A Happy Ending

This popped up on the radar a few days ago:

• A suspect was shot and critically wounded during a home invasion Wednesday night in the South Side’s Grand Crossing neighborhood.

  Police were questioning several people Thursday morning in connection with the crime.

  Four or five people broke into a home in the 1400 block of East 73rd Street around 9:45 p.m. Wednesday, police said.

  Police News Affairs [...] said one of the suspects was shot in the head, and was taken in critical condition to Stroger Hospital of Cook County. [Police] could not confirm that the homeowner had shot him.

That's because the homeowner didn't shoot him. His accomplices did.

And the story got even better yesterday:

• A 16-year-old boy died today, four days after he was accidentally shot during a home invasion authorities say he was involved in.

  Douglas Bufford, 16, of the 7200 block of South East End Avenue, was declared dead atJohn H. Stroger Hospitalat 1:55 p.m. today, according to the Cook County medical examiner's office.

  [...] Earlier, police said between four or five males forced their way into the home and announced a robbery, police said.
  
  One of the group accidentally shot a fellow attacker, 16, in the back of the head, police said.

Hahahahahahahaha! That's fantastic. In fact, it's so funny, we're going to laugh again - HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Sixteen and he's part of a crew doing home invasions? Good riddance to bad rubbish.

Hey Garry, homicide or no? Because we're charging the accomplices.

ZING!!!

Garey McKee at Police Limit lands another one:


There's probably a few years worth of material on CompStat meetings alone.

Let's Build an Airport!

Illinois is broke, Quinn is about to call a special session to gut pensions across the state, and you know Rahm is just waiting to follow his lead. So why would anyone want to spend extra money?

• Susan Shea has a message to all the opponents and pessimists who don’t think the South Suburban Airport ever will be built near Peotone.

  “To the naysayers, this is it. The FAA would not tell us this is the preferred place. This is where it’s going to be,” Shea said. “... It’s going to be such an economic engine for the community out there, for the state. It is going to happen. It’s just a matter of when. It’s not a matter anymore of if.”

  The airport project is under Shea’s watch as director of the aeronautics division for the Illinois Department of Transportation. The project was among several infrastructure topics discussed Friday during a meeting of the Chicago Southland Economic Development Corp. at Glenwoodie Golf Course in Glenwood.

  Construction of the airport would take three years, but she declined to say when it may begin.

"Director of Aeronautics Division of the Illinois Department of Aviation?" That's a hell of a business card. And she's sure that she is going to get a few billion dollars from a state that's already something like $80 billion in the hole in order to fund an airport that every major carrier has said they don't want and have no plans to use.

But evidently, certain Illinois politicos need the donations from construction companies and connected contractors would provide.

Joliet Shootings

Joliet PD getting busy lately:

• A 35-year-old Lockport man was transported this morning to a Joliet-area hospital for treatment of gunshot wounds received when he allegedly aimed his vehicle at Joliet police.
  
  The early morning shooting came less than 24 hours after Joliet Police shot a 29-year-old Crest Hill man who allegedly pointed a gun at them.
  
  The two men, who are former Joliet residents, were being kept under guard this morning at a Joliet-area hospital, according to prepared statements released today by Joliet Police. No police were injured and the wounds were termed "non-life-threatening." No police were injured.

That's always good to hear - no police injured.

To our suburban brothers, good luck and well done.

Another Mole Gets Tape

Well lookie here:

• The dirty deal went down just before Christmas 2010 in the car of a Bridgeport developer, the feds say.
  
  Inside the car were Joseph Mario Moreno, who had just been voted out of his job as a Cook County commissioner, and Michael DiFoggio, a Bridgeport developer who — from all appearances — wanted a garbage transfer station to be located in the Town of Cicero and was willing to cut a few corners to do it.
  
  Just months before, Moreno had been appointed to a Town of Cicero local business assistance committee by Cicero President Larry Dominick. It was a plum appointment that came with free health insurance.
  
  Moreno wanted more, though, authorities allege. He was willing to assist DiFoggio to get what he wanted from the Town of Cicero — but at a price, federal prosecutors allege.
  
  Inside his car, DiFoggio passed an envelope to Moreno, allegedly containing $5,000 cash.
  
  DiFoggio even had better news for Moreno, telling him that another $5,000 was on its way, the feds allege.

Bridgeport, wires, Outfit connections, private clubs.

This one could be good....very good.

First, Flash Mob, Now Flash Rob

A phenomena that we first heard of down in Florida and Atlanta has worked it's way up here:

• A mob of more than 20 teenagers descended on a trendy Wicker Park shop on Saturday and made off with more than $3,000 worth of jeans.

  CBS 2′s [...] reports the incident was caught on store surveillance cameras, and the owner posted the video on YouTube.

  Luke Cho said he hopes the images help police find the robbers, or maybe even shame the parents of the teens enough that they’ll turn the kids in.

Shame? Bwahahahahahaha! Pardon our laughter, but here it comes again:

• BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

There's even video:



The mob forced the doors in order to flee. No word on if they worked over the manager who locked the doors. But outnumbered 20-to-1, maybe locking yourself in with the animals isn't the smartest course of action. Look for reinforced "sally ports" to be the new redecorating model for stores - only three people allowed in at a time.

Ride to Remember

Took place on a beautiful Sunday:

• Motorcyclists and bicyclists are both participating in rides today to honor and remember Chicago police officers who died in the line of duty.

  This morning, the Ride to Remember kicks off at 10 a.m. at the Harrison District Police Headquarters, 3151 W. Harrison St., and heads to the Gold Star Families Memorial across from Soldier Field. The ride was started as an annual event in 2005 by detectives from what was then Area 4, the Harrison Police Area, as a fundraiser for the Chicago Police Memorial Foundation, according to organizers.

  This year, about 1,000 motorcycle riders were expected to participate.

And the associated bike event:

• This afternoon at 1:30 p.m., the Pedal for the Police ride, also benefiting the foundation, starts at from Chicago Police Headquarters, in conjunction with a long-distance bike ride sponsored by the Illinois Concerns of Police Survivors, the Cycle Across Illinois. The bike event also will end at the memorial.

Couldn't have asked for a better day for it.

We See Cameras...EVERYWHERE

But this has nothing to do with revenue:

• The map the city of Chicago is sending out with its “request for proposals” shows just how extensive coverage by cameras designed to catch speeders around parks and schools could be — if the city ever exercises all its options.

  Not to worry, city officials say: Aldermen mandated that cameras go up in only 50 to 300 locations for now.

  “By ordinance, we are limited to placing these cameras in only 20 percent of the 1,500 possible Children’s Safety Zones — that’s only 300 camera [sites] citywide,” said Pete Scales, spokesman for the city’s Department of Transportation. “We expect to only have about 50 of those up and running next year.”

Really? Have you seen the map?

Holy crap! If you believe this isn't solely about the revenue, we have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale.

Peterson About to Win in Court

Not just criminally, but on the civil front once all is said and done:

• They have no eyewitnesses, no confession and no DNA to show ex-Bolingbrook cop Drew Peterson killed Kathleen Savio — only disputed secondhand statements and conflicting autopsy reports.

  That limited, sometimes contradictory, circumstantial evidence means Will County prosecutors are going to have a hard time convincing jurors the now 58-year-old Peterson murdered his third wife, legal experts say.

  “I think it’s really going to be tough for the state,” said attorney Paul DeLuca, a former prosecutor in Cook and DuPage counties now in private practice.

Will County taxpayers are most likely going to get soaked should Peterson be cleared. Every day this psycho has been in jail (and yes, we believe he killed both wives), is going to be viewed as a day served to settle a political vendetta. They've even passed a "hearsay law" that flies in the face of hundreds of years of precedent in order to present what has to be the weakest murder case in Illinois history.

Still, they might luck out. We just doubt it at this point.

Jesse Jr Has an Ulcer

At least, that's how we interpret the press release:

• Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. is at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota “for extensive inpatient evaluation for depression and gastrointestinal issues,” according to a statement from Jackson sent late Friday by Rochester, Minn.-based Mayo.
  
