The Chicago City Council Finance Committee voted on two major settlements Friday.

In a narrow 12-15 vote, the committee voted down a $1.25 million payment for the family of Dexter Reed, who was killed by Chicago police officers in 2024 in a shootout following a traffic stop on the West Side.

Video from the shooting shows Reed shot an officer after failing to comply with orders to roll down his window, before officers fired 96 shots at Reed in 41 seconds, killing him. 

Both Reed's family and the Civilian Office of Police Accountability have raised questions about why a team of five plain-clothed tactical officers pulled over Reed to begin with.

The lawsuit filed by Reed's mother, Nicole Banks, claims the traffic stop targeting her son was "unlawful and pretextual," and was the result of traffic stop quotas CPD imposes on officers.  

"Officers had no reasonable suspicion that Dexter violated any law, and they falsely stated otherwise in official CPD reports," the lawsuit claims

Former COPA Chief Administrator Andrea Kersten, who stepped down last month, has said the officers involved said they noticed Reed wasn't wearing a seat belt, but she has questioned how they could have seen that through his vehicle's tinted windows.

Ald. Walter Burnett (27th), who voted in favor of the settlement, noted the traffic stop happened in a "gang-infested area," and suggested Reed might not have realized the plainclothes officers who surrounded his car with guns drawn were police.

"I couldn't imagine what was going on in the young man's head. He shouldn't have had a gun, he shouldn't have did what he did. But if somebody would have walked up on my car over in that neighborhood, I don't know how I would have reacted. I'm just being real with you," Burnett said. "There's a lot of shooting and killing and gang banging that goes on in that community."

Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th) said Burnett's explanation for supporting the settlement left him "speechless."

"When I hear someone vocalize that they don't know if they would do anything different than what this young man did to try to take the lives of Chicago police officers if they were in that same situation, what the hell is going on in this room? Seriously," Lopez said.

Lopez said colleagues who supported the proposed settlement "should be ashamed of yourselves."

"I don't care if you don't like it. Sometimes the truth has to be told, and there is a moral imperative that is dying in this city, and that is you do not have the right to kill an officer because they stopped you from breaking the law," Lopez said. "We have an officer who nearly lost his hand because this young man took it upon himself to open fire. Yes, his loss is unfortunate, but he is the responsible party for it. You want to settle, because you say it's cheaper? You are sending a message to every criminal, and you are also sending a message to every officer on the street that their lives do not matter anymore."

COPA's investigation into the circumstances surrounding the shooting remains open. With the Finance Committee's rejection of the proposed settlement, the Reed family's lawsuit against the city will now go to trial.

Meantime, the Finance Committee approved a $32 million settlement for Bryce Summary, a St. Louis man who lost both his legs on Chicago's Magnificent Mile after he was hit and pinned by a car that was fleeing police in May 2022.

Summary was in town with his wife for a conference. They were walking near Michigan Avenue and Ohio Street when someone driving a white Mercedes Benz tried to take off from a traffic stop.

Police had pulled the vehicle over for having a tinted covering on its license plate, but the Mercedes fled the traffic stop, and officers conducted a chase.

The lawsuit accused police of violating Chicago Police Department policy by initiating a chase over a non-serious traffic offense, failing to halt the pursuit to protect bystanders, and failing to immediately notify dispatchers of the chase. The lawsuit also accused the city of failing to install sufficient protective barriers on Michigan Avenue to protect pedestrians from "known risks and hazards" from traffic on the busy thoroughfare.

During the chase, the Mercedes' driver hit another vehicle, ran over Summary, and crashed into a nearby utility box, leaving Summary pinned under the car.

Although nurses from nearby Northwestern Memorial Hospital were nearby and rushed to stop the bleeding in Summary's legs before he was taken to the hospital, doctors were not able to save his legs, which had to be amputated below the knee.

The Finance Committee agreed to a settlement for $32 million in Summary's case, with $20 million being paid by the city and $12 million covered by the city's insurance.

The settlement in Summary's case now goes to the full City Council for a vote next week.