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Kane-County-Drug-Crime-300x226Last week, Kane County State’s Attorney, Joe McMahon, reported that Kane County Prosecutors have seen a rise in the number of criminal cases filed in Kane County in the first six months of this year compared to last year. McMahon reports that felony filings are up 15.7% compared to the same period last year. The increase in criminal cases in Kane County is happening with misdemeanor and traffic cases as well. In the first six months of 2017, 1,247 new felony cases were filed. During the same period last year, 1,078 cases were filed. Aurora, the largest city in Kane County, has seen a drop in the number of new felony cases. Most criminal cases in Kane County come from Aurora. The Village of Carpentersville has seen a rise in the number of Retail Theft cases. Carpentersville police attribute this to the opening of a new Walmart in Carpentersville. Elgin, the second largest city in Kane County, has seen a rise in violent crimes. McMahon is concerned with the increase in the number of criminal cases filed in Kane County since the number of criminal cases filed increased in 2016 as well.

In 2016, McMahon talked about the inability of authorities to make a dent in the number of Domestic Battery, or Domestic Violence cases filed in Kane County. In 2016, McMahon reported that of the almost 5,700 misdemeanor cases filed in Kane County in 2015, 1,219 involved Domestic Battery, or Domestic Violence charges. 200 Aggravated Domestic Battery felony charges were filed in Kane County in 2015. In the same 2016 discussion, McMahon talked about the impact that the heroin problem is having on Kane County. McMahon echoed his concerns about the heroin problem in Kane County last week when he announced an increase in the number of criminal cases filed in Kane County. Last week, McMahon stated that drug-related cases, “continue to be a serious problem.”

This morning, the Chicago Tribune is reporting about efforts that police departments throughout the State of Illinois are taking in an attempt to get drug users into drug treatment. Many local police agencies are trying to implement a program started by the police in Glocester Massachusetts a few years ago. The programs are commonly referred to as “Safe Passage.” If people walk into a police station and give up their drugs and ask for help, instead of placing them under arrest, the police will dispose of the drugs without filing criminal charges and will place them in drug rehab programs. More and more police agencies in Illinois are trying to do something like this with varying results. Authorities in Dixon Illinois report great success with their program. Dixon police report that 170 people have been placed into rehab with this program. More than half of the people placed in drug rehab have successfully completed their drug treatment. Dixon police report a 39% decrease in the number of misdemeanor and felony criminal cases filed.

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TheftThis is one of the more common questions that I get asked when people call me wanting advice about how to deal with a situation like this.  Many people think that as long as it’s not the police asking questions, they have nothing to worry about.  Nothing can be further from the truth.  If your employer is suspecting that you stole something and they want you to come in to the office to discuss the matter, you need to be aware of how dangerous this situation can be.  This situation can be more dangerous than talking to the police.  Let me explain why.

Everybody watches TV shows involving police criminal investigations.  Everyone is aware of terms like “probable cause”, “search warrant”, “arrest warrant”, and “Miranda Rights”.  But most people do not truly appreciate exactly what these terms mean in the real world.  What happens on TV does not always reflect how the real world operates. What we commonly refer to as our constitutional rights only apply to when the government is acting against us.  In other words, if the police want to ask you questions and you are not free to leave, the police must read you your Miranda warnings.  The police must let you know that you have the right to remain silent and that anything you say can and will be used against you in court.  They also must inform you that you have a right to an attorney and if you can’t afford one they will provide one for you for free.  In order for questioning to continue, you have to waive your Miranda rights.  If the police want to search your vehicle or your desk at work, they need a search warrant or your permission.  But these rights do not apply to your employer or to your employer’s security agents, unless you work for the state, local or federal government.  Your employer is not the government.  The security agents work for your employer and not for the government. So, when your employer wants to ask you questions about a possible theft, they don’t have to read you your Miranda Rights.  When your employer wants to search your desk at work they don’t need a search warrant nor do they need your permission.

