Chicago Sun-Times: All posts by Andy Grimm

State’s Attorney Kim Foxx revamps Cook County wrongful conviction unit

2023-12-06T13:00:00-06:00

Michelle Mbekeani will lead the rebranded Conviction Review Unit in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office.

State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, with little over a year left as Cook County’s top prosecutor, is revamping the office that handles wrongful conviction cases, one of the signature issues of her often embattled administration.

Since Foxx won election as a reform candidate in 2016, her office has overturned more than 200 cases based on allegations of misconduct or new evidence that cast doubt on convictions.

On Wednesday, her office announced a “rebranding” of the Conviction Integrity Unit, which she launched soon after taking office. It will now be called the Conviction Review Unit and will be headed by Michelle Mbekeani, a senior policy adviser to Foxx.

Foxx said in a statement that the new unit would “operate under the principle of participatory justice” by engaging with community members and criminal justice advocates.

“It represents a shift in our approach towards rectifying the wrongs of the past, ensuring fairness in our justice system, and incorporating community voices in our decisions,” Foxx said in the statement. “This move further symbolizes our promise to the people we serve that we will continue to review, rectify, and restore justice, especially in cases marred by historical injustices and misconduct.

“The Conviction Review Unit stands as a beacon of hope and a testament to our dedication to turning the tide against systemic inequities and rebuilding trust in our legal system,” she added.

Mbekeani has never worked as a line prosecutor handling criminal cases in the courtroom. She joined the state’s attorney’s office as a senior legal and policy adviser in 2018 after a stint as a staff attorney at the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.

Her predecessor as head of the unit, Nancy Adduci, will remain as one of two deputy supervisors working under Mbekeani.

In recent months, Adduci has come under fire from attorneys representing three men charged in the 2011 killing of Chicago Police Officer Clifton Lewis. Adduci had been assigned to the prosecution team in Lewis’ murder from the start, but was pulled off the case early this year, after lawyers for Tyrone Clay, Alexander Villa and Edgardo Colon claimed to have discovered a trove of evidence that was not turned over to the men’s trial attorneys.

Charges against Clay and Colon were dropped, and Villa has appealed the guilty verdict in his 2018 trial.

Foxx increased staffing for the Conviction Integrity Unit upon taking office, beefing up a unit that under her predecessors often seemed to have only one or two lawyers evaluating cases.

Advocates for the wrongfully convicted continue to complain about the slow pace of investigations into misconduct allegations, but nearly all agree that Foxx’s administration has been far more willing to investigate cases and move to reverse troubled convictions.

“There is no doubt that, in this county, because of the sheer number of wrongful convictions that we’ve seen, that this has to be a priority for the state’s attorney,” said Josh Tepfer, an attorney who represented dozens of people convicted in cases linked to corrupt Chicago police Sgt. Ronald Watts.

Foxx’s office has thrown out convictions in more than 200 cases that were based on arrests made by Watts and his unit, a move that Tepfer said was unprecedented in Cook County.

“I would hope that they would continue to become more proactive in the office, because there is still a lot of work that needs to be done,” he said.

Chicago taxpayers paid $700M in lawsuits accusing cops of framing people

2023-12-06T05:00:00-06:00

Jacques Rivera — who spent more than 20 years in prison after he was framed for a 1988 murder by former Chicago police Det. Reynaldo Guevara — speaks to reporters at the Dirksen Federal Building in 2018 after a jury awarded him $17 million from the city of Chicago.

Max Herman / Sun-Times

Jacques Rivera waited through more than 20 years in prison and countless court hearings before he was able to clear his name and go free.

Prosecutors dropped charges against him in 2011, and he received a certificate of innocence — a ruling from a judge that he did not commit the 1988 murder that landed him an 80-year sentence.

Once out, he waited another eight years on a lawsuit against the city of Chicago that ended with a jury awarding him $17 million in damages.

Some might say that payday was worth the wait, but Rivera says the money will never replace the years he lost behind bars. And it clearly wasn’t worth it for city taxpayers, who footed the bill for the award and another $6 million to outside lawyers who handled nearly a decade of litigation.

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“The crazy thing is, we tried to settle with the city, and they just wouldn’t do it,” Rivera said this week at the Cook County Criminal Courthouse, where he was watching another wrongful conviction case. “Before the trial, I would have been happy with $10 million and my attorneys’ fees.”

