As an active alum of the University of Chicago and its Exoneration Project, I try to forward on news of significant filings and pro bono efforts of the Exoneration Project and its affiliated programs. Professor Craig Futterman, the director of the Civil Rights and Police Accountability Project, has been leading the charge in a case that would determine if thousands of Chicago police misconduct records would be destroyed.
In the Illinois Supreme Court case The City of Chicago vs. Fraternal Order of Police, Chicago Lodge, No. 7, Prof. Craig Futterman, has argued:
“What’s terrifying is that what’s at risk – and not to be Chicken Little here – is that hundreds of thousands of thousands of records – of police misconduct records – can go up on smoke, and that means forever. Once they’re gone, they’re gone.”
The Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, the union representing Chicago Police officers, is asking the Illinois Supreme Court to allow them to destroy all police misconduct records older than five years.
“And it couldn’t come at a worse time,” Futterman said.
You can read the brief filed by the Civil Rights and Police Accountability Project. The Exoneration Project clinic focuses on cases involving convicted men and women who claim to be innocent of the crimes for which they stand convicted. In this course, students work on actual post-conviction litigation representing individuals who are asserting their innocence as well as advancing related claims associated with their wrongful convictions.
