One officer dismisses 2 tickets out of every 10. Another dismisses 7 out of every 10.
They are judging the same violations, filed the same way, in the same city, in the same years. The strongest predictor of whether a driver loses is not the ticket, the evidence, or the neighborhood. It is the name at the bottom of the ruling.
Same city. Same court. Same way of contesting.
Both are hearing officers with the City of Chicago, deciding mail contests between 2019 and 2025. Each number below is that officer's own record across every case they decided. They did not sit for the same stretch — Hurse's whole 2019–2025 record falls in 2019, Quinn's runs to 2025 — so the fairest read is 2019, the year they overlap. Measured there alone the gap is 53.5 points, against 53.0 pooled. It is not a difference of era.
Neither is an outlier. Every other officer on the bench falls somewhere between them.
They are not hearing different tickets, either. 11 violations were decided at least 100 times by both of them. Compared one violation at a time, Quinn dismisses the higher share in 11 of 11 — expired plates, meters, city stickers, street cleaning, red light and speed alike.
The tipping point moves 53 points across the bench.
All 65 officers who decided 500+ mail contests, ranked. The line down the middle marks the halfway point — where a driver's odds are a coin flip. Officers above it say no more often than yes; officers below it say yes more often than no. This chart pools every violation together; the next two sections hold the violation constant and the spread survives.
Full ranked table — all 65 officers
| # | Hearing officer | Decided | Dismissed |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lonathan D. Hurse | 5,972 | 20% |
| 2 | Robert W. Soelter | 2,090 | 29% |
| 3 | Harriet J. Parker | 4,077 | 30% |
| 4 | Marcia K. Johnson | 670 | 33% |
| 5 | Robert A. Sussman | 39,418 | 34.1% |
| 6 | Rodney Stewart | 8,044 | 35.3% |
| 7 | Donna Rizzuto | 4,354 | 38.1% |
| 8 | Ewa B. Price | 1,745 | 38.6% |
| 9 | Mary Jo Strusz | 5,603 | 41.8% |
| 10 | David Badillo | 18,583 | 42% |
| 11 | Ralph Reyna | 2,648 | 43% |
| 12 | Daniel Ruiz | 3,980 | 43.3% |
| 13 | Laurie Samuels | 3,017 | 43.3% |
| 14 | Heather Neaveill | 2,059 | 43.5% |
| 15 | Kyra G. Payne | 1,899 | 43.5% |
| 16 | Rhonda Sallee | 839 | 43.5% |
| 17 | Heather Neaveill-Kramer | 5,335 | 43.8% |
| 18 | Julie G. Davis | 1,273 | 44.5% |
| 19 | Jorge Cazares | 5,092 | 46% |
| 20 | Michael G. Cawley | 19,658 | 46.2% |
| 21 | Ricardo Lugo | 14,800 | 46.3% |
| 22 | Denis E. Guest | 15,381 | 46.4% |
| 23 | Melissa Ortiz | 1,334 | 46.5% |
| 24 | Julie Haran-King | 23,054 | 46.8% |
| 25 | Dyahanne Ware | 13,673 | 46.9% |
| 26 | Joan T. Alvarez | 20,522 | 46.9% |
| 27 | Gregory G. Plesha | 4,278 | 47.2% |
| 28 | Robert W. Barber | 6,284 | 47.5% |
| 29 | Urie R.Clark | 35,237 | 47.7% |
| 30 | Mitchell C. Ex | 4,603 | 47.8% |
| 31 | Philip L. Bernstein | 4,263 | 49.2% |
| 32 | Mark S. Boyle | 16,754 | 49.3% |
| 33 | Mable Taylor | 7,163 | 49.7% |
| 34 | Jose Padilla | 27,822 | 50% |
| 35 | Zedrick T. Braden | 3,861 | 50.1% |
| 36 | Gia L. Morris | 37,385 | 50.4% |
| 37 | Jewel Klein | 16,478 | 50.6% |
| 38 | Michael J. Dudek | 30,116 | 50.9% |
| 39 | Mark Moreno | 14,066 | 51% |
| 40 | Karen B. Breashears | 6,296 | 51.1% |
| 41 | Hugo Chaviano | 19,145 | 51.2% |
| 42 | Boye Akinwande | 934 | 51.7% |
| 43 | Mamie Alexander | 26,760 | 54.9% |
| 44 | Rhonda L. Walker | 2,183 | 54.9% |
| 45 | Alfred Quijano | 25,501 | 55.1% |
| 46 | Katie Diggins | 1,527 | 55.4% |
| 47 | Rachel L. Berger | 881 | 55.4% |
| 48 | Barbara J. Bell | 6,731 | 56.1% |
| 49 | Eileen McHugh | 28,739 | 56.2% |
| 50 | Evelyn Ginger Mance | 10,831 | 56.7% |
| 51 | James Reilly | 11,068 | 56.7% |
| 52 | Michael E. Connelly | 22,711 | 57.6% |
| 53 | Jean M. Brabeck | 21,056 | 57.7% |
| 54 | Elreta C. Dickinson | 22,564 | 57.9% |
| 55 | Taryn Springs | 4,091 | 57.9% |
| 56 | J. Paula Roderick | 5,497 | 59.1% |
| 57 | Zipporah J. Lewis | 4,567 | 59.2% |
| 58 | Kathryn Bailey | 7,801 | 59.6% |
| 59 | Martin J. Kennelly Jr. | 26,362 | 60.8% |
| 60 | Eli R. Johnson | 4,772 | 62.2% |
| 61 | Bernadette Freeman | 9,245 | 63.6% |
| 62 | Joseph Chico | 3,861 | 64.6% |
| 63 | Casandra Watson | 546 | 67.9% |
| 64 | Karen L. Riley | 7,813 | 70% |
| 65 | Michael Quinn | 62,803 | 73% |
“The harsh ones just get harder cases.” They don't.
