Oak Lawn Investigation Into Deadly Crash 'Fatally Flawed:' Attorney

OAK LAWN, IL — An hour after 28-year-old Murod Kurdi was struck by a vehicle as he got out of his parked truck the late afternoon of June 5, Oak Lawn Police Chief Dan Vittorio emailed the village manager, assistant village manager and trustees to apprise them of the situation:

“Units on scene, unidentified male victim appeared to be entering a parked vehicle on 91st St. Our offender possibly DUI struck him, which then sent him flying into another parked vehicle," Vittorio wrote. "Our offender is a female OL resident. Several members of our Traffic Unit are out of town, [Illinois State Police] will be assisting with reconstruction.”

The driver of the 2018 Kia Optima, identified in the crash report as Leanne Cusack, 27, admitted to the first Oak Lawn police officer on the scene that she had consumed a pint of Old Style and a shot of Patron tequila approximately one hour before the crash, according to redacted police reports provided to Patch by the Kurdi family’s attorney. The responding officer also noted in his report that Cusack’s breath bore a “slight odor of alcohol,” but she did not show any other signs of impairment.

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In their supplemental reports filed in the days following the crash, Ofcrs. Matthew Shilney and Liam Kelly, who also were investigating the crash, noted that Cusack did not display signs of alcohol impairment. She was able to stand and walk without swaying, her speech wasn’t slurred and her eyes were clear. Unlike their colleague, the officers claimed they could not smell alcohol on Cusack’s breath.

Hours later, she was released from the crash scene after refusing sobriety and breathalyzer tests at the advice of her attorney. Cusack was issued a citation for failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident, for which she is to appear in traffic court Tuesday, Aug. 8, at the Bridgeview Courthouse.

Kurdi died three days later of severe head trauma as a result of the accident.

David Petrich, the Kurdi family’s attorney, has charged that Oak Lawn police failed to conduct a thorough investigation, and, for the second time in less than a year, activists from the Arab American community are accusing Oak Lawn police of treating them as “less than.”

While it was within Cusack’s legal rights to refuse sobriety tests, Petrich said that police had other investigative tools at their disposal to initiate a forced blood draw by acquiring a warrant from the Cook County State’s Attorney and judge on call.

“There is no doubt that a forced blood draw should have been the next step,” Petrich said. “Instead, the police officers at the scene jointly decided to let the offender go home with a citation for speeding.”

The Village of Oak Lawn also issued a statement, saying the matter remains under investigation and “we are pursuing several avenues in that regard. The Village sympathizes with the loss of life and expresses its condolences to Mr. Kurdi’s family.

'His Head Is Busted Bad'

Just after 5:30 p.m. June 5, Kurdi came home from work and parked his Ford F150 pickup truck in front of his family’s home on the north side of the 5100 block of West 91st Street. According to video evidence acquired from a neighbor’s Ring camera, he waited a few seconds before getting out of his truck. He stepped outside the truck and closed the driver’s side just before he was struck by a white Kia Optima.

Kurdi was launched into the air, landing approximately 15 to 20 feet away from his truck. He came to rest against the rear passenger wheel of a parked, unoccupied Cadillac Escalade. His skull was cracked open and blood pooled out of his mouth.

Frantic 911 calls from panicked neighbors poured into Oak Lawn’s Emergency Communication Center.

“The back of his head is busted,” a caller told a 911 dispatcher. ““It looks like his head is busted bad.”

Cusack can be heard crying in the background. “I didn’t see him,” and then, “he walked in front of my car.”

There is no record of her calling 911 among the recordings and reports made available to Patch.

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Oak Lawn Fire Department paramedics arrived at the scene the same time as Ofcr. Benjamin Tholotowsky. Paramedics immediately began rendering aid to the gravely injured Kurdi, who Tholotowsky noted was “bleeding very heavily from the head and mouth.”

Bystanders guided police to a Kia Optima parked several houses away and pointed to a white female standing close to the Kia. The officer walked in the street and met the driver.

Tholotowsky said Cusack told him she was the driver of the Kia. A child was seated in a booster seat inside the car. Cusack said they were coming from McDonald’s at 91st and Cicero after she picked the child up from the babysitter, according to the report.

Cusack told the officer she was driving “25 to 27 mph” west down 91st Street and was talking to her boyfriend “hands free” on her cell phone, “when she heard a loud bang,” the officer said.

“While she continued driving westbound, after the bang, she looked around and saw people running to the aid of what appeared to be an injured pedestrian. She parked her car at [redacted], locked her daughter in the vehicle, and got out to investigate further,” the report continued.

Cusask then realized she had struck and injured the pedestrian, the officer said.

