One of the most high-profile police murder trials in recent Chicago history opened Tuesday with lawyers giving jurors two starkly different views of the two figures at the center of the case: slain police Cmdr. Paul Bauer and Shomari Legghette, his alleged killer.
Prosecutors portrayed Bauer as the pride of his department, a devoted officer needlessly gunned down while trying to tackle Legghette, a cowardly criminal who opened fire out of fear cops would discover his bulletproof vest, his cocaine and his 9 mm Glock.
But a defense lawyer painted Bauer’s death as just the opposite: Bauer was the one who was aggressive and out of control, and Legghette was just a low-level “street hustler” who acted in self-defense when a man he did not know was a police officer attacked him out of nowhere.
Bauer’s February 2018 slaying, in broad daylight in a stairwell in the Loop, shocked Chicago. Legghette, a 46-year-old four-time felon, was quickly arrested and scorned as the product of the kind of lenient justice system Bauer often criticized.
Two years later, Legghette sat at a table in a courtroom at the Leighton Criminal Court Building as his trial for the slaying began. Feet away were rows of uniformed police officers there to support a fallen comrade, ranking prosecutors including State’s Attorney Kim Foxx and Bauer’s widow, Erin, flanked by her family and supporters.
As Assistant State’s Attorney Risa Lanier described Bauer’s last moments, as a cop on-duty and answering the call to pursue a fleeing suspect, a young police officer in the gallery wiped away tears.
Legghette “executed” Bauer, Lanier said, after he led police on a foot pursuit through parts of downtown.
“He did so for no reason other than his own desperate attempts to avoid the police, to avoid custody, to avoid being detained, to avoid what even began as an attempt to have a simple conversation,” Lanier said.
After attending a training that morning, Bauer gave chase with his handcuffs unholstered and his radio at full volume, Lanier said — an attempt to blunt any arguments that Legghette did not know Bauer was a cop.
“He would answer the call and perform the functions of a Chicago police officer for the very last time,” she said.
Her opening remarks were precise and animated. The veteran prosecutor rolled her hands over each other as she described Legghette and Bauer tumbling into the stairwell, and snapped her fingers sharply while she described the volley of gunfire.
In his opening statement, Scott Kamin, Legghette’s attorney, described the shooting as a clear-cut case of self-defense. Legghette did not know that Bauer was a police officer, he said, promising jurors that they would hear Legghette’s story, in his own words, from the witness stand. .
Kamin admitted his client was a low-level drug dealer, and said he was in the area to meet a woman he was eyeing as a girlfriend and then get back to hustling his neighborhood.
Kamin also acknowledged the episode for Legghette began when he declined to speak to two people he did recognize as officers, cops who attempted to stop him for appearing to urinate in public on Lower Wacker Drive. Legghette began to leave, Kamin said, then a few moments later once he got to the street level he sensed that someone might be chasing him for an unknown reason.
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Shortly after that, Legghette would encounter Bauer, Kamin said, while still not realizing that he was the target of police officers. He at first thought maybe the strange man in a blue winter coat — Bauer — was an attorney running to make it to court on time, or perhaps someone was after him related to his drug dealing, Kamin said.
Kamin said Bauer’s coat covered his police uniform. Legghette meanwhile was wearing body armor and had a gun for protection because of his work in the dangerous drug trade.
Bauer ran after Legghette and pushed him down the stairwell, then put him in a chokehold, Kamin said.
“What Mr. Legghette did in firing at this guy who’s choking him, I mean, it was reasonable,” Kamin said.
“He’s upset about the incident, too, he’s never shot anybody in his life,” Kamin said. ” … He never used this gun before, that was a normal person being upset. Normal person who deals drugs, maybe does other crimes, I don’t know.”
By not making it clear that he was a police officer, “Cmdr. Bauer brought it on himself,” Kamin said.
Legghette sat at the defense table with his seat leaned back so far that from some angles his head was barely visible.
In a surprising note, Kamin’s opening statement hinted that Legghette may testify he was not the only person to fire gunshots in the stairwell that day.
After firing at Bauer to get him to release the chokehold, Kamin said, Legghette “hears some more shooting, but he doesn’t know what that is … then they stop, OK, they stop, somebody is at the top of the stairwell telling him to surrender.”
Police, prosecutors and witnesses have never said that anyone but Legghette fired shots that day. But in a letter he wrote to ABC-7, Legghette reportedly wrote that he believes Bauer was actually killed by friendly fire from police.
To guard against jurors believing that claim, prosecutors asked four civilian witnesses Tuesday if they saw any police fire their weapons after the first volley of gunshots echoed from the stairwell.
All of them said no, though each described hearing the boom of gunshots echoing from the stairwell.
“To hear that was completely a shock to my system,” Scott Verhey said. “I’m guessing at least five shots, and very quick, it was like a single burst.”
Also testifying Tuesday was Chicago police Cmdr. Warren Richards, who attended training with Bauer the morning before he died.
Prosecutors showed him the portrait of Bauer that has since become famous, displayed in shop windows and on posters around the city in his memory for months after his death. Bauer is in full uniform, his head tilted, smiling.
“That’s Paul Bauer,” Richards said, his voice growing hoarse.
“Were you friends?” Assistant State’s Attorney John Maher asked.
“Yes, sir,” Richards said. “Proudly.”
The trial is expected to continue into next week.