Former Inmate Settles Wrongful Conviction In Waukegan Murder Case For $20M
CHICAGO (AP) -- Attorneys for an Illinois man who wrongfully served more than 19 years in prison for the 1992 rape and murder of an 11-year-old Waukegan girl said Friday they've settled a federal lawsuit against prosecutors and police for $20 million.
Juan Rivera was tried three times for the rape and murder of Holley Staker. His first conviction in 1993, when he was 19, was reversed on appeal and he was granted a new trial. He was convicted again in 1998, and in 2004, a Lake County judge granted Rivera DNA testing and a new trial.
His most recent conviction came in 2009 and was reversed in January 2012 after DNA evidence led investigators to another suspect. No one has been convicted in the girl's slaying. The Illinois appellate court that freed Rivera barred prosecutors from trying the 41-year-old again.
Rivera's lawsuit accused Lake County state's attorney's office and the sheriff's department of coercing a confession and conspiring to deprive him of constitutional rights.
"This will go a long way toward compensating Juan Rivera for spending 20 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit," Steve Art, one of Rivera's lawyers, said Friday. "It demonstrates that there was serious alleged misconduct and that this case was very winnable for Mr. Rivera at trial."
According to Art, the settlement also shows Lake County taxpayers there's a price to pay when police and others in the criminal justice system violate individual rights.
Rivera said the money received from the settlement could never make up for 20 years in prison.
"I went through a living hell while I was prison," he said. "You know, I could live more comfortable now, my family can, I can go to college, get my education the way I've always wanted, but I still would prefer my 20 years with my family than $20 million."
Lake County state's attorney spokeswoman Cynthia Vargas didn't immediately return telephone calls for comment. However, Waukegan Mayor Wayne Motley said insurance will cover only part of the city's share of the settlement, $7.5 million. He expressed unhappiness at other municipalities agreeing to settle the lawsuit before his city could make a decision.
None of the defendants in the lawsuit admits wrongdoing in the settlement, and the law enforcement officers sued in the case were dismissed as defendants and won't pay damages.
Rivera was in custody on a burglary charge when he became a suspect. The lawsuit contended Rivera underwent several days of interrogation, leading to a mental breakdown on the third day. Medical officials at the Lake County Jail allegedly diagnosed him with "acute psychosis," and he was put in constraints and placed in a padded cell. The lawsuit said that on a fourth day of interrogation, Rivera signed a confession written in English, although he couldn't read or write the language.
Northwestern University's Center on Wrongful Convictions represented Rivera in efforts to clear him of the charges.
The lawsuit said police knew Rivera "suffered from intellectual deficits and that he had a history of pronounced emotional problems that would render him especially vulnerable to their coercive techniques."
In addition to the Lake County sheriff's department and prosecutors, the lawsuit targeted several Lake County Major Crimes Task Force officers, the cities of Waukegan and Lake Forest and the village of Buffalo Grove.
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