Boy falsely accused of killing to settle lawsuit

updated 8:13 p.m. ET Sept. 19, 2005

CHICAGO - A boy falsely accused of killing an 11-year-old girl seven years ago agreed Monday to settle his lawsuit against the city and two police detectives for $6.2 million, a judge announced.

The settlement, which still must be approved by the City Council, came less than a week after the council ordered city lawyers to settle the matter. A trial in the case began several weeks ago.

“The parents were satisfied with it and after seven years they wanted to get this behind them,” said Andre Grant, an attorney representing the now 15-year-old boy.

Grant said at least some of the money would be spent on therapy and counseling for the boy.

Earlier this year, the city agreed to a $2 million settlement with the family of another boy also falsely accused in the 1998 murder of Ryan Harris.

The girl’s slaying made national headlines after the two boys, then 7 and 8, became the youngest murder suspects in the United States at the time. It took almost a month before the boys were cleared after tests showed semen on the girl’s clothing could not have come from them.

DNA tests later prompted police to charge Floyd Durr, a Chicago man who has been convicted of sexually assaulting other girls. Durr is awaiting trial in the girl’s death.

City admits no wrongdoing
In a statement about the tentative settlement, the city did not admit any wrongdoing. It also did not admit wrongdoing in its settlement with the other boy.

The settlement “compensates (the boy) and his family for any trauma suffered as a result of this incident,” according to a written statement from Mara Georges, the city’s corporation counsel.

During the civil trial, the boy’s attorneys claimed police framed him and ignored evidence that showed he was innocent.

Attorneys for the city and the two detectives named in the suit countered that at the time there was reasonable cause to believe the two boys had been involved in the slaying. According to police at the time, they were arrested after they told detectives that they killed the girl for the shiny blue bicycle she was riding.

The girl disappeared July 27, 1998, and was found dead the next day in a weedy lot on the city’s South Side. She had been sexually molested and beaten.

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