  Jackson’s whereabouts have been a mystery since he went on medical leave June 10. The statement issued Friday said the congressman “has arrived at Mayo Clinic,” but did not say where he came from.

"where he came from"? Mars we always assumed.

But it seems like Jackson Jr is having stress related issues in regard to being the subject of a House Ethics investigation that is all but assured of resulting in some sort of censure along with his buddy being picked up by the Feebs and most likely flipping on certain fund raising improprieties. Not to mention the complete meltdown of his personal life. And election that could go either way since he hasn't been around to campaign in almost two months.

Dude has issues all right.

Stay Classy

You got to love when the family member of the dead ends up in jail - circle of life we suppose:

• On the night that former Chicago Public Schools basketball star Michael Haynes was gunned down, his younger brother allegedly threatened to shoot four people, according to police.

  Brian Haynes, 21, appeared in bond court Saturday and faces four counts of home invasion with the discharge of a firearm, Chicago Police said Saturday.

  A Cook County judge ordered Haynes held in lieu of $250,000 bail, according to the Cook County Sheriff’s office.

This article described the victim as the neighborhood "meal ticket," not as brother or son. That's kind of sad.

We also are confused by the fact that his brother (the deceased) was 22 and just starting Division I college? We used to assume that college players started college at 18, 19 if they sat a year. Twenty-two means a completely different body structure and in many cases, mental approach to any sport. Twenty-two is pretty much a semi-pro level.

A Hero...Again

The right place at the right time:

• A Chicago Police officer who performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on a 21-month-old boy who had stopped breathing is being lauded for helping out on the Skyway this afternoon.

  The officer, Edward Paukula, has about 17 years on the force, according to Pat Camden, a spokesman for the Chicago Police union.

  The baby was in the backseat of a vehicle traveling on the Skyway near 89^th Street at 12:24 p.m. when family members noticed that the child was not breathing, according to a police News Affairs statement.

  They stopped the vehicle and found the baby unresponsive, but the child's father turned to see a Chicago Police vehicle driving in his direction and flagged down the officer, the statement said.

  The police officer cautiously removed the baby from the vehicle, gently laying him on the pavement, and began to perform CPR, the statement said.

The baby regained consciousness and was taken to the hospital for treatment and observation. This isn't the first time the Officer has been in the hot seat:

• But Pakula is no stranger to being a “hero cop.'' He was hailed for saving the lives of residents in a burning South Side apartment building in November of 1999, according to a 1999 Chicago Tribune story.

Well done Officer.

Charity Ballgame

One week from today:

Chicago Fire Department Bravest
vs
Chicago Police Department Finest

13th Annual Charity Baseball Classic

Wrigley Field
Sunday, August 5th, 2012
Gates open at 1:30pm
Game starts at 3:00pm

Tickets: Advance purchase $5, Day of game $10

To purchase tickets online via Paypal visit: www.thechicagofix.com

All proceeds benefit the Chicago Fire Department Gold Badge Society
and the Chicago Police Department Memorial Park.

Another "Decrease in the Increase"

Evidently, McDownisUpisDown has the same team working for him that Obama has on the economic front:

• The White House chose to focus on the positive when it comes to GDP estimates released Friday.

  The estimates found economic growth slowed to 1.5 percent last quarter - down from 2 percent the previous quarter and 4.1 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011 -- but the chairman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisers said that at least it's still growing.

The economy is still growing, just slower.

They're still killing each other on the south and west sides, just slower.

Word is that Obama is rolling out "CompStat Hope & Change" next week. And after that, a new strategy/policy.

The Promoted (Updated to 31)

Alphabetical:

• Barker, Thomas
  Barney, Dean R
  Cato III, Ernest
  Ciccola, Dominick
  Davey, Thomas
  Delpilar, David
  Durham, Shenetta
  Finley, Allen
  Flores, Jorge
  Folino, John
  Foster, John
  Gaffney, Thomas
  Heard, Andrea
  Kochan, Mark
  Lee, Allen G
  Lorenz, Richard
  Mata, Ricardo
  McCauley, Meghann
  Meador, William
  Mihajlov, Robert
  Mohammad, Khalil
  Moreth, Michael
  Mullenix, Curtis
  Perez, Albert
  Plovanich, Michael
  Powell, Roger
  Rigan, Kristopher
  Senner, Andrew
  Stewart, Andrew
  Triantafillo, James
  Wantuck, Michelle

Don't have Units of Assignment, but it'd be nice to see if Patrol is adequately represented.

UPDATE: We're missing a name or two. Who's got 'em?

UPDATE: We got 30 names - that sounds correct.

UPDATE: 31. Late addition or someone who got passed over for some reason.

Rahm Shuffles Another Deck

First, Rahm out-and-out lied about hiring another 1,000 cops. He disbanded units that were already working the streets and claimed he meant he was "redeploying" another thousand cops, which was another lie.

Now he's raiding the suburbs for jobs that already exist:

• U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) says Motorola Mobility’s decision to relocate to Chicago from Libertyville is another example of Mayor Rahm Emanuel raiding the suburbs to help city.

  As WBBM Newsradio [...] reports, Walsh says it bothers him that Emanuel seems to be taking jobs from suburbs and bringing them to the city.

It should bother a lot of people because Rahm isn't creating jobs. He isn't even fostering an environment where jobs might be created. He's dragging in suburbanites (3/4 of the employees to be moved live outside of Chicago) and hoping they eat lunch downtown, by gas downtown and pay downtown parking rates or use the CTA. Libertyville is more than a little irritated and justifiably so.

Any idea what type of subsidies may have been promised to Motorola for the move?

5 Killed in 12 Hours

Stuff like this has to have McCompStat pulling his hair out. We can't react to any of this:

• On Thursday, Haynes was shot dead in the street while trying to stop two guys from the neighborhood from a fight over a stolen necklace near 116th and Vincennes, less than a block from his home. The 22-year-old was one of five men who were shot and killed over 12 hours in Chicago. So far this year, there have been 302 murders, a 30 percent increase from 2011. In the spring, the number of murders was 66 percent higher than the previous year.

There's that "decrease in the increase" again, none of which helps Rahm. And on a Thursday?

Who has the number of shooting victims. That would be a telling statistic. So would the clearance rate.

Sergeant List Out

The promotion list is out; 30 names. Will list with our regular postings later.

Rahm Plays Both Sides

We weren't going to even speak of the recent blow-up about Chick-fil-A and the completely personal beliefs of their Board. It's a bunch of nonsense and we don't really care about it. But this is telling.

Rahm has decided to knock Chick-fil-A for their non "Chicago values:"

• The mayor of Chicago said he will back a plan that would prohibit Chick-fil-A from opening a restaurant because the company’s support of traditional marriage does not represent the values of the Windy City. But a number of religious liberty groups said the ban would be a flagrant violation of the U.S. Constitution.

  “Chick-fil-A values are not Chicago values,” Mayor Rahm Emanuel declared in a statement to Fox News. “They disrespect our fellow neighbors, residents and family members.”

But Rahm has decided to embrace a different organization that promotes religious values in the public square, supports traditional marriage, and marches against violence, especially on Monday nights:

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Wednesday welcomed the army of men dispatched to the streets by Farrakhan to stop the violence in Chicago neighborhoods.

Oh yeah, they are also openly racist, anti-Semitic, have taken money from terrorists and their religious beliefs include stoning gay people to death. Must be their "Chicago values."

RIP Officer Bostic-Jones

Cook County lays one of their own to rest:

• Hundreds of mourners were at a West Side church today for the funeral of a Cook County correctional officer who was fatally struck by a hit-and-run driver as she was on her way to work last week.

  Nikkii Bostic-Jones of Plainfield was killed on July 18 as the 12-year-veteran officer was walking across California Avenue near 29th Street to begin her overnight shift at the maximum security division of the jail.

Godspeed Officer.

