Paul Vallas: Making the SAFE-T Act safe

The well-intentioned law must be adjusted to deny pretrial release to repeat violent offenders and those suspected of violent crimes.

Supporters of Illinois’ SAFE-T Act are well-intentioned in their desire that justice not vary based on income, but the law needs serious adjustments to ensure it protects the public. When violent offenders are released because the burden to show someone should not get pretrial release falls on prosecutors, victims are betrayed and communities lose faith in the system.

Critics of the act argue that it compromises public safety by restricting judicial discretion, eliminating cash bail and making it harder to detain suspects for serious crimes, potentially increasing releases of dangerous repeat offenders.

It is important to note, however, that the problem of releasing violent criminals, even with the SAFE-T Act, varies from county to county, heavily influenced by the local state’s attorney. Nowhere is this clearer than in pretrial release in Cook County under former Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.

Criticism of pretrial release decisions is well justified, but it would be misleading to blame it solely on the SAFE-T Act’s elimination of cash bail. Much of the criticism centers around highly publicized Cook County cases involving criminals with long arrest records committing violent crimes while on pretrial release awaiting trial for other felonies.

The SAFE-T Act, although flawed, does not eliminate state’s attorneys’ say on pretrial release. The surge in violence Chicago saw when COVID struck predated the SAFE-T Act, and most of the killings and non-lethal shootings then by individuals out on bail awaiting trial on other felony charges were as much a product of Foxx’s decisions not to charge defendants with crimes that would warrant detainment and her reluctance to fight pretrial releases.

Much depends on the prosecutorial approach, as DuPage and many downstate counties have demonstrated. In DuPage, the state’s attorney’s office and the courts frequently emphasize tougher conditions for pretrial release and stiffer sentences. DuPage County officials often highlight their approach to prosecuting retail theft and burglary, particularly in high-traffic areas like Oak Brook, targeting offenders from Cook County who travel there to commit crimes and seeking tougher sentences for them.

Chicago’s murder rate has fallen by almost 30% since Eileen O’Neill Burke became Cook County state’s attorney, not because she violated the SAFE-T Act’s no-bail provisions but because she asks judges to use the discretion the law gives them to deny bail in serious cases and for dangerous habitual felons. Under O’Neill Burke, pretrial detention petitions rose 70% in the first five months of 2025 and the detention rate nearly doubled.

That said, to fulfill its promise the SAFE-T Act needs to give judges less discretion, not more. This can be done without restoring bail but by mandating no pretrial release for certain offenses and placing the discretion and proof burden on the defense to justify waiving that requirement.

Here are reforms that would improve the law:

● Pretrial release should be denied to repeat violent offenders and those suspected of violent crimes, as well as anyone who attacks or even threatens a police officer or other first responders or contacts witnesses or victims.

● Serious and repeat offenders should serve their full sentences, while there should be mandatory sentences for those who attack first responders, intimidate witnesses and victims or use a firearm in commission of a crime. This is a needed deterrence.

Chicago itself could take its own steps:

● The city can enact its own public safety ordinance to ensure accountability for more serious offenses. Such an ordinance can provide for a minimum of 364 days in and include fines and probation for those who threaten police, intimidate witnesses, commit hate crimes, weapons violations or domestic violence offenses, or steal vehicles. Judges would remain free to impose tougher sentences.

● Chicago also can enact a public nuisance ordinance empowering police to make arrests, impound vehicles and impose heavy fines on individuals and organizations found guilty of violating the public way, damaging property, disrupting commerce and harassing city residents. Ald. Anthony Napolitano (41st) introduced such an ordinance in 2021, but it was never released from committee.

Someone’s experience with the criminal justice system should not vary based on their income. The SAFE-T Act corrects that.

Making the nature and repetitiveness of the offense the criteria for determining pretrial release, including denying it, would correct the issues within the SAFE-T Act. It would also bring accountability to prosecutors who are incapable of or unwilling to distinguish between those accused of violent versus nonviolent offenses and first-time versus repeat offenders.