SERVICE OF PROCESS IN PRISONER CASES

Each correctional facility in the State of Illinois has a prison Litigation Coordinator. We send Notice of Lawsuit and Waiver of Service forms to the Litigation Coordinator at the prison where the defendant(s) is located. The Litigation Coordinator distributes among the prison staff. We also have attorneys who normally represent the medical contractual defendants, from Wexford and Health Professionals, who have agreed to accept service on behalf of the medical defendants. Illinois Dept. of Corrections, Wexford and Health Professionals will generally supply us with a current address (home or work) for a defendant they cannot accept service for or who no longer works for corrections or the medical facility.

In our civil detainee (sexually dangerous detainees) cases, we serve some defendants at Dept of Human Services in Springfield with summons using the US Marshal and some we send waivers directly to facility where the defendants are being held. We also have two attorneys we send waiver forms to for medical contractual defendants, Liberty and Addus.

Basically, we only use the Marshal when necessary on prisoner cases. We worked with the Illinois Department of Corrections to set up this system because service of process on prisoner civil rights cases was being put on the back burner with the Marshal's Office.