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Recent Blog Posts
Termination of parental rights in Cook County, Illinois
The termination of a Cook County parent's rights is one of the most extreme family law measures that a court can take. Generally the termination of a parent's rights is done outside of the context of a divorce and is based on the best interests of a child.
When a petition to terminate parental rights is initiated, a court follows a two-step process outlined in the Juvenile Court Act.
Step one is for the court to consider whether there is "clear and convincing evidence" that a parent is an unfit person as defined in the Illinois Adoption Act.
The second step to terminating parental rights is for the court to consider whether such a drastic move would be in the best interests of a child.
Generally the "best interests" analysis is the most subjective and complex part of court proceedings. Illinois courts consider 10 factors in determining whether terminating a parent's parental rights is in a child's best interests:
- The child's welfare and physical safety.
Modifying child support in Cook County
Child support modification can be extremely tricky to navigate. In general, a parent attempting to change child support payments must show a "substantial change in circumstances" in order to modify a child support payment schedule.
Cook County courts have a extremely broad latitude in determining whether there is a substantial change in circumstances to support the modification of child support.
Traditionally, to establish a change in circumstances, a support-paying parent would have to show that there was a significant change in their income and also an increase in the needs of the children involved.
Illinois courts are more flexible in modifying child support however, and modifications are possible even when a noncustodial parent's income hasn't changed.
Substantial changes in circumstances can include:
- Remarriage of either parents
- Child reaching the age of 18
- Medical issues or other special needs that a child develops
The pitfalls of filing for divorce pro se in Cook County
Experienced legal representation is important if you are filing for divorce in Cook County. Many spouses attempt to file for divorce without legal help (also known as pro se) and end up having their claims dismissed because of technicalities.
This is exactly what happened to one Burbank woman. The woman's marriage broke down in spring of 2009 and she filed for divorce in May of that year.
During the divorce proceedings the woman represented herself and received an unfavorable distribution of the marital assets. The woman alleges that court considered inaccurate figures to evaluate her husband's stock holding and failed to take taxes into consideration when awarding her their Chicago home.
A number of filing errors prevented an appeals court from reviewing the substantive issues raised by the woman's appeal. Specifically the woman failed to provide the appeals court with a record of the trial court proceedings as required by Supreme Court Rule 321. Ill. S.Ct. R. 321. She also failed to properly serve her husband with attachments that she wanted included on her appellate record.
Chicago man may get help after row with police
A homeless Chicago man may find some mental health help after causing a scene with Chicago Police Officers in Uptown last week. Huffington Post reports that the 41-year-old man was arrested on the North Side last Wednesday.
The Chicago Tribune reports that the homeless man was attempting to sleep when someone reported him as trespassing. When police officers attempted to move him, he allegedly threw items at the officers.
Several media outlets report that in addition to allegedly pepper spraying the officers, the homeless man also tossed bottles of bodily waste at the officers.
The man faces several charges including aggravated battery, resisting a peace officer and criminal trespass.
James Cappleman, the 46 Ward Alderman, expressed relief on his Facebook page that the homeless man may finally get some mental health help.
Sufficiency of evidence in appellate cases
Last week we extensively covered a case involving a Chicago man named Gary who was challenging his conviction of aggravated battery against his neighbor's girlfriend. Ultimately the problem is that sufficiency of evidence appeals are notoriously hard to win in cases that hinge on the testimony of witnesses rather than hard physical evidence.
In reviewing a case based on sufficiency of evidence, a Cook County appeals court asks whether any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of a criminal offense beyond a reasonable doubt. The court views the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution and makes all reasonable inference in the prosecution's favor.
This means that that even if the appeals court judge would have decided the case differently, the court will uphold a verdict if it is possible that any reasonable trial court or jury could have decided in favor of the prosecution.
This makes it easy to see why the court could not overturn the Gary's aggravated battery conviction. Although it's highly likely that his neighbors were more intoxicated and hostile than they admitted to, it is also likely that Gary had ill-will toward his neighbor and hit Tara in the heat of the argument.
Brawl on Homan Avenue: the Court's View
During the past week we have followed a case involving a fight between two Chicago neighbors named Gary and Ken. During the fight Gary punched Tara in the face. Gary alleges that this happened because Ken swung at him, and then used Tara as a shield when Gary attempted to return his blow.
