Fulton v. Bartik, Case No. 20 C 3118

• Court: United States District Courts. 7th Circuit. United States District Court (Northern District of Illinois)
• Writing for the Court: Joan H. Lefkow, United States District Judge
• Citation: 547 F.Supp.3d 799
• Parties: John FULTON, Plaintiff, v. Robert BARTIK, et al., Defendants. Anthony Mitchell, Plaintiff, v. Robert Bartik, et al., Defendants.
• Decision Date: 01 July 2021
• Docket Number: Case No. 20 C 3118, Case No. 20 C 3119

547 F.Supp.3d 799

John FULTON, Plaintiff,
v.
Robert BARTIK, et al., Defendants.

Anthony Mitchell, Plaintiff,
v.
Robert Bartik, et al., Defendants.

Case No. 20 C 3118
Case No. 20 C 3119

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division.

Signed July 1, 2021

547 F.Supp.3d 805

Arthur R. Loevy, D. Samuel Heppell, Jonathan I. Loevy, Russell R. Ainsworth, Julia Therese Rickert, Loevy & Loevy, Andrea D. Lyon, Attorney at Law, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff John Fulton.

Andrea D. Lyon, Attorney at Law, Arthur R. Loevy, D. Samuel Heppell, Jonathan I. Loevy, Russell R. Ainsworth, Julia Therese Rickert, Loevy & Loevy, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff Anthony Mitchell.

Avi T. Kamionski, Grzegorz Labuz, Natalie Adeeyo, Robin Denise Shoffner, Shneur Z. Nathan, Nathan & Kamionski LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendants Robert Bartik, John Zalatoris, James Breen, Leonard Rolston, Edward Winstead, Joseph Struck, Robert Girardi, Michael Kennedy, Michael Schmitz, Brian Skora, Detective Aguirre.

Natalie Adeeyo, Nathan & Kamionski LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendants Richard Cervenka, Inv. S. Franco (# 40141).

Brian Patrick Gainer, Monica Burkoth, Jack E. Bentley, Samuel D. Branum, Johnson & Bell, Ltd., T. Andrew Horvat, Shayl Wilson, Cook County State's Attorney's Office, Zachary Adam Pestine, Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart, P.C., Chicago, IL, for Defendants McRay Judge, Jacob Rubinstein, Andrew Varga, Eugene Shepherd, Cook County.

James Peter Fieweger, Alexius Cruz O'Malley, Brianna Jane Siebken, Carolyn E. Isaac, Michael Best & Friedrich LLP, Michael David Bess, Winston & Strawn LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendant City of Chicago.

OPINION AND ORDER

Joan H. Lefkow, United States District Judge

In these related actions, plaintiffs John Fulton and Anthony Mitchell filed substantively identical complaints against the same defendants, alleging constitutional violations brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and state law claims.¹ Defendants Robert Bartik, John Zalatoris, James Breen, Edward Winstead, Joseph Struck, Michael Kennedy, Michael Schmitz, Brian Skora, Detective Aguirre, Leonard Rolston, Stephen Franco, Robert Girardi, and the City of Chicago (City Defendants), and McRay Judge, Jacob Rubinstein, Andrew Varga, Eugene Shepherd, and Cook County (County Defendants) moved to dismiss the complaints under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). (Dkts. 55, 70.)² For the reasons below, defendants’ motions to dismiss are granted in part and denied in part.

547 F.Supp.3d 806

BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs’ actions are based on events surrounding the investigation of Christopher Collazo's murder, and their arrests and prosecutions for that murder.³

I. The initial investigation of Collazo's murder

On March 10, 2003, around 3:00 a.m., Sid Taylor called 911 to report an alley fire. (Dkt. 1 at 5, ¶¶18, 20.) Officers arrived at the fire to find Collazo's partially burned remains, his wrists and ankles bound with duct tape, mouth covered with duct tape, and blood on and around the body. (Id. ¶19.)

That day, "Police Officer Defendants" — Bartik, Zalatoris, Breen, Rolston, Winstead, Struck, Girardi, Cervenka, Kennedy, Schmitz, Skora, Franco, Aguirre, and other unknown law enforcement — interviewed Taylor and Marcus Marinelli, who were both in the same street gang. (Id. ¶¶20, 24.) Taylor told officers that from his house he saw a fire and two men near it; he did not know either man's race. (Id. ¶21.)

Marinelli, who was Collazo's friend and the last person known to see him alive, told officers that he last saw Collazo at 9:00 p.m. on March 9, 2003. (Id. ¶¶23, 25.) He also told them that about one month earlier he and Collazo had robbed a black teenager who was trying to buy a gun from them. (Id. ¶25.) That teenager (who was Fulton) was referred to Collazo by a mutual friend of theirs, Johnitta Griffin, a 17-year-old girl. (Id. ¶25.)

