Vincent Gaughan

Last updated
Vincent Michael Gaughan
Cook County Circuit Court Judge
Assumed office
1992
Personal details
Bornc. 1941
CitizenshipAmerican
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater University of Illinois
DePaul University College of Law
OccupationJudge
Military service
Allegiance United States of America
Branch/serviceFlag of the United States Army.svg  United States Army
Years of service( –1968)
Rank Army-USA-OF-01b.svg Second lieutenant
Battles/wars Vietnam War
Awards Bronze Star Medal ribbon.svg Bronze Star Medal with "V" device

Vincent Michael Gaughan is a Cook County Circuit Court Judge in Cook County, Illinois [1] [2] who presided in the historic trial of Jason Van Dyke, the Chicago Police officer who murdered Laquan McDonald. [3]

Contents

Early years

Gaughan's parents were Irish immigrants [4] who attended the St. Vincent de Paul Church, their local parish church. He was named "Vincent". [2] Their family home was in Lincoln Park. [4]

Education

In 1964, he earned his Bachelor of Engineering (B.Eng.) at the University of Illinois. [4] He earned his law degree at DePaul University College of Law and was admitted to the Illinois bar in September 1972. [4]

Career

Gaughan joined the army after university and graduated from the Artillery Officer Candidate School in Fort Sill, Oklahoma where he was "commissioned as a second lieutenant. [4] He was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for valor for his service in the Vietnam war (-1968). [4]

He worked in the Cook County public defender's office from 1973 until 1991. [4] He started as a courtroom lawyer. [4] Later he was a "felony trial lawyer supervisor". In 1991, he was appointed to the Cook County, Illinois bench. He was elected as a judge in 1992. [4] [2]

In May and June 2008, he presided over the jury trial of the American singer and record producer, R. Kelly, [5] [6] in which Kelly was acquitted on all counts of child pornography charges. [4] The men were found guilty in the Brown's Chicken massacre case in 2007 and 2009, were convicted in Gaughan's courtroom. [4]

Judge Gaughan presided in the historic trial of Jason Van Dyke, the police officer who murdered the 17-year-old African American Laquan McDonald on October 20, 2014, in Chicago, Illinois. [7] [3] On June 6, 2016, Judge Gaughan agreed to name a special prosecutor for this case. [8] On October 5, 2018, Van Dyke was found guilty of second degree murder. [9] Judge Gaughan set the sentencing hearing date for January 18, 2019 and "lifted a decorum order, which will allow the Chicago Police Board to move ahead with disciplinary action against Van Dyke." [10] The New York Times described it as the case that changed Chicago. [11] [1] A revealing February 10, 2015 article in Slate entitled "Sixteen Shots" by an independent Chicago-based journalist, placed the Chicago Police Department under public scrutiny. [12] [Notes 1] In 2015, a year after McDonald's murder, a Cook County judged ordered the City of Chicago to release police dashboard-camera video showing Van Dyke shooting the victim. [1] On December 13, 2017, Judge Gaughan, "quashed a subpoena seeking the reporter Jamie Kalven's testimony, ending a battle over Mr. Kalven’s sources" saying that "the subpoena by the defense lacked specifics and sought 'irrelevant and privileged material'". [1]

An article in the Chicago Tribune , described the case as "another high-profile trial" for Judge M. Gaughan, an "idiosyncratic judge who set the standard for how Cook County handles headline-making cases" in his "ornate courtroom" with a "distant view of Chicago's skyline. [2] According to The New York Times, Judge Gaughan "is viewed as a mercurial jurist." [11] Attorney Steven Greenberg said that "If you’re Jason Van Dyke, I don't think you can ask for a better judge to hear this case. Judge Gaughan is unique and he's certainly opinionated, but he will go out of his way to make sure everyone gets a fair hearing." [2]

Personal life

When Vincent Gaughan returned from Vietnam, he lived with his parents in Lincoln Park. [4] In April 1970, then 28-year-old Gaughan was charged with four counts of aggravated assault after allegedly firing four rounds from an M1 Garand at a neighbor's house. [4] [13] Journalists Steve Bogira and Jim DeRogatis later investigated the allegations and were unable to determine the outcome of the case. [14]

Gaughan has been active in the Illinois branch of the American Legion since the 1990s when he served as its commander. [4]

Notes

  1. ↑ According to Julie Bosman's New York Times article, the key evidence in the case was a controversial police dashboard-camera video showing the accused shooting the victim, that was not presented as evidence until an independent Chicago journalist, Jamie Kalven, revealed its existence. Kalven received a tip from a source in November 2014, a month after the murder took place, which led "Kalven to a civilian who had seen the entire episode". Two months later Kalven read the autopsy report saying that McDonald had been shot 16 times.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">R. Kelly</span> American R&B singer (born 1967)

Robert Sylvester Kelly is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. He is credited with prolific commercial success in R&B, hip hop, and pop music recordings, earning nicknames such as "the King of R&B", "the King of Pop-Soul", and "the Pied Piper of R&B". Kelly's career ended in 2019 following his arrest and subsequent convictions on federal racketeering and sex trafficking charges involving sexual abuse of minors, for which he is currently serving a 31-year prison sentence.

