Roughly $347,904 to the Next of Kin — and It Is Not the Veterans Department That Pays It
Line of Duty Compensation is administered by the state Court of Claims and provides approximately $347,904 to the surviving next of kin of state service members killed in the line of duty in support of the Global War on Terrorism. It is the largest single state payment in this state's corpus, and because it runs through a court rather than an agency, families routinely never hear of it.
Verified August 23, 2026
What this benefit is
Line of Duty Compensation is administered by the state Court of Claims and provides approximately $347,904 to the surviving next of kin of state service members killed in the line of duty in support of the Global War on Terrorism. It is the largest single state payment in this state's corpus, and because it runs through a court rather than an agency, families routinely never hear of it.
What it's worth: Approximately $347,904 to the surviving next of kin of a state service member killed in the line of duty in support of the Global War on Terrorism
- The department states that Line of Duty Compensation is administered by the state Court of Claims.
- The department states the amount as approximately $347,904.
- The department states it is paid to the surviving next of kin of state service members killed in the line of duty in support of the Global War on Terrorism.
- The department does not state the filing route, the deadline, the order of precedence among next of kin, or how the figure is indexed.
Who is entitled to it
- You are in the next-of-kin class this payment is written for.
- You are in this state.
Not sure whether that describes you?
Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.
How to claim it
- 1Go to the Court of Claims, not to the veterans department. That single fact is why families miss this: it is a court process, and nothing about a bereavement points anyone towards a court.
- 2Ask about the deadline in the first conversation. No time limit is published and court-administered claims almost always have one. Assume it is short until told otherwise.
- 3Ask who counts as next of kin and in what order. With a payment this size, the order of precedence decides everything, and the department does not publish it.
- 4Take a state veterans service officer with you. They file claims for a living and this one has more money attached than anything else they will file this year.
- 5Do not treat the state's separate $3,000 hostile-action survivor payment as an alternative. They are different programmes with different administrators and a family may be in both.
- 6Confirm the current figure. The department gives it as approximately $347,904, which is the shape of a number that is adjusted rather than fixed — ask the court what it is today.
- Form
- A claim to the state Court of Claims
- File with
- The Illinois Court of Claims — with a veterans service officer's help
- No renewal
- Once granted it does not need renewing.
Sources
- authority · published policyIllinois Department of Veterans' Affairs — a guide to veteran state and federal benefits and services (Line of Duty Compensation)
Why only one source type: The department's own published benefits guide states the administrator, the amount and the eligible class. The Court of Claims' own pages were not read this session, and the legislature's statute server refused both a fetch and a browser navigation, so no statutory section could be checked.
This finder provides an informational match, not a government eligibility determination. The responsible agency decides your application.