Illinois Justice Project News Summary
April 7 - 13 2020
COVID-19 - COOK COUNTY JAIL - COMMENTARY
April 12 - Daily Herald commentary by Sharone Mitchell Jr.: "Releasing more prisoners the only way to prevent more deaths" . . . "The only safe response is removing enough people from the jail to slow the spread of infection by increasing physical distance. Locking the jail doors and throwing away the keys will not make it better for those held there or those working there and the family and friends of those workers."
COVID-19 - COOK COUNTY JAIL LAWSUITS
April 7 - Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "Detainees sue Cook County sheriff for release" . . . "A federal judge has agreed to fast-track a lawsuit filed last week against Cook County Sheriff Thomas J. Dart that calls for him to release or transfer detainees from the county jail to protect them against the spread of the novel coronavirus."
April 7 - Chicago Tribune: "Sheriff defends attempts to curb coronavirus at Cook County Jail as judge mulls lawsuit seeking releases" . . . "During two hours of arguments held by telephone before U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly, Dart’s legal team said the sheriff was ahead of the curve in recognizing the threat of the virus in the jail’s cramped conditions." . . . "While Kennelly did not rule on Tuesday, he did indicate that the plaintiffs had yet to clear an important hurdle for a temporary restraining order: proving that there was no remedy for detainees to argue at the state court level that they should be released due to the COVID-19 crisis."
April 7 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Federal judge holds hearing on lawsuit filed over Cook County Jail coronavirus response"
April 9 - Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "City files brief backing sheriff, opposes suit to release detainees" . . . "Attorneys for the city of Chicago filed an amicus brief in federal court Wednesday night, outlining opposition to a lawsuit that calls for Cook County Sheriff Thomas J. Dart to release detainees from the county jail to protect them against the spread of the novel coronavirus. Corporation Counsel Mark A. Flessner and Deputy Corporation Counsel Stephen J. Kane contend in the three-page document that releasing medically vulnerable detainees 'threatens to consume the resources of the [c]ity and endanger the health of its residents.'"
April 9 - Chicago Tribune: "Federal judge orders testing measures at Cook County Jail, but rejects request to order immediate releases due to coronavirus"
April 9 - WBEZ: "Judge Says Cook County Doesn’t Have To Release Inmates, But Conditions Must Improve"
April 9 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Family of Cook County Jail detainee who died of COVID-19 sues sheriff, county"
April 9 - WBBM-TV, CBS2, Chicago: "Family Of Cook County Jail Inmate Who Died Of COVID-19 Files Lawsuit, Takes Issue With Practice Of Shackling Inmates To Hospital Beds"
April 10 - Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "No inmate releases, but Sheriff Dart ordered to make jail fixes"
COVID-19 - COOK COUNTY JAIL
April 7 - Injustice Watch: "Former U. Chicago student, shot by police, has COVID-19 symptoms in Cook County jail"
April 8 - New York Times: "Chicago’s Jail Is Top U.S. Hot Spot as Virus Spreads Behind Bars" . . . "The jail in Chicago is now the nation’s largest-known source of coronavirus infections, according to data compiled by The New York Times, with more confirmed cases than the U.S.S. Theodore Roosevelt, a nursing home in Kirkland, Wash., or the cluster centered on New Rochelle, N.Y. The Cook County Sheriff’s Office, which operates the jail, said Wednesday that 238 inmates and 115 staff members had tested positive for the virus. But those figures most likely downplay the actual problem, the jail acknowledged, because the vast majority of the jail’s 4,500 inmates have not been tested."
April 9 - Chicago Tribune by Annie Sweeney: "Neighbors rally to local handyman locked up in Cook County Jail as threat of coronavirus spreads"
April 9 - Chicago Tribune editorial: "Coronavirus in Cook County Jail: Protect detainees, the public and criminal justice system"
April 10 - Chicago Tribune: "Second inmate at Cook County Jail dies of COVID-19, and the family of the first files lawsuit"
April 10 - WBEZ by Shannon Heffernan: "Nurses Warn COVID-19 Cases At Cook County Jail Aren’t Just Staying Behind Bars"
April 11 - WGN-TV: "‘Help us’: Cook County inmates post signs in windows as COVID-19 cases mount" . . . "Several signs were spotted in inmates’ windows throughout Division X, a maximum security facility. Some signs said 'help us, don’t let us die' and 'save us.'"
