Daley Plaza hummed with men and women in dark suits and bulging leather briefcases in hand, scurrying toward the courthouse entrance, lost in their phones or in their heads, practicing their opening arguments. Their civilian companions, on the other hand, shuffled, worry on their faces over their upcoming court appearances. Looking at the surrounding normalcy, it was hard to fathom that only yesterday a man had been murdered here. That life, for some, had not been affected.
I scanned the perimeter, my adrenaline elevated, and I instinctively watched for dark SUVs and Halloween masks and wondered how many security cameras had recorded yesterday’s incident.
The spot on the street where Judge Reynolds had lost his life was still cordoned off, and my chest tightened at the sight of the stain on the pavement. Without thinking, I found myself walking back to the curb, back to the spot the murder had taken place. Would anyone lay flowers at this spot or memorialize his passing here? Or would his dried blood become the debris of city life, something to be washed away by the street sweepers the next time they passed?
I pulled my eyes from the stain up toward the steel-and-glass structure behind me and shuddered, wondering if any of the judge’s staff had witnessed his death from the windows. Pushing the thought out of my mind, I headed toward the building.
The judge’s administrative staff was likely shell-shocked this morning, wondering what to do next and how to process the loss of someone they worked with so closely. There would be a whole host of in-process proceedings that were now disrupted. Likely, the entire domestic relations court would be in some level of disarray as other judges became responsible for pending cases and dealt with the shock and grief of losing a colleague.
Despite Janek’s dismissive reaction to my questions, I couldn’t let go of the thought that Reynolds’s death had been a hit—a dispute, an angry defendant, or even something in his personal life. His administrative office was my first stop. I knew enough people in the court system and how things operated to make my way into the building. But would anyone talk to me?
I passed through security and went straight to the third floor, where I followed the narrow hallway. The administrative staff was tucked away in the judicial maze out of sight of litigants or devastated family members, but close enough to the action that attorneys and judges could get to the office quickly.
Tiana Williams was the clerk who ran Judge Reynolds’s schedule and the person most likely to have insight into his personal life. I sensed the emotional disarray as soon as I entered the cluttered space. Instead of staff concentrating on their computers or being buried in the avalanche of paperwork that was still a crucial part of the court process, small groups of people huddled, whispering, hugging, shock etched in their eyes and in their shaky hands. Those forced to hover over their keyboards by some necessary deadline or because distraction kept them from crumbling at the loss looked stricken. Confused and grieving, their faces were ashen, and tissues sat nearby.
I stepped up to the first desk and asked if I could speak with Ms. Williams. The woman nodded and called over to her coworker, flipping a hand in my direction. Tiana was round in the right places with cheeks red and blotchy, made even more obvious by her white hair.
“My name is Andrea Kellner,” I said when she approached. “I’m with Link-Media. I was wondering if I could speak to you for a moment about Judge Reynolds.”
“I’m sorry, I can’t talk to the media. You’ll have to go through the division administrator,” she said, her voice breaking, then she sniffed and dabbed at her nose. Her eyes were bloodshot pools, and she clutched a soggy wad of tissues in her hand.
I looked at her hard. “I was there,” I said softly. “I was there when it happened. My friend and I are the ones that called 911 and stayed with him.”
Her mouth trembled as she stared back, fresh tears spilling onto her cheeks. Making no attempt to stifle them, she nodded. “Let’s go to the conference room.”
As her coworkers watched, I followed her to a bland beige room outfitted with a table, a gaggle of chairs, a big whiteboard, and the ubiquitous fluorescent lighting that made everyone look like they were about to retch.
“Please, have a seat. I’m sorry. Can you tell me your name again? My mind isn’t working very well today. We’re all so stunned. Not much work is getting done, but we all seem to need to be here anyway.”
She sat clutching her shaking hands on the table in front of her.
“I understand. It helps not to be alone during a tragedy. I’m Andrea Kellner. I’m with Link-Media.” I laid a business card in front of her.
She nodded and dabbed at her nose. “You said you were there. Did you see it all happen?” Her face seemed frozen in fear, as if she’d rather not know any more than she already did.
“I’m afraid so. The shooter’s vehicle was blocking access to Judge Reynolds’s parking. When the SUV didn’t respond to his horn, the judge got out of his car to ask them to move, but instead, two men got out of the SUV and just shot him.”
“I heard they wore masks,” she said tentatively, her eyes cast at her hands.
“Yes, Halloween masks.”
I watched her face, checking for some recognition or shift that would tell me she’d been expecting something, but I only saw more tears.
“I know this is rough, but can you think of any reason someone might want to harm the judge? Had there been any threats or any unusually hostile cases he was involved in?”
She looked up, her watery eyes full of questions. “You don’t think it was a carjacking, do you?”
“If it was, it seems unusual to me,” I said tentatively.
