Pursuant to Illinois law, all prison inmates are eligible for parole unless they have accepted a fixed release established by the Prison Review Board. The guidelines for determining eligibility for parole consideration are when a minimum term of an “indeterminate” as opposed to a “determinate” sentence has been served. A…
What is the nature of crime and can it be controlled? From the beginning of time, starting with the story of Cain and Abel, society has been perplexed with crime and its impact on how we interact with each other on a daily basis. Perhaps it is an inevitability of…
Probation If you are sentenced to probation, you have been given a sentence with lesser jail time than usual because you may be a first time offender, and a probation time period is attached to the sentence which indicates that any violation of the probation will require you to serve…
A few bad apples can spoil the whole barrel, or so they say. But in the case of some Chicago precincts where rogue cops are allowed to use their badges to commit crimes against its residents, this is all too true. Cities are discovering that the cost of allowing these…
You have been arrested. You do not have a “get out of jail” free card, so what do you do? If you are accused of a crime and arrested in Chicago, the first thing you will want to do is call your attorney. The very next thing you will want…
Rape and sexual assaults are crimes punishable by long prison sentences and with the “Mark of Cain” following the accused for the rest of his or her life. It can be a destroyer of reputations, and sometimes, of life. But what happens to the accused when the accusation proves to…
If you have ever been arrested for committing a crime in any state, whether convicted or not, you have a criminal record. Despite what you have been told, adult criminal records and juvenile criminal records (also known as “rap sheets”) are never automatically cleared. If you incurred a “rap sheet”…
Arrested, charged, prosecuted, imprisoned, but innocent. This scenario is played out over and over again in our judicial system across the nation. While America has one of the finest judicial systems in the world, sometimes we get it wrong and an innocent person ends up spending time in prison for…
Pop quiz: If suspected of committing a crime such as sexual assault, when should you talk to an attorney, before or after interrogation? Some people charged with a crime think they know the answer to this question, but sadly, many find out too late that they did not. Police officers…
Multiple murders on the streets of Chicago on any given weekend now seem to be a fact of life. The murder rate in Chicago has increased by 13% since 2013; shootings not ending in death were up 40% during the first three months of 2015. It is little wonder that…