Insanity defense wins acquittal for judge who had altercation with deputies
A Chicago judge accused of shoving a deputy last year has been found not guilty of battery by reason of insanity.
Cook County Circuit Judge Cynthia Brim was acquitted Monday after a bench trial before Will County Judge Liam Brennan, the Chicago Tribune reports.
Brim, who was charged with misdemeanor battery after an altercation with sheriff’s deputies last year at the Daley Center in downtown Chicago, had been suspended from her $182,000-a-year job while the charge against her was pending.
But she was re-elected to the bench in a retention election last November with 63.5 percent of the vote.
Brim was accused of approaching deputies at the Daley Center’s security checkpoint last March and asking them if they had found any keys. After being shown three sets of keys, she claimed one set and walked away.
She returned a few minutes later, authorities said, and, with no explanation, threw the keys at one deputy and shoved another in the chest with both hands.
Brim’s lawyer, James Montgomery, said in his opening statement Monday that his client was legally insane at the time.
But prosecutors that Brim was “criminally responsible” for her actions because she had chosen to stop taking her anti-psychotic medications.