Many people falsely believe that since their employer and their security agents did not read them their rights then anything they say to the employer and their security agents cannot be used against them in court. Again, this would be a mistake.  Many Theft cases that I have handled were developed using information gathered by store security and loss prevention agents.  With many of those cases it was obvious that the police allowed the employer’s security agents to gather all of the evidence before the police got involved.  That’s because the police knew that it will be much easier for the prosecutor to use the evidence that was gathered by private security because private security is not hindered by the Constitution.  If you talk to your employer and their security agents and make a statement the prosecutor does not have to show that you waived your Miranda Rights when you made that statement.  Miranda does not apply to your employer and their security agents.  In many ways, this is very unfair.  If your employer asks you to come into the office and talk about a Theft investigation involving you, you know that if you do not show up to that meeting, you will probably lose your job.  And, as you try to keep your job, you may try to talk yourself out of it without realizing that you’re only digging a deeper hole for yourself.

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402-ConferenceA Pre-trial conference is the usual way that a criminal case is resolved in Illinois without the need to go to trial. The Pre-trial conference is a meeting that occurs between the prosecutor, the defense lawyer, and the judge. The meeting is usually, but not always, behind closed doors, and the parties all get together to discuss the case to see if there’s a way to work out an agreement short of trial. Illinois Supreme Court Rule 402 allows for this conference to happen and sets forth the requirements for such a conference to occur. That’s why this type of conference is commonly called a “402 Conference” by lawyers and judges.

Supreme Court Rule 402 provides that a judge cannot request that the parties have a “402 Conference”. The request for a “402 Conference” has to be made by the lawyer for the defendant and the prosecutor must agree to participate in that conference. After the lawyer for the defendant requests that the court participate in a “402 Conference”, the court will admonish the defendant about what will happen at this conference and make sure that the defendant agrees to allow this conference to happen.

The judge will inform the defendant that the prosecutor will be present at this conference and will tell the judge about the facts of the case and what the witnesses are expected to say at trial. Many of the things that the judge will hear he would not normally hear unless the case went to trial. Some of the things that the judge will hear may not even be allowed to be introduced into evidence at trial. The judge will also find out about your criminal background. This is something that the judge would not hear about unless you were found guilty and the case proceeded to a sentencing hearing. At the same time, the judge will hear things about you that will be presented by your lawyer. Again, these are things that the judge may or may not hear about at the trial.

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ArrestThis is a very frequent question that I get from people that call me. They want to know how the police can arrest them without any evidence that they did anything wrong. Just because you were arrested by the police and charged with a crime does not mean that you are guilty. An arrest and a criminal charge is just an allegation. The police officer who arrested you, and the prosecutor that charged you with a crime, believe that you did something wrong. Now they must prove you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in court. There’s several things that you can do to make it more difficult for the police and the prosecutors to prove you guilty in court. Let’s talk about some of the things that you can do to help your case.

First, let’s talk about something you should not do. You should not resist the police and give them a tough time. There’s no benefit to arguing with the police officer and making their job difficult. All that can do is make the police officer angry and cause them to be a little tougher on you than they might otherwise be. In addition, don’t forget that the police officer is armed with a gun. If the police officer feels threatened, he may use physical force against you which never ends in a good way. If you resist a police officer you could be charged with Resisting a Peace Officer, or if you disobey a police officer’s instructions, you could be charged with Obstructing a Peace Officer.  While both charges are misdemeanors, they are serious misdemeanors because they carry mandatory punishments which could include mandatory community service or even jail time. Simply pulling away from a police officer while they are trying to place handcuffs on you, or trying to run away from a police officer who is trying to place you under arrest, could result in serious criminal charges. Those criminal charges could stick even if you are ultimately found not guilty of the crime that you were originally arrested and charged with. Plus, if you cooperate with the police officer, the officer may go a little easy on you and may even decide not to arrest you, or even charge you with a crime if they are not sure that you did anything wrong.  Even if the police officer arrests you and charges you with a crime, the fact that you cooperated with the police officer and did not give them a hard time could help you when it comes to talking to the prosecutor who is handling your case in court. The prosecutor is much more likely to go easy on you if the police officer tells them that you cooperated with them and did not give them a hard time.

The next piece of advice that I commonly give clients is to exercise their constitutional right to remain silent. I commonly see people who are arrested trying to talk themselves out of it. It almost always ends up being a bad move. If a police officer thinks that you did something wrong, you can talk to them until you are blue in the face and you will not be able to stop them from arresting you. For instance, if a police officer pulls you over and suspects that you have been drinking and the officer believes that you are drunk, the officer will take you down to the police station so that you can take a breathalyzer test. No amount of arguing and pleading with the police officer will change anything. What is more likely is that during the course of trying to convince the police officer that you should not be arrested, you are likely to say something to the police officer that could be used against you later on in court. An example is if you tell the police officer that you only had a couple of drinks and that you are fine to drive. Admitting that you have been drinking can be used against you in court later on to prove that you are guilty of a DUI.

