Cook County

Cook County is the second most important populous county in the United States, home to about 5.19 million people (U.S. Census Bureau, July 2025 estimate) across 134 municipalities and 946 square miles — Chicago plus everything from Evanston to Ford Heights. Roughly 27% of county residents are Hispanic or Latino, which is one reason our intake line is bilingual rather than "translation available."

It also runs one of the largest unified court systems in the world, and if you are injured here, the mechanics of that system will shape your claim more than most people expect. Two facts illustrate it.

First: the threshold that divides small cases from large ones is not one number, it is two. In the First Municipal District — the City of Chicago — claims up to $30,000 are handled in the Municipal Department and claims above it go to the Law Division. In the five suburban districts, that line sits at $100,000. The same injury, the same claim, a different building and a different track depending on which side of the city limit it happened on. That is not intuitive, and it is not something you would guess.

Second: which courthouse you deal with depends on geography, not choice. The Law Division and First Municipal District sit downtown at the Richard J. Daley Center. The suburbs are served by five district courthouses — Skokie, Rolling Meadows, Maywood, Bridgeview and Markham — and Law Division tort cases seeking more than $100,000 are heard in those suburban courthouses too, not only downtown.

Then there are the deadlines. The general Illinois personal injury limitation is two years (735 ILCS 5/13-202). But Cook County contains an unusually dense concentration of public defendants — the county itself, the City of Chicago, 134 municipalities, the CTA, the Forest Preserve District, dozens of school districts, park districts and a public hospital system. Claims against a local public entity are generally limited to one year (745 ILCS 10/8-101), and CTA claims to one year (70 ILCS 3605/41). In a county built like this, "you have two years" is a coin flip.

We are an intake and referral service, not a law firm, and we do not have a Cook County office. What we do: take your story once, in English or Spanish, at any hour; explain honestly which of these tracks your situation looks like; make room for the questions you have not been able to ask anyone yet, including the medical ones; and then, with your permission, connect you with a licensed Illinois attorney in our network who handles Cook County cases.

Which courthouse handles your case

The Circuit Court of Cook County is organised into the downtown divisions plus six Municipal Districts. For an injury claim, geography decides where you go.

First Municipal District — City of Chicago. Richard J. Daley Center, 50 W. Washington St., Chicago 60602. Also home to the Law Division, which handles higher-value tort cases countywide, with its Clerk's office in Room 801.

District 2 — northern suburbs. Skokie Courthouse, 5600 Old Orchard Rd., Skokie 60077.

District 3 — northwestern suburbs. Rolling Meadows Courthouse, 2121 Euclid Ave., Rolling Meadows 60008.

District 4 — western suburbs. Maywood Courthouse, 1500 Maybrook Dr., Maywood 60153.

District 5 — southwestern suburbs. Bridgeview Courthouse, 10220 S. 76th Ave., Bridgeview 60455.

District 6 — southern suburbs. Markham Courthouse, 16501 S. Kedzie Pkwy., Markham 60428.

A detail that surprises people: Law Division tort cases seeking more than $100,000 are heard in the suburban district courthouses, so a serious injury case arising in Markham or Skokie does not automatically move downtown.

Source: Circuit Court of Cook County and the Clerk of the Circuit Court, verified August 2026.

Mandatory arbitration, and why your case may go there first

Cook County runs two separate mandatory arbitration programmes, and a lot of injury claims land in one of them before they ever see a judge.

Municipal District arbitration. Circuit Court Rule 18.3(b) assigns to the arbitration calendar all Municipal District personal injury actions seeking money damages not exceeding $30,000 — and notably, that applies to personal injury actions regardless of whether a jury has been demanded. A three-member panel hears it.

Law Division arbitration. Rule 25 covers Law Division commercial and personal injury cases with damages under $50,000 where no expert witness has been retained under Rule 213(f)(3). A sole arbitrator hears those, at the Arbitration Center at 222 N. LaSalle Street. The referring court can also send larger cases there at its discretion.

The important thing to understand about both: the award is not binding. Any participating party may reject the arbitration award and proceed to trial. Arbitration is a filter, not a final answer, and being sent there is not a judgment about your case.

Deadlines in a county full of public entities

The general Illinois deadline for a personal injury lawsuit is two years from the injury (735 ILCS 5/13-202), and wrongful death is generally two years from the date of death (740 ILCS 180/2).