Multimillion-dollar payouts come before the Chicago City Council on an almost monthly basis, with the largest sums typically going to victims of police misconduct. Since 2000, the city has paid out nearly $700 million in 300 cases in which people said they were framed by Chicago police.

Of that, $138 million went to outside lawyers who defended the city.

Chicago City Hall is owed billions of dollars it hasn’t managed to collect

The tally covers only federal lawsuits and does not include fees awarded to the plaintiffs’ lawyers. Also not included are police-related lawsuits alleging misconduct such as false arrest and excessive force, or for crashes and fatal shootings.

“The city is looking at, easily, a billion-dollar liability over the last 23 years, with plenty more on tap,” said Andrew M. Stroth, a civil rights attorney whose nonprofit organization, Truth, Hope & Justice, collaborated on the report with the global law firm Ropes & Gray, the Law Firm Antiracism Alliance and Chicago-based insurance and risk management firm Aon.

Stroth is currently representing James Gibson in a lawsuit against the city, alleging he was tortured by former Chicago police Cmdr. Jon Burge into a false confession that landed him in prison for nearly 30 years.

“As far as I can tell, they have no strategy for how they evaluate these cases,” Stroth said. “And that is delaying justice for men like James Gibson at phenomenal costs to taxpayers.”

Law Department spokeswoman Kristen Cabanban said Wednesday that “the city is keenly aware of the complexity and special challenges presented by reversed conviction cases and continues to give careful attention to these cases both individually and as a group.

“However, the Law Department cannot comment publicly on ongoing litigation or provide litigation assessment,” she added. “Nor do we authorize the firms we engage to comment because doing so is inconsistent with our professional obligations and could jeopardize efforts to resolve these matters in a way consistent with the city’s best interests.”

Rivera was one of the first people to be exonerated based on claims of misconduct against former Chicago police Det. Reynaldo Guevara. The report lists 11 active lawsuits involving claims against Guevara.

Judge overturns murder convictions of woman in 1993 case tied to Reynaldo Guevara

Of 190 wrongful-conviction lawsuits pending in federal court, 156 involve allegations against former Chicago police Sgt. Ronald Watts, who in 2012 was sentenced to two years in prison for shaking down an FBI informant for $5,000.

“These guys have already lost so much time from their lives, it’s wrong to make them wait longer,” Rivera said. “And most of these guys, they want to settle. They want to move on with their lives and the rest of the time they have left.”

Eye-popping settlements are nothing new in Chicago. Wrongful-conviction cases have resulted in some of the biggest, and most controversial, payouts by the city.

Between 2017 and 2020, the city paid $72 million in settlements and judgments in just 19 wrongful-conviction cases, nearly a third of the $250 million the city paid in lawsuits across all city departments, according to a report last year by the City Hall inspector general’s office.

The same report faulted the city for poorly coordinating data sharing between the CPD, the Law Department and the Risk Management Department, hindering efforts to spot trends and identify ways to reduce the city’s risk of getting sued.

Ropes & Gray partner Alexander Zeltser said the firm wanted to develop a database that might help city officials weigh decisions in ongoing and future cases and identify patterns to prevent future wrongful convictions — practices that would be standard at a large corporation that found itself paying out large amounts in lawsuits on a regular basis.

In a corporate environment “you’d measure your costs of stricter, more robust training or more robust compliance procedures against the cost of having real negative outcomes that have a human cost ... as well as a financial cost,” Zeltser said.

Given the volume of cases related to wrongful convictions, the city could have developed a matrix to evaluate the likelihood of winning a case at trial and the potential costs of a jury verdict against the city, said Jon Loevy, whose firm Loevy & Loevy has handled nearly half of the wrongful-conviction lawsuits against the city.

In May, a jury awarded Loevy client Adam Gray $27 million, the largest amount the city has paid out in a wrongful-conviction case, according to the report.

Gray was arrested at 14 and spent 24 years in prison for an arson murder conviction that was overturned based on improved fire science evidence and allegations that police coerced bogus witness testimony.

Loevy has dealt with the Law Department and lawyers hired by the city under four different mayors dating back to Richard M. Daley. He said the lack of a methodical approach to settling cases has spanned every administration.

“My clients are seeking justice for having their lives destroyed, they are not the villains of this story,” Loevy said. “When we have done cases in California or New York, if you bring a meritorious case, they usually come out of the box with a reasonable offer.

