$5 Million for West Suburban man wrongfully imprisoned for rape

Prosecutors & Police Allegedly Withheld Evidence That Would Have Freed Him

 

Chicago, IL – Attorneys for Marcus Lyons announced that they had reached a $5 million agreement with the west suburban Village of Woodridge to settle a case alleging police misconduct that resulted in Lyons’ 3-1/2 years wrongful imprisonment for a rape that DNA evidence later showed he did not commit. 

The DuPage County prosecutors in the case were Joseph Birkett, now serving by appointment as a state appellate court judge and running for election for a full term in the November 2012 election, and Kathryn Creswell, now the presiding judge of the felony division in DuPage County Circuit Court.

Lyons was joined by his attorneys, Jon Loevy and Aaron Mandel of Loevy & Loevy Attorneys at Law, at a press conference yesterday in Chicago to discuss the settlement and his long journey to this day.

At the time of his arrest in 1987, Lyons was a Navy reservist with no criminal record, was in school at the College of DuPage, close to obtaining his degree in computer science, and was employed at Bell Labs as a computer operator.  He was engaged to be married and dreamed of starting a family.  He was the only African American man living in the apartment complex where the rape occurred, and where police suppression of biological evidence and a faulty witness identification ensured his conviction.

After being found guilty, Lyons was sentenced to six years in prison and served three-and-a-half of them before being released on parole. Then he found that his nightmare had only really just begun, because as a convicted felon and registered sex offender, he had difficulty finding employment and pursuing a meaningful career.  In addition, his personal relationships suffered as he never married nor had children.

Loevy & Loevy Attorneys at Law is the largest civil rights firm in the Midwest.  Over the past decade, Loevy & Loevy has won more in jury verdicts against law enforcement abuses than any other firm in the region.