The ISBA reports today that a recent Seventh Circuit Decision in Bell v. Chicago Police Chief Keating, No. 11-2408 (September 10, 2012) has threatened a Chicago Municipal Code Ordinance, Section 8-4-010(d), which prohibits acts of disorderly conduct when individual knowingly fails to obey lawful police order under circumstances where three or more other persons are committing acts of disorderly conduct in immediate vicinity, and where said acts are likely to cause substantial harm or serious inconvenience, annoyance or alarm. The plaintiffs alleged that the Ordinance violated their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The District Court ruled that the plaintiff's lacked standing to bring a facial Constitutional challenge to the ordinance. The Seventh Circuit reversed the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division and concluded that there was standing.
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The Chicago Tribune is reporting that the City of Chicago has finally come to terms with the legal flaws in their school speed zone camera plan. Illinois, thanks to a nearly 40 year legal opinion authored by the then-Illinois Attorney General will only cite a driver from exceeding a posted school speed zone if there are children present. This is a necessary element that the State must prove beyond a reasonable doubt to enforce the ticket.
The precedent exists unbroken to this day and requires the arresting officer to testify about the presence of children during a hearing. This is why signs throughout Illinois in school zones have smaller lettering saying "When children are present." In other words, the school zone speed only exists when children are present and otherwise it is the default speed for that road (prior posted speed limit). |
AuthorRishi Nair owns Nair Law LLC and practices as Of Counsel at Keener and Associates, P.C. Archives
October 2013
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