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DUI-1Every year the Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists releases it’s annual DUI arrest survey for Illinois DUI arrests.  This year’s study has some interesting statistics and numbers that I want to share with my readers.  The Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists sends out surveys to almost 700 police agencies in Illinois.  Roughly 81% of the police agencies responded and they release the findings every year.

For 2016, Rockford reported the most DUI arrests in Illinois, with 459. The top 10 list included the local towns of Elgin, with 365, Naperville, with 312, and Carol Stream with 305.  On the lower part of the top 10 was Cicero, with 305, Aurora, with 234, Lombard, with 233, Oak Lawn, with 233, Joliet, with 212, and Elmhurst, with 201.  The DUI arrest statistics from Chicago are not included in the annual Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists survey because the numbers from Chicago would dwarf any other town in Illinois, so they place the statistics for Chicago DUI arrests in it’s own, separate category.

The list provided by the Alliance Against Intoxicated Motorists is lengthy since it covers virtually every town and village in Illinois.  I want to include some of the local towns and villages that could be of interest to my readers. The first number is what place the town or village is in with DUI arrests in Illinois, and the second number is the total number of DUI arrests reported:

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DUIThe Arlington Heights Police Department has announced that they will have a Traffic Enforcement Campaign in place from June 26 to July 9, 2017. The Traffic Enforcement Campaign coincides with the upcoming Fourth of July weekend. The Traffic Enforcement Campaign will check motorists and vehicles for seatbelt violations, DUI driving, and a roadside safety checkpoint. The first roadside safety checkpoint will take place on June 28th on Arlington Heights Road just south of Algonquin Road. A roadside safety checkpoint is a way that the police can look inside your vehicle and pull you over to the side if they smell something, or see something inside the car, or suspect that the driver is up to no good. What the Arlington Heights Police are planning on doing this weekend is commonly known as a “Police Roadblock.” The Arlington Heights Police will be looking for people that are not wearing their seat belts and are Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol or Drugs. The enforcement campaign is being paid for with Federal Traffic Safety Funds and administered by the Illinois Department of Transportation.

If the Arlington Heights Police pull you over and suspect that you are Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol, you will be asked to pull over and exit your vehicle. The police officer will ask you to perform a series of tests on the side of the road (Field Sobriety Tests) to determine whether you were Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol. If the police officer has reason to believe that you are drunk, the officer will ask you to take a Preliminary Breath Test (PBT). The results of the PBT test cannot be used against you in court to prove that you were Driving Under the Influence of Alcohol. But the results of the PBT can be used to establish probable cause, or a valid reason, for the police officer to place you under arrest for a DUI. If the police officer believes that you failed those tests and the PBT detected alcohol in your breath, the officer may take you down to the Arlington Heights Police Department and ask that you take a breathalyzer test. The Arlington Heights police officer will inform you that if you take the breathalyzer test and the test registers a blood alcohol content of .08 or above, not only will you be arrested and charged with a DUI, but your license will be suspended for 6 months. The Arlington Heights police officer will inform you that if you refuse to take a breathalyzer test, your license will be suspended for 12 months. This license suspension is known as the Statutory Summary. If you refuse to take a breathalyzer test the officer may still arrest you and charge you with a DUI if the officer believes that he has enough evidence to prove you guilty of a DUI in Court. Proof that could be used against you could be the results of the Field Sobriety Tests, the officer’s observations and opinion, any statements you made to the officer, any witness statements, and any video of you of the Field Sobriety Tests.

