The urban translator wants to get paid.
Wallace "Gator" Bradley says he’s owed $312,000 for eight years of work involving Mark Maxson's release from prison and his wrongful conviction lawsuit.
Maxson was freed in 2016 after his murder conviction was vacated. He sued the city, settling for $8.75 million last month.
Bradley began calling himself the urban translator almost two decades ago in another wrongful conviction case.
In 2006, a federal judge allowed Bradley to sit in court alongside former Death Row inmate Aaron Patterson, who was suing the city, claiming he also was wrongfully convicted.
Patterson's attorney had asked the judge to let Bradley help his volatile client stay calm.
The judge agreed that because Bradley and Patterson had gang backgrounds, Bradley could "translate" the legal proceedings in "urban" terminology — as courtroom translators interpret languages like Polish and Spanish.
"Mr. Bradley and him come from a different subculture, and they are familiar with each other's, let's say, emotional needs," Patterson's attorney, Frank Avila, had said at the time. "So I'm using this analogy of having a translator in a different language. And I know that sounds kind of radical, but I think that's correct. And I think Mr. Bradley would be critical in communicating with my client."
Patterson, a former Death Row inmate, got a $5 million settlement in his lawsuit, and Bradley then requested almost $250,000 for his urban translator work at $75 an hour. When he wasn’t paid, Bradley sued Patterson and Avila. Patterson gave Bradley $75,000, but a Cook County jury ruled against Bradley’s demand for money from Avila, according to court records.
Bradley is a former enforcer for the Gangster Disciples street gang under kingpin Larry Hoover. He served four years in Stateville prison for armed robbery and burglary. Bradley was granted executive clemency in 1990 by Illinois Gov. James R. Thompson.
Since then, he’s been active in politics and civil rights advocacy. In 1995, he even got into a runoff for City Council but lost to the incumbent, 3rd Ward Ald. Dorothy Tillman.
In Bradley's current quest to get paid in the Maxson case, he points to a 2013 "Urban Translator contract" he and Maxson signed. Under the agreement, he was supposed to provide “services [such] as media, community and political liaison to assist Maxson in gaining his freedom."
Bradley points out that in a 2017 memo, Maxson's attorney Elliot Zinger had vouched for Bradley, saying he "provided the above named services in an excellent manner for the past 4 years and will be seeking substantial remuneration."
Bradley is now seeking compensation for 4,160 hours of work over eight years at a rate of $75 per hour — equal to almost a year and a half of eight-hour workdays, including weekends.
To resolve the fee dispute, Zinger and Maxson's other lawyer, Larry Dreyfus, filed a petition on Feb. 3 in Cook County Circuit Court. It says a mediation between Maxson and Bradley didn’t work out last month and the city won’t release the settlement money until Bradley’s financial lien against Maxson is lifted.
The lawyers say they can’t ethically represent Maxson or Bradley in their dispute, so they're calling on the men to represent themselves or hire different lawyers.
Maxson couldn't be reached for comment, and Dreyfus would only say, "We have encouraged them to resolve it."
"This is about greed," Bradley says. "To resolve it is easy. Pay me what you owe me. I did the work."