No one contested the fact that Gary hit Tara and that she was severely injured as a result. Gary argued that he lacked the requisite intent to harm Tara as he was attempting to return Ken's punch.
The trial court rejected the defense's version of events and said that it was unlikely that Ken would be able to pull Tara in front of him during the short time it would have taken Gary to return Ken's punch.
Gary also argued the fact that Ken and Tara had been drinking prevented them from being able to accurately remember the incident. The trial court noted that although intoxication is relative to the value of a person's testimony, it did not preclude the trial court from accepting their version of events.
Brawl on Homan Avenue: Kelly's story
This week we are covering an aggravated battery case that arose out of a fight on South Homan Avenue in Chicago. The fight involved a man named Ken and his girlfriend Tara who got into an argument with a neighbor named Gary one July evening.
The evidence indicates that Tara was punched in the face while talking to a woman who hanging out with Gary. Tara and Ken say that the punch was the culmination of Gary's hostile behavior throughout the evening.
The woman that Tara was talking to was named Kelly, and she had a drastically different version of events that night.
Kelly testified that she was over at Gary's house for a barbeque and that she had nothing to drink that evening.
Kelly says that Gary and another man were sitting on the porch when they saw Gary's neighbor Ken pull up to the drive way.
Contrary to Ken's testimony that he was not drunk, Kelly said that Ken "missed the driveway," ran over the curb and onto the grass. Kelly said that Ken and Tara then fell out of the car and had to lean on each other to make it to the house.
Brawl on Homan Avenue: Tara's story
This week we are following the case of a man who was convicted of aggravated battery after a getting into a fight with his neighbor, Ken, and Ken's girlfriend, Tara. The fight happened early one summer evening and the two sides have drastically different versions of events.
Ken and Tara testified that Gary immediately started screaming at them after they returned home from a bar one evening. The couple said that they had been drinking, but were not drunk, and that Gary's profane insults were wholly unprovoked.
Tara said that she wanted to mend the feelings between the two men, so she went back outside to try and make peace with Gary. Upon approaching the fence that divided the two houses, Tara testified that she asked Gary to shake her hand, but he would only curse at her.
The woman who was with Gary then walked up to Tara and the two had a calm conversation about how the two men should resolve their differences.
According to Tara, she be blacked out during the conversation and woke up on the ground with blood coming from her face. Medical records indicate that Tara had a broken orbital bone, nose, deviated septum, nerve damage and suffered drooping in her eye because of the incident.
Chicago man convicted of assault after fight with neighbor
In our last post we discussed a Chicago neighborly feud which turned violent one July evening. The feud resulted in one man being sentenced to aggravated battery and sentenced to two years of intense probation.
An appeals court recently reconsidered the case and affirmed the man's conviction. The man alleged that there was not enough evidence to support his conviction because he and his neighbor had drastically different accounts of what happened that evening.
So what happened?
The incident took place on July 13, 2009, on the 10800 block of South Homan Avenue in Chicago.
Version one of events:
According to trial documents, the neighbor, Ken, testified that he was out drinking with his girlfriend Tara. Ken said that he had "less than six drinks" and that he and Tara were not drunk when they returned home.
Upon pulling into his driveway, he noticed that his neighbor Gary was sitting on the porch next door. Gary had two friends with him, a woman and a man.
Neighborly feud results in assault charges against Chicago man
The bond between neighbors is one of the things that makes Chicago such a great place to live. Ties with neighbors create a sense of community and can greatly enrich the quality of a person's life.
Just the opposite is true for strained neighborly relationships. A toxic relationship with a neighbor can be a minor annoyance, at best, or result in serious criminal charges.
One Chicago man was recently convicted of aggravated battery after a feud with his neighbors turned violent. The man was sentenced after a bench trial and was ordered to serve two years of intensive probation.
An appeals court recently upheld the man's conviction, which he challenged based on the sufficiency of the evidence.
The trial documents show that the incident which led to the man's charges occured during the early morning hourys of July 13, 2009 on the 10800 block of South Homan Avenue in Chicago.
That evening the man hosted a BBQ with several friends. He and his friends were sitting outside when his next door neighbor pulled up next door.
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