago Police Department officer from 1989 to 1999” (Dkt. 88-5)—time periods that range from ten to thirty years.”

Tyler and Henderson were convicted of the 1994 murder of ten-year-old Rodney Collins in the Back of the Yards and spent 25 years in prison before Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx vacated their convictions in 2021 on the claims that they were framed for the murder. They field their wrongful conviction claims in July 2023.

The Tyler and Henderson wrongful conviction complaints, and a news story published in the Chicago Sun-Times, tells of an elaborate scheme by detectives to frame the brothers as part of a vendetta stemming from Tyler’s testimony for the defense in a separate shooting case.

Citing the wrongful conviction complaints, the Sun-Times story said that Tyler, who was 17 at the time, was then taken into custody and beaten “so severely in the chest, face and eyes that he was later taken to the hospital for vomiting blood.”

The story mentions Detective Kenneth Boudreau and his partner at the time, James O’Brien.

But an investigation by the Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission (TIRC), which in 2020 in a “close case” recommended a new evidentiary hearing for Tyler, noted that the doctor who treated Tyler said that he had a history of hematemesis, the vomiting of blood caused by a stomach ulcer or severe gastritis. In addition, Tyler never told the doctor, nor any other medical professional, that his injuries were the result of police torture. And the lockup keeper at the jail said that Tyler had no outward signs of physical harm and that he never complained about police mistreatment.

What’s more, Boudreau told Chicago City Wire for an earlier story that he never interviewed Tyler – “never met him,” he said.

Monell claims run through dozens of wrongful conviction lawsuits naming former current Chicago police officers and prosecutors – many of the lawsuits were filed after Foxx vacated the convictions. She has exonerated over 250 since first taking office in late 2016.

For an earlier story, an attorney familiar with Monell claims said that trial attorneys representing clients alleging wrongful conviction are using Monell as a "safety net."

“Monell is the exception to the rule that you can only sue a person,” said an attorney, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “So if by chance a police officer is found not liable, then they can fall back on Monell.”

The attorney also agreed with the response in the case, that Monell is a big "fishing expedition."

"You are looking at massive amounts of discovery involving other cases under Monell," the attorney said. "It's a way to locate other potential clients."