CITY HALL — The Finance Committee approved three major million-dollar settlements Monday, including $7.6 million in a Police Department rape case botched by failed DNA testing.
According to Corporation Counsel Stephen Patton, Dean Cage served 14 years of a 20-year sentence after being convicted of having "brutally raped" a 15-year-old schoolgirl on the 7000 block of South Wabash Avenue in 1994.
Cage was later exonerated on DNA evidence, and Patton said his attorneys successfully argued it "could've and should've been found" by Chicago Police and the city crime lab, which no longer exists.
The case was featured on the "Dr. Phil" show. It was complicated in that the victim never recanted her accusation, according to Patton.
Patton said he'd "strongly recommend" accepting the settlement, reduced from Cage's original request for $28 million. He said it argued in the city's favor that there was no "willfulness" on the part of the Police Department and "it was about mistakes being made," but that the risks of going to court were substantial He called the settlement a "cost-effective way to save the taxpayers money."
Patton said the same of a $1.2 million settlement to Donald Williams, who served three years in Cook County Jail after having a confession "coerced" that he was the lookout in a 2006 South Side murder. According to Patton, Cook County Judge Marcus Salone found a clear case of "psychological coercion" and alleged coaching of the witness in Williams' videotaped confession. Patton said Salone's decision was in "emphatic and, for us, problematic terms." Again, however, he emphasized that the settlement was a third of what was originally sought.
The city will also pay $4.3 million to 59 African-American women for race and sex discrimination in Fire Department hiring. The women were caught in a bind between a case for racial discrimination and sex discrimination. They failed a physical-abilities test later found to be biased against women.
"Quite frankly, we had a problem with that test," Patton said.
As such, they weren't party to a larger suit charging racial discrimination, known as the Lewis suit. Monday's settlement, Patton said, corrected that, although the final figure could change and be lower as the women are being given another chance to apply this month as part of the new firefighter exam.
The settlements head to the full City Council for final approval Wednesday.
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