If you are charged with a DUI in Arlington Heights, you will be allowed to post a cash bond at the Police Station and go home.  Your car will be impounded and you will need to pay fees to the Village of Arlington Heights to get your car back.  The longer you wait to get your car back the higher the fees will be.  You will be assigned a court date at the Cook County Courthouse in Rolling Meadows. All Arlington Heights DUI cases are held at the Rolling Meadows Courthouse. The Statutory Summary Suspension of your driver’s license will take effect on the 46th day following your arrest for a DUI in Arlington Heights. The only way to stop the Statutory Summary Summary Suspension of your driver’s license, or to reinstate a suspended license following a Statutory Summary Suspension, is to file a Petition to Rescind the Statutory Summary Suspension in Court. The Petition to Rescind the Statutory Summary Suspension can be filed anytime after you are arrested. However, you cannot file a Petition to Rescind the Statutory Summary Suspension more than 90 days after you are arrested for a DUI.

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Retail-Theft Cook County State’s Attorney, Kim Foxx, has announced that her office will stop prosecuting cases involving people charged with driving on a suspended or revoked driver’s license based on a financial reason, such as failure to pay parking tickets. tolls or child support. The decision to do this is based on a lack of funding for the State’s Attorney’s Office which has left the office with not enough prosecutors to handle the criminal prosecutions in Cook County. This does not mean that these cases will go away in Cook County. Individual towns, cities and villages will be allowed to prosecute these cases themselves. This could mean a rise in the number of cases being charged as Municipal Violations. Each city, town, and village can set up their own administrative process which involves Hearing Officers and attorneys hired by the towns and Villages, that collect fines for violations. The standard of proof in a Municipal Ordinance Violation case is much lower than in a criminal case and the potential punishment is a monetary fine and not jail time.

Another change announced by the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office has to do with charging people involved in serious car crashes while their licenses were suspended or revoked for financial reasons. Currently, if someone is involved in a serious car accident and their license is suspended, they could be charged with a felony if they have one previous conviction for driving with a suspended license. The Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office announced that they will not charge a driver with a felony unless they have at least five previous convictions for driving with a suspended or revoked license. This only applies if the suspension or revocation is based on a financial reason.

The Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office points out that the office is operating with 30% less funding than 10 years ago. The decision to stop prosecuting suspended and revoked license cases based on financial reasons will help free up some prosecutors to help prosecute more serious criminal cases. There’s at least 2 Courtrooms at the Daley Center that handle cases like this.  By declining to prosecute cases like this, the prosecutors assigned to those courtrooms will be reassigned to other courtrooms and courthouses.

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UUW-Unlawful-Use-of-a-WeaponYesterday, Illinois governor Bruce Rauner, signed a bill into law which increases the minimum sentence for defendants convicted of a second or subsequent violation of Aggravated Unlawful Use of a Weapon by a Felon. Under current law, a defendants convicted of a second or subsequent violation of the Aggravated Unlawful Use of a Weapon by a Felon statute would be convicted of a Class 2 felony which carries a mandatory prison sentence of between 3 to 14 years. The new law, which was signed yesterday, increases the mandatory prison sentence to 7 to 14 years.

This new law enjoyed broad bipartisan support in Springfield, something that has been very rare in Springfield in recent years.  This new law was strongly supported by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Chicago Police Department Superintendent Eddie Johnson.  Chicago officials are desperately trying to do something to deal with the out-of-control gun violence in Chicago.  It’s possible that this new law will do little, or nothing, to stop the gun violence in Chicago, but the politicians want to be seen as trying to do something.  In spite of the strong bipartisan support, our elected officials could not help but let this new law get caught up in the partisan bickering which has handicapped Springfield and endangered the health of the State of Illinois. Governor Rauner and Mayor Emanuel have been bickering over many issues concerning the funding needs of the City of Chicago.  Most recently, Governor Rauner has indicated that he would like to sell the Thompson Center in downtown Chicago.  According to Rauner, the possible sale of the Thompson Center could fetch the State of Illinois as much as $300 million.  Mayor Emanuel has been placing obstacles in front of Governor Rauner to stop any sale of the Thompson Center.  Most recently, Mayor Emanuel threatened to hold up zoning laws as an obstacle to allowing Rauner to sell the Thompson Center.  Governor Rauner wanted Mayor Emanuel to come to Springfield for the signing ceremony to show the voters that progress was being made in bipartisan efforts to do business and work past differences in Springfield.  Mayor Emanuel indicated he would not attend a signing ceremony in Springfield with Rauner and accused the Governor of threatening to veto a 911 bill for Chicago that would raise phone bills but provide more money for Chicago’s 911 system.