Simple Solution

Some of our readers caught it:

• this has been happening in 010 since our new commander showed up and more recently that she appointed her super hack Cynthia white to do her dirty work. XO white has called officers at home at 2 pm telling them their time for 1st watch that night is denied (less than 8 hours notice). After you say I can't make it in, I'm in another state or no babysitter she says I'll get a cr if you don't show up tonight and hangs up. Even better the commander had Cynthia come into roll call and have the audacity to ask for curfews because we're down more than 50% from last year. Well last year we had a capt in EV who we respected and treated us well for the activity we gave him. Does she really think that officers are gonna produce numbers and generate activity for them when they are constantly screwing with people? It's sad that she wonders why the activity has dropped so low from last year.

Um, don't answer the phone? Hello?

She's wrong, she's violating the Contract, and she's on a power trip to make up for the fact she ought to be in prison. Get the CR# Cynthia - it'll be hilarious answering your "allegations" since there aren't any you can hang your hat on. And the hostile workplace environment lawsuit to go with the counter CR allegations of abusing your position? Priceless. You're handing the officers every bit of evidence they'll need to cash in.

Burke Scared?

Is the heat finally catching up with Aldercreature Burke?

• Inspector General Joe Ferguson has already gone toe-to-toe with former Mayor Richard M. Daley and Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Now, he’s taking on the City Council’s most powerful alderman.

  Ferguson went public Thursday with a jurisdictional dispute that’s been simmering in private for weeks: the decision of Finance Committee Chairman Edward M. Burke (14th) to deny Ferguson access to databases related to the city’s $100 million-a-year workers’ compensation program for civilian employees.

  Burke’s staff is refusing to release that information on the grounds that: so-called “duty disability” is governed by state law, not city ordinance; that Ferguson’s investigative powers are limited to misconduct; and that the Finance Committee staffers who administer the worker’s comp program fall under the jurisdiction of the City Council’s own inspector general.

Once someone starts nitpicking over jurisdiction and who is allowed to see what, we're pretty sure they've gotten a hold of something good. Maybe that one thread that's the start of unraveling a whole bunch of good stuff.

Hey Feds? You're already looking at Ed's brother. Can you spare a couple investigators to look at what Ferguson is uncovering? We assume you have overreaching investigative authority over everything.

Hey, do you thing these investigations are originating at Rahm's behest to break Burke and remove the last check to unlimited mayoral power? It's no secret that Rahm and Burke had a rough go of it and Burke's brother is already under investigation for state scholarship abuses. If only there was a Rahm/Washington/federal authority connection that would tie it all together.

Thanks Weis

J-Fled - the gift that keeps on giving:

• A man filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Chicago Crime Commission alleging the non-profit damaged his reputation by falsely stating he was a leader of a local gang in a law enforcement book.

  Edward Arroyo says the Chicago Crime Commission’s Gang Book, which was released in January, falsely said he was a leader in Roselle of the Spanish Gangster Disciples, according to the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit court.

  Arroyo’s name and picture are featured on a page in the book dedicated to the Spanish Gangster Disciples leadership, but he says he is not affiliated with any gangs or “criminal enterprise,” according to the lawsuit.

This will be very interesting. Maybe the Crime Commission can hand out those smiley face stickers like the ones on the Blago billboards and instruct all the police departments, government agencies and other owners of the book to paste it over this guy's mug.

Stop Taking Time Off!!

You bastards better knock it off:

• Commander of 015 has hit a new low. Five people each were denied CU for both Fri and Sat on days. This is after the slips had already been signed by the XO. Commander just decided to deny the time, no reason in particular given, just you can't have your day off and slip returned by the watch commander.
  
  What's interesting is the note attached to the returned slips, (which is from the XO to the watch commander) says in part: problems arise when time is approved far in the future and the number of requests accrue over time. It needs to be the purview of the PRIMARY DSS, to monitor this and make appropriate adjustments...to ensure adequate coverage...on the watch.
  
  So, it needs to be the purview of the PRIMARY DSS, and the commander just comes along and denies time, even though I'm guessing all necessary beats would have been covered. (Otherwise the watch commander would have told us there might be a problem)
  
  Another order in the book reads in part: All requests for (time) must be submitted at least 7 days in advance. Requests submitted less than 7 days in advance will be rejected by the XO. This of course is being done for our convenience, so we can take advantage of the tour of duty exchange. Really?
  
  Everything going on in my life needs to be known 7 days in advance? Maybe I can get a job at the crystal ball unit.

Bad to worse in Austin. Maybe if someone pointed out that denying approved time off with less than 72-hours notice was a violation of the Contract and the General Orders, Barb would stop fucking up - not that that ever stopped her before in regard to illegal First Amendment investigations. Buckle up 015, the ride ain't getting any easier.

Homicide Numbers Climb?

Just as July is drawing to a close and everyone is thinking we might see the first reduction in the number of killings as compared month-to-month since something like October of last year, the wounded start dying and throwing the whole thing into jeopardy:

• A South Side man shot and critically wounded over the weekend died at a Chicago hospital, authorities said today.

  The 26-year-old victim was shot in the face by two gunmen as he sat on his front porch in the 5700 block of South Sangamon Street in the Englewood neighborhood about 12:35 a.m. Saturday, police said.

• A mother of three young children became the second person to die from a gang-related shooting at a Southeast Side park that also left a 17-year-old boy dead, authorities said this morning.

  The woman, Janeen Hancock, 34, was pronounced dead at John H. Stroger, Jr. Hospital of Cook County at 7:35 p.m. Tuesday, nearly an entire day after two males sprayed gunfire across Merrill Park near 96th Place and Merrill Avenue in the Jeffery Manor neighborhood on the Southeast Side.

This means a whole lot of press conferences scheduled to brag about the "decrease in the increase" have now been put on hold until such time as the actual totals are tallied up.

Burge Who?

If Rahm throws enough money at it, maybe it will go away:

• Aldermen approved more than $7 million in payments Wednesday to two more men who said they were tortured during the 1980s by detectives under the command of disgraced former Chicago police Cmdr. Jon Burge.

  An attorney for one of the men suggested that Mayor Rahm Emanuel — who didn't take office until last year — should apologize for the actions of Burge, who was fired in 1993 and is now serving 4 1/2 years in federal prison for lying about the torture and abuse of suspects.

  Instead, Emanuel said he wants the city to move past the scandal.

An apology would open the city to even more liability by admitting culpability.

But constantly throwing money at it isn't helping matters either.

Family Corruption

Gee, who would have guessed that a family member of Aldercreature Burke was under investigation?

• College tuition waivers awarded by a member of one of Chicago’s best-known political clans are under criminal investigation by a federal grand jury probing possible abuses in the state’s soon-to-be-dismantled legislative scholarship program.

  The grand jury in Chicago subpoenaed State Rep. Dan Burke (D-Chicago), brother of Ald. Ed Burke (14th) and brother-in-law to Supreme Court Justice Anne Burke, making the veteran House Democrat at least the third known current or former lawmaker whose waivers are being probed by the feds.

Any way to connect him with his brother? Maybe someone who received a scholarship?

Talk About Historical Ignorance

Just when you think politicians can't get any stupider, Aldercreature Carrie Austin sets the bar low and then starts digging. She starts out begging for help:

• Far South Side Ald. Carrie Austin (34th) appealed to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan on Tuesday to make Roseland and West Pullman the next target for his anti-violence initiative.

  Austin questioned why the 80-year-old Farrakhan and his army of men, known as the Fruit of Islam, had taken their appeal to the streets of South Shore before showing up in Area 2, which includes the West Pullman and Roseland areas besieged by gang violence.

Not sure if the "Area 2" quote is Austin or reporter Fran Spielman, but Austin hangs it all there later in the article:

• Austin said they projected a positive message.

  “When I see Farrakhan, it reminds me of the movie, ‘Malcolm X’ because those gentlemen are well-dressed, learned men and they are disciplined. That’s something our kids can take notice of…,” she said. “Our young men don’t think they’ll live past 21 and those that are 21 are not in sight. That’s sad for them not to have the thought of a future. This can teach them there can be another life.”
  

