BREAKING – HB 1628 Passes, Marking an Important Step Toward Data Collection and Transparency in Reporting Civil Asset Forfeiture Practices

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Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts is celebrating the passage of Illinois House Bill 1628, an important step toward enhancing data collection and transparency in reporting in civil asset forfeiture practices. This bill builds on reforms from 2018 to the civil asset forfeiture reporting process, and ensures we are able to evaluate those reforms. 

Led by Illinois Rep. Will Guzzardi in the House and Sen. Omar Aquino in the Senate, the law will take a big step toward more significant reforms needed in this area by requiring law enforcement to annually collect and report:

  • The legal basis for and location of seizures;
  • Demographic information about property owners; 
  • Certain details as to the expenditure of forfeiture proceeds by law enforcement agencies;
  • Criminal charges related to the seizure, if any; and
  • The forfeiture court case number initiated by prosecutors in an attempt to permanently keep the property.

The law will also require law enforcement agencies to share the information in a searchable database (where previously, each local agency was uploading individual reports to be collated) and to file null reports when there were no seizures, to distinguish them from agencies in violation of reporting requirements.

New Federal Civil Asset Forfeiture Legislation Won’t End Police Shadow Surveillance or Limit Tech Budgets

Civil asset forfeiture (CAF), sometimes referred to as “legalized larceny,” allows the state to permanently seize someone’s property, like a car or cash, based on the suspicion that the property was involved in criminal activity. CAF disproportionately harms low-income communities of color. In 2023, when Chicago Appleseed court-watchers observed 230 CAF cases in Cook County, over 80% of claimants were Black and Latine, usually navigating the civil court system unrepresented to try to gain back their property. 

The property in question is most often a car or small amount of cash: Over 40% of cash seizures in 2023 were for less than $2,000, or a car that individuals were depending on to get to work, school, and other obligations. The cost of going to court can easily outweigh what people stand to get back. In the meantime, CAF is used as a slush fund for law enforcement agencies, which have a perverse incentive to scout for assets. The Chicago Police Department alone receives $5-10 million annually through civil and criminal asset forfeiture, money that is subject to less regulatory oversight than the rest of their budget, and is often used for new tech and surveillance projects as a result. 

With more data being shared on this shadowy legal process (made especially opaque due to the lack of judicial transparency in Illinois), we hope to better understand how civil asset forfeiture is impacting Illinois residents with an eye towards geographic, racial, and gender disparities. HB 1628 is an important step towards reform and we look forward to Governor Pritzker signing the bill into law soon.

Maya Simkin (they/them) is an Appleseed Network Collaboration for Justice Fellow with Chicago Appleseed and a recent graduate of Chicago-Kent College of Law. They have a background in farming and permaculture, and love studying Jewish liturgy and other radical texts. Maya is committed to abolition and is interested in learning how efforts in public interest law can contribute to liberation. There are lots of damsons to pick, pit, and preserve into compote this week and Maya continues to be impressed by the small fruit’s magic blues and purples, and even greens.