There is a statuette of a cheetah in Antonio Romanucci\u2019s law office in a skyscraper overlooking the Chicago River. It sits next to a magazine cover of Romanucci, Chicago Lawyer\u2019s \u201c2021 Person of the Year.\u201d<\/p>\n
The cheetah is sleek and black. And, as the 65-year-old attorney explains, it represents a story he often recites to juries in civil rights cases after police car chases turn deadly.<\/p>\n
Jurors weighing responsibility want to know: Why is it the police officer\u2019s fault if a fleeing suspect crashes into an innocent third party?<\/p>\n
Romanucci knows it\u2019s a fair question, and he turns to nature for an answer. If the cheetah wants to eat, it must run faster than the gazelle. If the gazelle wants to live, it must outrun the cheetah.<\/p>\n
Applied to a police chase, the metaphor means the officers who initiated the pursuit are responsible for its results. Had the cheetah not started the chase, \u201cthe gazelle would never run,\u201d Romanucci points out.<\/p>\n
Juries may not always agree with the argument, but it has served Romanucci well. For decades, Romanucci and his law partner, Stephan Blandin, have led a successful practice representing not just the victims in police chases, but also patients harmed by doctors and faulty product manufacturers. His practice has catapulted him into the national spotlight, and he\u2019s represented some of the most famous plaintiffs in the country, including the families of George Floyd and Renee Good.<\/p>\n
Together, Romanucci and Blandin have won more than $1 billion in verdicts and settlements.<\/p>\n
The biggest settlement he won was for up to $800 million from MGM for victims of the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting.<\/p>\n
He won a $98.65 million verdict against former Dallas police Officer Amber Guyger for the 2018 murder of Botham Jean in a case that sparked nationwide outrage.<\/p>\n
Most notably, Romanucci represented Floyd\u2019s family in the historic lawsuit following his 2020 murder by a Minneapolis police officer that sparked protests, as Romanucci puts it, \u201cfrom Sydney all the way up to Alaska.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the country enters year two of the second Trump administration, Romanucci continues to be a prominent figure in civil rights law. He is representing the family of Good, the mother of three who was shot in the head by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jonathan Ross in Minneapolis.<\/p>\n
Last month, Romanucci testified in front of a congressional forum in Washington, D.C., about abuses by federal immigration agents.<\/p>\n
But where he learned to win cases was Chicago, where the city\u2019s long-troubled Police Department provided practice and an opportunity to stand up for people whose constitutional rights have been violated by their government.<\/p>\n
\u201cLitigating against the city of Chicago is probably one of the greatest schools of learning you could go to,\u201d Romanucci said.<\/p>\n
Friends and opposing counsel describe Romanucci as a hard worker whose personal skills earn him the trust of clients and juries. He traces it back to lessons he learned from his family.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not loud, I\u2019m not bombastic, I don\u2019t get pissed off,\u201d Romanucci said in a recent interview. \u201cI don\u2019t wear loud pink ties. I just tell the truth. I just speak from the heart.\u201d<\/p>\n
An immigrant story<\/p>\n
Romanucci\u2019s father, Dino, was born during the Great Depression in Hershey, Pennsylvania, but his parents took him to Italy when he was 2.<\/p>\n
Dino Romanucci didn\u2019t return to the United States until he was 19, when, according to his obituary, he came back with an \u201citch to finally see the America he saw only in film and see it in real life.\u201d<\/p>\n
He was drafted, served during the Korean War and was captivated by Antonio\u2019s mother, Anna Maria, through love letters mailed across the ocean to Italy. They married and moved to Chicago, where they lived in Austin and Galewood before heading into the western suburbs.<\/p>\n
Romanucci grew up speaking Italian at home, which later got him in trouble at school.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy parents got the call early on that there\u2019s something wrong with your son. \u2018He doesn\u2019t listen, he doesn\u2019t pay attention. He ignores everybody,\u2019\u201d Romanucci said. \u201cAnd so eventually they figured out that Sister Donna was calling me \u2018Anthony,\u2019 and I didn\u2019t know that I needed to answer to \u2018Anthony.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
In the late 1970s, Dino and a partner bought Benvenuti\u2019s Restaurant in Villa Park. They transformed the restaurant from a pizzeria that catered to local families into a gourmet spot.<\/p>\n