Really? Reminds you of Malcolm X? Evidently, she's forgotten or never learned that Louis is credited by Malcolm's family with being on the safe end of a shotgun during Malcolm's killing. In fact, Malcolm's daughter was charged with hiring an assassin to kill Louis way back in the 1990's for that belief. Even Farrakhan's own words lead most to believe that if he wasn't wielding a shotgun himself that day, he knows who did, assisted in creating the atmosphere that led to the killing and abetted in the cover up afterwards.

But he's going to come in and save Austin's ward from tearing itself apart?

Private Security Being Hired

Someone is realizing that they can't count on the deterrent effect of police if there are no police around to deter:

• For the last couple of days, things have been pretty tame in Boystown, particularly on North Halsted Street... now we know why.
  
  According to the folks at the Take Back Boystown Facebook page, armed security officers, dressed in yellow shorts and bullet proof vests, are patrolling the area.
  
  The private security team was allegedly hired by the Northhalsted Business Alliance.

We daresay that this is Rahm's ultimate goal - cut back on police and count on business and community groups to come up with the difference in coverage. We imagine some initial resistance from some, but peer pressure will force them to toe the line at some point. Rahm continues to get to cut manpower and shifts liability from the city to security companies.

Of course, if any of these security companies end up with a liability issue for injuring, maiming or killing someone, they go under and the rates climb for anyone else doing this sort of business. The costs get passed to the business associations and who knows where it all ends. Probably with more businesses fleeing the un-re-gentrifying areas.

Did we just invent a word? "Un-re-gentrifying" describes the decreasing of the increase of the portions of the city formerly uninhabitable. Or something.

Huh? Who Writes This Crap?

Another nonsense nuisance lawsuit:

• A man filed a lawsuit Tuesday against the City of Chicago and a police officer, saying the officer used excessive force when he shot him while he was unarmed.

  Joe Banks Jr. says he was riding his bike on Ohio Street July 25, 2011, when an officer opened fire, according to the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court. The lawsuit also names the Officer [...] as a defendant.

We're pretty sure that the involved officer isn't in fact an officer, but a high ranking member of the force.

• Officers who were on patrol tried to stop and interview Banks that day, but he fled, which led the officers to run after him, Chicago police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said at news conference last year.

  As an officer approached, Banks pointed a handgun at him and ignored orders to drop the gun, police said. An officer shot Banks on the 3200 block of West Ohio Street after he pointed the gun at the officer a second time, police said.

Um, wasn't he unarmed? So where does the gun come from? Unless the gun was there all the time and the lawsuit is just so much bullshit looking for a payout. Do these reporters even read when they write?

• In the lawsuit, Banks says he was unarmed at the time and that he was not trying to resist or escape an arrest. The lawsuit also says police used excessive force when Banks was handcuffed and had fallen to the ground.

You just said he had a gun!?! Why even give this asshole a platform to spout his crap?

And how do police use excessive force after he was lying on the ground shot? We don't just leave criminals wandering around without handcuffs when they've been taken into custody, especially on a gun charge. That kind of defeats the reasoning behind "in custody."

• The “arrest was false, without good faith, and without any probable cause or reasonable belief that Joe J. Banks was violating the law,” the lawsuit says.

Aside from the non-existent gun that he was caught with that is.

• Banks has suffered “severe and permanent injuries,” to his head, body and limbs as a result of the shooting, according to the lawsuit. Banks’ father said at a news conference last year that his son was not involved with criminal activity.

Because dear old Dad was actually there on scene and has kept close tabs on his adult son all these years. making sure he didn't smoke, drink and attended church at least three times a week. Give us a fucking break.

• “My son is not that type of young man,” Joe Banks Sr. said with two pastors and more than a dozen relatives by his side. “He's not a gangbanger, he doesn't sell drugs. … We are a decent family.”

Yeah, his IR# and arrest record say differently Dad. You'd hope that just once, the Department would release the rap sheets of these jackasses just to counter this type of nonsense. But that would be "prejudicial" to the criminal proceedings, while they can just spout this crap and poison entire generations and communities against the police.

Pick on the Taxpayers

Letters, we get letters!

• Hey SCC,
  
  Anyone remember Revenue targeting St. Juliana's during Mass on Sunday a while back.
  
  Not sure if this is totally by coincidence or what but with the City Council poised to vote on an Ordinance Amendment this week, it seems like someone from Revenue gave the order to target the 41st Ward before they can no longer write a certain parking ticket.
  
  The City Council is scheduled to Vote on an Ordinance change amending the Permits that owners of Pickup Trucks can get from the Alderman's Office allowing them to park 24 hours-a-day on Residential streets. The current Permit is restricted to Trucks/Large SUVs weighing up to 4,500lbs. The proposed Ordinance should lift that restriction to 8,000lbs.
  
  I know a lot of us have trucks for recreational, sporting, business purposes and the necessary 4WD to get to work in the winter. Throughout the 28 years I've lived in the 41st Ward I have rarely seen or heard of this ticket being written without a complainant. With this said, Revenue was out this morning Targeting Pickup Trucks on the West end of the 41st Ward writing tickets citing MCC 9-64-170A (Essentially, parking for expeditious loading/unloading only). Might be wise to spread the word to get your trucks off the side streets till this gets resolved. Trucks with RV plates and and a Cab Top on the bed, Looks like you might be safe.
  
  Oh and watch out for the infamous "It was a Guy on a Bicycle"!

So watch out northsiders. And southsiders, don't be surprised when they hit you next week for the same thing.

God Squad Out in Force

Desperate times call for desperate measures:

• Calling for widespread action to stop gun violence in Chicago, about 70 faith leaders from the city and nearby suburbs gathered Monday for prayer and reflection.

  "We're tired of doing funerals. I feel like this tiredness has awakened us to really do something," said Pastor Paco Amador of the New Life Community Church in Little Village.

When we're tired of doing something, we usually find something else to occupy our time. You know, like stopping pointless meetings and participating to make changes. We think it's called "parenting," but we could be mistaken.

Then you have this lunatic:

• The yellow school bus rumbled down 79th Street Monday evening, passing by boarded-up store fronts, a shuttered currency exchange and a little church — The Temple of Divine Love.

  A few minutes later, the bus pulled up to the curb, and two dozen or so men in suits and starched collars disembarked — stone-faced men, marching in single file, on a mission.

  For the second Monday in a row, “the Fruit of Islam,” Nation of Islam Leader Louis Farrakhan’s all-male disciples, flooded a South Side community — this time the South Shore in an effort to help stop the killings that have plagued the city this year. The shootings have caused the murder to spike, drawing international attention.

Farrakhan has the hilarious task of attempting to stop the killings without blaming the Jews like he always does, in a town with a Jewish mayor. Then he has to hope Rahm will throw him some of that crazy money like he did to CeaseFire, thereby putting him in the position of owing that Jewish mayor a political debt, namely an endorsement or votes. It's a wonder Farrakhan's head doesn't explode at the thought of having to do this.

We are also amused that he and his "fruits of islam" are out marching on a Monday during daylight hours, statistically pretty much the least violent time of all week. This should solve everything.

Again, Confusing Stats

From the Sun Times:

• Three men are dead and at least 28 other people wounded from gun violence across the city since Friday night.

That was the Monday report - sounds like a mess of a weekend.

But here's the Tribune writing about Sunday night:

• At least six people were shot across the city overnight, including a targeted attack this morning in the Marquette Park neighborhood, Chicago police said.

  The night of shootings follow a violent weekend that saw dozens wounded and seven killed...

So who has the correct definition of "weekend" according to the police stats? Seven dead sounds a bit more serious and three - 133% more serious. And if accurate, it made up the July shortage versus 2011 in one weekend.

Twenty-eight shot sounds like a bigger number than six shot overnight, but even six a night is turning out to be an average for Chicago.

And that six overnight doesn't count the triple shooting on the west side Monday afternoon.

Daley Dodges

We guess we won't be hearing the stuttering midget under oath any time soon:

• Former Mayor Richard M. Daley will not have to answer questions under oath about allegations that — as state’s attorney and as mayor — he failed to investigate torture allegations against convicted former Area 2 Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge.