<i>Anatomy of a Murder</i> 1959 film by Otto Preminger

Anatomy of a Murder is a 1959 American courtroom drama film produced and directed by Otto Preminger. The screenplay by Wendell Mayes was based on the 1958 novel of the same name written by Michigan Supreme Court Justice John D. Voelker under the pen name of Robert Traver. Voelker based the novel on a 1952 murder case in which he was the defense attorney.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chicago Police Department</span> Principal law enforcement agency of Chicago, Illinois, US

The Chicago Police Department (CPD) is the primary law enforcement agency of the city of Chicago, Illinois, United States, under the jurisdiction of the Chicago City Council. It is the second-largest municipal police department in the United States, behind the New York City Police Department. As of 2022 CPD had 11,710 sworn officers on duty, and in 2020 had over 948 other employees. Tracing its roots to 1835, the Chicago Police Department is one of the oldest modern police departments in the world.

Operation Greylord was an investigation conducted jointly by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the IRS Criminal Investigation Division, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the Chicago Police Department Internal Affairs Division and the Illinois State Police into corruption in the judiciary of Cook County, Illinois. The FBI named the investigation "Operation Greylord" after the curly wigs worn by British judges.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jim DeRogatis</span> American music critic and podcast host

James Peter DeRogatis is an American music critic and co-host of Sound Opinions. DeRogatis has written articles for magazines such as Rolling Stone, Spin, Guitar World and Modern Drummer, and for 15 years was the pop music critic for the Chicago Sun-Times.

Crime in Chicago has been tracked by the Chicago Police Department's Bureau of Records since the beginning of the 20th century. The city's overall crime rate, especially the violent crime rate, is higher than the US average. Gangs in Chicago have a role in the city's crime rate. The number of homicides in Chicago hit a 25-year high in 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anita Alvarez</span> American politician

Anita M. Alvarez is the former State's Attorney for Cook County, Illinois, United States. Alvarez was the first Hispanic woman elected to this position, after being the first Latina to win the Democratic nomination for state's attorney of Cook County.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Zagel</span> American judge (1941–2023)

James Block Zagel was an American judge and attorney. After a stint as a prosecutor, he became a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in 1987, assuming senior status in 2016. He presided over numerous high-profile trials, including those of several members of the Chicago Outfit and the corruption trial of former Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich. Zagel also sat on the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court from 2008 to 2015.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Garry McCarthy</span> American law enforcement officer and politician

Garry Francis McCarthy is the Chief of Police in Willow Springs, Illinois and previous Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department. He was a candidate for mayor of Chicago in the 2019 Chicago mayoral election.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Murder of Laquan McDonald</span> 2014 police murder of a black teenager in Chicago, Illinois, United States

The murder of Laquan McDonald took place on October 20, 2014, in Chicago, Illinois. McDonald was a 17-year-old who was fatally shot by a Chicago Police Officer, Jason Van Dyke. Police had initially reported that McDonald was behaving erratically while walking down the street, refusing to put down a knife, and that he had lunged at officers. Preliminary internal police reports described the incident similarly, leading to the shooting being judged as justifiable, and Van Dyke not being charged at the time. This was later disproved after a video of the encounter was released, showing that McDonald was walking away.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Assata's Daughters</span> Chicago organization of black girls and young women

Assata's Daughters is an American black power organization of young radical African-American women and girls in Chicago, which operates through a Black, queer, feminist lens, that focuses on political education, organizing, and revolutionary services. The group is dedicated to radical liberatory activism in the tradition of Assata Shakur, a former member of the Black Liberation Army (BLA). The organization is often criticised for this connection, as Assata Shakur was convicted of first-degree murder, armed robbery, and other crimes in 1977 in the murder of a New Jersey State Trooper.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eddie T. Johnson</span> Former Superintendent of Chicago Police Department

Eddie T. Johnson is an American retired police officer for the Chicago Police Department. He served as the 62nd Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department from March 2016 until December 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jussie Smollett hate crime hoax</span> 2019 hate crime hoax

On January 29, 2019, American actor Jussie Smollett approached the Chicago Police Department and reported a hate crime that he had staged earlier that morning. He planned the hate crime with two Nigerian brothers, Abimbola and Olabinjo Osundairo, who had worked as extras on the set of television drama Empire, in which Smollett was a cast member. During the staged attack, which took place on East Lower North Water Street in Chicago's Streeterville neighborhood, the disguised brothers shouted racial and homophobic slurs while one poured bleach on Smollett and the other placed a noose around his neck. In addition to falsely reporting that he had been attacked by two unknown individuals, Smollett described one of them as a white male. He also told police the men shouted "This is MAGA country" during the attack, a reference to the Trumpist political slogan "Make America Great Again". The brothers later testified that Smollett staged the attack near a surveillance camera so that video of it could be publicized.

