A Chicago police special unit faces possible investigation in the wake of an Illinois death row inmate's claims that detectives tortured him to extract a false confession. In 1986 Aaron Patterson claims officers in the unit suffocated him with a plastic typewriter cover until he confessed to the murder of an elderly couple. Patterson will have a chance to recount his allegations at a hearing granted by the Illinois Supreme Court.

The court's ruling has attorneys and police brutality groups calling for an outside investigation into the police group known as "Area 2." Lt. Jon Burge headed the special unit. Burge was fired in 1993 after a similar incident in which an inmate was tortured into making a false confession. The current allegations are another damaging blow to Illinois' criminal justice system, which has freed thirteen death row inmates since 1977 because of wrongful convictions.