  Daley avoided the hot seat on Monday — with an assist from Mayor Rahm Emanuel — thanks to $7.17 million in settlements advanced by the City Council’s Finance Committee.

  The new settlements bring to $53.6 million the amount of money local taxpayers have shelled out to defend Burge and his Area 2 co-horts [sic], compensate victims of their alleged torture and pay a special prosecutor to investigate the controversy.

This remains one of the more annoying cases we've followed - not a single person has been convicted of torture, not a single case has been brought to trial, not a single shred of physical evidence has even been produced to prove torture, yet $53 million (and counting) has been paid from taxpayer funds.

911 Efficiency?

What's this?

• SCC you have to put this info out there, every fri/sat/sun night supervisor from 911 calls 311 to have police officers log in as 911 call takers/dispatchers with no formal training.
  
  this makes the wait time for 911 calls go down and make it look like we don't have to hire.
  
  the bad part about all of this is that we are not trained call takers and are held responsible for every call that we take. I never saw this on our job description..... I Many calls to FOP were made but alot of questions unanswered.
  
  When are they going to stop robbing Peter to pay Mary and Paul??

So shouldn't this be some sort of contract violation? Not of the FOP Contract, but the Dispatchers? Aren't they associated with the IBEW or someone? The FOP violations might come into play if the Officers are actually held liable for incidents that fall outside the scope of their training.

Fuzzy Math

Ten more shot?

• Four teens – two 13-year-olds and two 16-year-olds – were shot within a half hour in the city's Englewood and Gresham neighborhoods on the South Side, according to police.

  The four were among at least 10 people shot overnight in attacks on the city's South and West Sides.

This set of numbers appears to include the ones we cited in the "Parents of the Year" post and a few extras. We're wondering if the Department has started issuing the same numbers on multiple occasions so they can cite a decrease at some point? Or is this just lazy reporters contacting News Affairs at different points and not citing times of occurrence accurately.

Regardless, this weekend had some of the higher totals for July.

Nice Pinch

Very observant:

• A man was arrested early Sunday morning, for trying to sexually assault a 50-year-old woman out for a jog in the Old Town neighborhood, reports The Chicago Tribune.
  
  The man grabbed her and dragged her into an alley near the 300 block of West Menomonee at around 7:30 this morning. Two other joggers heard her scream and were able to scare the attacker away, says the report.
  
  Police Officer Matt Peterson was patrolling the area received an alert about the attack and found a man who matched the suspects description.
  
  After questioning the 21-year-old man, Officer Peterson arrested him without incident.
  
  Charges have not been filed.

Nice job Officer.

$3 Million Bond

We wish that we could see similar high bonds on so many other attacks and wounding of officers:

• Dozens of Cook County correctional officers filled a courtroom Saturday as a Little Village man with a history of DUI arrests was ordered held on $3 million bail Saturday for the hit-and-run accident that killed a fellow officer.

  Juan Bello, 57, was charged with reckless homicide, leaving the scene of an accident and was cited for failing to yield to a pedestrian, driving too fast for conditions and driving on a revoked license.

  Nikkii Bostic-Jones, 37, was thrown onto the road and pinned under a sheriff’s car when she was hit by Bello’s van as she crossed the street outside the Cook County Jail on her way to work late Wednesday night, authorities said.

We're assuming this murderer is being held outside of Cook County.

Parents of the Year

Englewood with their nominees:

• Four teens - two 13-year-olds and two 16-year-olds - were shot within a half hour in the city's Englewood and Gresham neighborhoods on the South Side, according to police.

  Three boys, aged 13, 16 and 16, were walking in the 7100 block of South Loomis Boulevard in the Englewood neighborhood about 11:25 p.m. when two others approached them on foot and started shooting.
  
  
• About a half hour before that a 13-year-old was sitting on a front porch in the 8600 block of South Morgan Street in the Gresham neighborhood when two males approached him on foot and shot him in the right forearm...

Won't somebody think of the children??!!?? Rahm?

Nice Weekend

Shooting totals climbing again:

• Three men are dead and at least 18 other people wounded from gun violence across the city since Friday night.

  The weekend’s first fatal shooting happened in the 400 block of North Austin Boulevard, after a man intervened in a domestic argument between the suspect and a woman, police said. The suspect left to get a handgun, then returned about 12:50 a.m. and opened fire, striking the man and two other people.

Collateral damage and 20+ shot overnight.

Time due restricted again for 11 August - why is that now? Oh yeah, manpower for Biliken.

Taking it Easy

One of those rare weekends, so we're kicking back and spending time with the families. Open post for now. Stay safe.

Working for Free

That "anti-violence initiative" working your off days? Thanks for nothing:

• Anti-Violence Payroll Issues
  
  July 20, 2012
  
  Members who volunteered to work the Anti-Violence Overtime Initiative in June have not received their scheduled payment as of 4:45 pm today and the Department has not made any attempt to tell them why. Several members took it upon themselves to contact the Chicago Police Department Finance Division to inquire as to why they did not receive their pay. The Finance Division advised these members to contact the Lodge rather than offer an explanation.
  
  After several inquiries to the Finance Division, the Lodge was advised that although today was the target date for payment, a problem with a payroll program resulted in the non-payment. The next payment target date is August 1, 2012.
  
  While the Lodge and most of the affected members understand that computer problems can and do occur, we believe that our members deserve at the very least the common courtesy of an explanation by the Department that they serve. The Finance Division had to be aware of this problem early in the day, yet there was not any action taken to explain the situation to any of the hundreds of Officers who protected the citizens of the City of Chicago during what would have been their normal days off. Another thanks for a job well done!

"payment target date." That sounds so reassuring.

And why is an anti-violence initiative that is supposed to target weekend mayhem suddenly open seven days a week? We must be shorter than Rahm is letting on.

General Order Folly Continues

This disaster of an order keeps getting worse the more we read it:

• Section VIII-J-2-EXCEPTION:
  
  Bureau of Patrol members will not complete the automated Arrestee Debriefing Module when the arrestee is charged with any of the following: [...], Justifiable Homicide, [...]

Would someone like to point out that there is no such charge as "Justifiable Homicide," and the fact that a situation is "justifiable" means there is no basis for charging or holding a subject in any case? Oh wait, we just did.

Could anyone with a legal background school these New York morons in the Illinois Compiled Statutes before they put out some more drivel that is going to get coppers sued and the city paying out millions to assholes set on a lottery payday?

Maybe an actual fucking lawyer could read these things before McDumbass signs his name to it. Or has Legal Affairs been gutted like everything else in this Department?

Charges Filed

Some closure at least:

• Reckless homicide charges were filed today against a West Side man who allegedly struck and killed a Cook County correctional officer as she was about to begin her overnight shift at Cook County Jail.

  Juan Bello, 57, of the 2900 block of West 25th Street, was charged with leaving the scene of a fatal accident and reckless homicide. He was also cited for failure to yield to a pedestrian, going too fast for conditions and driving on a revoked license.

  State records show Bello's driver's license was revoked in 2010 after his second DUI arrest.

We have little doubt that had he been arrested at the scene, he'd be facing his third DUI arrest, this time with aggravating circumstances.

More Dumb Ideas

We really have to see if they'll stream the CompStat meetings online since we're sleeping when they start spouting their insanity. Then we wouldn't have to ask the readers if they saw this:

• At the last comstat meeting, it was determined that in 005, when officers go in with arrests, crime goes up on the beats. Tracy comes up with a plan that they are looking at "marrying" different partners during an arrest. So if two cars come in with different arrests, only one P.O. from each car will stay as the arresting officers and the other 2 P.O.'s will be "married" and go out together back on patrol. WOW! What a brilliant idea! Instead of hiring more cops. Who comes up with this crap??? Oh I know, the inside mice that have never really worked a beat car or made any arrest where the goofball goes nuts or has a CR because of something his partner did. Someone, please make it stop!!!

Where do they come up with this shit? And how do we get a divorce?

Show Rahm the Money

Still not getting the bills paid:

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration has made its second reimbursement request for expenses incurred during the NATO summit here in May, including a claim for more than $300,000 for costs to the CTA and more than $900,000 for police agencies.

