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ISBA staff helps members track bills of interest
By Jim Covington
Director of Legislative Affairs
The Illinois General Assembly is busy sorting through 6,184 bills filed in the past two months, including many that directly affect lawyers in their practices. ISBA's legislative staff tracks bills deemed to be of special importance to our members, offering testimony and comment developed by our sections.
Members can receive e-mail bulletins about hot-button legislative issues by signing up at http://www.isba.org/Legislative/legislativealert.asp.
The following are some important bills still alive in the legislative process.
Realtor and broker liability. House Bill 3575 (Fritchey, D-Chicago) amends the Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act. The current Act exempts communication of any false, misleading or deceptive information, "provided by the seller of real estate located in Illinois," by a real estate salesman or broker, unless the salesman or broker knows of the false, misleading or deceptive character of such information.
House Bill 3575 deletes the words "provided by the seller of real estate located in Illinois" so that a real estate salesman or broker may be held liable only if he or she knows of the false, misleading or deceptive character of information.
Juror fees. House Bill 339 (Madigan, D-Chicago) increases the daily juror fees from $4 to $25, $5 to $30, and $10 to $40 for the three classes of counties. To pay for these increases, a county board may impose a juror fund fee against plaintiffs and defendants. The initial juror fund fee must be justified by a cost study as sufficient to pay the increased amount of the juror fees and may be increased later after justification by another acceptable cost study.
FOIA sanction. House Bill 152 (Froelich, R-Schaumburg) amends the Freedom of Information Act so that if a public body denies access to a public record, it may be subject to reasonable attorney's fees and costs and a fine not to exceed $1,000. But the court must find that the denial was improper and unreasonable or was invoked for the sole purpose of delay without good cause.
Personal and homestead exemptions. Senate Bill 97 (Silverstein, D-Chicago) and House Bill 1523 (Mathias, R-Buffalo Grove) double the personal property and homestead exemptions in the Code of Civil Procedure.
Juvenile court expanded. House Bill 560 (Collins, D-Chicago) amends the Juvenile Court Act of 1987 to authorize its jurisdiction to include children age 18 and younger. Current law is age 17 and younger. It exempts traffic, boating, or fish and game law offenses, or violations of municipal or county ordinances.
Condo fees. Senate Bill 764 (Cullerton, D-Chicago) amends the Condominium Property Act to prohibit a board of managers from including any fees pertaining to the collection of a unit owner's financial obligation to the Association, including fees charged by a manager or managing agent, to be added to and deemed a part of an owner's respective share of the common expenses. It exempts attorney fees from this prohibition.
Residual doubt instruction. House Bill 2704 (Cross, R-Oswego) requires the court to give the jury a residual doubt instruction in murder cases. If the trier of fact determines that the evidence was sufficient beyond a reasonable doubt to sustain the verdict of guilty for first degree murder but does not foreclose all doubt respecting the defendant's guilt, the court must sentence the defendant to a term of natural life imprisonment.
"I think we all sort of go into this thinking it's a possibility, but you don't think it's going to happen to you, because it's so unthinkable ... Nobody is going to intimidate me off of my duty."
U.S. District Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow, after two of her family members were murdered Feb. 28 in her northside Chicago home
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"I have to get governmental justice on this; otherwise, I'll do my own justice."
Bart A. Ross, suspected murderer of Judge Lefkow's husband and mother, testifying in a 1995 medical malpractice lawsuit
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"Everyone agrees that this problem is real the question is what to do about it. And the reality is that with state budgets already tight politicians aren't exactly looking for ways to help out criminal suspects first."
Legal analyst Andrew Cohen at CBSNews.com, on an ABA report that found thousands of suspects are wrongly convicted each year because they are pressured to accept guilty pleas or have incompetent attorneys
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"The age of 18 is the point where society draws the line for many purposes between childhood and adulthood. It is, we conclude, the age at which the line for death eligibility ought to rest."
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, in the 5-4 majority's opinion holding that the execution of juvenile offenders violates the 8th Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment
Editor
A begrudging budget
Oops. No, make that a big, fat: OOPS!
The Illinois Equal Justice Foundation, which distributes the meager state allowance for legal aid to the poor, seemed for a while last month to have been summarily annihilated.
Amid the tumult and shouting over the billions of dollars to be spent, and the millions to be saved, the governor's budget for the next fiscal year failed to include any allocation to the Department of Human Services for legal assistance.
That line item vital to indigent individuals and families in crisis, but insignificant to the state's political hierarchy had been only $472,000 for the current year. As glaringly insufficient as that is, it's still better than the empty zero that was proposed.
The governor's budget address to the General Assembly came eight days after an updated Illinois Legal Needs Study revealed on Feb. 8 that $49 million annually might be adequate funding for representation of indigents in civil cases (see table of contents Legal Needs Study story). Two weeks later, the Land of Lincoln Legal Assistance Foundation said it would have to lay off as many as 10 attorneys by the end of the year.
The Legal Needs Study called for a ten-fold increase in the state appropriation for the Equal Justice Foundation to $5 million, which is still below the $6.8 million average of the nine other most populous states. Instead, the governor appropriated nothing for legal aid.
A disgrace, said Phil Rock, co-chair of the Equal Justice Illinois Campaign, who as Illinois Senate president had seen his share of budget inequities. "To have no funding budgeted whatsoever is unthinkable," he said.
Within hours, apologies and assurances began swirling in the bureaucratic breezes. The consensus is that the Equal Justice Foundation dole simply "fell through the cracks in a tight budget year." A "clerical mistake" maybe? Out of mind, out of sight, more than likely.
A spokesman for the Human Services Department promised, "We recognize the importance of legal aid to the poor, so we are going to find the money to fund it," probably at the same skimpy level of a half-million dollars as in previous years.
