Public Access to Illinois State Court Records

The State of Illinois is home to over 12.6 million people and has an area of 57,914 square miles. The state capital is Springfield, but the single most populated city in Illinois is Chicago. Over 2.7 million people live in Chicago proper, and over 9 million people live in the Chicago metropolitan area, which spans Cook County and 18 other nearby counties.

The Judicial Article of the Illinois Constitution of 1970 establishes a unified, three tiered court system, consisting of Circuit Courts, an Appellate Court, and a Supreme Court.

The Illinois Supreme Court is the state's highest court and is composed of seven justices, including a Chief Justice. Illinois has five Appellate Judicial Districts, so the Supreme Court consists of three justices representing the First Appellate Judicial District and one from each of the remaining four Appellate Judicial Districts.

The Supreme Court of Illinois has jurisdiction over cases appealed from the Appellate Court, but cases that resulted in a death penalty may be directly appealed to the Supreme Court. The Court has exclusive jurisdiction over matters involving legislative redistricting and determining the ability of the Governor to serve in office. The Supreme Court also has discretionary original jurisdiction in cases relating to State revenue and writs of mandamus, prohibition, or habeas corpus.

Illinois Supreme Court Justices are elected in partisan elections by popular vote to ten year terms. Justices are then subject to nonpartisan retention elections at the expiration of their term to remain on the court. To be eligible to be a justice on the Illinois Supreme Court, a person must be a U.S. citizen, a district resident, and licensed to practice law in Illinois.

The number of matters brought before the Illinois Supreme Court each year averages around 2,100. The Illinois Supreme Court has been involved with many important cases in U.S. jurisprudence, including Escobedo v. Illinois, Illinois v. Rodriguez, and Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education.

The Illinois Appellate Court is the state’s intermediate appellate court, with jurisdiction over appeals from the Circuit Court that are not directly sent to the Supreme Court. The Appellate Court is organized into five Appellate Judicial Districts, each of which hears appeals from the Circuits within that district. Once the Appellate Court makes a decision on an appeal, a person may petition the Supreme Court for review.

Each Appellate Court meets in a different city within their district. The First District meets in Chicago in Cook County, while the Second District meets in Elgin. The Third District meets in Ottawa, the Fourth District meets in Springfield, and the Fifth District meets in Mount Vernon.

Currently, there are 54 Appellate Court Justices, 18 of which serve the First District. Depending on location, judges are assigned to the Appellate Court by the Supreme Court, or they are elected by the residents of the district, to 10 year terms. These justices are subject to retention elections at the end of their terms.

Illinois is divided into 23 Judicial Districts, each containing one or more counties. Every Judicial District has a Circuit Court, the state’s trial courts of general jurisdiction. The Circuit Courts hear both civil and criminal cases, ranging from small claim actions to domestic relations to criminal felonies.

There are two types of judges in the Circuit Courts: Circuit Judges and Associate Judges. Each Circuit Court elects their own Chief Judge who deals with the court’s administration. Circuit Judges can hear any case assigned to them by the Chief Judge, but Associate Judges cannot hear criminal cases in which the defendant is charged with a felony, unless approval is received from the Supreme Court.

Circuit Judges are initially elected for a six year term, either on a circuit-wide basis or from their county of residence. They are then subject to retention elections when their term expires. Circuit Judges appoint Associate Judges to four year terms. All judges in the Circuit Courts must be attorneys licensed to practice in Illinois.

Created by the Illinois Constitution, the state judicial disciplinary system is composed of two independent entities: The Judicial Inquiry Board and the Courts Commission.

The Judicial Inquiry Board has the authority to receive, initiate, and investigate complaints concerning active Illinois state court judges. If necessary, the Board is also authorized to file a complaint with the Courts Commission.

The Courts Commission hears any complaints filed by the Judicial Inquiry Board. After notice and public hearing, the Courts Commission has the authority to remove from office, suspend without pay, censure or reprimand a judge for willful misconduct in office, persistent failure to perform his or her duties, or other conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice or that brings the judicial office into disrepute; or to suspend, with or without pay, or retire a judge who is physically or mentally unable to perform his or her duties. The Courts Commission is the only entity with the power to assess the complaints and render judgment and its decision is final.

• The busiest county for court cases in Illinois is Cook County.

• In 2021, over 4,000 cases were filed in the Illinois Appellate Courts.

• 1,821 cases were filed in the Illinois Supreme Court in 2021.

• The majority of cases filed in the Circuit Courts in 2021 were traffic related.

UniCourt is your single source for state and federal court records, offering comprehensive court coverage and the most complete and accurate dataset available.

Each day, UniCourt collects all of the newly filed civil and criminal cases in the Illinois Courts we cover and lets you search through those new case filings in our CrowdSourced Library™. You can also use UniCourt to track state court litigation and get real-time case alerts sent directly to your inbox. Additionally, UniCourt empowers you to download court documents on-demand without ever having to login to a government court database, and gives you unlimited access to download millions of free state and federal court documents in our CrowdSourced Library™.

UniCourt also gives you access to court records for all of the federal courts across the state of Illinois.

• Central District of Illinois
• Northern District of Illinois
• Southern District of Illinois

• Central District of Illinois
• Northern District of Illinois
• Southern District of Illinois

• Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals

UniCourt’s industry-leading Legal Data APIs provide Enterprise users with on-demand, bulk access to structured data from Illinois state and federal courts. Our Legal Data as a Service (LDaaS) collects, organizes, standardizes, and normalizes court data from Illinois state courts and all federal courts, and makes it readily available via our UniCourt Enterprise API for business development, competitive intelligence, litigation strategy, and docket management.