Chicago police reopen 2004 homicide

CHICAGO, Feb. 28 (UPI) -- Police in Chicago say they're reopening an investigation into a homicide case involving a nephew of Mayor Richard Daley.

Richard J. Varenko, Daley's nephew, was one of a group that got into an altercation outside a bar that resulted in the death of David Koschman, 21, in 2004, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Monday.

During a brawl between Varenko's party and four young men, including Koschman, outside a Rush Street bar, someone -- police have yet to identify -- punched the 5-foot-5 Koschman, who fell, struck his head on the street and died 12 days later.

The Cook County medical examiner's office ruled it homicide but no one has ever been charged.

Police and prosecutors say that's because their investigation concluded Koschman was the aggressor and that whoever hit him was acting in self-defense.

Critics say the investigation was mishandled

Detectives didn't begin interviewing witnesses until after Koschman died, they say, and didn't conduct lineups to try to identify who threw the punch until almost a month after the incident.

In what law-enforcement sources call an unusual move, the police department has assigned the reinvestigation of Koschman's death to a different detective bureau and prosecutors say their files on the case have disappeared.

"They declined charges, but they can't find the file?" said Richard Kling, a criminal defense attorney and college law professor. "I've been doing this for 39 years, literally thousands of cases. I've never seen a felony-review file missing. Ever. Never heard of one.

"There's certainly some red flags. Like not investigating the case earlier, a missing felony-review file, transferring the case from one area to another and not having lineups until a month later."