Newsome V. Mccabe

James Newsome spent 15 years in prison for murder. The killing and associated crimes (armed robbery and armed violence) occurred in October 1979. Newsome was arrested in November 1979 when police, who were holding him on other charges, noted his resemblance to a composite sketch of the person who in the course of a robbery shot and killed Mickey Cohen. Newsome was convicted of that crime in September 1980, see People v. Newsome, 110 Ill. App. 3d 1043, 443 N.E.2d 634 (1st Dist. 1982); and his efforts to obtain collateral relief were unavailing until December 1994, when a state court vacated his conviction. In 1995, after the State's Attorney declined to put Newsome on trial a second time, the Governor of Illinois concluded that Newsome is innocent and pardoned him. Newsome then filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. sec.1983 against five officers of the Chicago Police Department. He could not seek damages for wrongful arrest and detention; that claim accrued in 1979, so the statute of limitations expired in 1981. See Gonzalez v. Entress, 133 F.3d 551 (7th Cir. 1998). But a claim based on wrongful conviction and imprisonment did not accrue until the pardon, see Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994), and Newsome tried to take advantage of the newly opened window for suit. Absolute immunity forecloses any action against the prosecutors and judges, but Newsome has tried to avoid that doctrine by suing the investigating officers, arguing that the police were complicit in a wrongful prosecution. He calls this a claim of "malicious prosecution" and contends that the police must pay for failing to halt the criminal prosecution. The defendants responded by arguing that Newsome's theory is legally deficient and that, at all events, qualified immunity prevents an award of damages.