Dirksen Federal Courthouse, Chicago
CHICAGO — The second of two men who claim Chicago detectives coerced them into confessing to the "heinous" murder of a Chicago couple to allegedly help a woman steal the couple's baby has apparently reached a settlement with the city, just days after it was revealed Cook County's controversial former chief prosecutor had allowed them to obtain a key court document that allowed them to sue the city and former officers, even though she still believed he and his once-convicted accomplice were guilty.
On May 7, U.S. District Judge Steven Seeger announced in an item posted to the court docket that attorneys for Arturo DeLeon-Reyes, on one side, and the city of Chicago and Chicago Police officer defendants, on the other, had reached the deal to end DeLeon-Reyes' lawsuit.
That announcement came four days before the parties were scheduled to square off at trial before Seeger over DeLeon-Reyes' claims of malicious prosecution at the hands of former Chicago Police Detective Reynaldo Guevara.
The terms of the settlement were not disclosed in court. However, the deal will require approval by the Chicago City Council, which means, under city policy, it is at least more than $100,000.
DeLeon-Reyes has claimed he and another man, Gabriel Solache, were coerced by Guevara and at least one other Chicago Police officer into confessing to killing Mariano and Jacinta Soto in 1998.
Solache and Reyes were convicted and sentenced to prison, after they both confessed to assisting in stabbing the Sotos to death in their home in Chicago. Prosecutors said the men allegedly helped kill the Sotos to help abduct their two children on behalf of Adriana Mejia, so Mejia could allegedly fulfill her dream of becoming a mother.
Both men recanted their confessions and accused Chicago police officers of coercing them.
Reyes and Solache were eventually exonerated and freed when then-Cook County State's Attorney Foxx declined in 2017 to pursue new trials against either man.
The men swiftly filed lawsuits against the city and the police officers involved.
They were later presented with so-called “certificates of innocence” by Cook County judges in 2022 and 2023, respectively.
According to court records, Solache also earlier reached a settlement with the city. The terms of that settlement also remain undisclosed, and are subject to a vote by the City Council.
The men's certificates of innocence were expected to play a significant role at trial, with a particular focus on how it was they came to obtain them.
Generally, such certificates of innocence can only be obtained when someone who has been convicted of a crime persuades a judge that they are actually innocent — a legal standard upheld by the Illinois Supreme Court as recently as October 2025.
Typically, such process is adversarial, as prosecutors routinely argue against granting such proclamations to people against whom their offices had earlier secured convictions.
However, the two men were among a group of people legally exonerated of murder who obtained the certificates when Foxx's office reversed course and chose not to oppose them.
According to sworn testimony from at least one of Foxx's former deputy prosecutors, that decision allegedly came after Foxx's office allegedly adopted a position that it would not oppose such certificate petitions from people who had been convicted in cases that involved Guevara.
Guevara has stood at the center of scores of cases accusing him of wrongful convictions, alleging he improperly coerced confessions and framed those later convicted of crimes, including murder.
To date, cases involving misconduct accusations against Guevara have resulted in payments totaling more than $141 million from the city, according to published data. There are still dozens of lawsuits pending involving misconduct accusations against Guevara, including the cases lodged by Solache and DeLeon-Reyes.
The Cook County State's Attorney's Office's alleged policy involving certificates of innocence under Foxx also was the central subject of a recent deposition, in which Foxx was questioned under oath.
The questions came from attorneys for the city and the defendant officers as part of a different case, also involving two defendants who accused Guevara of allegedly coercing their confession to murder.
In that deposition, Foxx admitted under oath that she continues to believe Solache and DeLeon-Reyes may be guilty of the murders they were convicted of.
Further, in the deposition, Foxx admits the decision in 2022 and 2023 to not oppose the certificate of innocence petitions from a number of people convicted of murder and other crimes in cases investigated by Guevara and his partners came after high-level meetings with representatives from the Exoneration Project, a Chicago group tied to lawyers who have secured millions of dollars in payouts from the city on behalf of people who claim they were wrongfully convicted.
