A court-monitoring group that studied policy changes during the first 500 days of Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke’s leadership found in a new report that prison sentences for retail theft more than doubled last year, alleging that the top prosecutor returned “to the tough-on-crime prosecution that weakened Cook County communities for decades” when she took over from former State’s Attorney Kim Foxx.
The report, released on Wednesday by the Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts, called on Burke to revisit some of her policy decisions while also making recommendations to the Illinois General Assembly, including increasing the legal threshold to be charged with retail theft as a felony.
“In reality, many people commit retail theft because they need groceries, they need the basic necessities that for a lot of people they do not have the money to buy,” said Austin Segal, director of research at Appleseed and one of the report’s authors.
The findings are not surprising, given that Burke reversed a number of Foxx’s policies after running on a platform that was more tough on crime than the former progressive prosecutor, even as the report shows a continued divide between Burke and progressive groups advocating for criminal justice reform.
In a statement, Burke’s office said it is “committed to strengthening public safety by taking dangerous weapons off our streets, supporting and seeking justice on behalf of victims, protecting survivors of domestic violence, combating crime on public transit and deterring violent offenders from inflicting harm on our neighborhoods.”
Her office said it has offered to meet with Appleseed to discuss the report.
The Appleseed report, titled “500 days forward, 10 years back,” examined the impact of new policies, drawing on press releases, news reports, data and information obtained through public records requests. The group also previously released reports evaluating Foxx’s tenure.
“The Burke administration has targeted retail theft, gun possession, and domestic violence cases, putting policies in place that impose higher charges and harsher pretrial conditions in an indiscriminate manner,” the report said. “The administration has also implemented policies and practices that remove checks on the police and federal agents.”
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For her part, Burke has said that the office’s policies are meant to address gun violence.
“For us, it’s guns, guns, guns. Every single day,” Yvette Loizon, chief of policy at the state’s attorney’s office, previously told the Tribune.
The Tribune has catalogued many of the changes referenced in the report, including detention policies that have accompanied an increase in the jail’s population, a program that allows police to directly file some gun charges and a change in protocol for referrals to restorative justice courts, which was later reversed.
The report notes that Burke reversed a policy set by Foxx, who during her tenure said her administration would not file felony retail theft charges unless the stolen goods were valued at more than $1,000.
Illinois law sets the threshold at $300, which is what Burke has now directed prosecutors to use.
According to the report, 36% of retail theft cases were charged as felonies in 2025 compared with 18% in prior years.
Though retail theft cases that result in prison sentences make up a small portion of overall cases, the study also found that prison sentences for retail theft rose to 7% in 2025 from 3% the year before, which marked Foxx’s last year as top prosecutor; 2024, though, saw a decrease from the prior year of 2023 when 6% of retail theft convictions resulted in a prison term.
The study’s authors called on the Illinois General Assembly to increase the threshold that allows prosecutors to file retail theft charges as a felony, noting that the state’s $300 bar is one of the lowest in the country.
In 2011, lawmakers increased it to $300 from $150. In 2019, legislators filed a bill that attempted to raise the threshold to $2,000.
“Given that retail theft is largely a consequence of poverty, imprisoning people convicted of retail theft for multiple years only serves to exacerbate the problem and destabilize families and communities,” the report said.