“Here, you go to trial and it seems to be more of a lottery where one guy gets $7 million, another guy gets $20 [million] and maybe both of them would have settled for more like $8 million,” he added. “And you’ve saved millions in attorney’s fees.”

Biggest police framing payouts by city

The biggest payouts

Largest payouts by Chicago taxpayers as a result of lawsuits over wrongful convictions since 2000.

Settlements

Armando Serrano and Jose Montanez — $20.5 million
Tyrone Hood — $17.5 million
Harold Richardson — $16.8 million
Juan Johnson — $16.4 million
Michael Saunders — $16.08 million
Vincent Thames — $16.08 million

Jury awards

Adam Gray — $27 million
Eddie Bolden — $25.2 million
Thaddeus “T.J.” Jimenez — $25 million
Nathson Fields — $22 million
Jacques Rivera — $17 million

Source: Wrongful Convictions Database Report.

Thaddeus “T.J.” Jimenez — the story and “Motive” podcast of a Chicago man’s wrongly convicted of murder and his downward spiral after his $25 million payout

Ex-judge faces felony charges for alleged theft from Tuskegee Airman

2023-11-20T21:11:21.673-06:00

Former Cook County Judge Patricia Martin faces a seven-count indictment for allegedly stealing retirement funds and savings from World War II aviator Oscar Wilkerson Jr.

Cook County courts

Former Cook County Judge Patricia Martin returned to a Cook County courthouse last week to face criminal charges accusing her of stealing several hundred thousand dollars from the last-known surviving member of the famed Tuskegee Airmen.

Martin appeared at the courthouse in Bridgeview on Friday, where she faces seven felony counts for allegedly taking more than $100,000 from the financial accounts of Oscar Wilkerson Jr.

Oscar Lawton Wilkerson Jr., last known surviving member of the Tuskegee Airmen in Chicago area, dead at 96

She is accused of doing so over two years, starting when Martin was given control of Wilkerson’s finances when the nonagenarian World War II veteran moved into a nursing home in Orland Park in 2020.

Martin — who was head of the child protection division of the Cook County Juvenile Court system until she retired from the bench in 2020 — is the niece of Wilkerson’s former wife.

Wilkerson, the last known member of the trailblazing all-Black Tuskegee aviators, died in February, a day before his 97th birthday.

Oscar Lawton Wilkerson Jr., last known surviving member of the Tuskegee Airmen in Chicago area, dead at 96

Martin wasn’t arraigned Friday because her case will be assigned to a judge from outside Cook County, according to her attorney Michael Leonard. Martin now lives in Missouri and was allowed to return to the state, according to court records.

Martin, who has been disbarred and faces a $1.2 million civil judgment over the alleged theft from Wilkerson, plans to fight the criminal charges, her lawyer said.

Ex-Cook County judge, accused of stealing decorated Tuskegee Airman’s life savings, is ordered to pay $1.2 million

“She’s definitely looking to defend herself vigorously,” Leonard said. “She’s a wonderful person with an unbelievably positive reputation, and we expect that all to come out in these proceedings.”

The indictment, handed up Nov. 9, includes charges of theft, money-laundering, financial exploitation of an elderly person and running a continuing criminal enterprise. Prosecutors say Martin took money from Wilkerson’s accounts and used it to buy cryptocurrency.

How Illinois’ safety net to protect the elderly from financial exploitation is falling short

According to a civil lawsuit filed against Martin before Wilkerson’s death, Martin stole more than $380,000 from him, with Wilkerson learning the money was missing when he got a bill for $40,000 in unpaid fees from his nursing home.

Lawyers for Wilkerson said Martin drained his bank and retirement accounts and repeatedly accessed the accounts even after a judge ordered her not to do so. That judge entered the $1.2 million judgement against Martin in May and urged Wilkerson’s attorneys to seek criminal contempt charges against Martin.

The day after the judgment, the Illinois Attorney Registration and Disciplinary Commission filed a disciplinary complaint against Martin. Martin gave up her license, acknowledging that the accusations would be proved.

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LiFE Restaurant reopens in West Garfield Park after Labor Day car crash

2023-11-20T06:00:00-06:00

Joe Black stands outside his West Garfield Park LiFE Restaurant, which reopened after making repairs to damage caused when a car crashed through its front windows over Labor Day weekend.

Heidi Zeiger / Sun-Times

Work started Friday at LiFE Restaurant as it has most mornings since Joe Black opened the place in West Garfield Park six years ago. Black cued up a gospel song on his speaker and his wife, Tonya, stepped to the grill.

