CHAMPAIGN, IL (Chambana Today) – The Champaign County Jail has started tracking and reporting restraint chairs to the State of Illinois for the first time.
An Illinois Answers Project investigation raised questions about how Champaign County tracks and reports use of the chairs. The Jail has updated its record-keeping practices and is now submitting its required reports to a state oversight unit. An Illinois Answers probe found that Illinois jails strap down people to chairs over a thousand times a year, which is often in violation of state and county policies and for longer than manufacturers recommend.
The records showed that the staff complied with state and county guidelines, but Illinois Answers also revealed gaps in the documentation of restraint chair incidents. The county, upon being asked by Illinois Answers for records in 2023, was denied on the grounds that staff would have to search through 6,000 individual booking files and more than 1,000 pages of emails to identify the relevant documents and redact sensitive information.
Nearly every other jail in the state was able to provide records to Illinois Answers within weeks or months. However, Champaign County Jail’s reliance on handwritten and paper records had no easy way to search for restrain chair use.
“I don’t necessarily think that our use of the restraint chair in any way, shape or form has been bad,” Superintendent Karee Voges said. “I would tell every single person that’s in this field the importance of tracking and the importance of documenting that.”