New Kane County State's Attorney takes first steps in new role

ST. CHARLES TOWNSHIP – Jamie Mosser, Kane County’s newly elected state’s attorney, said she is taking steps to meet everyone who works in the office in her first month on the job.

“A significant amount of them, I already know and been lucky enough to work with them before,” Mosser said, speaking at her first press briefing Tuesday. “But there are some newer attorneys and support staff that I never met. And I wanted to talk to them to give them an idea of my vision for the office, to really see what they thought was working and what wasn’t working and to try to incorporate that all in together.”

Mosser said – as she said throughout the campaign – “It was not going to be an office that was about me. It was going to be an office that was about all these great people here who have worked so hard.”

“And it really matters to me, the changes that they think are helpful – what we can do, to do justice better,” Mosser said.

She is also trying to be cognizant of the coronavirus pandemic, to have staff use technology to work from home while still moving cases during the courthouse shutdown.

The State’s Attorney’s Office has 120 total staff, a little over 60 of them are attorneys. There’s support staff, investigators and case managers as well, she said.

Some staff have been sent home out of an abundance of caution in not wanting to spread the virus, but even while home, they’re checking email, voicemail and sending discovery information to defense attorneys, Mosser said.

Mosser herself has recovered from a bout with coronavirus, having contracted it from a family member after the election, she said.

“I was quarantined and no one else got it,” Mosser said.

Too much work, not enough lawyers

Her predecessor, Joe McMahon, had often complained of not having enough lawyers.

Mosser agreed.

“I knew it while I worked here. I knew it while he was here. And … we are feeling it now,” Mosser said.

The biggest issue now is attorneys have to review more discovery than ever before – police squad car video, now there’s police body camera footage, video that people take on their phones and various home security systems that also record data that attorneys need to review, she said.

Police now go to homes and businesses to try to get security system footage as part of their investigation, she said.

“On top of what we had to review before, along with jail phone calls, they have iPads, communication that happens between iPads," Mosser said. "There’s so much because of the advancement of technology that we have to review – because that’s our job. Ethically, we have to do that."

This is one example of how the workload has increased but not the staff. And while an assistant could be trained to look for certain things, ultimately, the responsibility to know what is in a case falls back on the attorney handling it, she said.

“I’d feel better if I reviewed rather than having to rely on someone else,” Mosser said.

Lack of up-to-date technology

While DuPage County has a DocuShare content management system where discovery information is uploaded and defense attorneys have immediate access – Kane County does not have a system that sophisticated.

“DuPage County’s is far and away better,” Mosser said. “But what we’re doing is, we’re sending it to the attorney. The attorney has a window of time – because of the technology – to open it up. And if they don’t open it up, they’re requesting that we send it again. It’s not as easy as a reset button. It’s putting the information back in and sending it off.”

Kane County’s technology has not caught up to what DuPage has, Mosser said.

“I would love to be able to get something, but again that goes to the money through the budget that we have and the issues we have to try to update us to the technology,” Mosser said.

She did not know how much a system like that would cost other than “I know that it’s a lot of money.”

DuPage County has reached out to Kane about the system, but Mosser said they would have to bring in everyone in the justice system to discuss it.

Vertical prosecution office

One of the changes Mosser can make without a technology purchase is to create a vertical prosecution office, where attorneys are assigned certain types of cases to achieve consistency in the prosecutors’ offers.

“It’s one unit and you discuss the issues, you discuss the cases and that way you don’t have one person making an offer in one courtroom and another making an offer on a similar case in another courtroom,” Mosser said. “You have consistency.”

The other part of a vertical prosecution office is the ability to get through cases more quickly.

“One of my passions when I worked here was domestic violence prosecutions,” Mosser said. “There wasn’t a motion filed in a domestic violence case that I hadn’t already seen or heard, so it was very easy for me to be able to respond to motions, to argue in court, set up the indictment, talk to victims – because that’s all the cases that I did.”

The idea is to streamline the process and be consistent in what prosecutors offer so dispositions of cases are more closely aligned, she said.

“That is the dream I want to get to, that so far covid is interfering with,” Mosser said.

COVID enforcement

While McHenry County’s State’s Attorney has said he would not prosecute any cases of restaurants or bars violating the governor’s no inside dining order, Mosser said she was not taking any stance like that.

“Every case has to be looked at individually because that is ethically what we should do before we file any type of a case,” Mosser said.

“I can tell you there have not been any criminal charges that have been filed against any businesses because for the most part, when the Health Department and Sheriff Hain comes in, they work with them to come into compliance,” Mosser said. “I will not say specifically like a blanket order, because everything has to be looked at individually for us to ethically be doing our job.”

Mosser, a Campton Hills resident, said she has heard of Luau Coffee, which has openly defied orders to socially distance or wear masks.

“In terms of what we do, is obviously, our Health Department that originally comes in. And then there is a notice to comply and then there is the notice of dispersement and then there is potential for a citation to be issued,” Mosser said.

“I do know that particular owner has talked to law enforcementand has moved chairs and tables to come into compliance,” Mosser said. “So again, it’s one of those things that everything has to be looked at on a case-by-case basis and right now, we have not been asked to look at Luau Coffee specifically for that.”

Mosser said a request for enforcement has to come from the Health Department – not from Campton Hills resident Scott Johansen, who has sent multiple email requests to the Health Department about non-compliance with the Governor's order not to allow indoor dining.

“Without knowing more specifics about what the Health Department has or has not done, and outside of this one citizen who has made multiple complaints, I can’t fully answer that,” Mosser said. “But what I can tell you, I know they (the Health Department) have been very proactive in talking to our businesses in terms of trying to make sure we are not increasing the pandemic or making anything worse.”