The mother of an 11-year-old boy fatally stabbed while protecting her has filed a lawsuit claiming the state ignored the danger posed by her ex-boyfriend, who is charged in the attack and was released from prison a day before it.
Crosetti Brand, 37, is charged with forcing his way into Laterria Smith’s Edgewater apartment March 13, 2024, and stabbing her and her son, Jayden Perkins. The boy died at a hospital.
The lawsuit, filed Thursday, claims several levels of enforcement failed its oversight by ignoring Smith’s calls for help and Brand’s history of domestic violence before releasing him from prison one day before the stabbings.
Brand was released from Stateville Correctional Center after having been sent back to prison earlier in the year for menacing the mother while on parole. Smith had been a victim of multiple domestic violence cases against Brand, including repeated violations of protection orders, according to the lawsuit.
The Illinois Prison Review Board, Department of Corrections, the Chicago Police Department, Cook County Sheriff’s Office, and the city and county are named as defendants in the lawsuit. It also names former Prison Review Board chair Donald Shelton and board member LeAnn Miller, who both stepped down shortly following the attack.
“Despite clear warnings, documented parole violations, and explicit threats, Defendants willfully ignored the danger posed by Crosetti Brand, a convicted violent offender with a long history of domestic violence, aggravated battery, and parole violations,” the lawsuit states. “They failed to protect Ms. Smith and her children — despite multiple opportunities and legal obligations to do so.”
Smith, 34, was four months pregnant at the time, and her 5-year-old son also witnessed the attack which he described to a child advocate as “savaging.”
Prosecutors have said the woman had been alerted when Brand was released on parole in a separate case in October 2023 because she was the victim in previous domestic violence cases against Brand.
Brand had sent text messages to Smith in the following months, including one Jan. 30, 2024, threatening her family, according to prosecutors and the lawsuit. Two days later, he allegedly appeared at the door of her apartment building in the 5900 block of North Ravenswood Avenue while she had a protective order against him.
The lawsuit claims Chicago police officers didn’t take a report of that incident and dismissed Smith’s “urgent pleas and instructed her to return to court to obtain another protective order, despite the existing order being valid and enforceable.”
Brand turned himself in the next day and he was sent to Stateville Correctional Center for parole violations.
A Cook County judge later denied Smith a protective order against Brand on Feb. 21, finding that Brand didn’t pose a threat to her because he was in custody. A hearing was set in that case for March 13, 2024, the same day as the attack.
The Prison Review Board ordered Brand’s release after a Feb. 26, 2024, hearing in which he denied visiting Smith’s home earlier that month, the lawsuit states.
Brand, who faces felony counts of murder, attempted murder, home invasion, domestic battery and other charges in relation to the stabbings, is due back in court Monday in that case.
The Chicago Police Department and Prison Review Board said they don’t comment on pending litigation.
Mohammad Samra contributed.