April 12 - Chicago Sun-Times: "3rd detainee with coronavirus dies as cases at Cook County Jail top 300"
April 12 - WGN-AM, Matt Bubala Show: "Lack of equipment at Cook County jail raises concern for virus hotspot" . . . "Cook County Jail staffers don’t have proper access to personal protective gear and hand sanitizer despite close contact with detainees in a facility where COVID-19 is reported to be a “hotspot” according to the correctional officers’ union who have represent jail staff."
April 13 - Chicago Tribune: "Inmate’s long fight with criminal justice system ends in coronavirus death"
April 13 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Former NU prof wants out of Cook County Jail to help with coronavirus research" . . . "As Cook County Jail struggles to contain one of the most virulent outbreaks of COVID-19 in the country, one of the world’s leading infectious disease experts who is a detainee there wants out, saying he can help with the pandemic. Even before Wyndham Lathem made international headlines as the target of a week-long manhunt that began after his boyfriend was discovered murdered in a River North apartment three years ago, the microbiologist had been world-renowned for his research on the bubonic plague."
April 13 - NPR News by Cheryl Corley: "The COVID-19 Struggle In Chicago's Cook County Jail"
COVID-19 - COOK COUNTY JUVENILE TEMPORARY DETENTION CENTER
April 8 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Another chief judge’s office employee at juvenile detention center contracts COVID-19" . . . "The newly confirmed case is at least the second employee at the Juvenile Temporary Detention Center to contract the virus. On Monday, the chief judge’s office said a 16-year-old detainee at the detention center contracted COVID-19, the first resident at the facility to test positive for the disease."
COVID-19 - IDOC
April 7 - The Appeal: "Prisoners in Illinois describe dire conditions amid coronavirus outbreak" . . . "It took a prisoner’s death ‘just for them to pass out a single extra bar of soap,’ one incarcerated man said."
April 7 - WAND-TV, Decatur: "With inmates released during pandemic, sisters hope to reunite" . . . "Cases of the virus are showing up at the Logan County-based prison. Statistics from the Illinois Department of Corrections showed four staff members and one inmate were infected. Amber Morrison, the oldest of seven, said it is dire for her sister to come home. Morrison said Kimberlee suffered from lung infections and her left lung is scarred."
April 11 - Galesburg Register-Mail: "Second Henry Hill Correctional Center inmate tests positive for COVID-19"
April 12 - Shaw Media: "Another staff member tests positive for COVID-19 at Sheridan Correctional Center" . . . "With 10 confirmed inmate cases, Sheridan has 2nd most cases in the state's prison system"
April 13 - Chicago Crusader: "With health problems, Roosevelt Myles’ attorney push for his release" . . . "The attorney for Roosevelt Myles on Friday, April 3, submitted a letter to Governor J.B. Pritzker, asking him to grant clemency to the Chicago man who has been in prison for 28 years for a murder he didn’t commit. As Myles struggles with underlying health conditions, his attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, is concerned that his life is at serious risk as the coronavirus pandemic threatens to spread through the state’s prison system. As numerous red-tape delays force Myles’ post-conviction appeal to drag on, Myles continues to struggle from diabetes, and high blood pressure. Bonjean believes time is running out to save the life of an innocent man."
April 13 - Chicago Tribune: "Five inmates that tested positive for COVID-19 in the state prison system have died" . . . "As on Monday, the Illinois Department of Corrections has announced confirmed cases in 14 of its nearly four dozen facilities. The problem at Stateville is particularly dire, where most of the system’s 107 staff and 146 inmates who tested positive are located."
