New Cook County Circuit Court chief judge sworn in for first time in over 20 years

CHICAGO (WLS) -- The new chief judge of the Cook County Circuit Court was installed Monday morning.

The Honorable Charles S. Beach II took the oath during a packed ceremony inside the Chicago-Kent College of Law. He was elected in September.

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"Our job is not merely to process cases. It is to deliver justice - fairly, efficiently and with respect to every person who comes through our doors," Chief Judge Beach said. "I am honored by the trust placed in me by my colleagues, the legal community and the people of Cook County. This role comes with great responsibility. I pledge to lead with integrity, to listen and to act boldly to make our courts more accessible, efficient and just for all. We begin today - let's get to work."

Chief Judge Beach is an eight-year veteran of the bench. He took over for former Chief Judge Tim Evans, who served eight terms since 2001.

Evans served longer than anyone in the county's modern court history.

Beach takes the helm at a time of intense scrutiny in the face of high-profile cases where people accused of violent crimes in Cook County are being allowed to remain free.

Beach, on Monday, assumed responsibility, at least in part, for cleaning up the problem.

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He was appointed to the circuit court in 2017 and supervised both the traffic and pre-trial divisions. He also oversaw the transition away from cash bail to the Pre-trial Fairness Act's first appearance court.

Analysts hope he will use that experience to address what some say are serious problems with the existing law that took effect more than two years ago.

"I trust that Charlie Beach will take that into consideration as priority No. 1, especially since he worked that courtroom for a couple of years. There are a number of offenses that are very violent and serious offenses, where people are hurt, where judges do not have the authority to detain," said Professor Richard Kling, with Chicago-Kent College of Law.

While it is up to the legislature to amend the statute to give judges that discretion, Kling says Beach can lobby to make that happen. He can also make changes to the electronic monitoring program that recently saw Lawrence Reed allegedly set a woman on fire on the CTA's Blue Line despite being placed on 24/7 monitoring by a Cook County judge back in August.

It is a program that until recently was run by the Cook County Sheriff's Office but was transferred to the Office of the Chief Judge, despite that office not having the resources to continually monitor and or address violations in real time.

"I expect that Judge Beach is going to be looking into that very seriously and seeing how he can get the EM program back under Tom Dart's bailiwick. Or there's now a statewide program for EM as well. But it needs to be monitored by sheriffs who have the ability when somebody violates to take them into custody and back to court," Kling said.

More than 1 million cases are filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County each year, making it one of the largest unified court systems in the world.