Protests at Kane County courthouses to be restricted to designated areas

Public protests at Kane County’s courthouses are going to be limited to designated “free speech areas,” per new rules announced Tuesday by Chief Judge Robert Villa.

The new rules come in the wake of controversy over federal immigration agents arresting people on the grounds of the public-safety campus in St. Charles, which houses the Kane County Judicial Center, the sheriff’s office and jail, the coroner’s office and the Juvenile Justice Center.

People have recently protested while agents were arresting people after they had been released from jail.

At the Judicial Center, protesters and picketers will have to use the lawn and stay no less than 100 feet away from the building’s entrance.

At the Kane County Courthouse in downtown Geneva, they will have to stick to public sidewalks around the perimeter of the campus.

The new rule also prohibits the prolonged use of horns, whistles, sirens, or amplified devices to deliberately disrupt law enforcement or court activities, or to intimidate or harass someone. Immigration activists have blown whistles to alert people that federal agents are nearby, and have also blown them during several confrontations at the public-safety campus.

The rules also state that people are to behave calmly and in a nonconfrontational manner. Videos of some of the people protesting arrests show them yelling at agents.

The rules do not address protests at the sheriff’s office, which shares a parking lot with the Judicial Center.

Villa also issued an order saying federal, state and municipal law enforcement officers should notify local law enforcement and court security before arresting someone at or near a courthouse.