Prosecutors decline to charge Chicago police officers in shootings of Adam Toledo, 13, and Anthony Alvarez, 22
Almost a year after 13-year-old Adam Toledo was killed by a Chicago police officer in a Little Village alley, sparking shock and grief around the country, Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx announced her office would not bring criminal charges against the officer who fired the fatal shot.
Nor will they charge the officer who killed 22-year-old Anthony Alvarez, who was shot by police just days after Toledo’s death.
Both Toledo and Alvarez were carrying guns on the nights they were shot, and despite the sorrow of their families and Foxx’s “deep, deep concerns” about police foot pursuits, prosecutors determined that both officers reasonably believed they were in danger when they opened fire, Foxx said at a news conference Tuesday.
“There are no winners in this very tragic situation,” she said, saying there was not sufficient evidence to bring murder charges against either officer.
In keeping with policy, the Office of the Illinois State’s Attorneys Appellate Prosecutor also reviewed the cases and agreed that the officers should not be charged, Foxx said.
Toledo was the youngest person to be fatally shot by Chicago police in years. His death sparked an outcry that only intensified after the release of graphic footage from body-worn cameras and surveillance video. In a split second, Toledo can be seen running from Officer Eric Stillman, tossing a gun behind a fence, turning toward the officer, raising his hands and being shot, video shows.
All those actions happened “almost simultaneously,” Foxx said, and Toledo was shot “as he completed his turn.”
While surveillance footage captured from the other side of the fence makes it clear Toledo lobbed the gun away, video from the body-worn camera mounted on Stillman’s chest does not clearly show Toledo throwing the gun.
Stillman knew Toledo had been carrying a weapon, and believed the teen was turning toward him to shoot, Foxx said.
“We’ve concluded that there was no evidence to prove that Officer Stillman acted with criminal intent,” Foxx said at the news conference.
Also Tuesday, Toledo’s family filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against the city and Stillman, saying the officer’s use of deadly force was unjustified and excessive, records show.
“Adam never brandished, pointed, or otherwise threatened Stillman with a firearm or any other weapon whatsoever,” the suit states.
A spokesperson from the city’s Law Department said the city had not yet been formally served with the lawsuit and declined to comment further, citing pending litigation.
In a statement, attorneys for the Toledo family said they would be contacting the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division “to address this horrific travesty.”
In the second shooting addressed by Foxx, which took place just two days after Toledo was shot, Alvarez was running from police on the Northwest Side, carrying a gun in one hand and a cellphone in the other. He stumbled as he ran, but Officer Evan Solano did not see him slip and fall, Foxx said.
“(Solano) observed Mr. Alvarez in a crouching position with a handgun in his right hand,” Foxx said, noting that the officer “believed that Mr. Alvarez was waiting to ambush him.”
“He also observed Mr. Alvarez looking back at him while running with the gun in his hand,” Foxx said. “He thought Mr. Alvarez was turning to shoot toward him and his partner, who he believed was behind him.”
Solano ordered Alvarez to drop the gun and then fired several shots.
A new policy on foot pursuits
Both Toledo and Alvarez were shot in the course of foot chases, which led to calls for a set of guidelines governing police foot pursuits. Alvarez’s family has filed a lawsuit alleging the city bears responsibility for the death in part because police had no such policy when he was shot.
While the city implemented a temporary policy in May, a couple of months after the shootings, the final guidance still is in its last stages of completion after rounds of community feedback.
Foxx said Tuesday she has concerns about foot pursuits, which can be dangerous for both police and civilians. In particular, Solano and his partner “created the conditions which the use of deadly force became necessary,” she said.
There was no need to begin chasing Alvarez in the first place, Foxx said. While he had fled from police when they tried to make a traffic stop the night before, officers knew the man’s home address and could have found him there later if they wanted to question him, Foxx said.
Alvarez was not committing any apparent crimes when officers approached him, and he would not even have been arrested for the traffic offenses from the night before, Foxx said.
Solano “may have committed” several errors during the foot chase as well, Foxx said, such as rounding corners blind and not waiting for his partner when he saw Alvarez with a gun.
Solano was stripped of his badge and police powers and placed on paid desk duty in June pending an investigation by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability. It wasn’t immediately clear why Solano was stripped two months after the shooting took place.
Stillman, meanwhile, has not been stripped of his police powers and remains on full duty, Chicago police confirmed.
Foxx said she met with members of the Toledo and Alvarez families earlier Tuesday, and acknowledged that prosecutors’ decisions were “profoundly disappointing” to them.
