Sheriff Tom Dart filed a petition before the Illinois Supreme Court on Monday asking the justices to force the state department of corrections to accept the transfer of over 500 people from the Cook County Jail.
The state Supreme Court is delaying the reactivation of speedy trial rights until October in order to give chief circuit judges statewide “at least 90 days to prepare,” according to a press release.
The deteriorating vacant dorms, built in the early 1900s, were “costly” and difficult to maintain, officials said during community meetings earlier this year.
Covid-19 restrictions have led to a growing felony court backlog in Cook County. To clear it, “we have to move faster than normal,” one expert said.
County officials say the jail mailroom accidentally rejected Injustice Watch’s judicial election guide. But accidents violate the Constitution, too.
Officials said workers in the jail’s mailroom incorrectly identified the election guides as contraband.
The Cook County Sheriff’s policy to reject some people who had been ordered released on electronic monitoring may have violated the Fourth Amendment, an appellate court ruled.
There are about 800 more people in the jail than there were in early May. Injustice Watch took a closer look at what’s causing the change.
The federal judge’s order didn’t go as far as some civil rights advocates had hoped. The ongoing work of pushing for structural change to the criminal justice system must continue.
Charles Thomas has been denied bond twice since mid-March, even as judges and prosecutors have said publicly that they are doing everything they can to release people from the jail.