State's Attorney Kim Foxx Presents 2022 Budget to Cook County Board

Cook County Board Finance Committee
Departmental Budget Meeting
October 27

State’s Attorney - Presented by Kimberly Foxx

Proposed 2022 Budget: $187,870,209            2021 Budget: $176,029.324
2022 includes $526,335 from the American Rescue Plan Special Purpose Fund

Proposed 2022 FTEs: 1,432                2021 FTEs: 1397.4

Highlights: 2021 Initiatives and Outcomes

• Given the pandemic, The Speedy Trial Act was suspended in late March of 2020 and restored on October 1, 2021.   
• Limited court proceedings meant a significant decrease in cases disposed, and although the gap is closing, we expect to finish the year under target.
• The number one charge remains guns, allowing a focus on public safety and violence.

Operational Opportunities: 2022 Initiatives and Goals

• The State's Attorney (SA) office will continue to expand alternative prosecution programs, and work with partners and community to decriminalize addiction, mental health issues, and poverty.  
• Additional initiatives include increased investigations of past wrongful convictions and preparing for implementation of the SAFE-T Act (the Omnibus Criminal Justice Act that the Illinois Legislature passed and the Governor signed early in 2021).

State’s Attorney Foxx’s Remarks

• In addition to the criminal cases, the SA is the lawyer of record for the county (civil side). $266 million were awarded to the County in a case regarding the failure of Sam’s Club to pay taxes on cigarettes.
• Cook County leads the country in vacating wrongful convictions. This work also helps build trust in the community.  
• A goal is increasing community engagement.  We welcome meeting with constituents in order to better explain the work of the SA.  
• The SA endeavors to be the most transparent SA office in the country and the website has a detailed description of the office’s work, accompanied by data. https://www.cookcountystatesattorney.org/ 
• The workload at Cook County exceeds that of Los Angeles County and New York.  LA County is the largest State’s Attorney office in the U.S. and Cook County is second. But LA County does not handle civil cases or misdemeanors.  NY does not handle misdemeanors.  
• In Cook County, felonies must get approval from the SA; but misdemeanors are directly filed by law enforcement.  In other major US jurisdictions, city attorneys deal with misdemeanors.

Foxx suggests that there are misunderstandings and even misinformation about how and when felony charges occur in Cook County.  She explains the procedure:

• The SA is only involved in a case when an arrest is made.
• Law enforcement (LE) investigates, talks with witnesses, gathers information, and makes an arrest. 
• LE takes the case to the felony review office in the SA office to evaluate whether there was a crime, whether the arrestee is the right person, and whether the evidence can be linked to the arrestee.
• When the case is lacking, the SA cannot indict the arrestee but asks LE to gather more evidence.  The case remains open while additional evidence is sought.
• Evidence gathering is done optimally before arrest since after an arrest is made, an arrestee can be held for only 48 hours.  
• Charges are often brought much later than the date of the crime. But once the case is charged, the SA can use only the evidence gathered at that point. 
• According to ABA Criminal Justice Standards:  “A prosecutor should not seek an indictment unless the prosecutor reasonably believes the charges are supported by probable cause and that there will be admissible evidence sufficient to support the charges beyond reasonable doubt at trial.” 

Commisioner Questions:

Q  Do you have any problem hiring staff?
A   We do well in hiring. We target law students.  There are challenges:

• Covid has caused problems in retention and hiring. 
• Cook County is a low paying office: $69,000 start for assistant.  Law firms pay $160,000. 
• Although many new hires come with a commitment to public service, others come, get the experience, but leave.  Student debt factors into staff leaving.  
• A concern is that many experienced people are retiring.  
• A Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion person has been hired to meet hiring standards.  

​Q  How is your budget striking the balance to help people feel safe but not criminalizing members of the community?
A  We prioritize crimes of violence.  In the past, resources were going to shoplifting and drug cases. For the last four years, we have focused on gun offenses.  Narcotics cases have shrunk because these should be diverted to treatment.  This allows more resources to go to violent crime. 

Q  There was a gunfight recently in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago. There was a video.  Why was no one charged? The mayor used the term “mutual combatants,” indicating that both sides of the incident should be arrested.  Should they have been?
A  The video did not capture the beginning of the conflict.  Under the law, people do have the right to defend themselves—and so the beginning is important.  In this instance, all of the witnesses said, “I want a lawyer.”  The police and we agreed that we had not enough evidence. The mayor’s remarks were disappointing.  Frustration cannot lead us to make bad choices.  

Q  How can we help address mental health needs?
A  Too many mentally ill people are in jail. The felony review team sees that these are mental health situations.  But when people go to Mental Health Court, they get more entangled in the system than they need to be.   People should be deflected out of the system entirely.  But the SA doesn’t have a mechanism to do that--we need robust treatment so that they don’t come to us at all. We have not been thoughtful about the role of trauma and mental health in gun violence.  Children who suffer trauma have no access to social workers, therapy.  They feel they are better off with a weapon. But a child with a gun easily overreacts, leading to tragedy. Our strategies have not been proactive but reactive   We need to figure out how to bring services on the front end.

Q What about the budget for dealing with carjackings?
A The PA office cannot do anything until the police bring cases to them.  The case-clearing by the police for carjackings is only about 12%.

Observer - Janet Kittlaus