Efforts Underway to Boost Low Juvenile Expungement Numbers by by Lily Oberman and La Risa Lynch
To read this article on the Chicago Bureau website, click here.
Thousands of young adults in Cook County are missing out on getting a clean start in life by failing to take advantage of the state’s liberal expungement laws for individuals who’ve committed crimes as a juvenile.
In 2013 the Cook County Circuit Court Clerk’s office had 5,994 juvenile cases on file and only 661 sought expungement of their criminal records – with only one being denied.
Dorothy Brown, Clerk of the Circuit Court of Cook County, called it “abysmal” to have so few people seek and be granted expungement, “especially since it is so easy…I think the main thing is education,” about the simplicity of the process.