  The total amount billed to the Chicago NATO Host Committee on Friday is more than $3.2 million, which comes on the heels of a request for more than $15 million last month. Sarah Hamilton, a spokeswoman for Emanuel, said the city would continue to submit itemized bills to recoup its costs.

It's kind of like being a contractor for the city and waiting 6 months, 9 months, a year to get paid. Nice to see the shoe on the other foot for a minute.

Sergeant Guilty

Is anyone not getting the message here?

• A Chicago Police officer was found guilty of aggravated battery and official misconduct Thursday after he was caught on surveillance tape repeatedly striking a 19-year-old man whose hands were cuffed behind his back.

  Before making his ruling in the two-day trial, Circuit Judge Clayton Crane said the case was an especially difficult one to rule on, given the poor quality of the surveillance tape and having to rule on the limits of police force.

But as a reader pointed out, the judge had no problem dismissing numerous witnesses and evidence of a bunch of drunk sheriffs firing their weapons on the highway, terrorizing a minority couple.

We know we aren't going to persuade anyone to abandon their opinions, just like they aren't going to sway ours. Therefore, we'll keep our own counsel and draw our own conclusions. This one was hard to explain either way.

This is a General Order? (UPDATE)

A few weeks, maybe a month or two back, we wrote about this "Legitimacy" training the Department is making everyone go to. We haven't heard much noise about it lately - maybe they ran out of money? But we figured it was some "reverend feel-good" bullshit. Looks like we weren't too far off of the mark.

The Department (aka McCompStat) just rolled out the newest strategy, the "Gang Violence Reduction Strategy." We commented that it looked like a series of screens in the C.L.E.A.R. system that promote data collection about all sorts of affiliations, past events, etc. We didn't realize there was an entire General Order on the whole thing - General Order 10-01. Get a load of this:

• The Department's commitment to professionalism, obligation, leadership, integrity, courage and excellence has driven many meaningful public safety achievements. The Chicago Police Department conducts training and establishes procedures consistent with the concept of Legitimacy and Procedural Justice, with the goal of strengthening our relationship with the community and ultimately improving officer safety and efficiency. The concept of Legitimacy and Procedural Justice consists of the following four principles:

1. Giving others a voice (listening);
2. Neutrality in decision making;
3. Respectful treatment; and
4. Trustworthiness.

Wow. Really? This is a guideline for Department operations? Who writes this shit? It's like C.A.P.S. on major league meth. And it goes on for 10 or 12 more pages. Legitimacy gone wild!

Two things for certain:

1. Someone is going to get a gold star for writing this crap.
2. If you ever expect to get promoted, you better learn this order backward, forward, inside and out.

The kool-aid tastes so good!

UPDATE: A commentator points out that the shooting order reads:

• that first responders to a shooting scene should
• Verify someone is shot
• Send a flash message.
• Notify CPIC. No mention of rendering aid...the law staff is gonna love this...

Nice catch. Not a word about aid. So if they bleed out, you're covered.

UPDATE II: Section VI-A-1-a:

• The general message conveyed is "We will help you if you will let us, but we will stop you if you make us."

This job and this city are so doomed.

What We Deal With

What LBJ's "great society" has wrought:

• Had some dumb bitch out with a video camera last night AFTER a foot chase. We arrived shortly after the original officers lost sight of dipshit, and several patrol cars were still in the area. So I see this woman with a camera in hand and I ask what she is filming exactly, her answer was as follows: "I understand that y'all were chasing a boy you believed had a gun. I understand from some neighbors that the boy did not have a gun, and this is just another man hunt by y'all."
  
  I then asked what she seems to think is so important to film at this point since the foot chase was called off? Her response: "This is important because I believe this is just another attempt by y'all to exterminate our youth."
  
  Now I don't know if she meant the police, white guys, or white police, but either way it is this sick twisted mentality coupled with several other factors destroying the black community. Pull your fucking heads out of the sand, open your fucking eyes, and take responsibility for the bullshit going on all around your neighborhoods. I have NO personal attachment to your neighborhood, and I am only there because I am paid to be there, and due to HIGH crime rates required to be there.

Remember, we are all just Pilgrims.

Sued Over Justifiable Shooting

This is fucking ridiculous:

• Two men charged with murder filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Chicago Police Department, alleging officers used excessive force against them when they were shot.

  John W. Givens and Leland Dudley say they were unarmed and their vehicle was stopped outside of an electronics store on April 30 when the officers opened fire at “close range,” according to the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court.

The vehicle was stopped because it had plowed through a steel door, rammed a squad car, run over a police officer and struck another squad car before officers disabled the van full of assholes bent on murdering police officers by shooting the driver.

• All three men were unarmed when police officers approached the minivan, in which the plaintiffs were passengers, according to the lawsuit.

Except for the aforementioned van, which weighs in excess of one ton. And they were "accomplices," not passengers you fucking media whores. That's why they were charged with murder.

• “The City of Chicago policemen had no justification for the use of this deadly force,” the lawsuit said.

Yeah, okay. Any other state in the nation, this is laughed out of court. But here? Who knows.

Hit and Run Suspect in Custody

We were unavailable most of the day, so we didn't get to cover this one:

• A suspect is in custody in Wednesday night’s hit-and-run death of a popular Cook County correctional officer, struck and killed as she walked to work at the Cook County Jail, sources said.

  Nikkii Bostic-Jones, 37, was hit around 10:50 p.m. Wednesday while crossing the street outside the jail on her way to work, officials said.

  Bostic-Jones flew into the southbound lane and was hit and pinned under a sheriff’s car, sheriff officials said.

  Police obtained the possible make and model of the full-sized van responsible, as well as a partial license plate number. Using databases, they located a similar van nearby, owned by a man who lives near the jail, source said.

  Evidence on the van appeared to link it to the crash, sources said.

That entire street and boulevard around the jail is a death trap. County had stationed squad cars as crossing guards on and off over the years when employees and sheriffs had been hit by cars. Maybe it's time to figure out a better parking arrangement for our brothers and sisters working the jail. They shouldn't have to risk their lives crossing the street to get to that hellhole they work in.

Godspeed Officer Bostic-Jones.

Aldermanic Overreach

The headline in the Sun Times Wednesday:

• Chicago aldermen rework city’s gun law to satisfy federal judge

How about they start with this?

• A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

And then why don't they stop there?

Asshats.

No Honor Among Thieves

How could this happen? Oh wait...we know exactly how:

• A Chicago alderman’s office on the Southwest Side has been burglarized, and thieves made off with an air conditioner, three computers, and a TV.

  Ald. Ricardo Munoz (22nd) said he feels “violated” after someone broke in through the front door of his ward office at 2500 S. St. Louis Av., sometime between Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning.

When burglars broke into Anthony "Big Tuna" Accardo's home, justice was meted out harshly. Might we see the aldercreature's unsavory supporters attempting to "make good" on some ne'er-do-wells in Little Village?

School Strike Coming

The arbitrator's report was rejected by both sides - unanimously by both sides:

• The long-awaited fact-finder’s recommendation on how to solve “toxic’’ Chicago teacher contract talks was finally made public Wednesday — but nobody wanted it.

  Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s handpicked school board and hundreds of Chicago Teachers Union delegates both, unanimously, rejected the recommendations of a fact-finder both sides had picked to help resolve their stalemate.

  School board president David Vitale said the cash-strapped district just didn’t have the money to pay recommended raises next year of 15 to 18 percent, totaling some $330 million. CPS had offered four years of two percent raises.

  Though the fact-finder had recommended a fat pay hike for teachers ordered to work 20 percent more next year, Chicago Teachers Union delegates didn’t like his dismissal of their concerns about job security. They said they fear the district’s growing use of “turnarounds” and school closings that displace good teachers through no fault of their own.

So Rahm completely united the teachers into a force that just may derail his national ambitions. He gambled all of his political credibility on an end-around in Springfield that pretty much attempted to remove the teachers from the process, and he is on the losing end. This explains his going completely balls out against the police and fire with his tame reporters. He's got to win somewhere and neither of our bargaining units can strike.