COVID-19 - IDOC LAWSUIT AND EXECUTIVE ORDER ON FURLOUGHS
April 6 - Chicago Tribune: (corrects the link in last week's news summary) "Pritzker signs executive order allowing medical furloughs for IDOC inmates vulnerable to coronavirus" . . . "Gov. J.B. Pritzker has expanded eligibility for inmates’ medical furloughs in hopes of minimizing the spread of COVID-19 in state prisons." . . . "Pritzker’s order comes on the heels of lawsuits filed last week seeking the release of thousands of Illinois prisoners amid the alarming spread of the coronavirus." (COVID-19 EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 19)
April 7 - WBEZ by Shannon Heffernan: "Illinois Officials Say They Reacted Quickly And Aggressively To COVID-19 Threat In Prisons" . . . "In the court filing arguing against the federal court’s intervention, Illinois officials say they’ve already stopped new admissions into the state’s prisons and have granted early release or medical furloughs to over 500 people behind bars. The filing says the state’s total prison population has dropped by about 1,000 people over the last month."
April 7 - Chicago Reader: "As COVID-19 spreads through Illinois prisons, inmates and advocates seek clemencies and medical furloughs to save lives." . . . "'I’m coughing, I’m wheezing, I haven’t been tested for COVID, there’s several individuals in my wing that haven’t been tested for COVID and have clear symptoms of the virus,' Eugene Ross, a prisoner in segregation at Stateville, said in a voice recording delivered to members of the media by inmate advocates. Ross complained that authorities had taken measures to prevent inmates from placing phone calls to their families, that food supplies were dwindling, and that a plan was underway to move prisoners into a condemned wing of the facility that he referred to as 'a torture chamber.'"
April 8 - Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "Pritzker signs executive order expanding prison furloughs" . . . "Executive Order 2020-21 suspends a 14-day time limit for furloughs as well as a need to seek 'available' medical services under the Unified Code of Corrections, giving Rob Jeffreys, acting director of the Illinois Department of Corrections, authority to release 'medically vulnerable' prisoners to home confinement “for up to the duration of the Gubernatorial Disaster Proclamations” related to coronavirus."
April 9 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Parents, advocates urge Pritzker to release inmates as prison coronavirus cases skyrocket" . . . "Pritzker signed an executive order Monday that allows the Illinois Department Of Corrections to furlough “medically vulnerable” inmates. More than 500 prisoners have been released by IDOC, according to Pritzker’s office. But advocates warn that Illinois prisons mostly house people serving time for violent crimes and aren’t eligible for early release — which could prove deadly during the pandemic."
April 10 - Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "Inmate-release process deemed constitutional" . . . "A federal judge Friday blocked a bid by state prisoners for an accelerated release or transfer amid the coronavirus, finding state officials’ current processes don’t violate their constitutional rights. U.S. District Judge Robert M. Dow denied requests for emergency orders that would have ordered Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Robert Jeffreys, acting director of the Illinois Department of Corrections, to release or move prisoners to their homes to self-isolate in medical furlough."
April 10 - Chicago Tribune: "Federal judge declines to step in and order state to release more inmates in the face of COVID-19 threat" . . . "U.S. District Judge Robert Dow issued the opinion a week after a pair of lawsuits were filed by a consortium of Chicago civil rights attorneys and community activists seeking the release of as many as 13,000 prisoners due to the COVID-19 crisis, including many who were convicted of nonviolent offenses, are elderly, at elevated risk to get ill, or have already served most of their sentences."
April 11 - Illinois Radio Network: "State Lawmaker Speaks Out on Furloughs" . . . "State Rep. John Cabello, R-Machesney Park, is critical of the lack of details surrounding the order, which allows prisoners who meet certain criteria to be released in order to help slow the spread of coronavirus."
April 13 - Slate: "It’s Time to Start Releasing Some Prisoners With Violent Records" . . . "But how dangerous is it to release prisoners with violent records? We recently carried out an empirical study using post-release crime data on hundreds of thousands of such prisoners. We found that it is much less dangerous than you probably think. And during this pandemic, we can add, it seems doubtless much less dangerous than keeping them behind bars."
April 13 - Chicago Reader: "‘I’m not overreacting’" . . . "A man who has waited 20 years for a court-ordered hearing is trying to secure release from prison before the virus hits."