Around the same time, Romanucci went to the University of Wisconsin for undergrad then came back to John Marshall Law School, where he graduated in 1985.<\/p>\n
Although he didn\u2019t go into the family business, the restaurant and his father played a big role early in his career.<\/p>\n
Back then, Romanucci\u2019s father would refer his employees to the son for help when they had car accidents or other issues.<\/p>\n
\u201c(He\u2019d say) \u2018Call my son,\u2019\u201d Romanucci recalled. \u201cAnd so that\u2019s how I got my start. I\u2019m in private practice today because of my father, because he helped me with so many clients.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prominent family law attorney Enrico Mirabelli remembers Romanucci from his early days, when he was a young lawyer handling workers\u2019 comp cases. He said he helped recruit Romanucci to a leadership position in the Justinian Society of Lawyers, a group founded in 1921 by Italian lawyers who were tired of being discriminated against.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou just knew by the way he carried himself and the way he approached everything that he was going to be a successful person,\u201d Mirabelli said.<\/p>\n
Others also noticed Romanucci, with help from his family.<\/p>\n
Harry Comerford was Cook County\u2019s chief judge at the time and a patron of the family restaurant.<\/p>\n
One day, Romanucci recalled, Dino told his son, \u201c\u2018I think you need to come talk to this man. He sounds important.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Comerford recommended Romanucci for a job with the Cook County public defender\u2019s office, which he said set him on a 40-year path of \u201cdefending people with Fourth Amendment cases.\u201d<\/p>\n
After the public defender\u2019s office, Romanucci worked at different firms before teaming up with Stephan Blandin to open their own shop.<\/p>\n
In the early days, Romanucci and Blandin started in a small office with a card table and a plastic bag for the garbage.<\/p>\n
Changing practice<\/p>\n
Now Romanucci\u2019s office is filled with trial mementos.<\/p>\n
A baseball bat from one of the earliest successful cases against a bat manufacturer, accusing them of making dangerous aluminum bats that hurt kids.<\/p>\n
A turtle from the Supreme Court, underscoring how slowly the wheels of justice turn.<\/p>\n
A rubber ball for Jake Tinman, a child who had a stroke and a leg amputation. To prepare him for trial, Romanucci visited him at home and brought him to the office for comfort and familiarity.<\/p>\n
In the courtroom, Romanucci used the ball to roll back and forth so the jury could see his diminished physical abilities, he recalled. The jury came back with a $22.3 million verdict.<\/p>\n
Going to trial, Romanucci said he likes to spend large periods of time with clients.<\/p>\n
\u201cI tell them, in order for me to do well for you, I have to become you. I have to know you. I have to understand you. I have to feel you, because I\u2019m the one that\u2019s going to spend 90% (of time) in front of the jury,\u201d Romanucci said. \u201cYou only get to testify for one day, maybe one hour, maybe two at the most, and I\u2019m going to be the one that they\u2019re going to see the most.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd if they don\u2019t trust me telling your story, then neither of us wins.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2020, Romanucci\u2019s life changed.<\/p>\n
He had gone to Florida to recharge when a friend texted to ask if he\u2019d seen a video from Minneapolis of a man being killed by a police officer. He watched the footage of Derek Chauvin kneeling on George Floyd and said, \u201cHoly s\u2014, this is the biggest civil rights case in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Romanucci\u2019s friend texted, \u201c\u2019Buddy, I hope you get the case.\u201d Two hours later, attorney Ben Crump called to ask him to join him representing the family.<\/p>\n
\u201cI coalesced my team here and said that we must now prepare this case like we\u2019ve never prepared another case, ever. The playbook is out,\u201d Romanucci said. \u201cWe\u2019re going to create one for the Floyd case, because this is the biggest case that will ever happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
In January, Romanucci was hired by Renee Good\u2019s family. In that case, Romanucci said he launched a plan that, first, has involved dispelling the government\u2019s claim that Good was a \u201cdomestic terrorist.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI promised the family I will never repeat that word or those two words,\u201d Romanucci said, referring to the government\u2019s phrase as \u201cDT.\u201d<\/p>\n
Like with the Floyd case, Romanucci said he immediately grasped the importance.<\/p>\n
