Natalia Chi
COOK COUNTY – A judge long involved in remand reforms has been appointed to oversee the Pretrial Division of the Cook County Short circuit.
Courthouse observers applauded the appointment of Judge Mary Marubio to the position, with one attorney calling her an “ideal” person for the job. Marubio has been a supervisory judge in the Pre-trial Section since 2021.
He replaces Judge David Navarro, who will move to the 1st District Court of Appeals.
“Judge Marubio has been a trusted and valuable leader in the preliminary division under Judge Navarro,” Chief Justice Tim Evans said in a statement. “I’m confident the division will benefit from his leadership.”
The Preliminary Division holds hearings to set and review bail before cases are transferred to other divisions. It also handles extradition hearings and applications for certain search warrants, among other duties.
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Marubio was among the first justices to be appointed to the Preliminary Division when it was created in 2017 to implement reforms to county bail hearings that had been mandated earlier that year by Evans.
The reforms set new expectations for judges to release defendants on bonds they can afford when they are not considered a risk to public safety.
Marubio was also involved in the Pretrial Task Force/Commission on Pretrial Practices of the Illinois Supreme Court, charged with providing recommendations to the court in preparation for changes mandated by the SAFE-T Act, which among other criminal justice reforms would make Illinois the first state in the nation to abolish cash bail.
The division now led by Marubio was expected to be significantly refocused on January 1, when cash bail was to be eliminated statewide. But those changes were halted by a decision by Kankakee County Chief Judge Thomas Cunnington, who ruled that parts of the bail reform bill were unconstitutional.