Concealed Carry Works Again

Hopefully, this video shows up okay:

Nice shooting there old timer.

Here's the Newest Strategy

Again? How many times are we going to revamp this?

• This week the Superintendent Garry McCarthy launched what he is calling the Gang Violence Reduction Strategy.
  

  It's a system that will help police do more than just react to the shootings and killings that have put the city in the national spotlight this summer. It coordinates and streamlines gang intelligence to help the cops on the street be more proactive, and prevent more violence.

  It's a scene that plays out every single night on Chicago's streets; shootings that so far this year have left more than 1,200 people injured and more than 275 people dead.

As far as we can tell, it's another series of screens in the arrest reporting process that gathers data. Nothing earth shattering. Not really a new "strategy" either.

Long Overdue

This could get interesting:

• The special prosecutor appointed to investigate the 2004 death of a man during a drunken confrontation with a nephew of then-Mayor Richard Daley’s said today he has convened a grand jury but offered no timetable for when the investigation will be completed.
  
  Dan Webb, a former U.S. attorney, was appointed to investigate the death of David Koschman nearly three months ago.
  
  Speaking today at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse following an unrelated court appearance , Webb told reporters a grand jury with full subpoena powers and the power to compel witnesses to testify under oath is hearing evidence. Webb has put together a team of attorneys to work on the case, which he acknowledged was complicated by the years since the violent death.

We're going to arbitrarily set the over/under for someone taking the Fifth at ten days from the first witness called.

Thanks for the $14 Million Rahm

Gee, what could cut overtime costs?

• The Chicago Police Department could pay officers up to $14 million in overtime this summer as part of its plan to curb an increase in violence, a spokeswoman said Monday.
  
  The money already was accounted for in the department's budget and mirrors what the city has spent on similar violence-reduction initiatives in previous years, said Sarah Hamilton, a spokeswoman for Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
  
  Emanuel said this year's strategy is being directed in a more "targeted way" in the face of a nearly 38 percent increase in homicides in the first six months of 2012 compared with 2011. It's unclear what that means, however, because the administration declined to elaborate.

"...declined to elaborate?" We guess that means another new strategy is on the way.

In the meantime, hiring continues to slow and Rahm continues his indirect attacks in a media blitz designed to cripple our negotiating positions. But hey, keep paying that OT.

Station Insecurity

No one watching the lots? No cameras?

• Ten cars parked in the lot of the Ogden police district on the West Side were vandalized overnight, just days after two other cars in the same lot were scratched, authorities said.

  In the latest incident, 10 cars were found scratched and marked with graffiti around midnight in the lot at 3315 W. Ogden Ave., according to Chicago Police Department News Affairs. The window of one of the cars had been broken, police said.

  Around 4 a.m. on Sunday, two cars were similarly damaged, police said.

  No one was in custody, and police could not say if surveillance cameras caught the vandals.

There's that silly idea that cameras can "catch" anything. Cameras record. Cops catch. And pretending that a 40-inch high decorative fence can stop anyone from hopping over it and having their way in a police lot without being observed once is unbelievable.

Will the city make good on paying for the damages?

Rahmbo-Cop

We've linked to the "Day by Day" comic strip for years now. Conservative in bent and always funny, Chris Muir has carved out a niche for himself in the liberal media wasteland as a voice of the Right.

This past Sunday, he took on Chicago violence:

"Tiny Dancer"? We're pretty sure that originated in our comment section and may have been popularized by Kass. Regardless, it is heartening to see that Rahm is going to be a focal point of many election issues.

Disability Series

Evidently, the Sun Times article is a three-day series. So we'll be seeing another beating in the media.

Here's part of the issue that no one is touching on:

• The Appellate Court of Illinois ruled in 2000 that one of the officers be given a pension based almost solely on the fact that the City did not offer the officer a light-duty spot.

That means that for 12 years now, the City has known how to end many of the abuses, but refused, instead making a conscious effort to push these costs onto an already strained Pension Fund rather than delineate and define what a "limited duty assignment" would entail and who would therefore be eligible to work in one.

We have dozens, maybe tens of dozens of officers who are willing to come back from cancer, heart attacks, or other long term ailments and work the desk, at Ident, in warrant offices, at data entry, etc. Is it the best solution? Probably not. But is it a necessary function and does it free up able-bodied Officers? Sure. The duty-disabled would require a little training and updating in their qualifications for the assorted certifications required by local, state and federal law regarding sensitive information gathering and disseminating, but it's doable.

Unfortunately, Novak and Fusco, best known for their work on the Hired Truck scandal, appear to have been rolled for political purposes by Rahm and Rahm's people.

Taste Numbers Up

Wow, big surprise - Best Taste Ever!

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Monday proclaimed his shrunken and revamped Taste of Chicago a success and said he plans to do more of the same next year.

  By cutting the Taste in half, bumping it to mid-July and charging for concert seats at the Petrillo bandshell, Emanuel led some people to fear he was trying to kill the premier summer festival that had become a drain on Chicago taxpayers.

  Those fears turned out to be unfounded.

• Overall, attendance was 1.2 million or an average of 240,000 for each of the five days.

  That’s up 5,000-a-day from last year’s draw of 2.35 million over five days, which was down 11 percent from 2010 and 37.5 percent from the event’s 2006 and 2007 heyday.

  Restaurant revenues for the 2012 Taste were not yet known.

  Last year, the 59 participating restaurants made $4.9 million — 20 percent less than the year before.

We're sure they'll release those numbers in a few weeks when it won't really matter and no one is paying attention.

On the police side though, there is word that on two of the days of Taste, there were actually zero arrests for anything, an unheard of occurrence. Maybe we can get another ribbon if it went that well.

Williams "Dumped"

A few weeks ago, Weis-inger told Gene Williams his head was on the chopping block. That Gene was incompetent in his current position of "Acting Chief of Patrol." Yesterday, the axe finally fell and Weis-inger took his promised vengeance on his rival.

Williams was named Chief of the Administrative Bureau.

Wow. Get called out in front of 200-plus of your fellow exempts, co-workers, underlings, politicians and others, then get promoted with a big bump in pay? It's like he's got "Anthony Carothers Syndrome" or something - take three or four weeks straight of verbal beatings at CompStat and get a higher rank and better pay.

Hey Al, can you belittle us and put our head on the chopping block?

Coincidence?

The Cubs are the hottest team in baseball the past three weeks. 15 and 5.

Homicides for July are down over last years totals.

So does that mean the entire homicide problem McCompStat is experiencing is actually dependent on the Cubs keeping a hot streak alive?

Better get those boys some pitching, stat!

Alley Time

An observant reader noted that Rahm's speech last week told gang bangers to "take it to the alley" and "keep it away from the kids."

They followed Rahm's advice and ended up beating a crippled man to death who was just picking cans up and then put the video on YouTube.

We assume this will be part of the defense strategy.

Nice job Rahm.

Depravity

Thank goodness they're stupid, but where do you even get the idea to do something this stupid?

• Two more teens have been charged in connection in the deadly attack on a 62-year-old man last week that was recorded and posted on Facebook the same day a judge denied bond for a 16-year-old.

  Nicholas Ayala, 17, and Anthony Malcolm, 18, were each charged with first-degree murder and robbery in the slaying of Delfino Mora, according to Chicago police.
  
  Both Ayala and Malcolm each took turns using a cell phone camera to record the Tuesday morning beating that killed Mora, authorities said.

Film the murder and post the snuff film on a social media site. Wow. The death penalty would be too good for these animals.

All is Well, All is Safe

Just don't ride the CTA:

• Chicago police are searching for two gunmen who forced a woman off a Blue Line train and sexually assaulted her just two blocks from a Logan Square neighborhood police station last month.

  The 52-year-old woman met the two suspects June 30 as she boarded the train at the West Side Kedzie-Homan stop, police said.

  They later forced her off the train at gunpoint at the California station about 6:30 a.m. and took her to an apartment in the 2800 block of West Lyndale where they sexually assaulted her, according to a community alert issued by Area North detectives.

