On October 23, 2012, a teenager detained awaiting a parole revocation hearing filed this class action in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The plaintiff, represented by the MacArthur Justice Center and Uptown People's Law Center, asked the court for a declaratory judgment that the policies of the Illinois Prisoner Review Board regarding parole revocation hearings were unconstitutional. They also requested that the Court enjoin the defendant from subjecting juveniles awaiting a parole revocation hearing to these policies. The plaintiff alleged that the Illinois Prisoner Review Board was violating his due process rights by depriving him of counsel, not providing a timely hearing, and not allowing him to present evidence at his parole revocation hearing. The plaintiff also filed for class certification in a motion alongside the complaint. The case was initially assigned to Judge Samuel Der−Yeghiayan, and later reassigned to Judge Andrea Wood and referred to magistrate judges for settlement conferences.
In early 2014, the parties reached a consent judgment that was filed with the court. On May 2, 2014, the plaintiffs filed a new motion to certify a class for purposes of settlement. On May 8, the court preliminarily approved the settlement and class certification of "all juvenile parolees in the State of Illinois who currently or who will in the future face parole revocation proceedings." On July 25, 2014, an amended complaint was filed to include the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice as a defendant and remove the governor. The court finally approved the class on July 31.
The court also finally approved the consent decree on August 28, 2014. The decree provided that the Illinois Prisoner Review Board must provide counsel during the parole revocation hearing process and included terms for the procedures for presentation of evidence at the hearings and the time frame for the hearing to take place. The parties also agreed to third party monitoring of the Illinois Prisoner Review Board's compliance with the decree for 18 months.
In February 2015, the plaintiffs filed to enforce the consent decree, arguing that the defendants refused to provide the documents necessary for the plaintiffs to evaluate compliance with the consent decree. However, they subsequently withdrew the motion in April 2015 after the plaintiffs received the information and documents they sought.
The monitor proceeded to file numerous reports over the next several years. On February 17, 2016, the monitor filed three reports were filed with the court for the past quarters. Each report indicated that the defendants were making progress toward complying with the consent decree, but that they were still not fully compliant. Two more reports were filed on September 19, 2016, indicating that "the spirit of the MH Consent Decree is being fulfilled and Defendants are in substantial compliance." The report also indicated that further monitoring was necessary to ensure that administration changes and budget issues did not threaten continued compliance. On April 26, 2017, the monitor filed two more reports indicating the same concern. The ninth quarter report on August 14, 2017 stated that there was still substantial compliance, but that a continued risk existed that certain individual cases would not be compliant and that the defendants were not complying with payment of fees to the monitor and youth attorneys.
The monitor subsequently continued to provide oral reports to the court at status hearings in 2018. In September, the monitor filed a letter with the court indicating their conclusions. They stated that the defendants were still not consistently complying with the paragraph of the consent decree requiring payment of representation for the youths' representation, which was the final provision left for the defendants to complete. However, since the youths had had continued representation, the monitor suggested there was no longer a need for active monitoring. On October 12, 2018, the court terminated the independent monitoring provision of the consent decree, which closed the case.
Steve Vnuk - 10/02/2014
Virginia Weeks - 09/27/2017
Keagan Potts - 03/18/2019
compress summary
