A petition signed by 500 supporters of the ACLU's call for a moratorium on the placement of new surveillance cameras was mailed to Chicago mayoral candidates this afternoon.

ACLU Intern Maura Ross mailing petitions to mayoral candidates

The petition reads:

Recently the ACLU of Illinois released a comprehensive report on the extensive and integrated surveillance camera system in Chicago. The surveillance system has been expanded in recent years with little community input and insufficient guidelines to protect privacy in the City.

I urge you to adopt the ACLU's call for a moratorium on the placement of new cameras in Chicago until a full review has been completed, including ample opportunity for community input and consideration of whether to remove some cameras.

Also, surveillance cameras should not be used without new privacy guidelines.

Whichever candidate wins next Tuesday's election, let's hope they heed the calls for a moratorium on new cameras, an open and thorough review of the camera surveillance system and stronger regulation of existing cameras.

This morning, the ACLU of Illinois participated in an argument before a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in our case seeking to improve conditions at the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC). The argument today grew out of a challenge by the local union representing employees at the JTDC which objected to changes being made at the facility.

Today’s argument centered on a number of technical issues, mainly matters relating to the federal district court’s power under the Prison Litigation Reform Act. ACLU of Illinois Associate Legal Director Ben Wolf urged that the panel not elevate ‘form over substance” and reminded the Court that the “conditions at the JTDC are still dangerous” for the children housed at the facility.

The Court asked for further briefing on a number of the issues raised during the argument. We will keep you posted on the course of this case.

For more than a decade, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois has worked tirelessly to improve conditions for the young people held at the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC), one of the largest juvenile detention centers in the country.

Learn more about our case Jimmy Doe v. Cook County Download our appellate brief

Dirksen Federal Building, home of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Photo used under a creative commons license from pobrecito33

The JTDC long has been recognized as a dangerous, violent, filthy and overcrowded place. Court-appointed experts and monitors in this case found numerous examples of staff acting out violently against the youth detained at the facility; other experts found the facility to be unsanitary -- with rodents and pests present throughout the JTDC; and, the children were simply not cared for -- including having to wear dirty clothes and underwear for days on end.

The latest development in this case is an argument before the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals (set for February 16, 2011) resulting from a union challenge to the plans of the Transitional Administrator (TA) to create a new staffing structure within the facility in order to bring the JTDC into constitutional compliance. The TA was appointed to run the facility by the district court after the County repeatedly failed to make improvements at the JTDC -- and delaying implementing these changes posed real dangers to our clients at the facility.

Chief Judge Holderman approved the TA’s reorganization plan, and the union appealed. In response to an effort by the Teamsters to block the TA's changes at the facility, the ACLU of Illinois will tell the appellate court in Chicago that the TA must be able to make these changes so that our clients are able to live in conditions that are in compliance with the court’s orders and the U.S. Constitution. We assert that the union's objections to the TA's plans (including requiring staff that interact with our clients to meet specific training and educational requirements) are not supported by state and federal law and must not take primacy over the constitutional interests of our clients.

We will provide updates on the case during and after the argument via facebook and twitter.