A Chicago prosecutor offered a blistering resignation letter to Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, blasting Foxx’s mission vision and value statements as "just a PR stunt.”
25 year veteran persecutor James Murphy said that he has “zero confidence” in the leadership of Foxx, and can no longer continue to work for an Administration that he doesn’t respect.
“I would love to continue to fight for the victims of crime and to continue to stand with each of you, especially in the face of the overwhelming crime that is crippling our communities,” Murphy said, adding “However, I can no longer work for this Administration. I have zero confidence in their leadership.”
He continued to accuse his now former boss for being “more concerned with political narratives and agendas than with victims and prosecuting violent crime.”
Being the second-largest prosecutor’s office in the country, Murphy said Foxx’s office has been “hemorrhaging talent" over the last few years, leaving the rest still working "overworked, overstressed, and under-resourced.”
Murphy addressed several issues that Foxx has been accused of going easy on such as violent crimes of carjacking and gun violence, leaving the city in absolute turmoil.
He also recalled when his initial thoughts about leaving his position began once Foxx passed the SAFE-T Act— a law that aims to reform the state’s approach to criminal justice, including by narrowing the definition of who can be charged with first-degree murder.
“And it was in that process that I began to realize that the Administration’s ‘Mission Vision and Values’ was just a PR stunt, just words on a page. Fairness. Accountability. Integrity. Respect. Collaboration. Those words should mean something. … Yet time after time after time, this Administration has shown that they don’t live the meaning of those words. Or they don’t care,” Murphy said.
Although Murphy supports a cash bail, he felt that the law was being rushed, leaving his concerns unheard.
“How many mass shootings do there have to be before something is done? This Administration is more concerned with political narratives and agendas than with victims and prosecuting violent crime. That is why I can’t stay any longer,” Murphy said in his letter, after citing an incident where a man avoided murder charges in a shooting that left a woman dead because of the SAFE-T Act’s narrower definition for murder cases.
Murphy ended his resignation letter by saying “if this Administration was truly concerned with effectively fighting violent crime, then they would fully staff those courtrooms and Units.”