\u201cA woman killed in the middle of the street by a federal law enforcement officer during an occupation by our own government of a major American city,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The team set out to do a series of media interviews and push out information dispelling the government\u2019s narrative. Romanucci released the autopsy results to make clear what happened. He said a strategy he often relies on is to let people have the facts and make up their own minds.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo when we release the autopsy result, specifically the one where the shot to the head was to the side and it exited her right side, let the people make their own decision where Jonathan Ross was when he pulled the trigger,\u201d Romanucci said. \u201cAnd why is that important? Because a police officer should never shoot at a moving vehicle from the side. That is against reasonable and good police practices.\u201d<\/p>\n
A partnership<\/p>\n
Blandin said the partnership works in part because they complement one another. Romanucci is charismatic and social, with a background in hospitality making him \u201cservice oriented.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m much crabbier,\u201d Blandin quipped.<\/p>\n
Their differences were clear from the start.<\/p>\n
Early in their practice, the two had a slip-and-fall-case where they settled with a co-defendant before trial but lost the rest of the case in front of a jury.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re both licking our wounds trying to figure out: How are we going to tell people we just lost this (case) that we tried?\u201d Blandin recalled. \u201c(Tony said) \u2018What are you talking about? We didn\u2019t lose the case, we won it.’\u201d<\/p>\n
They walked into the Justinians event and Romanucci put his spin on the story. Instead of leading with the loss, Romanucci came in and said, \u201c\u2018Hey, we just had $300,000 on a not guilty.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Jim Ormond, a former attorney with the city of Chicago now in private practice, faced off with Romanucci twice in jury trials over the years and praised him as a worthy adversary.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s really in a league of his own in terms of emotional intelligence and ability to connect with both the victims and family members to bring out testimony that\u2019s helpful,\u201d Ormond said. \u201cI think jurors connect with him in the process as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Law school classmate Eddie Wanderling remembers Romanucci as someone \u201cwilling to help anybody,\u201d who would stop and give cash to a homeless person and didn\u2019t have \u201ca nasty bone in his body.\u201d<\/p>\n
The only time Wanderling recalled Romanucci losing his temper was after college. They were preparing for a trial in a lawsuit involving a car accident where a mother was killed and the rest of her family seriously injured. It wasn\u2019t going well, and Romanucci vented.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe demands perfection. Not only does he demand it from everybody else, he demands it from himself,\u201d Wanderling said. \u201cWe may not notice something but if it didn\u2019t go the way he wanted, it would bother him to no end. Almost to where I think he\u2019s too compulsive about it. But he really cares about his clients. It doesn\u2019t matter their race, their gender, their beliefs. If somebody\u2019s civil rights are violated, he\u2019d step up and defend them with all the ability he could.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another John Marshall classmate, Jim Sotos, became a top attorney representing police officers accused of misconduct. He said he was surprised when Romanucci began taking on civil rights cases as he had been \u201ca personal injury lawyer\u201d earlier in his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t know Tony was doing this kind of work and didn\u2019t know if he\u2019d do much of it,\u201d Sotos said. \u201cBut man, he took the area of law by storm. I was pretty blown away by that. I never saw it coming. He\u2019s quickly developed a reputation as one of the very best police misconduct (and) civil rights plaintiffs lawyers in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although Romanucci is known for civil rights litigation, he didn\u2019t have his first big break in the field until 2005.<\/p>\n
The case involved Vernon Hudson, who was driving westbound on I-290 in May 2001 on his way to help a friend jump-start his car, the Tribune reported at the time. A cop car hit him, caused him to roll over, and paralyzed him. The case was what Romanucci calls a \u201czero offer\u201d case, meaning the city offered no settlement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey said we could never win it,\u201d Romanucci said.<\/p>\n
Instead, they got a $17.6 million verdict.<\/p>\n
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