“You have to set the energy,” Black said after selecting a soulful rendition of “Yahweh” as his wife buttoned her chef’s jacket.

“God keeps like a forcefield around here,” he said of the restaurant, an assessment he doesn’t hedge even after he’s reminded that a car crashed through the front of the restaurant over Labor Day weekend and came to rest just a few feet from where he was standing.

What it’s like to live in Chicago’s most violent neighborhood, West Garfield Park

A steady stream of customers began a few minutes after Black rolled up the security gates on the repaired front of the business. The gate shielding the door needs a little finesse since the crash.

The name of the restaurant is spelled out in 3-feet-high letters on the replacement windows, a first for LiFE, as Black had wanted the restaurant to build business by word of mouth in its early years.

“Business is back like we never closed,” Black said. “We are here to feed people, to nourish the people.”

In restaurant owner’s own words: Without violence, West Garfield Park would be world’s ‘best community’

Tonya Black, chef and co-owner of LiFE, prepares food at the West Garfield Park restaurant.

Heidi Zeiger / Sun-Times

Forcefield notwithstanding, LiFE had been shut down by the Labor Day crash and the COVID-19 pandemic since it opened in 2017. Its original launch date was pushed back when another car smashed through the front windows as the driver fled a gunfight on Madison Street.

Before plowing into the Blacks’ restaurant, the driver in the Sept. 2 crash was fatally shot by a pedestrian he’d struck. The driver sped onto the sidewalk, through the roll-down gates and into the front of the restaurant, which had been closed for the holiday weekend.

Joe Black and Tonya Black wait for police to clear things so they can get into their restaurant after a car smashed into the front of the business. The driver had been shot after striking a pedestrian.

Andy Grimm / Sun-Times

Hours after the crash, Joe Black looked at the bullet-pocked car wedged in the front of his business from behind police tape. He called his insurance company and started planning his reopening.

“It’s all good. LiFE is resilient. LiFE is love,” Black said in September. “We will open back up. We’d be open today if we could get the front door open. People count on us, on our food.”

The slaying had been the 24th of the year in West Garfield Park, which has seen more shootings — over 900, or roughly one every other day — than all but two of Chicago’s 77 designated community areas, according to Chicago police data.

With only about 17,000 residents, the rate of shootings in West Garfield Park is by far the highest in the city, nearly three times that of Austin, the adjacent neighborhood of 96,000 that most years leads the city in total shootings.

Joe Black grew up in the neighborhood, and the sheer volume of violence in such a small community made it no surprise that he knew the victim — a cousin.

The level of violence owes much to the clutches of men selling drugs along Madison Street near the Blacks’ restaurant and others working on blocks around the neighborhood. Drug dealers were waving baggies at passing cars within about an hour of police clearing the shooting scene in September, and drive-through drug transactions continued Friday.

“Those guys don’t want to be out there 12 hours a day, maybe getting shot,” Black said, noting his business is hiring additional staff for the first time since the pandemic.

Joe Black, owner of LiFE restaurant, greets customer Kyle Kirby.

Heidi Zeiger / Sun-Times

The Blacks chose to open in the 3800 block of West Madison Street specifically for the symbolism of locating a restaurant that serves nutritious food alongside one of the few open-air drug markets in America. As a child, Black and his mother had rented an apartment upstairs over an old bar — “a really bad one,” Joe Black said.

LiFE Restaurant in West Garfield Park aims to nourish community

Black says he plans to open LiFE restaurants in other locations, pointing to a chain grocery store across Madison Street that was demolished a few weeks ago to make way for a multimillion-dollar retail and housing development.

“This is what it takes to make a change. You have to have people invest in the community,” Black said. “I want to have a place like this in every neighborhood.”

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Chicago city lawyers want a federal judge to recuse himself from hearing a Jon Burge-related suit

2023-11-14T18:18:38.473-06:00

James Gibson spent nearly 30 years in prison for a 1989 double-murder. He has sued the city of Chicago, saying that, while being questioned, he was tortured and framed by detectives working under former Chicago police Cmdr. Jon Burge.

Ashlee Rezin / Sun-Times (file)

Lawyers for the Chicago Police Department want a federal judge to recuse himself from presiding over a lawsuit filed by a man who spent decades in prison after he says he was framed by detectives working under corrupt former Cmdr. Jon Burge.