Tholotowsky observed front-end damage and a cracked windshield on the Kia on the passenger side. According to the report, Cusack’s boyfriend arrived and joined her at the scene.

'Slight Odor Of Alcohol'

As the officer spoke to Cusack, Tholotowsky said he detected a “slight odor of alcohol on her breath.” When he asked Cusack if she had been drinking, she replied that she had one shot of Patron tequila and a pint of Old Style at Demma’s Bar and Grill in Oak Lawn, an hour or so before the crash, the officer said.

While speaking to Cusack, Tholotowsky said Cusack’s boyfriend corrected her time frame. He told Tholotowsky it had been two hours before the accident when she last consumed alcohol. Her boyfriend further stated that they both had been at Delta’s Lounge – not Demma’s – in Burbank from 3 to 3:30 p.m. – two hours before the crash – gambling at the machines, the report said.

Cusack also told the officer that she had since eaten a Big Mac and chicken nuggets after drinking the beer and tequila shot, the report said. Aside from the slight odor of alcohol on her breath, Tholotowsky noted in his report that Cusack showed no other signs of alcohol impairment.

“She was able to stand without swaying, was coordinated and did not need to use anything for balance. Speech clear, logical and coherent,” his report said.

Tholotowsky also described performing a horizontal gaze Nystagmus test on Cusack and no indicators of impairment were found.

Due to the alleged smell of alcohol on Cusack’s breath and her admission to drinking prior to the crash, Tholotowsky asked Cusack to perform additional field sobriety tests and preliminary breath tests. She refused, stating she wanted to speak to a lawyer first, the report said.

“I don’t want to be liable for someone walking in front of my car, you know,” Cusack is said to have told the cop.

She was cited for failure to reduce speed to avoid an accident.

Tholotowsky then read the traffic crash warning to motorists, which carries an automatic 12-month license suspension for failure to blow. Cusack and her boyfriend left the scene on foot. The Kia was towed to the Oak Lawn police garage and held for investigation.

Robert Olson, Cusack’s attorney, told Patch that she called him from the scene of the crash. She claimed that Kurdi stepped out from between parked cars in front of her vehicle. Olson said he advised her not to take a breathalyzer test or submit to a blood draw.

“[Officers] didn’t believe they had reasonable grounds to charge her with driving under the influence,” Olson said in previous interview.

'Black Box'

On June 7, Ofcr. Mark Hollingsworth contacted Cusack and asked for permission to examine the Kia’s event data recorder, or “black box,” to determine the vehicle’s speed up to the moment of the crash. The Oak Lawn officer told her that such information would be helpful in his investigation, and beneficial to her defense in case of future civil actions, he noted in his supplemental report.

Cusack declined, stating she would feel much more comfortable speaking to an attorney before allowing the black box to be examined, the report said. The next day, Hollingsworth went to the Bridgeview Courthouse and obtained a warrant for the black box as well as Cusack’s cell phone data.

The black box was sent to the state police to be analyzed to determine the Kia’s speed, braking or steering maneuvers before and after the crash. Trooper T. Terrazas explained that no data was recorded by the EDR due to the airbags not being deployed, nor did the vehicle record the “event” as being “significant” enough to trigger the recording system. The last time the EDR recorded the Kia’s data was “approximately 2,000 ignition cycles prior to the event.”

'No Resemblance'

On June 18, Ofcr. Peter Hennessey went to the Delta Lounge in Burbank to look at the bar’s security video. The detective downloaded video from 4 to 6 p.m. from June 5. Hennessey noted that the security system was an hour behind the actual time due to the time change. The video showed only four patrons inside the tavern, including a maintenance worker, two bartenders and another man who walked briefly into the bar. The only women at the Delta Lounge were the two bartenders.

Hennessey described the ages of the bar patrons on the video as senior citizens or middle-aged. The security video included another female bartender who showed up for her shift, a technician working on the gaming machines, and a female patron in her 40s who sat down and ordered a drink.

“At no time did anyone resembling the image of Cusack and her boyfriend enter the Delta Lounge in the hours preceding the traffic accident,” the report said.

None of the reports provided to Patch indicated if Oak Lawn police visited Demma’s Bar and Grill to check the bar’s security video for footage from June 5.

“During my investigation of this matter, a bartender at the same local bar told me on June 16 where the offender admitted to drinking on June 5. Unless there is justice, this tragedy is almost certain to be repeated,” Petrich told supporters at a recent rally in front of village hall.

Petrich and activists from the Arab American Action Network are calling for an independent review of the Oak Lawn police investigation.

“I assure you that the information that I have to date would lead everyone to the conclusion that the investigation by the Oak Lawn Police Department was fatally flawed,” Petrich said.