Bringing a claim in Waukegan
People contact us from Waukegan years and often decades after what happened. That is the norm in this work, not the exception.
Waukegan sits in Lake County, Illinois. Most civil claims are filed in the circuit court of Lake County (the 19th Judicial Circuit); claims against the State go to the Illinois Court of Claims.
The institutions that come up here
Lake County falls under the Archdiocese of Chicago. The Illinois Attorney General’s 2023 report named 275 clerics with substantiated child sexual abuse claims in the Archdiocese of Chicago.
Schools and public bodies here
Waukegan Community Unit School District 60 serves most of the city. Waukegan is the seat of Lake County and of the 19th Judicial Circuit, so Lake County claims are heard here.
Where the responsible body is a school district, a county, or the state, the Illinois Tort
Immunity Act comes into the analysis, along with notice requirements that do not apply to a
private organisation. It is the first thing to check and it is easy to get wrong.
The federal record here
Waukegan Community Unit School District 60 carries three open Title IX investigations with the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, among the highest of any Illinois district. An open investigation is not a finding of wrongdoing, but it does mean the district’s handling of complaints is being examined externally.
Support in Waukegan, whether or not you ever call a lawyer
Zacharias Center for Sexual Abuse: 24-hour hotline 847-872-7799. Gurnee and Skokie offices.
You do not have to speak to a lawyer to get help. RAINN is also on
1-800-656-4673, free and confidential, 24 hours.
Questions people in Waukegan ask
Will anyone here find out?
Not from us. The first conversation is confidential whether or not you go ahead, and if you bring a claim, steps can be taken to protect your identity in the court record.
I only remember part of it.
That is ordinary and it is not a barrier. Memory of childhood trauma is often incomplete, and cases are built from institutional records rather than from a complete account.
I am asking for someone else.
That is fine, and it happens often. We can explain how this works so you can pass it on, with no obligation on them to do anything.
If you would rather not call, the case review form takes about a minute and asks nothing about the abuse itself.