Among other errors in the 2023 trial over the police shooting of Harith Augustus, the court erred in allowing the defense to dismiss two Black potential jurors, appellate court rules.
CHICAGO — It has been nearly eight years since a Chicago police officer killed beloved South Shore barber Harith “Snoop” Augustus, and nearly three years since a Cook County Circuit Court jury found in favor of those officers in a lawsuit filed by Mr. Augustus’s family. This week, however, the Illinois Appellate Court reversed that verdict and remanded the case to a new trial.
When the case came to trial in July of 2023—almost exactly five years after the shooting—the jury returned a verdict in favor of the defendants. But, during jury selection, attorneys for the city used peremptory challenges to dismiss two potential Black jurors, which the plaintiff’s attorneys argued at the time was discriminatory. The trial judge disagreed.
However, in a March 31, 2026 ruling, the Appellate Court sided with the plaintiffs.
“Defendants use of peremptory challenges to exclude two Black venirepersons based on race is a violation of the equal protection clause of the federal and Illinois constitutions,” the Court concluded.
“We are thrilled that the Appellate Court saw the saw the injustice of the first trial and ordered a new one,” says attorney Renee Spence of the civil rights law firm of Loevy + Loevy. “The family deserves justice for Mr. Augustus’s senseless death, and these officers—who recklessly and needlessly caused it—should be held accountable.”
A barber at the Sideline Studio barbershop on East 71st Street, with a faithful and growing list of clients, Mr. Augustus was a beloved fixture of the neighborhood, and his death rocked the South Shore community, which responded with protests and vigils. “Barbers are sometimes the closest thing to a pastor or a counselor for a lot of folks,” the shop’s owner, Adonius Johnson, told the Chicago Sun-Times a few days after the shooting. “Snoop was one of the ones that always listened.”
On July 14, 2018, a group of Chicago police officers—ironically, on a supposed good-will patrol to introduce new officers to the neighborhood—stopped Mr. Augustus on foot while he was completing errands near where he worked. The stop was allegedly initiated because one of the officers spotted the outline of a handgun in the waist of Mr. Augustus’s pants. Surrounding him on the sidewalk, the officers quickly escalated to violence even as Mr. Augustus was pulling out his wallet and attempting to show them his ID and Firearm Owners Identification card. When one officer roughly grabbed his arm, Mr. Augustus pulled away and ran into the street, where a probationary officer named Dillan Halley shot him five times.
Halley claimed that Mr. Augustus had pulled the gun and intended to shoot them, but this assertion was contradicted by bodycam footage showing another officer needing to unsnap Mr. Augustus’s holster in order to remove the weapon after Mr. Augustus’s death.
In their review of the shooting, the Civilian Office of Police Accountability (COPA) concluded that these officers “clearly demonstrated a lack of clarity regarding how to engage [Augustus] who they observed to be carrying a concealed firearm. Furthermore, their lack of understanding led to an escalation of the encounter which may well have impacted the ultimate, tragic outcome.”
In November of that year, Mr. Augustus’s family filed a lawsuit in the Cook County Circuit Court against the officers and the City of Chicago, with his mother, Vivian Romeo, as plaintiff and representative of the estate. The complaint charged the defendants with battery, wrongful death, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and civil conspiracy.
In 2022, a Circuit Court judge threw out several claims, including civil conspiracy. The Appellate Court ruled this week that the dismissal of the civil conspiracy count was a mistake, as the count depended on the question of whether the officers had sufficient cause to conduct an investigatory stop of Mr. Augustus. “Mere possession of a firearm is not sufficient to give rise to a reasonable suspicion that the possessor is illegally carrying that firearm to justify such an investigatory stop,” the Appellate Court said.
More than a year before Mr. Augustus’s death, the Department of Justice had announced the findings of an investigation into the Chicago Police Department, reporting on what it called a pattern of civil rights violations that fell heaviest on Black and Latino neighborhoods. This report—which became the basis for a 2019 consent decree—found, among other damning conclusions, that “CPD has tolerated racially discriminatory conduct that not only undermines police legitimacy, but also contributes to the pattern of unreasonable force.”
In the 2023 trial, however, as the Appellate Court opinion discusses, the judge barred any suggestion that race was a factor in Mr. Augustus’s death.
“In the first trial, the court failed to give proper weight to the racial realities of not just this case, but the world in which we live,” says attorney Scott Rauscher. “We’re pleased the Appellate Court has given us another opportunity to seek justice for Mr. Augustus through a new trial.”
The defendants in the case include CPD officers Dillan Halley, Megan Fleming, Quincy Jones, and Jay Tan, as well as the City of Chicago. Attorneys Spence, Rauscher, and Locke Bowman, all partners at Loevy + Loevy, represented Mr. Augustus’s family on appeal. The same team, with attorney Danielle Hamilton, represented the family at trial.
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For the Appellate Court’s opinion, click here.
For the complaint in this lawsuit, click here.
To link to this release on Loevy + Loevy’s website, go here.
Contact:
Renee Spence, Partner, 312.243.5900, spence@loevy.com
Scott Rauscher, Partner, 312.789.4969, scott@loevy.com
Locke Bowman, Partner, 773.710.0158, locke@loevy.com
Michael McDunnah, Dir. of Comms, 312.371.5871, mcdunnah@loevy.com