City of Champaign Pays to Settle Lawsuit on Police Misconduct Records

Champaign, Illinois Police officers stand with the Mayor and City Council after being sworn in

The City of Champaign is paying out yet again to settle a lawsuit related to unlawfully denied public records. Check CU filed the lawsuit in April of 2022 when the City refused to provide records on complaints of police misconduct.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request was sent on March 21^st, 2022 and asked for copies of complaints submitted against police officers in 2021 and 2022. Three days later, City Clerk Shannon Myers fully denied the request.

Myers claimed that releasing the complaints would interfere with pending or contemplated law enforcement and administrative proceedings, and that the records were also exempt as “preliminary drafts, notes, recommendations, memoranda and other records in which opinions are expressed….”

Civil Rights Law Firm Loevy & Loevy, based in Chicago, filed a complaint on behalf of Check CU Founder Christopher Hansen with the Sixth Judicial Circuit Court in Champaign, Illinois on April 8^th, 2022.

The lawsuit alleged that the “CITY OF CHAMPAIGN improperly asserted FOIA’s exemptions for preliminary drafts and interference with pending law enforcement investigations to withhold complaints filed against police officers in 2021 and 2022.”

And that “CHAMPAIGN has not shown how the disclosure of the records would ‘interfere with pending or actually reasonably contemplated law enforcement proceedings’ and would ‘interfere with active administrative enforcement proceedings.’”

The City of Champaign tried two different times to have the lawsuit dismissed, but neither were successful. Those pleadings were filed by City Attorney Thomas Yu and Assistant City Attorney Nancy Rabel.

After the lawsuit was filed, the City did eventually provide the police complaint records and, in an agreement signed on October 30^th, 2023, agreed to pay plaintiff’s attorney’s fees in the amount of $4,000. Earlier that same month, the City of Champaign settled another FOIA lawsuit on a different matter, also paying $4,000 in plaintiff’s attorney’s fees.

The settlement agreement, executed on October 30^th, 2023, and signed by Assistant City Attorney Nancy Rabel, is provided below.