Kane County, Illinois Court Records

Due west of Chicago, Kane County has a large population of about 515,000 and is a part of the Chicago metropolitan area. Nearby counties include Cook, DeKalb, DuPage, Kendall, McHenry, and Will. Major regional employers include Caterpillar Inc., MetLife, and Hollywood Casino Aurora. 

Once a major industrial powerhouse of the region, Kane County today is more suburban with a service and tourism-focused economy. Some manufacturing jobs remain. Due to the location of major cities such as Aurora and the close proximity of the City of Chicago, businesses based in this region are more likely to encounter job applicants from farther afield. Likewise, other counties in the Chicago metro will often encounter people looking outside their home counties for work.

Hiring in a metro area demands a thorough hiring process that leaves you fully informed and ready to decide who should work for and represent your business. In dense urban areas such as these, people move frequently. As they move, they may leave behind a criminal record in one county to live in another where they do not have such a record. Ensuring you detect all the relevant information when hiring requires acknowledging this fact and adapting your processes in response. A metro-specific screening policy helps.

Such a policy is an important supplement to the job interview process and helps determine a candidate’s trustworthiness. Even though there is no clear link between past crimes and future behavior, understanding the level of risk you may assume by hiring someone is an important step. Today’s vetting solutions open the door to rapid, repeatable processes that enable employers in many industries to hire with greater confidence.

Advanced reporting tools from backgroundchecks.com power employer vetting procedures around the country with an easy-to-use process that, in many states, can produce results within minutes. However, before you can begin ordering background checks, you must take steps to comply with Illinois’s statewide “ban the box” law. You should also review your obligations surrounding consent and learn how to provide a proper standalone disclosure form as required by the Fair Credit Reporting Act.

The ban-the-box law applies to all private employers of 15 or more people, except in the city of Chicago, which applies the rules to all employers regardless of size. Before ordering a background check, you must conduct an interview with the applicant or provide them with a conditional job offer. The law was amended in 2021 to make it illegal to base the denial of a job application solely on a criminal conviction.

There are a few circumstances where it is acceptable to deny someone based on their record. These conditions include:

• The job would provide an opportunity to re-offend
• The conviction has a direct relation to the job role
• Public safety or the safety of others in the business would be at undue risk

Every applicant must receive an individual assessment that considers any efforts made towards rehabilitation, how old the person was when they committed the crime, and other state-defined elements. Employers continue to retain the right to deny applicants based on a positive marijuana test, but cannot fire workers for off-duty use in general.

With a compliant process in place, you can equip yourself with our solutions to vet applicants who have received conditional offers. The US OneSEARCH provides immediate results from our professional database of compiled criminal records, including Kane County and the rest of the Chicago metro area. View more information on our online coverage map.

Searching criminal records at the county court level throughout the metro area can also provide you with more up-to-date and relevant information on recent or pending cases. Such searches ensure that you can cover all your bases around Chicago without worrying about leaving important information undiscovered. 

Background reports generated by backgroundchecks.com include information from the following:

• Kane County – Felony and misdemeanor records from 1999-November 2018
• Illinois sex offender registry
• Methamphetamine offender registry
• Child Murderer and Violent Offender Against Youth Registry 

These reports can include the subject’s:

• Name
• Offense/Charge
• Sentence
• Disposition

Better understand your applicants and make more informed hiring choices in Kane County when you partner with backgroundchecks.com.