While working as an attorney specializing in civil rights cases more than 15 years ago, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Cummings was among dozens of lawyers and activists who signed on in support of a pair of reports that condemned a special prosecutor’s investigation into accusations of torture by Burge and his so-called “midnight crew” of detectives.

Unlike some of the other supporters, Cummings wasn’t involved in researching and drafting the reports.

Cummings, now a newly appointed federal judge, was handed a docket of more than 200 cases last month, including the lawsuit filed by James Gibson that accuses Burge’s detectives of torturing him into a false confession in a 1989 double-murder.

The case, filed in 2019, had been in front of Judge Sara Ellis, with U.S. Magistrate Judge David Weisman assigned to handle settlement discussions.

“Your Honor (Cummings) was listed as one of the individuals who submitted two reports in 2007 and 2008 regarding Jon Burge and detectives under his command,” city lawyers wrote in a court filing, saying they intend to ask Cummings to recuse himself.

“Respectfully, Defendants believe that Your Honor’s role as an individual signing onto these reports disqualifies Your Honor from presiding over this case ... and wish to address this before this Court considers any further matters.”

Gibson’s attorneys have noted that city lawyers haven’t raised objections about Weisman, who, in his previous career as an assistant U.S. attorney, led the prosecution team that sent Burge to prison. The ex-commander was sentenced to 4.5 years in prison in 2011, though Weisman argued he should have gotten 20 to 30 years.

A spokesperson for the city Law Department wouldn’t comment. Gibson’s attorney, Andrew M. Stroth, said the move to disqualify Cummings from the case was a delaying tactic.

“Attorneys for the city of Chicago are doing everything they can to delay and deny justice for an innocent man,” Stroth said.

Gibson was sentenced to life in prison for the 1989 killings of Lloyd Benjamin, an insurance agent, and his client, a mechanic named Hunter Wash, who were gunned down at Wash’s garage on the Southwest Side.

Gibson claimed he was beaten by detectives Anthony Maslanka and John Paladino, an accusation the state Torture Inquiry Relief Commission found credible, sending his case back to court for review.

An appeals court overturned Gibson’s conviction, and a special prosecutor assigned to the case dropped the charges.

What it’s like to live in Chicago’s most violent neighborhood

2023-11-03T14:17:30.588-05:00

The Conservatory-Central Park Drive Green Line station at West Lake Street and South Central Park Avenue in West Garfield Park, Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

LiFE Restaurant in West Garfield Park aims to nourish community

2023-11-03T12:36:57.096-05:00

Joe Black, 38, at the counter of LiFE Restaurant on West Madison Street in West Garfield Park. Over Labor Day weekend, a car crashed into the front of the restaurant after the driver was shot and fatally wounded — by a man he was trying to run over. Black, who grew up in the neighborhood and as a child lived in an apartment above the restaurant, opened LiFE to provide healthy meal options in an area “full of fast food and barbecue spots.”

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

WGP INTRO

In the series, Voices from Chicago’s most violent neighborhood, the Sun-Times spent months talking to residents who call West Garfield Park home.

Read their stories.

Since 2017, West Garfield Park native Joe Black and his wife, Tonya, have owned LiFE Restaurant on West Madison Street. Tonya cooks up a menu from recipes she created. No pork, no red meat, nothing fried. Joe takes orders, a process that almost always seems to involve greeting customers by name and starting a conversation that often turns into a motivational speech.

Joe Black, 38

Owner, LiFE Restaurant, 3858 W. Madison

We opened LiFE here very intentionally. We wanted to offer people something that wasn’t barbecue or fried food because this is a food desert. We wanted to offer people jobs.

People come in, and yeah, I talk. And I listen. I just had a woman come in, just had a baby, and she tells me she’s got postpartum depression and is really struggling. What am I supposed to say? ‘Here’s your food, next order’? Sister needed some help.

I grew up in West Garfield Park. My family has been here for six generations. My grandmother lives right down the street.

My mother and I, when she was struggling with addiction, actually lived in the apartment upstairs. This used to be a bar then. A bad one.

Voices from West Garfield Park: Former Park gang member works to pull others out of isolation

On the day I signed the lease, I called my mom and told her, and she said, ‘I’m 30 years sober today.’ We were living in that apartment when she had a vision and God touched her.

The guys out on Madison (selling drugs) don’t help business. The elders try to stay off Madison because they make it too dangerous. They aren’t afraid of (the dealers), but they are afraid of the activity that goes on around them, that someone might come by shooting.

