Bill Text: IL HR0715 | 2025-2026 | 104th General Assembly | Introduced

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Bill Title: Mourns the passing of Standish E. "Kwame" Willis, Esq. of Chicago.

Sponsorship: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1)

Status: (Passed) 2026-03-18 - Resolution Adopted [HR0715 Detail]

Download: Illinois-2025-HR0715-Introduced.html

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HOUSE RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois House of
Representatives are saddened to learn of the death of Standish
E. "Kwame" Willis, Esq. of Chicago, who passed away on
February 28, 2025; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis, born to Andrew and Plumie Willis on
August 16, 1941, was a lifelong Chicagoan who was raised on the
West Side and under the Church of God in Christ (COGIC) faith;
he was a first-generation high school graduate who enlisted
into the United States Air Force during the Vietnam War; after
being honorably discharged, he worked as a bus driver for the
Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), where he helped organize
several wildcat strikes, including the largest in Chicago's
history that disrupted travel city-wide during the 1968
Democratic National Convention, which helped win concessions
from the CTA union and led the City of Chicago to begin
dismantling racist policies and practices impacting Black
drivers; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis, while still with the CTA, attended
Crane Junior College, where he was an active student leader;
during his studies, he led a march to protest the murders of
Black college students by South Carolina National Guardsmen in
Orangeburg, South Carolina; he also served as editor of the

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college yearbook, founded the Afro-American History Club, and
was elected as president of Student Government, through which
he led the student movement to name the new campus after
Malcolm X; upon completing his associate's degree, he
transferred to the University of Chicago, earning a Bachelor
of Arts and a master's degree in Latin American Studies; he
studied economics at the master's degree level at the
University of Illinois Chicago, and he earned his Juris Doctor
from Chicago-Kent College of Law; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis became a lawyer who specialized in
civil rights, police brutality and misconduct, criminal
defense work, and human rights; he initially joined Peoples'
Law Office (PLO) as a partner, during which time he also joined
the Lawyers for Washington movement; he served PLO for several
years prior to establishing his own firm, The Law Office of
Standish E. Willis, in 1989; he tried numerous federal jury
trials and several state jury and bench trials, and he argued
many cases before the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals; he
also litigated hundreds of civil rights lawsuits against many
municipalities involving public officials, served on the
Federal Defender Panel and its prestigious Selection
Committee, and was named one of Chicago's "Tough Lawyers" by
Chicago magazine in 2002; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis taught in various settings over the

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course of his professional life, devoting the same level of
dedication and rigor to the classroom that he brought to the
courtroom and community organizing; he taught a number of
courses, including the GED program at Malcom X College,
African American history at Stateville Correctional Center,
and economics at Roosevelt University for ten years; he was a
frequent guest lecturer at Chicago-area law schools and led
annual workshops for lawyers and lay people across the nation,
providing state-certified continuing legal education (CLE)
credits; he served as a faculty-lecturer for the annual civil
rights seminar sponsored by the Illinois Institute for
Continuing Legal Education (IICLE), the Chicago-Kent College
of Law, and the American Bar Association in the area of 42
U.S.C. 1983 on civil rights liability and litigation; he also
maintained speaking engagements on issues related to the
criminal justice system, the death penalty, police brutality,
community control of police, the prison-industrial complex,
America's political prisoners, racism and the American legal
system, international human rights, and reparations; further,
he was the subject of and contributed to chapters and articles
of numerous books, dissertations, and documentaries; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis founded the grassroots organization
Black People Against Police Torture (BPAPT) in 2005; he led a
coalition of lawyers, activists, and community members to
internationalize the Chicago Police Torture cases by means of

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international human rights mechanisms and treaties to which
the U.S. was subject; he presented evidence of police torture
before both the Organization of American States'
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in 2005 and the
United Nations' Committee to Eliminate Racial Discrimination
(CERD) in 2008, helping to bring a modicum of justice in the
Chicago police torture cases by sparking the indictment of
former Chicago Police Department Commander Jon Burge; through
BPAPT, he called for reparations, was among the first to
challenge Chicago's right to host the Olympics, coined the now
familiar phrase of "the torture capital of the U. S.", and
personally initiated and drafted the legislative bill which
was ultimately enacted in 2009 in the form of the Illinois
Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission (TIRC), securing justice
and freeing many torture victims and survivors; and
WHEREAS, Stan Kwame was involved in many social justice
campaigns, including the Free South Africa Movement to end
Apartheid; he organized the African-American Defense Committee
Against Police Violence after the televised beating of Rodney
King in 1991 and The Riverdale Eight, a group of
African-American women who were brutalized by Riverdale police
officers, in 1995; he joined many abolitionists globally to
spare former Black Panther Party member Mumia Abu Jamal from
execution, organizing and chairing the African-American
Committee to Free Mumia Abu Jamal; he continued educating and

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mobilizing support for all victims of racial and political
oppression, including the numerous victims of the notorious
Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) by authoring a
stakeholders' report on COINTELPRO Political Prisoners in
2010, which was submitted to the first UN Universal Periodic
Review (UPR) of the United States; he was also instrumental in
leading then-Governor George H. Ryan to clearing Illinois'
death row and commuting the death sentences of four men who had
been convicted based on tortured confessions; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis was a longtime member of the National
Conference of Black Lawyers (NCBL), serving as chair of its
Chicago Chapter; he was a longtime board member for the Black
United Fund of Illinois (BUFI) and co-founded several
significant institutions, including the Communiversity, a
pre-cursor to the Center for Inner City Studies, the Black
Student Congress, African Liberation Day in Chicago, the
National Anti-Imperialist Movement in Solidarity with African
Liberation, the Chicago Conference of Black Lawyers/NCBL
affiliate, and the Office of HBCU Development and
International Cooperation (OHBCUD); he also served as a member
of the Durban 400 in 2001, helping secure a UN declaration that
the Transatlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity;
and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis was often recognized for his

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unswerving commitment to social justice work and solidarity by
groups across racial, generational, and class lines, including
the National Lawyers Guild, the Arab American Action Network,
the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, the Cook County Bar
Association, and the National Conference of Black Lawyers; he
became the namesake of the Standish E. Willis Community
Service Award by Black law students at Chicago-Kent College of
Law in 1984; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis will be remembered as a tireless
advocate for oppressed communities across the globe who stayed
true to his Chicago roots and Pan African calling, remaining
guided by the needs of the community and the people; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis was preceded in death by his parents
and his youngest brother, Sheldon "Rell"; and
WHEREAS, Stan Willis is survived by his wife, Sali Vickie
Casanova-Willis; his children, Lil' Reggie, Heavenly, Akiza,
Kimani, Ayesha, Amilcar, Charis, Ricky, Carlos, and Reyna; his
siblings, Winnette and Reginald; and a host of grandchildren,
great-grandchildren, great-great-grandchildren, cousins,
friends, and comrades; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE ONE
HUNDRED FOURTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that

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we mourn the passing of Standish E. "Kwame" Willis, Esq. and
extend our sincere condolences to his family, friends, and all
who knew and loved him; and be it further
RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
presented to the family of Stan Willis as an expression of our
deepest sympathy.