Foxx Defends Office Over Exoneration Silence

Cook County’s exoneration system is supposed to sort out a simple question — was this person wrongfully convicted, or not? But Kim Foxx’s newly public deposition makes clear the answer inside the prosecutor’s office was sometimes much murkier than the court orders made it look. Foxx said her office could stay silent on a certificate of innocence petition even if prosecutors privately believed the person was still guilty. That matters because those certificates do real work — they clear records, unlock compensation, and shape how the public understands a case. ### What set this off? The immediate trigger is testimony Foxx gave last month in civil litigation tied to disgraced former Chicago police detective Reynaldo Guevara. ABC7 obtained the deposition, and the remarks blew up because Foxx said she still believed Arturo DeLeon-Reyes and Gabriel Solache committed the 1998 Bucktown murders, even though both men were later exonerated and received certificates of innocence. (abc7chicago.com) ### Who are those men? DeLeon-Reyes and Solache were convicted in the stabbing deaths of Mariano and Jacinta Soto after interrogations led by Guevara. DeLeon-Reyes got life. Solache was sentenced to death in 2000 before Illinois commuted death-row sentences in 2003. Their confessions later unraveled, and a judge threw out DeLeon-Reyes’ confession in 2017 after finding Guevara told “bald-faced lies” under oath. (abc7chicago.com) ### So what did Foxx actually say? The key point was not just that Foxx questioned their innocence. It was that she treated a prosecutor’s non-opposition as something weaker than an endorsement. In plain English — her office could let a certificate of innocence go through without wanting to stand up in court and say, yes, we believe this person absolutely did not do it. That is the gap driving the backlash. (news.wttw.com) ### Why is that such a big deal? Because a certificate of innocence is not symbolic paperwork. In Illinois, it helps expunge or seal records and sends the case toward state compensation. It also becomes a powerful fact in later civil suits against the city. If prosecutors treated some of those petitions as pragmatic decisions rather than factual judgments, then the public meaning of the certificate gets a lot less clear. (abc7chicago.com) ### Where does Guevara fit in? Guevara is the common thread. His cases have produced a long line of overturned convictions and exonerations, and Foxx’s office created a specific review approach for claims tied to him after meetings with lawyers from the Exoneration Project and related civil-rights firms. That overlap is now part of the legal fight — critics say it blurred the line between conviction review and litigation strategy. (hoodline.com) ### Why is this surfacing now? Partly because the lawsuits are still moving. WTTW reported one Guevara-related federal trial was set for May 11, and one settlement involving Solache had already been reached in principle. So Foxx’s deposition is not just old history surfacing late — it lands in the middle of active wrongful-conviction cases where innocence findings carry financial and legal consequences. (cwbchicago.com) ### Has the county’s approach changed? Yes — and that is what makes Foxx’s comments feel even bigger. Under current State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke, Cook County prosecutors have opposed far more certificate petitions. Injustice Watch’s review, summarized by Hoodline, put Burke’s opposition rate at about 82 percent where the office filed a position, versus about 25 percent during Foxx’s second term. Basically, Foxx’s era was more permissive, but Burke’s era is more openly skeptical. (news.wttw.com) ### What is the real argument here? It is not just about two men or one detective. It is about whether exoneration means factual innocence, legal insufficiency, or just institutional surrender when a tainted case is too risky to defend. Foxx’s deposition suggests those categories were sometimes blended together. That is why defense lawyers are furious, why city lawyers care, and why this has turned into a fight over transparency as much as guilt. (hoodline.com) ### Bottom line Foxx basically said the paperwork did not always match the office’s private beliefs. Once that is out in the open, every past and future Cook County innocence ruling gets a harder second look. (abc7chicago.com)