Since we opened, I’ve approached (the dealers) as human beings. I’ve given them nourishing food. They don’t hang in front of my spot anymore.

I’ve offered some of them jobs. That’s all they want. Most of them don’t want to be doing what they’re doing.

Over Labor Day weekend, a car crashed through the front of the restaurant after the driver was shot.

Owner Joe Black and his wife, Tonya, survey the damage after a vehicle crashed through the front window of their restaurant, LiFE at 3854 W. Madison St., after the driver was shot by a pedestrian in West Garfield Park, Saturday. | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times

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Owner Joe Black stands at the counter after a vehicle crashed through the front window of his restaurant, LiFE at 3854 W. Madison St., after the driver was shot by a pedestrian in West Garfield Park, Saturday, Sept. 2, 2023. | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times

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Owner Joe Black surveys the damage after a vehicle crashed through the front window of their restaurant, LiFE at 3854 W. Madison St., after the driver was shot by a pedestrian in West Garfield Park, Saturday, Sept. 2, 2023. | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times

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Owner Joe Black and his wife, Tonya, talk to Chicago police officials after a vehicle crashed through the front window of their restaurant, LiFE at 3854 W. Madison St., after the driver was shot by a pedestrian in West Garfield Park. | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times

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I actually knew the guy who got killed. He was my cousin. I don’t know the other guy who shot him. I’m sure people know but don’t want to tell me.

He was in here all the time. I had talked to him earlier in the week about a job. He had a job but it was on a grant and the grant ran out.

He’s not trying to go back to what he did a long time ago. He’s a man; he’s got bills to pay, He wants to be a man. Next thing I know he was out playing dice, and that’s how I heard (the chase and the crash) all started. ...

If people wasn’t so pressurized, maybe they wouldn’t pop like that. I think a lot of people, what they have, it’s probably temporary insanity or they black out. It’s all just too much.

UPDATE: LiFE Restaurant reopens in West Garfield Park after fatal Labor Day weekend crash, ‘God keeps like a forcefield around here’

West Garfield Park activist fights to improve ‘wellness’ of community

2023-11-03T12:36:21.121-05:00

Lashone Kelly, interim director of the Garfield Park Rite to Wellness Collaborative, stands at the end of a strip of a half-dozen boarded-up houses in the 3900 block of West Wilcox street in West Garfield Park. Her organization works to rally other community groups to collaborate to bring investment to the West Side neighborhood, which has struggled to retain population since the 1950s, when the Eisenhower Expressway cut an eight-lane swath of pavement through the south end of the community.

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

WGP INTRO

In the series, Voices from Chicago’s most violent neighborhood, the Sun-Times spent months talking to residents who call West Garfield Park home.

Read their stories.

Kelly is a lifelong resident of Chicago’s West Side. Born in West Garfield Park, her family moved to Austin when she was a child. When she married, she moved into a house on the east side of the park. Before joining the Garfield Park Rite to Wellness Collaborative, she worked for the Chicago Department of Housing, chasing bad landlords and trying to rescue derelict buildings.

Lashone Kelly

Interim executive director, Garfield Park Rite to Wellness Collaborative

We have a lot of advantages in West Garfield Park. We have the Blue Line and the Green Line that run through the neighborhood, we have the most beautiful park in the city and some beautiful housing stock. What we don’t have is resources.

When I was growing up, you had Sears (just north of West Garfield Park) that had hundreds, maybe thousands of jobs. You had a Western Electric plant (in Cicero). You had Brach’s candy factory. You had major retailers up and down Madison and Pulaski. Those jobs are gone. …

Lashone Kelly, interim director of the Garfield Park Right to Wellness Collaborative, works in her office in the non-profit’s office in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Lashone Kelly (center), interim director of the Garfield Park Right to Wellness Collaborative, works with her team in the non-profit’s office in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Lashone Kelly (right), interim director of the Garfield Park Right to Wellness Collaborative, and executive assistant LaCreshia Birts participate in a Zoom meeting in the non-profit’s office in West Garfield Park, Thursday, Sept. 14, 2023. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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If you go 5 miles east of West Garfield Park, which is the West Loop, or 5 miles west, which is Oak Park, the life expectancy for residents is 13 years longer than it is in West Garfield Park. That has to do with violence, but also with a very high rate of infant mortality. ...

