Cook County State's Attorney Eileen O'Neill Burke has rewritten her office's contract with a data vendor to block the company from sharing personal information about people held in Cook County Jail with federal immigration agents.
The revised contract with Appriss Inc., announced Nov. 9, prohibits the company from disclosing personal data to federal law enforcement or to third-party databases that could be used for immigration enforcement, according to a statement from the Cook County State's Attorney's Office. The contract is effective immediately.
Park Ridge and Niles fall within Cook County, and the jail data at issue covers individuals held at the county lockup.
Appriss handles legally required notifications to crime victims when an offender is released from custody. But the company also counts U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and LexisNexis Risk Solutions among its customers, according to the state's attorney's office. Those relationships have raised concerns about data sharing since at least 2022.
What changed
Burke first updated the Appriss contract in October 2025 to prohibit data sharing directly with ICE. The new revision goes further. It requires Appriss to stop sharing data with any third-party database, including LexisNexis Risk Solutions, that may itself sell private information to federal agencies.
In August, the office required Appriss to shut off the data feed supplying personal information to third parties. Under the revised contract, Appriss must also take steps to prevent any party it contracts with from accessing or purchasing personal information of individuals held in the jail.
The state's attorney's office said it is among the first jurisdictions in the country to add such a prohibition to a vendor contract.
Courthouse enforcement backdrop
The contract changes come as ICE agents have been spotted at Cook County courthouses over the past year, according to the office's statement. The statement named the Domestic Violence Courthouse, the Leighton Criminal Courthouse and the Markham Courthouse as locations where agents have appeared. Agents have made arrests on courthouse property and, in other cases, appeared to wait for people to leave court proceedings before detaining them, the office said.
Burke said in the statement that participants in the justice system should be able to trust their personal information will be protected regardless of immigration status. She said fear of coming to court among victims, witnesses and defendants undermines the office's ability to seek justice and keep communities safe.
Coalition and commissioner weigh in
A coalition including Mijente, Organized Communities against Deportations, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and Just Futures Law issued a joint statement calling the contract change a victory for Cook County residents' privacy.
Cook County Commissioner Alma E. Anaya said in the statement that the revision removes language that had allowed personal information to be shared. Anaya called on other county agencies to close similar loopholes.
An Injustice Watch investigation published in August found that prosecutors' offices in one out of every six Illinois counties provided information to ICE. Illinois' TRUST Act bars police and other agencies from helping federal agents deport people without a federal criminal warrant, but the law does not clearly state whether prosecutors are bound by those same restrictions, according to the investigation.
The state's attorney's office said it also supports residents by certifying U-Visa applications for crime victims, facilitating virtual meetings to reduce ICE encounters at courthouses and upholding the TRUST Act.