I wasn’t sure how much to say. I had questions but no answers, and my journalistic speculation would simply add to her burden when there was already too much.
“How so?”
“Well, from my vantage point, it seemed planned. As if they were waiting for him. Or at least waiting for someone. And Judge Reynolds didn’t fight. He offered up the vehicle the minute he saw the gun, but they fired anyway. I came here because I’m wondering if you know about anything going on in his life, personally or a tough case, even if it seems harebrained, it might lead to an answer.”
“I don’t know. The man is—excuse me, was—a divorce judge. I can’t believe that he’s gone.” Her voice cracked with the words. “I’ve worked here for almost twenty years, eight of those for Judge Reynolds.”
She paused to collect herself, the shock still staggeringly fresh.
“Ending a marriage isn’t exactly happy stuff for anyone to go through,” she continued. “I’ve been there myself, and I’d rather cut off an arm than go through that again. But normally, it’s not the judge that gets the brunt of the heat. Attorneys and your ex, that’s where the venom is directed. Ninety percent of these things are wrapped up outside of the courtroom, anyway. I don’t see this as a pissed-off dad taking his revenge. Maybe if it were a dead attorney, I could see the argument. You should hear some of those stories.” She grimaced. “It baffles me that anyone would voluntarily become divorce counsel. You see people at their worst, then become their closest confidant, and they hate you in the end, resenting every dime they had to spend getting through the divorce, regardless of the outcome.”
She’d nailed the sentiment, and I smiled to myself.
“Was there anything in his personal life that might have been challenging for him?”
“Last year was a rough one for his family. His wife, Eileen, died. She had pancreatic cancer. Suffered for about two years before she lost the battle. They tried everything. Surgery, immunotherapy, even a bunch of really out-there alternative therapies at some clinic in Mexico. And that stuff isn’t exactly covered on the government insurance plan. It was all out of pocket. God knows how much that cost. But they were determined to do everything humanly possible to treat her, and it might have given her a few more months, but ultimately, it just wasn’t enough.”
“He must have been devastated,” I said, imagining the roller coaster of stress and fear, not only for his wife but for the complications throughout their lives. Cancer was a family disease in the same way addiction was.
“He hasn’t been the same since. They didn’t have kids, but it’s as if a light had been turned off inside him. He went through the motions here at work, but he was flat, robotic. Just didn’t seem to have any joy left in him anymore.”
“Is there anything else that comes to mind?” Given what Reynolds had been through, I imagined financial concerns were likely as well.
“Well, it’s pretty hard for a Black man not to have some haters. Those kooks locked back in the fifties segregation mind-set don’t take kindly to an African American man in power. Most of what we’ve seen here in the courthouse is the subtle stuff. You know, those people who would argue to the death they’re not racist and then use dismissive language in the next sentence. A Black man has to be twice as good at his job to get the same level of respect as the white guy with the same title and the same experience.”
“Just like women,” I added.
She chuckled. “Sad, but true. He looked past that garbage. He didn’t have the mental energy or interest in trying to set someone straight about their racist tendencies. He was here to do his job, and if somebody didn’t like the color of his skin or the texture of his hair, too damn bad. Their problem, not his."
“Did anyone step over the line? Perhaps threaten the judge?”
I was running through the obvious stuff, hoping for a tidbit that could direct me down one rabbit hole or another. This was how investigations worked. Gather as many bits as you could and hope some of them started a picture, but in the beginning, all you had were random puzzle pieces that may or may not belong to the story.
“It happened now and then. There’d be an occasional letter from some bozo who said he should be dead or an email talking about the awful way they wanted him to die. Of course, these are the types of fools who never have the balls to identify themselves. They’re just cowards with mouths. We send those messages over to the sheriff. Standard protocol for all the judges. I don’t know what else they do other than increase security now and then.”
“Do you remember anything specific, or perhaps an individual who was particularly vile?”
“Every now and then, these racists come out from beneath the rocks they’ve been hiding under. We don’t pay them much mind. The only recent one I remember is this guy who got his shorts in a bundle and kept ugly-tweeting at the Cook County Court about Judge Reynolds being corrupt. Judges aren’t on social media. I’m sure you can imagine why. The court let us know as a matter of protocol. Or CYA, depending on your perspective. Why these dummies think Twitter is an appropriate legal communication tool is beyond me.”
“Corrupt? Do you know what he meant by that? Do you remember the guy’s handle?”
“Look, Twitter is just a place for windbags who can’t handle pushback. We don’t take any of that seriously. I imagine he was another one of those stupid narcissists who didn’t like how his case turned out and threw out vague accusations of bribery because he lost custody of his kids. Reynolds would be the last guy to do anything even remotely illegal. I don’t remember the creep’s Twitter handle, but it started with something like Zippy.”