About 25% of the parcels in West Garfield Park are vacant or city- or county-owned. That’s also the highest in the city. That’s also an opportunity to redevelop something positive in those spaces. …

We had the Aldi close (in 2021) in the middle of the night. They closed up on Friday, and on Saturday, the store was empty. The way they did it really hurt people. … Now there is no major grocery unless you go to Oak Park or the Pete’s on Western (about 3 miles east). That’s a long way if you’re a senior on the bus.

We have two projects proposed for the Aldi site, both about $80 million with city subsidies, that will bring back an anchor grocery store and provide housing. That’s a significant investment.

We have another $10 million committed to the Sankofa Wellness Village, which will have a grocery and space for the arts and wellness care from Rush Medical Center. That’s a significant investment.

Voices in West Garfield Park: Business owner chooses to stay despite the violence

I see the guys waving their little bags on Madison Street, and I’m nosey, so I pulled over one time and asked, ‘What are you selling?’ And the guy said, ‘Just weed.’ I asked, ‘Aren’t you worried about getting arrested?” And he said, ‘Nah, it’s legal.’ I don’t think some of them know what they’re doing is even against the law.

They say if they arrested everyone on Madison, there’d be guys back out there in a day, and they’d have to keep arresting them. I just know that it isn’t happening on Michigan Avenue and State Street.

I think things are changing. The last few years, things got so crazy, I think people started paying attention again. People are tired. It’s like, enough is enough.

Former West Garfield Park gang member works to pull others out of isolation

2023-11-03T12:35:52.886-05:00

Marcus “Moon” Mitchell, 49, outreach and intervention manager at the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago, sits in the lobby of the non-profit’s office in West Garfield Park. INVC targets neighborhood residents who are among the most likely to be shot— or shoot someone— to a program of job training and counseling intended to steer them away from violence.

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

WGP INTRO

In the series, Voices from Chicago’s most violent neighborhood, the Sun-Times spent months talking to residents who call West Garfield Park home.

Read their stories.

Born and raised in West Garfield Park, Marcus “Moon” Mitchell remained a high-ranking gang member into his 40s before he was recruited to work for a community violence intervention group. Now he’s in charge of outreach workers for the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago.

Mitchell’s teams recruit active gang members — mostly men in their 20s and 30s who are nearly 50 times more likely to be shot or to shoot someone than the average Chicagoan. Some of Mitchell’s staffers have been shot on the job. More than a few program participants have been killed as they tried to change their lives.

Marcus “Moon” Mitchell, 49

Outreach and intervention manager, Institute for Nonviolence Chicago

Growing up in West Garfield Park in the 1970s and ’80s was fun. It was love. We played a lot of sports. We played football, baseball, basketball. It was a different atmosphere from now.

I jumped off the porch in about 1987, seventh or eighth grade. My oldest brothers were Unknown Vice Lords. When I came up, (the Unknowns) was Four Corner Hustlers, so I became a Four Corner Hustler.

When I was 13, I was making a few thousand dollars every other day. I wound up buying a car when I turned 14. I would go and ride it and park it and walk home so my parents wouldn’t see it and ask questions. ...

Marcus “Moon” Mitchell, 49, outreach and intervention manager at the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago, chats with workers with the non-profit during an outreach event in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Marcus “Moon” Mitchell, 49, greets old friends at a Delano Elementary School reunion event outside the school, now called Genevieve Melody Public School in West Garfield Park. | Andy Grimm/Sun-Times

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Rayqwan Alexander, 32, an outreach worker at the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago, chats with kids getting their faces painted during an outreach event in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Rayqwan Alexander, 32, an outreach worker at the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago, chats with kids during an outreach event in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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By the time I was about 44, I was still hustling and doing my thing, but I just got tired of that rigamarole. The game was changing. There was a lot of snakeism going on, where people back door you. People you think are your friends wind up being your enemies. ...

Right before I came into the program, I caught a dope case. I had to pay a lawyer $8,500 to make $250 (selling drugs). It didn’t add up, the risk and the reward.

A lot of (gang members) don’t want to be doing what they do. But they are embarrassed, they’d be ashamed that they don’t know something. So instead of asking and learning, they’d rather go without.

Voices from West Garfield Park: Activist fights to improve ‘wellness’ of community

Their life is isolated. They can’t go on this block or that block, because of territory. You have some of these guys, they haven’t even been downtown. They haven’t been to the movies. They haven’t been to the beach. ...

