A measure to end qualified immunity as a legal defense for law enforcement officers advanced out of the House Restorative Justice Committee at a Thursday hearing.

House Bill 1727, introduced by Rep. Curtis Tarver, D-Chicago, would create the Bad Apples in Law Enforcement Accountability Act. It aims to remove the court doctrine of qualified immunity for officers, opening them up to civil litigation if they participate in the “deprivation of any individual rights” guaranteed in the Illinois Constitution. The liability is created even for officers who fail to intervene if such a deprivation is otherwise occurring.

The Biometric Information Privacy Act of 2008, known as BIPA, was developed to protect individual privacy in the Internet Age, but some business groups say the law is not working, prompting an effort to revamp it.

Since 2019, 1,076 lawsuits citing BIPA have been filed in Illinois, Kearicher said, against companies like the Salvation Army and St. Anthony’s Hospital, resulting from timekeeping systems that use a fingerprint scan.

The Illinois Senate passed a bill Thursday to allow victims in personal injury and wrongful death cases that reach a verdict to collect interest on money they receive from court, with the intent of incentivizing settlements in these cases.

Gov. JB Pritzker vetoed an earlier version of the bill that was approved by both chambers in the January lame duck session.