Cook County is where that general rule most often fails, because so many potential defendants are public:

• Local public entities — Cook County itself, any of its 134 municipalities, school districts, park districts, the Forest Preserve District, public housing authorities, and their employees: generally one year (745 ILCS 10/8-101). One carve-out worth noting: claims arising out of patient care against a local entity run two years from discovery, with a four-year outer limit (745 ILCS 10/8-101(b)) — relevant given the county's public hospital system.
• Chicago Transit Authority — generally one year (70 ILCS 3605/41). The old six-month notice requirement was repealed effective June 1, 2009, so a missed notice is no longer the obstacle some outdated websites claim.
• Dram Shop claims against a liquor licensee — one year, with statutory damage caps that are adjusted annually for inflation and published by the Illinois Comptroller (235 ILCS 5/6-21).
• Workers' compensation — employer notice within 45 days; filing with the Commission within 3 years of the accident or 2 years of the last compensation payment, whichever is later (820 ILCS 305/6).
• Injured minors — generally two years after turning 18 (735 ILCS 5/13-211).

General information, not legal advice. If any public body might be involved in what happened to you, assume the shorter deadline and act accordingly.

Comparative fault, stated precisely

Illinois applies modified comparative negligence under 735 ILCS 5/2-1116. A plaintiff whose contributory fault is found to be more than 50% of the proximate cause is barred from recovering. At 50% or less, recovery is allowed and damages are reduced in proportion to the plaintiff's share of fault.

Note the statutory language: "more than 50%", not "51% or more." A plaintiff found 50.5% at fault is barred. The section was most recently amended by P.A. 103-1053, effective December 20, 2024.

In a wrongful death case, Illinois applies the analysis twice — first to the decedent's own contributory fault, then separately to each beneficiary's, with the same "more than 50%" bar applied per beneficiary (740 ILCS 180/2(g)–(i)).

Work injuries in Cook County go somewhere else entirely

A workers' compensation claim is not filed in the Circuit Court. It goes to the Illinois Workers' Compensation Commission, on an Application for Adjustment of Claim (Form IC01), filed through the Commission's electronic CompFile system. There is no filing fee.

For Cook County claimants, the Commission's administrative office is at the Cook County Office Building, 69 W. Washington St., Suite 900, Chicago, IL 60602, and hearings are held at the Richard J. Daley Center, 50 W. Washington St., Room LL-17.

Remember the two comp clocks: 45 days to notify your employer (820 ILCS 305/6(c)) and three years from the accident, or two years from the last compensation payment, whichever is later, to file (820 ILCS 305/6(d)).

Note: some older Commission publications still list a former Chicago address on West Randolph. The 69 W. Washington address is the current one per the Commission's own contact page, verified August 2026.

Outside the city, this is still Cook County

About 85% of Cook County's 946 square miles is incorporated, and the majority of its residents live outside Chicago. If you were hurt in Cicero, Berwyn, Oak Lawn, Evanston, Skokie, Schaumburg, Des Plaines, Palatine, Orland Park, Tinley Park, Calumet City or any of the other 130-odd municipalities, everything on this page applies to you — with the $100,000 suburban threshold rather than the city's $30,000, and your case in the district courthouse that serves your area.

Trauma coverage outside the city is real too: Advocate Christ in Oak Lawn, Loyola in Maywood, Advocate Lutheran General in Park Ridge and Prime Healthcare Saint Francis in Evanston are all Level I adult trauma centers.

And every suburban municipality is its own local public entity, which means the one-year deadline under the Tort Immunity Act is just as live in Berwyn as it is in Chicago.

We have deliberately not published a ranked list of "most dangerous intersections." The lists in circulation come from law-firm marketing studies using proprietary scoring rather than from any government agency, and versions of the most-cited study disagree with each other on the underlying crash counts. Where a figure was not available from a government source — including crash counts broken out for Cook County on its own — we have left it out rather than repeat one we cannot stand behind.

Written by the Injury Support Illinois content team and last reviewed in August 2026 against Illinois General Assembly statute text, Circuit Court of Cook County rules and general orders, the Clerk of the Circuit Court, the Illinois Workers' Compensation Commission, U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts and Cook County government publications. General information only — not legal advice.