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Homelessness

Once-homeless University of Chicago law grad getting treatment, hopes to return to law practice

By Debra Cassens Weiss

March 19, 2025, 12:41 pm CDT

A University of Chicago Law School graduate who lived for two years on the streets of Los Angeles has moved back home with his mother in Virginia and hopes to resume law practice.

Rob Dart moved home in January and has been taking anti-psychotic medication for more than three months, the Wall Street Journal reports. He is taking online continuing legal education classes and hopes to regain his law license.

The Wall Street Journal had chronicled efforts by Dart’s family to help him in articles published this month and in May 2024. He began hearing voices when he was 35 years old and returned to his mother’s home at that time. He received medication and therapy for two years but quit treatment in 2022 during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dart ended up homeless in Los Angeles. His sister and mother had traveled to California to try to help him, but he often rejected them.

The Wall Street Journal’s coverage spurred some people to offer help. One reader set up a tab for Dart at a coffee shop. Another connected Dart’s family with a psychiatrist affiliated with a Pasadena, California, hospital who said he would treat Dart when he was willing to accept help.

Late last year, Dart began treatment at the hospital. But during the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this year, Dart successfully petitioned for release. Days later, he agreed to return to his mother’s home and began treatment.

Online records indicate that Dart was admitted to law practice in Illinois in 2004 and in California in 2009. He was suspended in California for failure to meet state CLE requirements in 2022 and for failure to pay fees in 2023. He also failed to show compliance with Illinois CLE requirements and was last registered there in 2022.

Dart’s last registered address with Illinois attorney regulators was at the Wilshire Law Firm in Los Angeles.

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3. White male law student settles suit against…

Law Students

White male law student settles suit against Chicago Bears over ‘legal diversity fellow’ position

By Debra Cassens Weiss

September 5, 2024, 10:36 am CDT

A student at the DePaul University College of Law has settled a lawsuit claiming that the Chicago Bears football team refused to consider him for a “legal diversity fellow” position because he is a white man.

Law student Jonathan Bresser Jr. had alleged race and sex discrimination in his March 11 suit, filed in federal court for the Northern District of Illinois.

A notice posted by the court clerk said the parties had reached a binding settlement agreement, Law360 reports.

The Chicago Bears posted the fellowship position in November 2023. The posting said the team was looking for a “person of color and/or female law student,” according to Bresser’s suit. Bresser said he met all other requirements when he applied for the job.

Bresser noted that he had more than two years of experience as a litigation paralegal at the Trent Law Firm, which represented him in the case.

Hat tip to Above the Law and TaxProf Blog, which noted the suit resolution.

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3. Law student’s suit alleges Chicago Bears…

Law Students

Law student’s suit alleges Chicago Bears didn’t hire him as ‘legal diversity fellow’ because he is white man

By Debra Cassens Weiss

March 25, 2024, 10:05 am CDT

A first-year student at the DePaul University College of Law in Chicago claims in a lawsuit that the Chicago Bears football team refused to consider him for a “legal diversity fellow” position because he is a white man.

Student Jonathan Bresser Jr. claims in the March 11 suit that he is qualified for the position because he has more than two years of experience as a litigation paralegal at the Trent Law Firm, which is also representing him in the case.

Law360 and Bloomberg Law have coverage, while JD Supra has analysis of the case, filed in federal court for the Northern District of Illinois.

The suit includes a sentence from the 2023 U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down race-conscious university admissions programs at two schools.

“Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it,” the Supreme Court said, citing an earlier case.

A job posting emailed in November 2023 said the Chicago Bears team was looking for a “person of color and/or female law student,” according to the suit. Bresser applied, intending to submit his grades as a supplement to his application when they became available, as the job posting allowed.

Bresser was rejected Jan. 5, before he submitted his grades. The previous month, Bresser said, he received a notification that his LinkedIn profile had been viewed by a Chicago Bears employee. The LinkedIn profile included a photo.

On March 1, nearly two months after rejecting Bresser, the Chicago Bears requested Bresser’s grades transcript, “attempting to claw back” the rejection, the suit says. The request happened after the team received Bresser’s charge of discrimination and right to sue letter.

Bresser alleges race and sex discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and the Illinois Human Rights Act, race discrimination in contracting in violation of Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act, civil conspiracy, and conspiracy to interfere with civil rights in violation of Section 1985 of the Civil Rights Act.

A Chicago Bears spokesperson declined to comment when contacted by Law360.

