Victims of disgraced cop Ronald Watts seek to get 100 convictions thrown out chicagocrusader.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from chicagocrusader.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
CHICAGO (WLS) Nine more convictions connected to disgraced former Chicago Police Sergeant Ronald Watts were thrown out at the request of Cook County State s Attorney Kim Foxx Friday.
Tinere Johnson was two months pregnant when she said Watts set her up on drug charges during his reign of terror.
Johnson said she didn t know what to do when Watts and his team rounded her up on drugs charges at the Ida B Wells Homes in March 2008. I m two, three months pregnant with my first child, so I was really scared and really mad and shocked that these people really did that to me, Johnson said.
9 more convictions from disgraced Chicago Police Sgt Ronald Watts vacated msn.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from msn.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Over the past three years, the Exoneration Project has been working with the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit to reverse those cases.
“Every time we do one of these mass exonerations, there is a pit in my stomach,” Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx said. “There is relief that we are able to right the wrongs of the past, and sorrow that this is the state we find ourselves in…that for so long Sgt. Watts and his crew were able to terrorize and criminalize a community.”
Tepfer told Judge LeRoy Martin, Jr., the cases followed a similar pattern. Watts and his crew would single out men who had had previous contact with law enforcement at the now demolished Ida B. Wells Housing complex. They would shake them down for money or drugs. When the men failed to comply, they would often be beaten and arrested on trumped up charges or planted evidence.