Police Officer Defendants interviewed Griffin. (Id. at 6, ¶26.) She told them that she was a friend of Collazo's but knew nothing of his murder. (Id. ¶27.) She also told the officers that she had referred Fulton, who also was her friend, to Collazo to buy a gun, but Collazo and Marinelli robbed Fulton instead of selling him a gun. (Id. ¶27.) Griffin denied knowing of a connection between the robbery and Collazo's murder. (Id. ¶28.)

Police Officer Defendants gathered information on Collazo's murder that had no connection to Fulton, including a license plate number. (Id. ¶29.) This information was exculpatory for Fulton and Mitchell, but officers withheld it from anyone outside of the Chicago Police Department. (Id. ¶29.) At some point, Schmitz and Skora fabricated a police report, stating that Taylor had identified the two men near the alley fire as black. (Id. ¶30.)

Defendants chose to frame Fulton and Mitchell, and their friend Antonio Shaw, for Collazo's murder. (Id. ¶31.) Police Officer Defendants re-interviewed Griffin, during which they coerced her into falsely implicating Fulton in Collazo's murder with a false narrative that they had concocted and fed to her. (Id. at 6–7, ¶¶32, 35.) In her false statement, Griffin stated that she had talked with Fulton on the phone multiple times on and around March 9, 2003, and he had demanded that she facilitate revenge on Collazo for the gun sale robbery. (Id. at 6, ¶32.)

Police Officer Defendants then arranged for and conspired with Rubinstein, an assistant state's attorney, to record Griffin's false statement and falsely document that it was the result of legitimate interrogation tactics. (Id. at 7, ¶33.) Rubinstein did so because he knew that probable cause for charging Fulton and Mitchell with Collazo's murder did not exist. (Id. ) Alternatively, Police Officer Defendants concealed the

547 F.Supp.3d 807

fabricated statement from Rubinstein, and fellow assistant state's attorneys Judge and Varga (Prosecutor Defendants). (Id. ¶34.)

II. Fulton's arrest and false confession

On March 18, based on Griffin's false statements, defendants arrested Fulton. (Id. ¶36.) He was an 18-year-old high school senior, living with his fiancée Yolanda Henderson and their child. (Id. ¶38.)

Defendants questioned Fulton at the police station. (Id. ¶39.) Fulton explained to them that Griffin had connected him with Collazo in late January or early February so that he could buy a gun for personal protection. (Id. at 8, ¶39.) He further explained that he, Mitchell, and Shaw met with Collazo and Marinelli, but Collazo and Marinelli robbed him at gunpoint. (Id. ¶39.) Fulton told defendants that neither he nor Mitchell saw Collazo again, and he denied seeking revenge or knowing anything of Collazo's death. (Id. ¶¶40, 41.) He also told them that on March 9 he was with Henderson at the University of Chicago Hospital emergency room or was otherwise at their apartment until he left for school the following morning. (Id. ¶41.)

Defendants insisted that Fulton adopt the same fabricated story that they had coerced Griffin into telling. (Id. ¶42.) They used false promises of leniency, threats, and physical violence over a long detention in harsh conditions to coerce him into falsely confessing to Collazo's murder and implicating Mitchell and Shaw. (Id. at 8–9, ¶¶43, 44, 49.) Fulton falsely confessed that he, Mitchell, and Shaw beat Collazo and placed him in the trunk of his car. (Id. at 10, ¶50.) Defendants also fabricated an additional false confession from Fulton, obtained by Bartik, a police officer and polygrapher, that Fulton had spontaneously confessed to Collazo's murder before a polygraph exam. (Id. ¶¶51, 52.)

Police Officer Defendants arranged for and conspired with Judge and Rubinstein to coerce Fulton's false confession and statements implicating Mitchell and Shaw, and document that it was the result of legitimate interrogation tactics. (Id. ¶46.) Judge and Rubinstein conspired with Police Officer Defendants because they were aware that there was no probable cause to charge Fulton with Collazo's murder. (Id. ¶47.) Alternatively, Police Officer Defendants concealed their coercive interrogation tactics and fabrication of Fulton's statements from Prosecutor Defendants. (Id. ¶48.)

III. Mitchell's arrest and false confession

Mitchell was arrested on March 19. (Id. at 15, ¶60.) He was age 17 at the time. (Id. at 14, ¶ 59.) Defendants used abusive tactics to coerce him into falsely confessing to murdering Collazo. (Id. at 15, ¶¶60, 61.)

Police Officer Defendants then arranged for and conspired with Rubinstein to fabricate Mitchell's false confession and statements implicating Fulton and Shaw, and then falsely documented that those statements had been the result of legitimate interrogation tactics. (Id. at 15–16, ¶¶63, 66.) Rubinstein conspired with Police Officer Defendants because he knew that there was no probable cause to charge Mitchell or Fulton with Collazo's murder, and he was complicit in the officers’ plan to frame them for the murder. (Id. ) Alternatively, Police Officer Defendants concealed their interrogation tactics and fabrication of Mitchell's statements from Prosecutor Defendants. (Id. ¶64.)

IV....