Arthur Loevy, a lawyer and labor leader who came out of retirement to work with his son at Loevy & Loevy, a powerhouse in wrongful convictions and police misconduct litigation, died April 11 after suffering a brain bleed in his sleep, his family said. He was 87.<\/p>\n
The firm is nationally recognized for winning multimillion-dollar jury verdicts and settlements, often fighting the city of Chicago\u2019s Law Department.<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy was a master negotiator who honed his skills for decades as a leader with the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union, fighting for worker\u2019s rights in tension-filled bargaining sessions. <\/p>\n
He also previously worked for the Cook County Police Association, a group that helped suburban police departments unionize and negotiate contracts.<\/p>\n
In 1998, he came out of retirement to practice law at a firm opened by his son, Jon Loevy. <\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy was humble, but his experience quickly became an asset, according to his son.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe started at the bottom, with 30-year-olds bossing him around, but we quickly realized he knew more than all of us combined and was the best negotiator we\u2019d ever met, and he became the heart and soul of the place,\u201d Jon Loevy said. \u201cHe had spent his career negotiating union contracts against the toughest guys you could ever imagine \u2014 so he came in pretty well versed, and it was like watching an NBA player against junior varsity most of the time.\u201d<\/p>\n
(Loevy & Loevy represents the Sun-Times in Freedom of Information Act cases.)<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy worked out of a conference room at the firm\u2019s West Loop office. Younger attorneys regularly stopped in to pick his brain.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe could come up with a strategy and could get to the bottom of a matter in like 10 seconds,\u201d said attorney Matt Topic, who learned how to be confident at the negotiating table from watching Mr. Loevy. \u201cWhen the other side got agitated, he would remain calm … and it\u2019s a total flex. It shows your confidence and strengthens your position.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is the only person I\u2019ve ever seen who could stare down and shout down a federal judge during a settlement conference,\u201d said attorney Steve Greenberg.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was always behind the scenes, but all the success we\u2019ve had we owe to him and we\u2019re grateful,\u201d Jon Loevy said.<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy was born March 21, 1939, to Carl and Rose Loevy and grew up on the North Side. His father worked at a furniture store and his mother was a homemaker. Mr. Loevy attended Von Steuben High School, Carleton College and the University of Michigan Law School.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe got out of law school could have done anything and decided to get involved in the union movement and make sure people were treated and paid fairly,\u201d Jon Loevy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a big deal in the movement,\u201d he said, adding that he was recently looking at old photos of his father with Jesse Jackson, Ted Kennedy and Richard M. Daley.<\/p>\n
In recent years, Mr. Loevy carried a leather briefcase and wore a jacket and a tie to a largely informal law office.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe never got a cellphone and didn\u2019t use email to communicate, so he never got distracted,\u201d his son said. \u201cHe came to work the day before he died, as he did every day of the week, and contributed just as he always did and was absolutely 100% sharp, had not slipped an inch. And he died in his sleep and went out on top of his game. He could not have scripted it better.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy, who most recently lived in a Gold Coast condo, made a habit of taking his watch off and giving to his son before closing arguments at a trial.<\/p>\n
\u201cSince he wasn\u2019t very sentimental, that was as close to sentimental as we ever got,\u201d Jon Loevy said.<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy also served on the executive board of the Chicago Federation of Labor, as a board member for Amalgamated Bank and as a trustee of the Textile Workers Pension Fund.<\/p>\n
Mr. Loevy, who raised his family in Northbrook, also is survived by is wife, Barbette Loevy, his daughters Karen Horowitz and Debra Loevy, and nine grandchildren. Services have been held.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arthur Loevy, a lawyer and labor leader who came out of retirement to work with his son at…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":735542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,5386,1818],"class_list":{"0":"post-735541","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-chicago","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-illinois"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116422867076462257","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}