News & Commentary

For years, law enforcement agencies have extracted millions of dollars in cash, vehicles, and other property from Illinois residents through the little-understood practice of civil asset forfeiture. Civil asset forfeiture laws allow the government to permanently take property away from someone on the basis that the property is associated with a crime—even though the person may never have been convicted or even arrested for any offense.

Testimony of Heidi Dalenberg (B.H. v. Walker Class Counsel and Partner, Riley, Safer Holmes & Cancilla) Before the Illinois Senate House Human Services Committee

Every day, we learn about new data breaches caused by inadequate security, faulty and exploitable systems, or intentional attempts to obtain sensitive data by malicious actors or hackers. Whether a case of negligence or malfeasance, there is one constant in these stories: sensitive information, often personal information, gets compromised. And when that information falls into the wrong hands or is misused, it can have profoundly damaging effects – especially on our young people.Our laws give companies broad discretion to collect, use, and sh

Anyone who regularly drives a car in Chicago knows that it’s easy to get a ticket. The City issues millions of vehicle-related tickets every year. The majority are for non-moving violations totally unrelated to unsafe driving. This is a big money maker for Chicago, which collects hundreds of millions of dollars every year (7% of the City’s entire operating budget) from parking tickets.

Statement of Rachel Murphy, Staff Attorney, At the Coalition for Police Contracts Accountability Press Conference.

On June 21, 2018, the ACLU of Illinois filed a lawsuit against the City of Chicago and the Chicago Police Department, seeking to force the Chicago Police Department to turn over documents related to their use of social media monitoring software. The ACLU sought these public records through the Freedom of Information Act, and after months of promising documents were forthcoming, the Chicago Police Department failed to provide any documents and stopped responding to the request.

Beginning today, you can be part of an army of people across Illinois who are contacting their state representatives urging them to protect net neutrality in Illinois by supporting House Bill 4819. 

Testimony of Nora Collins-Mandeville, Director of Systems Reform Policy, Before the Senate Appropriations Committee on the DCFS Budget