I tell the young men, ‘Look at me. I once was where you’re at, and now I live just as good as you, but you’re doing something illegal. I don’t have to watch behind my back.’

We had a Delano (Elementary School) reunion over Labor Day weekend. We needed it to happen. We needed to show those young people that love we used to have. (Delano was closed in 2014.)

You had ex-gang members, ex-ballplayers and everybody that turned out to be teachers, plumbers, electricians, activists. You’ve got it all. I wanted them young fellas to see that.

But if we had 300 people out there, 220 of them don’t live in the neighborhood no more. ...

I think if we keep bringing these resources in the neighborhood and give these young men these opportunities, they’ll take advantage of them.

West Garfield Park business owner chooses to stay despite the violence

2023-11-03T12:35:16.897-05:00

Marie Henderson, 82, owns Out of the Past Records, and has lived in West Garfield Park since the 1950s— one of the stores she and her husband owned burned during the rioting after Martin Luther King’s assassination in 1968. Henderson raised five children and still lives a few blocks away from the store. The business is the last of more than a half-dozen she and her late husband once owned.

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

WGP INTRO

In the series, Voices from Chicago’s most violent neighborhood, the Sun-Times spent months talking to residents who call West Garfield Park home.

Read their stories.

Walk under the tattered canopy that reads Out Of The Past Records, and you are greeted in the small foyer by portraits of some of the shop’s best customers. Marie Henderson said the family business had its beginnings in the 1960s with her husband’s photography studio.

Marie Henderson, 82, owner

Out Of The Past Records, 4407 W. Madison

We had a wig store, we had a jewelry store, then we had records. So eventually we narrowed it down to just records and variety stuff.

When I came to Chicago it was 1955, my first year in high school. It was fascinating. The problems we have now, we didn’t have them.

Madison and Pulaski was like State Street. We had all the stores. In 1963 when we opened, you had Three Sisters (a clothing store), Thom McCann (a shoe store), all kind of stores. …

We used to go into Garfield Park, we used to take our kids over there to the bridge to see the goldfish in the water. Garfield Park had a beautiful flower rotation out there, where you see open spaces now. It was really nice. …

I raised five kids in the neighborhood, and I own my own home. And then I have family, my aunt is across the street. Then I got neighbors, what’s left. There’s about six or seven of us on the block.

Voices from West Garfield Park: Mom wonders if neighborhood is a safe place to raise kids

Sometimes it’s kind of hard to think about it because when I first moved there in 1963, it was beautiful. It was all homeowners. We used to have block club parties for the kids. Kids played in the neighborhood, they were free. …

After Martin Luther King got killed, they rioted and they burned everything down. They burnt the studio down. … Then after the riot, everything started to shut down.

Marie Henderson, owner of Out of the Past Records, looks at some of her late husband’s photography as she stands in the vestibule of her store in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Marie Henderson, owner of Out of the Past Records, stands among rows of albums in her store at 4407 W. Madison St. in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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Marie Henderson, owner of Out of the Past Records, sorts albums while customers mingle and family members work at her store in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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A granddaughter of Marie Henderson, owner of Out of the Past Records, works at her store in West Garfield Park. | Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

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I had a store in the 3900 block (of Madison), and I sold it a few years ago. At that time my husband got sick ... and I didn’t have the time to run that store, and besides, it had gotten real bad down there. …

The bank moved, then some of the stores moved, the doctor’s office. The dentist. We have a lot of seniors in this neighborhood, and they have to go downtown to try to find somewhere to buy groceries because they closed the Aldi’s down.

On my block of Monroe, it’s always action. They shoot. It’s regular. We hear it a lot at night, maybe every week.

Marie Henderson owns Out Of The Past Records at 4407 W. Madison St. in West Garfield Park.

Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times

I’m surprised it’s kind of quiet now. A couple of weeks ago someone got killed over by Madison and Pulaski. Some boy ran into a store or something and got shot. …

It bothers me a lot. I have cameras on my house, to try to keep an eye on things. The graystone buildings, we still have a lot of them. They’re beautiful. Some are well taken care of, some of them are not. …

I don’t see any sense in moving. My kids are trying to get me to move. They say if it gets any worse, mom, you’re going to have to move. My aunt, her kids are telling her the same thing.

Why should I have to move when I own my home, pay taxes? Somebody that’s out doing wrong, they get to stay?