Springfield, Ill. — A judge found the director of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services in contempt of court on Thursday for willfully refusing to turn over records about how a foster youth who later died was cared for by the agency. Sangamon County Judge Jack Davis held Director Heidi Mueller in indirect civil contempt, ruling she had “willfully violated a court order” and that the finding “allows remedies to ensure future compliance.”
The records at the center of the fight concern the death of Mackenzi Felmlee, 18, who was found dead in a Fairview Heights foster home in May 2024. Her foster mother, Shemeka Williams, and foster grandmother, Cornelia Reid, face murder charges. For more than a year, the state agency responsible for her care fought to keep the public from seeing what that care looked like.
What the judge ordered
The contempt finding grows out of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed in March by Capitol News Illinois after DCFS denied the outlet’s request for records about Felmlee’s care. One of the reasons the agency gave for the denial was that the request had not actually asked for records. On June 10, Judge Davis ordered DCFS to release the personnel records of two caseworkers involved in the case, and to pay attorney costs and fees along with a $5,000 civil penalty within 30 days. The order came after DCFS attorneys failed to appear at multiple hearings.
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Months later, the agency still had not complied. At Thursday’s hearing, Davis drew a line in the timeline. The earlier failures, he said, amounted to “ineptness and as incompetence, a lack of oversight, a lack of communication,” but not willful contempt. After August 12, he said, the noncompliance became willful, because by then the “buck had been sufficiently transferred up the chain of command.” He gave the agency 30 days to produce the records and pay, and set a December 4 hearing to decide whether the contempt can be purged.
The agency’s explanations
Mueller testified that the failures were the fault of administrative staff. A summons, she said, sat unhandled on an administrative assistant’s desk for months. The FOIA denial, she said, was a mistake caused by a staff member clicking the wrong dropdown menu. There was “no intentional attempt to ignore it,” she told the court, and the agency intends to pay what it owes.
The attorney who sued on behalf of Capitol News Illinois was not persuaded.
“You don’t get to just say ‘oops.'”
Don Craven, attorney for Capitol News Illinois
A spokesperson for Gov. JB Pritzker said Mueller “has the full confidence of the Governor.”
Not the first time
This is at least the second time in five years that a judge has held a DCFS director in contempt of court. In 2022, then-Director Marc Smith was found in contempt by a Cook County judge over the agency’s repeated failure to place children in appropriate settings; an appellate court later overturned those findings. A pattern in which the person running a child-welfare agency is repeatedly cited for defying the courts is not a story about one official. It is a story about an institution that treats court orders, and the public’s right to know how it treats children, as optional.
Why the secrecy matters
The records DCFS fought to withhold are not abstract. They would show what two caseworkers did, and did not do, for a young woman in the state’s care before she was found dead. When an agency’s first instinct after a foster youth dies is to deny a records request on the technicality that no records were asked for, the secrecy is the story. Transparency is not a courtesy a child-welfare system extends when convenient; it is the only way the public can know whether the agency that removes children is keeping the ones it takes alive. The fix here is not a bigger budget or more staff. It is an agency that obeys a court and opens its files. Families trying to pry loose their own records from a child-welfare agency can start with this guide to filing a CPS complaint.
Key facts
- Sangamon County Judge Jack Davis found DCFS Director Heidi Mueller in indirect civil contempt on October 29, 2026, for willfully violating a court order.
- The order, issued June 10, required DCFS to release two caseworkers’ personnel records and pay a $5,000 penalty plus attorney fees within 30 days.
- The records concern the care of Mackenzi Felmlee, 18, found dead in a Fairview Heights foster home in May 2024; her foster mother and foster grandmother face murder charges.
- The case began with a FOIA lawsuit filed by Capitol News Illinois in March after DCFS denied its records request.
- Judge Davis gave DCFS 30 days to comply and set a December 4 hearing on whether the contempt can be purged.
- It is at least the second time in five years a judge has held a DCFS director in contempt; former Director Marc Smith was cited in 2022.
Sources
- WGLT — ‘Incompetence:’ DCFS director found in contempt for noncompliance with judge’s order (2026-10-29)
- Capitol News Illinois — Caseworker for foster child who later died had troubling history, documents show (2026)
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