CHICAGO — There’s a big change coming to the electronic monitoring system that is supposed to keep an eye on criminal defendants awaiting trial: Operation of the program will be moving from the Cook County Sheriff’s Office to the office of Chief Judge Timothy Evans.
Evans’ office already operates two electronic monitoring systems—one that monitors adherence to daily curfews and another designed to protect domestic violence victims. Now, under Cook County’s newly approved 2025 budget, the courts will start becoming responsible for tracking criminal defendants on house arrest.
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart has been trying to unload the electronic monitoring program from his office for years. Dart has been vocal about his belief that the courts are putting violent criminals on electronic monitoring—people who should be kept in jail rather than wearing an ankle monitor for a system designed for low-level offenders.
According to Dart’s office, moving the electronic monitoring program to the courts will bring the county in line with national norms. Cook County is the only sheriff’s office in the country that operates a pre-trial electronic monitoring program, a Dart spokesperson said.
The current timeline calls for the sheriff’s office to stop accepting new electronic monitoring participants by April 1, according to Dart’s office. All electronic monitoring placements after that date will go on a court-operated system.
Dart’s spokesperson said his office will continue to monitor all participants in the sheriff’s program until their criminal cases conclude or a judge releases them from electronic monitoring.
Moving the county’s house arrest program to the courts will have another effect: documents and records regarding the court’s program will not be subject to release under the state’s Freedom of Information Act, which exempts the judicial branch. Citizens, journalists, and researchers interested in examining the court program’s operations will only receive information if the chief judge agrees to release it.
Conversations between the sheriff’s office, Evans’ office, and other officials are “ongoing,” according to the sheriff’s spokesperson, who said Dart’s team is working to “ensure a safe and efficient transition beginning April 1.”
As a possible sign of things to come in the years ahead, Evans told the Union League Club in 2022 that he “would prefer not to have electronic monitoring. I believe therapy is better.”
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