If case mix explained the spread, holding the violation constant would collapse it. Here is the same chart for one single violation — expired plate or temporary registration, 2019-2025, 50 officers with 500+ decided cases each. Same statute, same contest method, same years. The spread does not collapse. It widens to 78.4 points.
Tighter still. That range pools 2019-2025, and the citywide mail dismissal rate moved a long way inside it, so an officer who only sat in a harsh year would look harsh for reasons that are not about them. Collapse it to a single calendar year — 2019, the year Hurse actually sat — and 47 officers decided 150+ of this one violation. The spread is still 71.2 points: 15.2% to 86.4%. One violation, one year, one filing method, nothing averaged.
Full ranked table — all 50 officers
| # | Hearing officer | Decided | Dismissed |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Lonathan D. Hurse | 893 | 15.2% |
| 2 | Harriet J. Parker | 599 | 30.4% |
| 3 | Heather Neaveill-Kramer | 556 | 44.4% |
| 4 | Donna Rizzuto | 705 | 48.8% |
| 5 | Gregory G. Plesha | 614 | 51.6% |
| 6 | Dyahanne Ware | 1,820 | 51.9% |
| 7 | Robert A. Sussman | 4,983 | 53.5% |
| 8 | Daniel Ruiz | 537 | 54% |
| 9 | Rodney Stewart | 1,389 | 55.1% |
| 10 | Mitchell C. Ex | 654 | 58.7% |
| 11 | Jorge Cazares | 1,118 | 59.1% |
| 12 | Mary Jo Strusz | 854 | 60.2% |
| 13 | Jewel Klein | 2,262 | 62.3% |
| 14 | David Badillo | 2,935 | 62.8% |
| 15 | Denis E. Guest | 2,312 | 64.4% |
| 16 | Zedrick T. Braden | 537 | 64.8% |
| 17 | Joan T. Alvarez | 3,324 | 65.4% |
| 18 | Michael G. Cawley | 3,642 | 67.7% |
| 19 | Michael E. Connelly | 3,777 | 68.7% |
| 20 | Philip L. Bernstein | 715 | 68.7% |
| 21 | Michael J. Dudek | 4,491 | 71.1% |
| 22 | Jose Padilla | 4,619 | 71.2% |
| 23 | Gia L. Morris | 6,771 | 72.2% |
| 24 | Barbara J. Bell | 1,172 | 72.5% |
| 25 | Julie Haran-King | 4,393 | 72.9% |
| 26 | Mark Moreno | 2,192 | 73.1% |
| 27 | Robert W. Barber | 880 | 73.6% |
| 28 | James Reilly | 1,939 | 73.9% |
| 29 | Eli R. Johnson | 802 | 74.7% |
| 30 | Mark S. Boyle | 2,744 | 76.9% |
| 31 | Mamie Alexander | 3,664 | 77% |
| 32 | Ricardo Lugo | 2,214 | 77.6% |
| 33 | Martin J. Kennelly Jr. | 4,460 | 79.2% |
| 34 | J. Paula Roderick | 916 | 79.5% |
| 35 | Mable Taylor | 1,002 | 79.7% |
| 36 | Urie R.Clark | 5,375 | 80% |
| 37 | Zipporah J. Lewis | 701 | 80.3% |
| 38 | Karen B. Breashears | 961 | 81.7% |
| 39 | Taryn Springs | 682 | 82.3% |
| 40 | Evelyn Ginger Mance | 1,906 | 83.9% |
| 41 | Eileen McHugh | 4,649 | 84.6% |
| 42 | Jean M. Brabeck | 3,922 | 84.8% |
| 43 | Hugo Chaviano | 3,231 | 85.6% |
| 44 | Elreta C. Dickinson | 3,893 | 86% |
| 45 | Kathryn Bailey | 1,658 | 88.1% |
| 46 | Alfred Quijano | 3,749 | 89% |
| 47 | Joseph Chico | 765 | 89.5% |
| 48 | Bernadette Freeman | 1,653 | 90.3% |
| 49 | Karen L. Riley | 1,513 | 93.1% |
| 50 | Michael Quinn | 10,288 | 93.6% |
The same officers judge the same way a decade later.