“The grief on their mothers’, their fathers’, family members’ faces was almost unbearable,” she said. “To lose a child is beyond what any of us would want to imagine. To lose a child at the hands of law enforcement was unfathomable for them.”
Oscar Martinez, Alvarez’s father, told the Tribune he feels “destroyed.” During their meeting with Foxx on Tuesday morning, he said, they asked why the officer didn’t go to Alvarez’s home to find him instead of chasing him.
“They said just because he (Alvarez) had a gun, the officer’s life was at risk,” Martinez said. “And we told them, ‘There are other ways to stop him. That’s what they’re trained for.’”
Martinez said his faith in God and the community support the family has received are giving him strength to keep fighting for justice for his son, Martinez said.
“I have no words,” he said. “I feel destroyed, hurt.”
Foxx came into office in 2016 after strongly criticizing the way her predecessor, Anita Alvarez, handled the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. Alvarez waited more than a year to bring charges against the officer in that case, a pace that Foxx said at the time was far too slow.
Foxx also campaigned on a promise to request that each police shooting be investigated by a special prosecutor, stating that Cook County state’s attorneys have an inherent conflict of interest because they work so closely with police. That promise did not come to pass; however, since 2019, police shootings have been assessed for charges by a unit within the state’s attorney’s office that is largely separated from the regular chain of command.
In a statement on behalf of Alvarez’s family, attorney Tania Dimitrova said they were “saddened and disappointed” in Foxx’s decision not to charge Solano.
Attorney Tim Grace, who represents both Stillman and Solano, said he believes “the Cook County state’s attorney’s office understands the difficulties that Chicago police encounter every single day.”
“Both of my officers went to the state’s attorney’s office and explained why they were required to use deadly force,” Grace said. “We didn’t hide from anything.”
Grace said despite the outcome, both officers “are devastated that they had to take a life.”
“I think a lot of times we don’t understand the torment that goes through these officers after the shooting,” he said. “There’s not enough counseling in the world to get them through what they had to do.”
Toledo case
Toledo was in Little Village in the early morning hours of March 29, 2021, accompanied by 21-year-old Ruben Roman.
Roman allegedly was captured on video firing the gunshots that brought officers to the area, authorities have said. He fired off shots at the corner of 24th Street and Sawyer Avenue, and he fled with Toledo shortly afterward, with officers pursuing them into an alley, according to Cook County prosecutors.
Roman was arrested first, after apparently having handed the gun to Toledo. Toledo kept running, video of the shooting shows, pursued by Stillman.
To support murder charges against Stillman, prosecutors would have to prove that he knew Toledo had dropped the gun at the time he fired, according to a memo outlining prosecutors’ decision not to bring charges. But Stillman “made his risk assessment and pulled the trigger of his firearm” in a split second while Toledo was turning toward him, the memo notes.
In addition, an autopsy found that Stillman’s bullet traveled from the left side of Toledo’s body to the right, indicating that at the moment Toledo was shot, he was turning toward the officer, not facing him head-on.
The 9 mm Ruger that was recovered near Toledo matches the fired shell casings that were found on the corner where Roman was shooting, prosecutors have said.
Before video of Toledo’s shooting was released, Roman was charged with gun crimes and felony child endangerment.
However, when Roman was formally indicted by a grand jury, child endangerment charges were not included — meaning Roman’s charges are no longer tied to Toledo’s death. He is awaiting trial; his next court date is scheduled for later this month.
Foxx said Tuesday that her office ultimately determined the evidence did not support bringing child-endangerment charges against Roman.
“Essentially, the actions of Mr. Roman were not the reasons for Adam Toledo’s death,” she said.
Alvarez case
Anthony Alvarez was shot a couple of days after Toledo, on the city’s Northwest Side. Footage released by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability shows Alvarez stumbled as he ran, carrying a gun in one hand and a cellphone in the other. By the time he got up and tried to continue moving away, Solano had caught up to him.
“Hey! Drop the gun! Drop the gun!” Solano yelled, and raised his own weapon to fire off five shots.
Alvarez collapsed to the ground in a tidy front yard, moaning in pain. An autopsy later revealed he was shot in the back and thigh. “Why are you shooting me?” he said.
“Because you had a gun!” the officer responded.
In a memo outlining their decision not to bring charges against Solano, prosecutors noted that “an individual holding a handgun in the manner in which Alvarez did, unholstered, unconcealed, with his finger near the trigger, could be considered an imminent threat.”
