By Chief Justice Mary Jane Theis
In 1987, the Illinois General Assembly mandated each of our judicial circuits to establish a pretrial services agency. For many years, that goal remained unreachable, due to a lack of resources in many parts of our state.
When the General Assembly passed the so-called Pretrial Fairness Act in 2021, geographic gaps became more apparent. The Illinois Supreme Court acted quickly, establishing the Office of Statewide Pretrial Services (OSPS) to assist the judiciary in implementing a new system in which monetary bonds would be abolished and pretrial release would be presumed, and appointing former Cook County Circuit Court Judge Cara LeFevour Smith to lead it.
As the architect tasked with creating a pretrial services system across Illinois, Director Smith’s vision and determination has been exemplary. In 2022, OSPS began with 12 staff members. Today, the office employs more than 280 pretrial professionals. OSPS now operates in 82 Illinois counties and has completed over 61,000 pretrial investigations. That volume of work would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.
On July 1, OSPS will no longer be an arm of the Court, but an independent agency. Here to explain its history and detail its invaluable role is Director Smith.
38 Years in the Making
By Cara LeFevour Smith, Director, Office of Statewide Pretrial Services
Maintaining a fair criminal justice system is always a work in progress. Sadly, across the country we have become accustomed to hearing a lot of rhetoric while seeing very little concrete action.
Here in Illinois, though, we have witnessed head-spinning advancements in recent years. We have risen from a state largely devoid of pretrial services to one that has meaningful pretrial services in every courthouse, for every defendant. This tremendous accomplishment is thanks to a pretrial services revolution that the Illinois Supreme Court and the Illinois Judicial Conference laid the foundation for more than 40 years ago.
In 1980 an Illinois Judicial Conference committee studied bail procedures in Illinois and made two primary recommendations: expand the authority of judges in setting pretrial release conditions and establish pretrial services across Illinois.
Then State Representative John Cullerton introduced HB3573, Illinois’ Pretrial Services Act, during Illinois’ 84th
General Assembly. On May 22, 1986, urging passage of the bill, Representative Cullerton said, “What we’re saying with this Bill is [...] we’re recognizing the need for a judge to have information before he sets bond, better information that he has now. It’s going to have the effect of having people who should not be incarcerated not have to be, because other conditions will be set. Both those people who are more violent offenders, are more likely not to come back to court or people who lie about their employment or their family ties, this will be verified by this pretrial services agency who works for the court, not for the defendant or the state, and as a result people who should not get out on bond will not get out on bond. [...] The courts are calling for it. It’s an independent agency, not an employee of the state or of the defendants.”
The legislation passed with an effective date of July 1, 1987, and required each judicial circuit in Illinois to establish a pretrial services agency to provide judges across Illinois with accurate and verified background information for defendants and to supervise compliance with any pretrial release conditions ordered by the court. However, primarily due to a lack of local resources, most judicial circuits in Illinois were unable to establish a local pretrial services agency. As a result, pretrial services were largely unavailable across the state and jail populations grew.
In August 2021, following the passage of the SAFE-T Act abolishing cash bail, the Court recognized a renewed imperative for pretrial services to exist throughout Illinois to support judges and other stakeholders as the sweeping changes in our criminal justice system took place. Acting on the recommendation of the Court’s Commission on Pretrial Practices, the Office of Statewide Pretrial Services (OSPS) was born.
The Court charged OSPS with establishing a statewide pretrial services agency to serve Illinois courts and stakeholders. In September 2021, with extraordinary support from Marcia Meis, director of the Administrative Office of the Illinois Courts (AOIC), and her leadership team, a small team of dedicated professionals got to work building a new state agency from the ground up – without a blueprint or roadmap.
OSPS launched pretrial services operations in 69 Illinois counties in July 2022 and today it serves as the pretrial services agency for 82 of Illinois’ 102 counties. On June 30, 2022, OSPS had 12 employees and today more than 280 pretrial professionals are providing services in courthouses across the state.
OSPS pretrial officers provide the courts they serve with verified criminal history reports and pretrial investigations. They operate a 24/7 Centralized Operations Division, monitor defendants ordered to pretrial supervision, alert the court to new criminal charges and provide defendants with court date reminders. OSPS supervises a daily average of 8,500 pretrial individuals across the counties it serves, and it provides personal care kits and transportation assistance to defendants in need. OSPS also provides critical behavioral health and substance use referrals where appropriate and necessary.
I am very proud of our work to date. Since we launched operations in July of 2022, we have completed more than 61,000 fair and impartial pretrial investigations, supervised more than 27,000 individuals and provided nearly 120,000 court date reminders to defendants. OSPS also provides the public and stakeholders critical pretrial metrics for the counties we serve through our data dashboard, which is updated daily and available on the Court’s website.
While the AOIC has served as OSPS’ incredible incubator since we were created in 2021, it has always been the Court’s goal to realize the words of then Representative Culleton on the House floor in late May 1986 – for OSPS to be an independent agency. Last year, the Illinois General Assembly passed PA 103-602, amending Illinois’ Pretrial Services Act to establish OSPS as “an independent agency, not an employee of the state or of the defendants.”
PA 103-602 takes effect July 1, 2025, 38 years to the day that Illinois’ Pretrial Services Act took effect. We could not have made it to this milestone without the extraordinary support and guidance of the Illinois Supreme Court, the AOIC, the Conference of Chief Judges and the hundreds of stakeholders we serve across Illinois. My OSPS colleagues and I are committed to continuing our work to ensure comprehensive and meaningful pretrial services are here to stay, across Illinois. Please visit us on and after July 1st
at www.ilosps.gov.