Cook County expected to pay $17 million in Burge-connected Jackie Wilson case

Cook County is expected to pay $17 million to a Chicago man exonerated in the 1982 killings of two Chicago police officers, according to court records and a recommendation from a county board subcommittee.

Cook County commissioners are scheduled to vote on the deal this week, which would bring a quiet end to a civil rights lawsuit filed against former Cook County state’s attorneys accused of railroading Jackie Wilson for murders committed by his older brother.

The lawsuit against several Chicago police officers involved in the case will continue in federal court.

Wilson’s case traces back more than 40 years to the slayings of Chicago police Officers William Fahey and Richard O’Brien, who were fatally shot by Wilson’s older brother Andrew during a traffic stop.

Jackie Wilson, then 21, was behind the wheel of the car and was accused of being the getaway driver. Wilson has said he did not know his brother would shoot the officers.

The courts have previously found that both brothers were tortured into giving confessions by Chicago police officers under Cmdr. Jon Burge. Burge and his so-called midnight crew of rogue detectives led the torture of criminal suspects for two decades, coercing dozens of confessions.

Chicago taxpayers have paid more than $130 million in lawsuit settlements and judgments related to Burge’s conduct over the past two decades, according to public records. The amount includes $5.5 million in reparations for torture survivors, which was approved by the Chicago City Council in 2015.

The Wilson settlement — thought to be among the largest for a single defendant in Cook County history — is an unusual step for the state’s attorney’s office. Prosecutors are often dismissed from wrongful conviction lawsuits because they have near-absolute immunity from such actions. Exceptions can be made when their actions are not related to advocating for the prosecution, such as acting as an investigator or serving as a witness.

A spokeswoman for the Cook County state’s attorney’s office declined to comment Tuesday, citing pending litigation.

Wilson, now 63, spent nearly 37 years in prison before charges were dropped at his third trial in 2020; he later received a certificate of innocence. That trial was halted after a special prosecutor alleged then-Cook County assistant state’s attorney Nicholas Trutenko knowingly gave false testimony on the stand.

Jackie Wilson, in prison for 36 years in cop slaying, freed days after confession tossed

Trutenko, who was the lead prosecutor at Jackie Wilson’s second trial, has been accused of concealing a decadeslong friendship with a British con man who served as the key witness at that trial in 1989. Trutenko’s attorneys have said the relationship began after he had left the office for private practice and had no bearing on the case.

Trutenko was charged with perjury, official misconduct, obstruction of justice and violating a local records act in relation to his witness testimony at Wilson’s third trial in 2020. A Cook County assistant state’s attorney who represented Trutenko at the trial, Andrew Horvat, was charged with official misconduct after a special prosecutor alleged Horvat warned him not to ask Trutenko about the friendship during his testimony.

Both men have pleaded not guilty to the charges. The strange friendship between Trutenko and his witness – close enough that the prosecutor later became godfather to the con man’s daughter – took center stage at the men’s criminal trial, which began late last year at the Rolling Meadows courthouse. The proceedings, however, were abruptly halted after a judge limited a key witness’s testimony and the special prosecutor sought a rare mid-trial appeal.

The case is currently before the Illinois 1st District Appellate Court.

Trutenko and Horvat were both named defendants in the Wilson civil rights complaint expected to be settled by the Cook County state’s attorney’s office. Their names will be dropped from the case if the deal is approved.

Horvat’s attorney Terry Ekl said the settlement was between Wilson and the county, without any input from his client.

“Since we’re not part of the agreement, obviously, there’s no admission of wrongdoing,” Ekl said. “It has no impact whatsoever in the criminal case.”

Trutenko’s attorneys could not be reached for comment.

All other former Cook County state’s attorney employees named in the suit will be dismissed if the county board approves the deal. The named defendants include former Cook County prosecutor Lawrence Hyman, who took Wilson’s tainted confession, and the estate of well-known former prosecutor William Kunkle, who was the lead prosecutor in Wilson’s first trial and died in 2022.

The settlement also would prevent another legal discussion of how Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx’s office handled Trutenko’s constitutional rights following his indictment.

In November, Lake County Judge Daniel Shanes, who was assigned the case after the entire Cook County judiciary was recused, barred large portions of testimony from an assistant state’s attorney assigned to the civil actions bureau, ruling that he had an attorney-client relationship with Trutenko in the weeks leading up to Trutenko’s testimony during Wilson’s 2020 trial.

That attorney testified before a grand jury that indicted Trutenko in March 2023.

Shanes delivered a lengthy opinion in which he rebuked the handling of the matter by Foxx’s office, calling the concept of attorney-client privilege a “bedrock of justice.”

“The attorney-client privilege is the oldest privilege in American law. It is the longest standing doctrine of our kind in our jurisprudence,” Shanes said.

Tribune reporter A.D. Quig contributed to this report.