At best, that's less than two percent of total legal aid funding in Illinois from all sources the federal Legal Services Corp., interest on lawyers' trust accounts, the $42 fee per registered attorney, bar foundations, corporate grants, fund-raising events, individual donations, etc.
It's a pity that legal aid to the needy seems to be only the squeal that's left after state government renders the whole hog into sausage.
But for the graceless and godless
Heart-stopping tragedy overwhelmed Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow on Feb. 28, when she entered the sanctuary she revered as home. The specter of a loving husband and beloved mother, slain in barbaric fashion, awakens each of us to our mortality, and our vulnerability.
Speculation was strong that the murders represented vengeance against a federal judge for an opinion that was based on the law and the facts of a matter. That this could happen in a tranquil Chicago neighborhood, or anywhere in the United States, is a perversion of all codes and creeds we respect.
Perhaps the man who committed suicide March 9 in Wisconsin, a misfit with a grudge against the legal system, was the lone killer. Perhaps it was just coincidence that Feb. 28 is the date of the onset in 1993 of the siege of Branch Davidians in Waco, which spawned a cataclysm in Oklahoma City two years later.
But "perhaps" is a term of art for the forensic savants and the sentinels of law enforcement who plumb the evidence and probe the leads. The coward who slaughtered these innocents had to be identified, so we could learn the odious source of his motivation.
"Those who kill martyrs are always petty thugs, seeking with their very triviality and inconsequence to end the lives of people who live good lives," said Harvard chaplain Jacqueline Schmitt in her funeral homily.
"Those who kill martyrs think that by this violent and banal act they are wiping out the truth by wiping out the people who witness to the truth," she added.
This patent allusion to seekers of truth and stewards of justice focuses our attention on the likelihood that an iconoclastic vendetta may be in progress against independence of the judiciary. Only a faint shadow of doubt suggests otherwise.
So here we are, on the verge of celebrating Law Day XLVIII, bearing the banner of "The American Jury: We the People in Action." Let the sermons begin.
There is no better time for the bench and bar to reinforce the notion that an attack against our system of law and order is a crime against every community of discerning citizens.
Women's Bar to present 3 Hooton Awards
The Women's Bar Association of Illinois will present Judge Mary Heftel Hooton Awards to three Illinois jurists during its 91st annual judicial reception from 5:30 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, March 23, in Chicago's Mid-Day Club.
The recipients are Cook County Judge Jane Louise Stuart, a member of the ISBA Assembly and the Committee on Women and the Law; Appellate Justice Sheila M. O'Brien of the 1st District, and 18th Circuit Judge Hollis L. Webster.
The awards are named in memory of Judge Hooton, whose estate provided for the WBAI's permanent home in the Chicago Bar Association building. Call (312) 341-8530 for reservations.
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Chief Justice Mary Ann G. McMorrow of the Illinois Supreme Court will receive the Margaret Brent Award from the American Bar Association Commission on Women in the Profession during the annual meeting in Chicago in August.
The Women's Bar Association plans to reserve table seating for members who want to honor Justice McMorrow. Call (312) 554-8530.
Appellate Justice Anne Burke of the 1st District will receive a Freedom Award on Friday, May 13, from The John Marshall Law School Alumni Association. The awards luncheon will be held in the Red Lacquer Room of the Palmer House Hilton in Chicago.
Recently honored
North Aurora attorney Brad M. Swearingen received the Kane County Bar Foundation Pro Bono Award on Jan. 22 during its annual dinner. Chair of the KCBA Family Law Committee, he devoted 85 hours of pro bono last year to low-income parties in marriage dissolutions.
Appellate Justice Neil F. Hartigan received an Outstanding Contribution to the Legal Profession Award from the Chicago alumni chapter of Phi Alpha Delta Legal Fraternity during its annual St. Patrick's Day luncheon on March 16.
ISBA Assembly member Patrice Ball-Reed was honored March 16 by the Chicago Midwest Section of the National Council of Negro Women during a Women Making History reception. An assistant Illinois attorney general, she is secretary of the ISBA Bar Publications Board and a member of several committees.
Cook County Judge John O. Steele, president of the Illinois Judges Association, and Dean Patricia Mell of The John Marshall Law School received C. F. Stratford Awards from Cook County State's Attorney Richard A. Devine to commemorate Black History Month in February.
ISBA Assembly member Mary L. Milano, associate director of the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, has been elected to her fourth term as treasurer of the Italian American Political Coalition (IAPC). She is vice chair of the ISBA Committee on Law-Related Education for the Public and a member of the International and Immigration Law Section Council.
ISBA Assembly member James J. Morici of Morici, Figlioli & Associates, Chicago, chairs the IAPC membership committee. Thomas M. Battista of Rock, Fusco & Garvey, Chicago, chairs the finance committee. He is past chair of the ISBA Administrative Law Section Council and a member of the State and Local Taxation Section Council.
Cook County Judge Leo E. Holt received a Legal Legacy Award and a Charles Hamilton Houston Award on Dec. 3 during his retirement party. He served in the Criminal Division for more than 18 years.
Scott F. Turow of Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal, Chicago, received the William H. Avery Award for Equal Access to Justice on Dec. 9 from the Legal Aid Bureau of Metropolitan Family Services. He was honored for his leadership in capital punishment reform.
Mikvas to get Humanities Award
Abner and Zoe Mikva will receive the Illinois Humanities Council's 2005 Public Humanities Award during a gala 30th anniversary banquet Thursday, April 28, in the Palmer House Hilton, Chicago.
A former federal judge, congressman and White House counsel, Abner Mikva is an arbitrator and mediator with JAMS in Chicago. He was inducted as an Honorary Fellow of the Illinois Bar Foundation in December.