Statement to Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx on her decision to not seek re-election
MEDIA ALERT - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Frank Chapman 312-513-3795 media@caarpr.org
The Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR) salutes Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx for her contributions to the cause of justice in her two terms in office.
When we met SA Foxx in 2016, her campaign slogan was that “Cook County is the wrongful conviction capital of the U.S.” While Black and Latino communities in every city in this country suffer from police terror, only in Illinois is there a torture commission established by the state legislature because of the legacy of Jon Burge and numerous other torture cops in the Chicago Police Department.
Since her 2016 election, the National Registry of Exonerations reports that Cook County has exonerated 287 cases. We know the number of wrongfully convicted souls Kim Foxx has aided in their quest for freedom is much higher than this number, as the registry doesn’t include the cases in which the State’s Attorney’s Office declined to retry upon victory in post-conviction hearings.
CAARPR’s Campaign to Free Incarcerated Survivors of police Torture (CFIST) has a report covering 407 known cases of wrongful convictions in Cook County, of which only 73 have been exonerated. There are also at least 100 detectives that engaged in coercion and frame ups who have never been brought to justice.
The Chicago Police Department is so filled with racism, corruption and criminal behavior, it can only be swept clean by the power of a massive movement. The election of Kim Foxx in 2016 was an expression of the masses desire for justice as she received 1.5 million votes.
The mass movement went on to pass the historic legislation, Empowering Communities for Public Safety. From that legislation, 230,000 people voted for a majority of the police district councilors in the February 28th election who are dedicated to holding the police accountable.
Then over 600,000 people elected Brandon Johnson mayor of Chicago, rejecting the racist, hate filled law-and-order candidacy of Paul Vallas, backed by the Fraternal Order of the Police (FOP).
The mass movement fighting for the Black, Puerto Rican, Chicano/Mexicano, and working-class survivors of police crimes defeated the FOP twice in these two elections. While the FOP will inevitably make a desperate attempt to claim a victory in SA Foxx’s decision not to run for re-election, the truth is that our movement is not going anywhere.
In the time she has left in office, we urge SA Foxx to stand with this movement by moving even more boldly to immediately to vacate convictions for all those framed, tortured, and wrongfully convicted as outlined in our detailed report: https://www.caarpr.org/cfist
Finally, we urge her to seek a progressive successor to continue her fight for justice alongside the Chicago Alliance and her many other allies in the fight to Free Them All!
