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Illinois

Political repression plays out state by state — shaped by local institutions, prosecutors, and movements for defense. These are the documented political prisoners and cases the census holds for Illinois.

716Documented
5In custody
402Released

Eras of repression in Illinois

Where Illinois’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.

1920s 169 1930s 134 1960s 70 1910s 69 2020s 63 1970s 60

Documented cases

716 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.

Cody Sutherlin
Released
Cody was one of five antifascists arrested fleeing the May 19, 2012 raid on a white nationalist "Economic Summ...
Dylan Sutherlin
Released
Dylan Sutherlin was arrested on May 19, 2012. Brother of co-defendant Cody Sutherlin. Arrested fleeing the Ma...
William Tanner
Released
William Tanner was from Chicago, Illinois. William Tanner was convicted at the mass IWW trial in Chicago, sent...
Monk Teba
Released
Monk Teba was the communications secretary of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party and wrote poetry...
Daniel Teuscher
Released
Daniel Teuscher was from Fisher, Illinois. Daniel Teuscher was a Mennonite and objected to military service on...
Norman Thomas
Released
Norman Thomas was arrested while trying to speak to workers in the Christian County courthouse in Illinois dur...
Freeman Thompson
Released
Freeman Thompson was an Illinois miner and National Miners Union organizer. He had led the United Mine Workers...
Alejandrina Torres
Released
Alejandrina Torres was known as a community leader and educator associated with Puerto Rican community institu...
Carlos Alberto Torres
Released
Carlos Alberto Torres is a Puerto Rican nationalist linked to the FALN era of clandestine independence activit...
Manuel Rabago Torres
Released
Manuel Rabago Torres was a bodyguard to party president Pedro Albizu Campos who also attended meetings of the...
Enrico Travaglio
Released
Enrico Travaglio was employed as a printer or typesetter for the anarchist paper Free Society. He was arrested...
Louis Truelock
Released
Louis Truelock survived the December 4, 1969 Chicago raid that killed Fred Hampton and Mark Clark and was amon...
Irwin St. John Tucker
Released
Irwin St. John Tucker was born in Mobile, Alabama; Episcopal priest (ordained 1913, General Theological Semina...
John Tucker
Released
John was arrested with three co-defendants while fleeing the May 19, 2012 militant antifascist attack on a whi...
Brian Vaillancourt
Released
Brian Vaillancourt is an animal advocate arrested February 9, 2013 in Chicago in an attempted McDonald's arson...
Diego Vargas
Released
Diego Vargas, of Aurora, Illinois, was federally prosecuted for actions on two consecutive nights of the 2020...
George Voyzey
Released
George Voyzey was Illinois district president of the National Miners Union during the 1929–1930 coal strike, w...
Clayton Lee Waagner
Clayton Lee Waagner was confined in Illinois, according to the FBI’s account of his anti-abortion activity. T...
Joselyn Walsh
Released
Joselyn Walsh was prosecuted over an anti-ICE protest at Broadview in September 2025. The case ended without c...
Harold Ward
Released
Harold Ward was a Black official of the United Electrical/Farm Equipment workers (UE-FE) and a leader of the 1...
Wallace Scott Weicherding
Wallace Scott Weicherding was detained in the United States in the 1998 New Order weapons prosecution. Contemp...
Lee Weiner
Released
Lee Weiner was a sociology graduate student at Northwestern University and one of the two Chicago Eight defend...
Fred Werrmann
Released
Fred Werrmann was a German immigrant who legally entered the United States in 1926 and became a leader of Chic...
Mickey White
Released
Michael "Mickey" White was a member of the Black Panther Party jailed in 1969. According to The Black Panther...

Institutions in Illinois

Prisons, jails, and detention centers in Illinois that appear in the census’s case files.

Cook County JailChicago, Illinois
57 cases
Chicago police lockupChicago, Illinois
9 cases
MCC ChicagoChicago , Illinois
8 cases
Woodstock Jail (McHenry County)
7 cases
Southern Illinois Penitentiary, ChesterChester, Illinois
6 cases
FCI Pekin Satellite CampPekin, Illinois
5 cases
USP MarionMarion, Illinois
5 cases
FCI PekinPekin, Illinois
4 cases