The Chicago Police Board voted on October 17, 2019 to dismiss Chicago Police (CPD) Officer Robert Rialmo who fatally shot Quintonio LeGrier and neighbor Bettie Jones on December 26, 2015 while answering a 911 domestic violence call at the LeGrier residence in Chicago. The dismissal capped a "chaotic finish to a high-profile trial" where a judge first announced that the jury found Rialmo unjustified in his shooting of LeGrier, but erased the verdict promptly, after declaring that the jury found Rialmo feared for his life when he shot LeGrier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Illinois Public Access Opinion 16-006</span> Illinois Attorney General opinion concerning freedom of information

Illinois Public Access Opinion 16‑006 is a binding opinion of the Illinois Attorney General pursuant to the state's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Issued in 2016 in the aftermath of the murder of Laquan McDonald by a police officer, the opinion addressed a public records request from CNN for private emails by officers of the Chicago Police Department (CPD) related to the incident. After CPD denied CNN's request, the Attorney General's office, led by Lisa Madigan, ruled that the police officers' private emails about McDonald's murder were subject to public disclosure, even though those emails were communicated on accounts outside of the police department's email servers.

<i>16 Shots</i> 2019 American murder documentary

16 Shots is a documentary film about the murder of Laquan McDonald. Written and directed by Richard Rowley, it is an updated and expanded version of the 2018 movie The Blue Wall. It had a limited theatrical release on June 7, 2019, and started streaming on Showtime on June 14, 2019. It was released on DVD on August 4, 2020.

Alison Flowers is an American journalist who investigates violence, police conduct and justice. She was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize for Audio Reporting in 2021 for her work on the podcast Somebody, which tells the story of Shapearl Wells, mother of Courtney Copeland who was killed outside a Chicago police station in 2016. She won an Emmy for her work on the SHOWTIME documentary 16 Shots and is the author of Exoneree Diaries: The Fight for Innocence, Independence and Identity, a portrait of four exonerated criminals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ja'Mal Green</span> American civil rights activist

Ja'Mal Green is an American community activist from Chicago, Illinois. A Black Lives Matter activist, he was an unsuccessful candidate for mayor of Chicago in 2019 and 2023.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">A. S. Trude</span> British-American lawyer (1846–1933)

Alfred Samuel "A. S." Trude was a British-American lawyer. Trude was one of the most noted attorneys in his time, working on a number of high-profile cases. He resided in Chicago most of his life. While he was largely a civil attorney and occasional criminal defense attorney, among his most famous cases as a lawyer was his successful prosecution of Patrick Eugene Prendergast for the assassination of Chicago Mayor Carter Harrison Sr.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jamie Kalven</span> American journalist (born 1948)

James Ewan Kalven is an American journalist, author, human rights activist, and community organizer based in Chicago, Illinois. He is the founder of the Invisible Institute, a non-profit journalism organization based in Chicago's South Side. His work in the city has included reporting on police misconduct and poor conditions of public housing. Kalven has been referred to as a "guerrilla journalist" by Chicago journalist Studs Terkel.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Bosman, Julie (November 26, 2018). "Journalist Who Told Laquan McDonald's Story Faces Fight Over Sources". The New York Times. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 St. Clair, Stacy (August 24, 2018). "Vincent Gaughan: The Van Dyke judge known for his smarts, sharp tongue and secretive style". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  3. 1 2 Siegel, Zachary (January 2, 2019). "I was arrested during the Laquan McDonald murder trial. Here's what I learned". Columbia Journalism Review. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Bogira, Steve (January 18, 2016). "What the Van Dyke murder trial judge has in common with Laquan McDonald". Chicago Reader. Feature. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  5. ↑ Grossberg, Josh (June 13, 2008). "R. Kelly Found Not Guilty!". E! Online . Retrieved September 25, 2009.
  6. ↑ Levin, Josh (June 13, 2008). "Long Live the Little Man Defense!". Slate . San Francisco: The Slate Group . Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  7. ↑ Davey, Monica; Smith, Mitch (November 24, 2015). "Chicago Braces After Video of Police Shooting Is Released". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  8. ↑ "Judge to appoint special prosecutor in Jason Van Dyke trial". ABC7 Chicago. June 2, 2016. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  9. ↑ Sanchez, Ray (October 5, 2018). "Officer Jason Van Dyke found guilty of second-degree murder in Laquan McDonald killing". CNN. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  10. ↑ Rivera, Mark; Hope, Leah (December 14, 2018). "Judge sets date for sentencing hearing for Jason Van Dyke". ABC7 Chicago. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  11. 1 2 Smith, Mitch (September 17, 2018). "Why Chicago Is Closely Watching the Trial of the Officer Who Shot Laquan McDonald". The New York Times. Retrieved January 9, 2019.
  12. ↑ Kalven, Jamie (February 10, 2015). "Sixteen Shots". Slate . Retrieved January 9, 2019. Laquan McDonald shooting: A recently obtained autopsy report on the dead teen complicates the Chicago Police Department's story.
  13. ↑ DeRogatis, Jim (2019). Soulless: The Case Against R. Kelly. New York City: Abrams Press. p. 141. ISBN   978-1-4197-4007-7.
  14. ↑ DeRogatis, Jim (2019). Soulless: The Case Against R. Kelly. New York City: Abrams Press. p. 141. ISBN   978-1-4197-4007-7.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.