Two FOIA productions cover two eras. 40 officers appear in both and can be matched one-to-one. Each dot is one of them — their dismissal rate in 2012–2018 across the bottom, 2019–2025 up the side. Dots land on the dashed line when an officer judged the same way ten years apart. Hover any dot to name the officer.
Across these same 40 officers the average barely moved — 48.7% then, 49.4% now — so this is not a citywide drift carrying everyone along together. Individual officers keep their own posture across ten years, two mayors, and a rebuilt hearing system.
Most of them keep their distance from the city.
The chart above compares two eras. This one draws every year separately — 30 officers who decided 150+ mail contests in each of at least 8 years, so no dot is a small sample.
The scale is not the raw dismissal rate. The citywide rate swings on its own — 50.7% in 2012, 39.8% in 2020, 61.4% in 2024 — and plotting raw rates draws the city's swing far louder than any officer, so every line dips in 2020 together and it reads as though the system moved everyone. So each dot is that officer's distance from the citywide rate that year. Zero means they judged like the city did. Removing the tide cuts the year-to-year wobble from 5.8 points to 3.7, while the gap between officers stays 9.4 — what is left is the officer. Hover any dot for the officer, the year and both numbers.
“Everyone holds a lane” would be too strong, so here is the count: 12 of the 30 never once cross from one side of the pack to the other in their entire career — not in fourteen years, not in either direction. The other 18 do cross at least once. Sussman and Stewart are picked out in colour precisely because they wander, and a reader should see that as clearly as they see Quinn and Hurse holding station 43.599999999999994 points apart.
And the cheap way to fight a ticket is the losing one.
In all fourteen years, showing up in person beat mailing it in. Most drivers cannot take a morning off work to attend.
Everything above, as files.
These are the exact files the charts are drawn from. No registration, no request.
hearing_officers_overall.csvEvery officer, both eras, mail contests — decided cases, dismissals, ratehearing_officers_by_violation.csvOfficer × violation, mail contests — the case-mix control (930 rows)hearing_officers_by_method.csvOfficer × contest method (mail vs in-person)same_officer_across_eras.csvThe 40 officers matched one-to-one across both FOIA productionsofficer_by_year.csvOfficer × year — every officer-year behind the lanes chartcitywide_by_year_method.csvCitywide dismissal rate by year and method, 2012–2025The underlying releases and the City's own response letters are on our data sources page.
How to check this.
Source. Chicago Department of Administrative Hearings, released under 5 ILCS 140 as FOIA H118909-110325 (citations issued 2019–present) and H150277-083126 (Aug 2012 – Dec 2018). One row per adjudicated case, with the officer, contest method, violation, disposition and reason as recorded by the City.
What counts as a decision. Only Not Liable and Liable. Dismissal rate = Not Liable ÷ (Not Liable + Liable). Continuances, withdrawals and denials are not decisions and are excluded. The officer charts use mail contests only, so the channel is held constant.
Thresholds. An officer needs 500+ decided cases to appear, so no rate here rests on a handful of files.
Names are left exactly as the City recorded them. That means “Heather Neaveill” and “Heather Neaveill-Kramer” appear as two entries, almost certainly one person recorded under two identities. We did not merge them, because deciding that two names are one person is an inference and this should stay faithful to the source. Their rates are 43.5% and 43.8%, both mid-range, so nothing here turns on it — and neither end of the range is affected. It is the only such pair in the 2019–2025 set.
The two productions name officers differently — usernames (quinnm) before 2019, full names (Michael Quinn) after. A naive join returns zero matches and looks like total turnover. We matched only where it is one-to-one in both directions and dropped the two we could not resolve, including a pair of usernames that both fit one person. The decade-persistence chart above uses the 40 that survived.
Autopilot America contests Chicago parking tickets for drivers by mail. We filed these FOIAs to learn what actually wins. We are publishing the officer analysis because it is a fact about the hearing system that drivers cannot see and we can. Reporters are welcome to use, cite, or audit any of it; if a reproduction run disagrees with a number here, tell us and we will re-check the source. Contact randyvollrath@gmail.com.