At the end of the day, the bickering politicians but aside their petty partisan fight and Chicago Police Department Superintendent Eddie Johnson attended a quickly arranged signing ceremony in Springfield. However, Mayor Emanuel did not attend.  In order to get support for this legislation, the new law also makes other changes to the law.  This new law gives greater power to the Illinois Department of Corrections to give sentencing credits to inmates who have been sentenced to prison.  This may allow some inmates to be released earlier from state prison.  This new law also appears to give more options for first time offenders to address the causes of their crime.  We have to see, what, if any options will be available for first-time offenders to avoid jail and a possible criminal conviction.  These changes appear to be trying to take steps towards lowering the prison population and the costs associated with the criminal justice system.  This effort seems to be a concession towards those legislators concerned with the cost to taxpayers for housing inmates in state prison.  I saw a recent survey that it costs the State of Illinois about $25,000 a year to house an inmate in State Prison for one year.  Another change to this law creates a task force within the Illinois State Police to help combat gun crimes.

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Bond-Hearing-2On June 12, we reported that Illinois Governor, Bruce Rauner, signed a Bail Reform bill into law.  The new law seeks to make changes to the bail process in Illinois by trying to move away from the requirement of posting cash as a way to avoid keeping people in jail who are poor and lack the financial means to post the cash needed to be released from county jail on minor criminal offenses. The new law requires that if the Court sets a cash bond at an initial Bond Hearing, and the defendant is unable to post the cash required, a second Bond Hearing must take place within 7 days of the arrest.  The purpose of this second bond hearing is to re-examine whether there are alternatives available to the requirement that cash be posted.  This second Bond Hearing is a further step towards moving away from making posting cash the main way to be released from jail pending resolution of a criminal case.

About 18 months ago, the Illinois Supreme Court instituted a pilot program, which had many of the changes contained in this new law, to see how they would impact the court system.  Kane County was one of the counties that participated in this pilot program.  Kane County has seen some of the impacts of this new law and county and court officials are expressing some concerns which we will discuss.

The first impact is a loss of revenue.  The Clerk of the Circuit Court of each county is allowed to keep 10% of any bond money posted.  So if a defendant posts $10,000 in bond money, when the case is finished. the Clerk of the Circuit Court will refund $9,000 to the person who posted the bond and will keep $1,000 for the Clerk of the Circuit Court.  If fewer people are required to post a cash bond, this means that there’s less money for the Clerk of the Circuit Court.  Kane County officials estimate that this could cause a $200,000 loss in revenue this year.  Kane County is already facing a budget deficit.  You would think that this loss in revenue could be absorbed by the savings from the lower number of inmates in Kane County Jail.  However, a recent increase in the number of violent crimes in Kane County has led to an increase in the jail population in Kane County Jail. Kane County officials blame the increase in the violent crime rate in Kane County to the fact that gang members can get to Kane County from Chicago via I-88 and I-90.  Chicago gangs are able to extend their drug trade from Chicago to Kane County, causing an increase in violent crimes and a further strain on Kane County’s limited resources.

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Bond-Hearing-1On Friday, Illinois Governor, Bruce Rauner, signed a new bill into law which takes affirmative steps to try to solve the bail problem in Illinois. The bill, called the Bail Reform Act, makes some significant changes to the bail process in Illinois and seeks to deal with the problems faced by people who are charged with minor crimes who are stuck in jail because they are unable to come up with the low amount of cash to post bail so they can be released.

I recently posted an article about a 60 Minutes episode which points out the numerous problems with Cook County Jail. In that article, I pointed out that last year, over a thousand people spent more time in Cook County Jail than what they were eventually sentenced to by the court. What was most disturbing is that just as many people spent over 222 years more than what they were eventually sentenced to. The main reason behind this was that non-violent offenders, who were charged with minor crimes, were not able to come up with the low amounts of cash needed to post the bail needed to get out of jail. As a result, they were stuck in Cook County Jail until their case was finished.

Tom Dart, the Cook County Sheriff, the man who is in charge of running the day-to-day operations of Cook County Jail, has long been an advocate for reforming the Bail process. He has been pushing the Illinois Legislature for a number of years, to address the Bail process so that this injustice of forcing people who are poor to sit in jail for many months just because they are poor. I pointed out in this article that the Illinois Legislature is working on steps to try to deal with this problem.

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