While officially a non-profit organization associated with the University of Chicago School of Law, the Exoneration Project is led by lawyers from the Chicago firm of Loevy & Loevy, who are regularly and prominently involved in suing the city of Chicago over alleged wrongful convictions.
The Loevy firm is representing DeLeon-Reyes in his lawsuit.
Eight attorneys from the Loevy firm serve as staff members at the Exoneration Project, including Exoneration's executive director, Josh Tepfer.
In the deposition, Foxx admits to, at least, meeting with Tepfer and another Loevy attorney in 2022 and continuing to talk with Tepfer, at least by email, in 2023. In the deposition, Foxx admits to discussing a "universe" of dozens of cases, tied to Guevara, in which Tepfer and his associates were seeking certificates of innocence.
In the deposition, Foxx admitted to also feeling pressure from unspecified others to essentially drop all opposition to certificate of innocence petitions and other postconviction matters involving people convicted of murder and other crimes in cases involving Guevara.
In the deposition, Foxx asserts she never directed her office to simply step aside in such cases, asserting she believed that to do so would violate ethics rules and potentially the prosecutors' oath. Rather, she claimed in her testimony that she directed deputies to fully investigate all certificate of innocence cases to determine which to oppose or not.
In the deposition, attorneys for the city and Guevara, however, noted that testimony contradicts earlier testimony from a deputy prosecutor who had handled a certificate of innocence petition case. In that testimony, the deputy said she believed she had been instructed by Foxx and other superiors in the office to drop all opposition to certificate of innocence petitions in cases involving Guevara.
And the deputy testified the Cook County State's Attorney's Office had conducted no investigation of any kind into the certificate of innocence petition case she was leading, before telling a Cook County judge that the Cook County State's Attorney's Office would not oppose the petition.
Under rules set for the deposition by a judge, attorneys for the city and Guevara did not ask Foxx about the process by which the Cook County State's Attorney's Office had determined whether to oppose certificate of innocence petitions for DeLeon-Reyes, Solache, or any other people who had been convicted of murder or other crimes, beyond those involved in that other case.
However, in the deposition, the attorneys for the city and Guevara noted that in an email sent by Tepfer to Foxx, Tepfer directly thanked Foxx for agreeing in 2022 to no longer contest any innocence certificate petitions in cases involving accusations against Guevara, potentially including the cases of DeLeon-Reyes and Solache.
Foxx disputed she had agreed to such a blanket policy and rather asserted she had directed her deputies to take a closer look at some of the cases Tepfer had presented.
However, Foxx confirmed she did not seek to correct Tepfer's statements or apparent understanding of the results of their meeting and later conversation.
And in the weeks and months following the meetings and conversations with Tepfer and others involved with The Exoneration Project, Foxx's office dropped its opposition to certificate of innocence petitions and exoneration attempts in cases involving Guevara.
However, in her deposition, Foxx stated clearly that her office's decision on whether or not to oppose an exoneration motion or certificate of innocence petition has no bearing on whether she or her deputy prosecutors believed the evidence showed that person was guilty of a murder or other crime.
Since late April, lawyers for DeLeon-Reyes and the city and officers had sparred over how to handle Foxx’s deposition in the expected trial.
Attorneys for DeLeon-Reyes had urged the judge to exclude the deposition, as well as all other argument over how DeLeon-Reyes had obtained his certificate of innocence.
Attorneys for Guevara and the city had warned DeLeon-Reyes’ legal team in court filings against attempting to tell jurors that the certificate of innocence somehow proves DeLeon-Reyes was wrongfully prosecuted and imprisoned. Should DeLeon-Reyes' team have introduced such a claim, the city and Guevara's team said they would have assailed that claim by entering evidence showing the certificate should never have been granted at all.
