Sheriff's Office: Chicago Bears Free to Leave Thanks to Illinois SAFE-T Act
Presumed innocence has ruined everything
COUNTY SHERIFF’S OFFICE—The Chicago Bears’ potential upcoming move out of state is just another example of the Illinois SAFE-T Act at work, and disappointed football fans have no further to look than the office of Governor JB Pritzker, a representative for the county sheriff says.
“We used to be able to hold just about anyone anywhere for as long as we felt like,” said the representative. “But now everyone walks free. Criminals after they’re charged, reporters after they print very mean articles, and apparently whole football teams can just up and leave after using up all their tax incentives.”
Taking effect in 2021, the Illinois SAFE-T Act overhauled pretrial detention in the state and eliminated the cash bail system, in addition to introducing new rules regulating police body cameras, investigations of misconduct, and more. Law enforcement officials throughout the state have criticized the act since its inception.
“We’ve seen their little posts about Indiana,” the rep continued. “In the good old days, we used to call that a flight risk. They so much as sneezed at a yellow light, we would have had them locked up tighter than the Walmart after 8 PM.”
As with many critiques of the SAFE-T act, this reasoning ignores that the cash bail system disproportionately incarcerated poor suspects regardless of their likelihood of reoffending before trial.
“I hope they do head to Indiana,” the sheriff told reporters outside the building. “All goes well, this county will be part of Indiana soon anyway.”
The sheriff appeared to be referring to a political posturing stunt in which certain Indiana state officials offered to annex large portions of Illinois that have historically clashed with Cook County politics, a proposition political analysts have described as “absolutely bonkers.”
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