COVID-19 - CLEMENCY
Chicago Tribune: "Gov. J.B. Pritzker quietly grants clemency requests to Illinois prisoners amid coronavirus pandemic, including one released Thursday who had been serving life"
COVID-19 - CHICAGO POLICE
April 8 - Chicago Tribune: "Chicago’s top cop calls spike in violence a ‘pandemic’ that is draining resources from fighting coronavirus outbreak" . . . "Mayor Lori Lightfoot and interim police Superintendent Charlie Beck decried Tuesday’s spike in gun violence in Chicago, saying the shootings strain the city’s health services at a time when hospitals need to focus on the coronavirus pandemic. 'Violence of any kind is never acceptable,' Lightfoot said. 'But the fact that this is especially urgent now as our ability to treat all Chicagoans is being stretched to the breaking point, we cannot allow this to happen and we will not allow this to happen.'"
April 8 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Lightfoot decries warm weather outbreak of violence' . . . 'Interim Police Superintendent Charlie Beck says there are 'two pandemics that face Chicago — and only one of them is virus-induced.'"
April 8 - Chicago Sun-Times: "As his time helming CPD ends, Charlie Beck is confident his changes will ‘survive time’" . . . "Asked how he would like to be remembered in Chicago, Beck said he hopes he’ll be thought of as 'somebody that has a great love for this city and wanted to help it through a particularly tough time in its existence and did his absolute best while he was here. I hope that the changes that I made survive time. I’m confident that they will, or I wouldn’t have made them. And I hope that they bring Chicago the police department that it deserves.'"
April 9 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Community leaders demand end to ‘racist’ police tactics, want other protections for those ‘most vulnerable’ during pandemic"
April 10 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Second Chicago Police officer dies of COVID-19"
April 11 - Chicago Tribune: "Second CPD officer to die after contracting COVID-19 was 25-year vet who ‘investigated hundreds of homicides’"
April 11 - WTTW, Chicago Tonight: "Second Chicago Police Officer Dies of COVID-19" . . . "The second Chicago police officer to die from the coronavirus was Sgt. Clifford Martin, a lifelong Chicagoan and father of three, who grew up in a housing development in Chicago and became one of the most 'respected detectives in Chicago Police Department' in his 25 years with the department."
April 11 - Associated Press: "Crime drops around the world as COVID-19 keeps people inside" . . . "In Chicago, one of America’s most violent cities, drug arrests have plummeted 42% in the weeks since the city shut down, compared with the same period last year. Part of that decrease, some criminal lawyers say, is that drug dealers have no choice but to wait out the economic slump."
April 13 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Chicago Police Department COVID-19 cases now at 200"
COVID-19 - COOK COUNTY PUBLIC DEFENDER
April 12 - WBBM NewsRadio, "At Issue" with Craig Dellimore: "Amy Campanelli, Cook County Public Defender" . . . "Public Defender Amy Campanelli talks with Craig Dellimore about efforts to release Cook County Jail inmates who may be at high risk for COVID-19 infections. She also discusses the debate over Cash Bond and public safety, defending people during a pandemic...and the presumption of innocence."
COVID-19 - AROUND THE STATE
April 7 - Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission: "Protecting the health & well-being of justice-system-involved children & youth" . . . "Concerned about the spread of coronavirus in juvenile detention facilities, the Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission issued a letter to Illinois' judicial branch leaders. In the letter, the Commission requested action and provided recommended steps for protecting the wellbeing of young people, families, and caregivers in contact with the justice systems across the state."
April 7 - Daily Line: "Calls for release of prisoners during pandemic grow louder as 1st Cook County Jail detainee dies, 2nd death at Stateville" . . . "The Department of Juvenile Justice, which so far has seen no cases of Covid-19 among incarcerated youth or staff, has so far released 63 teens from their five facilities statewide since March 1, and currently has 156 youth in custody."
April 10 - Daily Herald By Charles Keeshan and Susan Sarkauskas: "With academies closed, arrival of needed rookie cops is on hold"
April 13 - Chicago Sun-Times: "McHenry County judge orders names of coronavirus patients to be shared with law enforcement to protect officers"
COVID-19 - IMMIGRATION - ICE
April 7 - Southern Illinoisan by Molly Parker: "Pulaski County reports 1st COVID-19 case as officials warn they may arrest people violating stay-home order" . . . "In response to repeated gatherings of crowds outside an apartment complex and convenience store, Pulaski County officials said they are prepared to arrest people found violating the Illinois governor’s stay-at-home order." . . . "Currently, there are about 145 people in custody at the facility, about 130 of whom are ICE detainees, said facility administrator Damon Acuff. He said that everyone in the custody of the facility is treated the same, and declined to say whether those in the facility's custody who tested positive for COVID-19 were jail inmates or ICE detainees."