Jurors in Chicago, Illinois, have convicted a man of murdering a police officer and trying to kill two of her colleagues during a tragic traffic stop.

Sentencing is pending for Emonte Morgan, 23, with a post-trial motions hearing set for April 19, according to Chicago ABC affiliate WLS. Charges are first-degree murder and two counts of attempted first-degree murder. The jury reportedly took three and a half hours to determine that he meant to kill Officer Ella French, her partner Carlos Yañez, and a third officer, Joshua Blas.

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3. Chicago isn’t liable for bicyclist injured…

Tort Law

Chicago isn’t liable for bicyclist injured by pothole on road that wasn’t designated bike route, court rules

By Debra Cassens Weiss

January 2, 2024, 3:37 pm CST

A bicyclist who wasn’t on a designated bicycle route when he was injured by a pothole can’t recover from the city of Chicago, even though there was a Divvy bicycle rental station nearby, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled last month.

The state supreme court ruled against bicyclist Clark Alave, who said he was thrown from his bicycle after striking the pothole in 2019, fracturing his teeth, injuring his hip and shoulder, and causing facial cuts and scars.

The Chicago Sun-Times, the Cook County Record and Capitol News Illinois via WTTW have coverage.

The Illinois Supreme Court interpreted the Illinois Tort Immunity Act, which said cities have a duty to maintain their property in a reasonably safe condition for use by people “intended and permitted” to use the property.

Chicago permits bicyclists to use any roadway that motorists use, but that doesn’t mean that bicyclists are intended to use all those roadways, the Illinois Supreme Court said in its Dec. 14 opinion.

In Alave’s case, he was riding on a road without a designated bike lane and signage, indicating that the city did not intend him to be using the road, the state supreme court said.

The presence of a Divvy station about 100 feet away only establishes that the city permitted bicycling on the road—not that it intended it, the state supreme court said. The Illinois Supreme Court noted that city code allows bicyclists to ride on the sidewalk to access the nearest bicycle lane; in this case, the nearest bicycle lane was one block away, the city said.

Michael S. Keating, who filed an amicus brief on behalf of the advocacy nonprofit Ride Illinois, said in a statement the Illinois Supreme Court’s decision affirmed “harsh precedent” that distinguished between permitted and intended users of roads, according to the Cook County Record.

“This holding simply does not reflect that massive surge in bicycling that has occurred in Chicago, the suburbs and throughout the rest of Illinois,” Keating said. “On that fact alone I think the Illinois Supreme Court should have clarified more specifically what ‘intended’ means beyond just the presence of bike lanes, a bike map or signs.”

Keating did, however, praise the Illinois Supreme Court for a Nov. 30 decision holding that an uninsured motorist policy must cover a policyholder’s son who was injured by a hit-and-run driver while riding his bicycle.

A 44-year-old man has been arrested for allegedly murdering his 34-year-old ex-girlfriend last month, fatally shooting the Chicago mother in front of her two children just hours before a court extended a protection order against him.

Kenneth Brown was taken into custody last week and charged with one count of first-degree murder in the slaying of Maria Roque, Illinois authorities announced.

According to the Chicago Police Department, members of the Great Lakes Regional Fugitive Task Force on Dec. 29 located and apprehended Brown at an area located in the 3100 block of W. Harrison Street. Police said Brown was “identified as the offender” who, in the early morning hours of Dec. 13, shot and killed Roque in front of her home located in the 500 block of N. Long Avenue in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago’s West Side.

As previously reported by Law&Crime, authorities issued an arrest warrant for Brown one day before Roque’s death because he allegedly violated the protection order she had against him. That protection order was extended on Dec. 13, just hours after Roque was killed. Court records reviewed by Law&Crime show that a protection order was issued on Nov. 7 and then extended on Nov. 28. The protection order was extended again on Dec. 13 and was set to last until Jan. 3, 2024.

The protection order was initially granted in November when Roque accused Brown of grabbing her and slamming her to the ground during an argument, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. He also allegedly threatened to set Roque’s car on fire and destroy her personal possessions.

The order of protection reportedly prohibited Brown from having any contact with Roque and stated that he could not take their 8-year-old daughter or any pets out of Roque’s care.

A CBS News investigation found that making an arrest is not the only way the Chicago Police Department closes a case. In something called “exceptional means,” police take credit for clearing cases even though justice for families was never served. Megan Hickey has more on the series “Crime Without Punishment: Unsolved Murder in America.”