Cook County Jury Awards $79.85 Million Over Fatal Unauthorized Police Pursuit

On September 2, 2020, two Chicago police officers tried to stop a Mercedes-Benz in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood on the city's South Side. The driver refused to pull over and sped away at roughly 90 miles per hour. The officers gave chase. Moments later, both cars blew through a stop sign at 80th and Halsted Streets, and the fleeing Mercedes struck another vehicle. The wreck pushed the cars into a Honda carrying a family that was out running an errand to pick up a computer.

A 10-year-old girl riding in the back seat was killed. Her father and her 5-year-old brother were in the car with her. Both were injured but survived. Court records later established that the chase was never authorized under Chicago Police Department policy, which restricts when officers may pursue a driver over a minor traffic violation.

The family retained Salvi, Schostok & Pritchard. Before trial, the city admitted responsibility for the crash, so the December 2024 proceeding in Cook County Circuit Court, before Judge Preston Jones Jr., came down to one question: what the loss was worth. Patrick Salvi II, Lance Northcutt, Aaron Boeder, and Eirene Salvi represented the family. They asked jurors to measure the value of a child's entire life. The city countered that the right figure fell somewhere between $12 million and $15 million.

"The bright shining star of the family was killed," Salvi told the jury. "That was their life, and the city took it." The firm laid out the department's decision to chase a car over an alleged traffic violation, and the human cost of that choice for a family that had done nothing wrong. Jurors heard how quickly an ordinary drive turned into a deadly collision, and how the family's life changed in seconds.

The jury returned a verdict of $79.85 million, which the firm called the largest police pursuit award in Illinois history. The family had asked for more than $140 million. The city had argued for a small fraction of the result.

The case did not end at that number. Rather than fight through post-trial motions and an appeal, the two sides settled in 2025 for $62.5 million. Of that total, $20 million came directly from Chicago taxpayers and $42.5 million from the city's insurance carrier.