CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Cook County’s chief judge is firing back at Mayor Lightfoot with statistics to argue that there’s no reason to stop putting suspects on home electronic monitoring.
Mayor Lightfoot had asked Cook County Chief Judge Tim Evans to put a moratorium on the use of electronic monitoring for people accused of certain violent crimes.
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But, Cook County Chief Judge Tim Evans said that while there is a wave of violence sweeping America’s cities, including Chicago, there’s no evidence that people released on bond or on home electronic monitoring are responsible for it.
He wrote in a letter to Mayor Lightfoot that about 86 percent of those charged with murder and attempted murder are not set free and are held in Cook County Jail to await their trials.
Additionally, during a four-year period through this past fall, Judge Evans said that less than five percent of people released on electronic monitoring before trial were rearrested, and most of those arrests were for misdemeanors. The number of those released on electronic monitoring who were then rearrested on gun charges made up less than one percent of all gun arrests.
Judge Evans said the law requires defendants to be released on the least restrictive conditions that will ensure they’ll appear in court and that will reasonably protect the community.
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