April 9 - Chicago Tribune: "‘Reckless and dangerous.’ Advocates for immigrants again press for halting detention hearings and deportations during pandemic"
April 13 - Southern Illinoisan by Molly Parker: "3 Pulaski County detainees who tested positive last week for COVID-19 are in ICE custody" . . . "A 26-year-old Guatemalan national, a 33-year-old Honduran national, and a 32-year-old Mexican national in ICE custody at the detention center tested positive last week; those who have come in contact with these individuals have been 'cohorted' and are being monitored for symptoms, an ICE official told The Southern in an emailed response to questions. The practice of cohorting refers to quarantining multiple people together as a group."
COVID-19 - GUNS
April 10 - Illinois State Police news release: "Illinois State Police director files emergency rules regarding FOID and CCL renewals"
April 10 - Chicago Sun-Times: "Gun shops see COVID-19 business boom: ‘A very different panic than we have seen in the past’"
COVID-19 - COURTS
April 8 - Chicago Tribune by Dan Hinkel and Megan Crepeau: "Inmates with ongoing innocence claims sit in prisons threatened by coronavirus as courts shut down" . . . "Last year, Illinois led the nation in exonerations with 30, and the state has cleared more than 300 convicts over the last three decades, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. Now with the coronavirus gaining a foothold in the Cook County Jail and the state prison system, prisoners who may have been wrongfully accused or convicted could remain stuck behind bars and in harm’s way, just like the guilty."
April 10 - Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette: "Federal courthouses donate masks to health care workers" . . . "The federal courthouses in the Central District of Illinois are the latest to do closet cleaning and find masks that can be redirected to front-line health care workers."
COURTS
Injustice Watch: "Appellate court denies new trial for Chicago man convicted months after judge accepted a bribe in mob case"
Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "Canceled prison debate teacher can proceed with free-speech suit" . . . "In a written opinion last week, U.S. District Judge John J. Tharp Jr. declined to dismiss the First Amendment claim Katrina Burlet brought against Gladyse Taylor, the assistant director of the Illinois Department of Corrections, among other defendants."
Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette column by Jim Dey: "What’s the benefit of ducking a big legal issue?" . . . "Interest groups on both sides of the gun-control debate waited in anticipation for a forthcoming ruling by the Illinois Supreme Court on the constitutionality of the state’s Firearm Owners Identification Card law. But instead of getting a substantive ruling, the high court punted — sending the case back to a White County trial judge for further review — and in the process, provoked Justice Lloyd Karmeier to issue a dissenting opinion that blasted the majority for irresponsibly ducking the issue."
BAIL REFORM
The New Republic: "Bailing Out: Criminal justice reformers are rethinking the crusade against cash bail." . . . "Born as it was out of a community’s desire to free its loved ones, the Chicago (Community Bond Fund) is animated by an intimate appreciation of how procuring bail for an arrestee can immediately alleviate individual human suffering. But its leaders also recognize the rhetorical and educational value of a bail fund."
CHICAGO POLICE SUPERINTENDENT SEARCH
WBEZ by Patrick Smith: "Pick For Top Cop Did Not Reduce Violent Crime In Dallas. How Will He Do In Chicago?"
WBEZ: "David Brown, Lightfoot’s Pick For Chicago Police Chief, Brings Mental Health Expertise To The Job"
CHICAGO POLICE
Chicago Daily Law Bulletin: "City remains defendant in ‘code of silence’ suit against cop"
ILLINOIS JUVENILE JUSTICE COMMISSION
Illinois Juvenile Justice Commission: "Commission appoints new Executive Director Drea Hall"
JAILBREAK
Macoupin County Enquirer-Democrat: "Suspected murderer escapes from jail" . . . "Kavanaugh obtained access to a closet, crawled through the ceiling and out a second story window. Outside video shows Kavanaugh on foot heading southbound, according to the sheriff’s department."
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