Illinois Bar Journal

Defaulted defendants frequently seek relief from default orders and judgments in the form of motions to vacate brought under 735 ILCS 5/2-1301 or 2-1401. As they say, timing is everything. The availability of relief from an order or judgment to which a defaulted party may be entitled and the standard the court must apply in determining whether a party is entitled to the relief he or she seeks depend almost exclusively on the timing of the request. Moreover, because of the procedural uniqueness of the Illinois Mortgage Foreclosure Law (IMFL), found in Article XV of the Illinois Code of Civil Procedure, an understanding of the interplay between the IMFL and the Article II civil practice statutes is critical for a successful litigant. In her February 2020 Illinois Bar Journal article, “Mortgage Foreclosure Relief,” Cook County Circuit Court Judge Cecilia Horan examines possible relief from default orders and judgments available in mortgage foreclosure cases and the limitations on those remedies.

Conflicting federal and state laws pose many interesting legal questions for Illinois and other states that have legalized recreational cannabis. In his February 2020 Illinois Bar Journal article, “Major Buzzkill,” Joe Schomberg examines one often-overlooked issue: the availability of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code to businesses engaged in, or adjacent to, the bourgeoning legalized cannabis industry. Schomberg’s article received first place in the Illinois Bar Journal’s 2020 Lincoln Award Legal Writing Contest.

Although Illinois caselaw appears to suggest there is no duty to defend an insured (including an additional insured) before a suit, an insurer has a good-faith duty to its insured to respond to a demand made before suit and will often rely on two “black letter” rules to determine their responsibility. One rule is that they have no obligation to pay defense costs incurred before the insured tenders the claim to the insurer; the other rule is that the insurer owes no duties to the insured until the insured is sued. In his January 2020 Illinois Bar Journal article, “Tender-Hearted Insurers,” Scott O. Reed explains that while both rules are a rough approximation of the limits Illinois courts have placed on a liability insurer’s early-stage duties in a claim, caselaw contains exceptions and qualifications to those rules. Reed suggests that knowing the contours of these guides to an insurer’s early-stage duties will allow counsel for insureds and insurers to make informed recommendations to their respective clients about how to resolve conflicts over early-stage costs and settlements.

Gino DiVito, author of the ISBA’s “The Illinois Rules of Evidence: A Color-Coded Guide,” was recently surprised when he uncovered more than three dozen differences between the Illinois and Federal Rules of Evidence. Some differences are major, some are minor. ”But all differences matter,” DiVito says. “Anyone serious about evidence—including all judges and most attorneys—must know the differences.” Fortunately, in the January 2020 issue of the Illinois Bar Journal, DiVito provides a succinct guide of all the differences between the IRE and FRE in his article, “The Surprising Number of Differences Between the Federal and Illinois Rules of Evidence.” DiVito writes, “I’m not aware of any freestanding guide on the differences between the Federal Rules of Evidence and the Illinois Rules of Evidence. Until now.”