Seriously, the assholes took a woman off the train at gunpoint, walked her a few blocks away and continued the assault? We know Mass Transit is short and 0630 hours is kind of early, but no one saw a thing? No one called this one out? Something odd here, but we aren't sure which way it's going.

Crime is Down....

....but all we hear about is shootings shootings shootings. Even in the burbs, where they're getting knocked down 6 at a time:

• Six people were hospitalized after being injured in a shooting late Saturday night in west suburban Maywood, officials said.

  Police were called to a home in the 1900 block of South 19^th Avenue about 11:48 p.m. after receiving a report of a multiple people being shot at a gathering there, according to Larry Shapiro, spokesperson for the Village of Maywood.

Did anyone tell Mope-rah?

Sun Times Article (UPDATE)

Big front page story about people on disability actually leading lives.

We haven't read the article yet, and as of this posting it doesn't seem to be online.

A few points in the meantime:

• If the subjects of the article are actually disabled and have been judged as such by a competent doctor, there's nothing that says they can't go out and enjoy life, including hunting.
  
  
• If they are scamming, then they should face the consequences and make restitution following a proper investigation and court proceedings, and any medical professional who abetted their scam ought to be investigated and stripped of their licenses, too.
  
  
• This certainly seems like odd timing, doesn't it? We've stated before that to have a gentlemens' agreement, one must be negotiating with actual gentlemen. We'd question the process that led to the article being posted just as our contract expired.

We'll link the article when it becomes available. And when we become available in the morning.

UPDATE: Article now linked.

Missing

If found, please ignore.

FOP Gets in on the CeaseFire Act

Welcome to the party:

• There is heavy friction between the Chicago police union and CeaseFire after the anti-violence organization helped a shooting suspect turn himself in earlier this week.

• Some say it’s the non-profit’s first big “get” after receiving $1 million in city funding. But some say the news conference was all show for CeaseFire.

  “I’m a little skeptical about why they’re throwing a press conference,” says [some guy], president of the Fraternal Order of Police. “It’s something to justify spending a million dollars and try to portray like they’re doing something for society.”

However, the Roseland CeaseFire claims they aren't affiliated with the CeaseFire that got a cool million from Rahm. So does this mean that there are different factions of CeaseFire and each faction will be demanding a million bucks to put a lid on shootings (almost 50 so far this week) and do follow-up investigations for named offenders that police investigations have narrowed down?

And if they're not affiliated with each other, are they actively warring like other gang factions? We can't wait for the first CeaseFire on CeaseFire shooting.

Taste Up, Taste Down

All sorts of conflicting numbers coming out of the Taste:

• The scaled-back Taste of Chicago wraps up Sunday, and the question many people are asking is whether the changes in the festival have made the experience more enjoyable or less.

  After losing money for three years Taste of Chicago was moved to after Independence Day and shortened from ten days to five.

• According to figures provided to vendors, sales were down 100,000 tickets on Wednesday compared to the Wednesday of last year's festival.

  But Thursday saw an increase of 150,000 tickets over the Thursday of Taste 2011.

Apples and oranges as the Wednesday and Thursday they are comparing last year led into a four day weekend for the 4th. But a swing of a quarter million tickets is pointless without a baseline to compare it to.

The big number coming out though is zero killed.

Nine Shot, Two Dead

Typical Friday night:

• Two people were killed and seven others were wounded in shootings across the city Friday night and Saturday morning, police said.

Of course, we're also averaging 6 shot a day during the week, working out to around 60 people appearing at hospitals with extra holes in their bodies each week.

Halfway through July - who has the numbers so far and compared to last year?

Cop Attacked

Foot chase and a fight:

• A police officer was attacked early Friday during a foot chase in the South Chicago neighborhood.

  Two officers were on patrol in a squad car when they saw two men, one with a gun, standing in a garage near 80th Street and Manistee Avenue about 1 a.m., police said. The male officer jumped out of the car and starting chasing the armed man on foot while his female partner tried to cut him off the squad car.

  But when the man saw the squad car he doubled back toward the garage, police said. Just then, the other man struck the male officer with a “blunt object,” possibly some kind of steel pole. He initially thought he’d been hit with a bat.

Treated and released for unspecified "non-life threatening" injuries. Get well soon Officer.

Foot = Foot

Once again:

• SCC, unless I missed it there has been no mention of what GMac said at Compstat re: Foot patrols. To wit: Commanders must justify why a fixed post police officer gets a car from now on. Inclement weather is the only real reason, otherwise all fixed posts must be on foot.

These "posts" aren't storefronts or downtown spots with tourists all around. These posts are deep in enemy territory at high traffic dope spots. Spots where weapons are commonplace and turf wars rage. Spots that are easy to hide dope and where the dealers can operate out of sight.

We certainly hope that downtown has thought this one through. And then the supervisors mention their concerns. And finally, the FOP can ensure that officer safety concerns are paramount and in the front of everyone's mind.

McSuburbanite Says "Move Out"

Drawing on his vast experience as a resident of suburban New York, Mc(insert name here) demeans those bitching about the drive to work:

• Interesting that McCarthy is on record at a comstatt meeting as saying that when was a captain in New York, he travelled nearly 2 hours each way to get to work. Consequently, if he did it, we can do it!!!!
  
  But what nobody calls him on is that the 2 hour one way travel time was his choice.... New York police and fire do not have to live in the city. He lived in the burbs with his family.
  
  I too would gladly travel 2 hours to 007 or 011 if it meant I could get my family away from this shithole.

Sounds like a good argument. Maybe McResidency can start the petition in Springfield.

Rahm Vacations

He sure seems to be out of town a lot. Almost as much as Obummer ends up golfing. Sure, you can call them "working vacations" to drum up business for the city, an especially hard sell given the state of our downtown tourist areas being overrun and slowly destroyed.

But seven vacations in his short tenure while we can't even use the hours we earned years ago to extend our days off by a single day to attend the wedding of a dear friend? Something is definitely wrong with this picture.

Counter-Spin

Word is that the bosses downtown have dictated that no mention of CeaseFire will appear on any case report or arrest reports, especially as it relates to any arrests being made. This is probably in response to the numerous instances we pointed out of the "former" thugs getting caught dirty, time and time again.

It also makes it harder to spin instances like this:

• Hey SCC get this right now in area south the offender who shot the two girls leaving the park had through the hard work of fugitive apprehension unit been set to turn himself in.
  
  Now because of political considerations and rumor of a little cash to dad Cease fire is going to accompany the offender to area south in front of prearranged news cameras. The guys who worked this and beat the bushes to get this guy are getting sent away so some felon can say he talked this guy into surrendering. The offender had nowhere to go....
  
  Sing chased his family was cooperating and now for some quick cash and good press the police are being told to walk away. God help us. Please stay safe back each other up and remember the brass will sell you down the river just to make political points.

So the Fugitive Apprehension Unit does the grunt work, chasing leads and beating the bushes, but since we're sharing all our information with the assholes and they need something/anything to counteract the bad press they so richly deserve, they're getting the credit for this?

A-fucking-mazing. Could someone in the press ask exactly what it was that lead CeaseFire to this individual? Any investigatory tips and clues so the CPD could pick up some pointers? As they stammer through some bullshit, everyone can get a clue as to how the public is being played.

UPDATE: Here comes the counter-spin:

• The man surrendered to Area South detectives Thursday evening, according to police News Affairs Officer Daniel O’Brien. Police are calling him a person of interest in the shooting.

  The man’s family contacted anti-violence group CeaseFire Roseland through an attorney to help facilitate the man’s surrender at the Calumet District police station, said Bob Jackson, the head of CeaseFire Roseland.

The Trib also has CeaseFire mentioned prominently. We wonder what it must be like to live your entire adult life as a tool for the Rahms of the world. All in search of that byline and an invitation to the dinner parties.

Starbright?

This is interesting:

• The stage is being set for McCarthy's exit. Mayoral staffers have an internal nickname for McCarthy...
  
  Starbright.
  
  It came up after one department head who hates McCarthy's guts, pointed out how shiny the stars were on his uniform.
  
  McCarthy does not listen to anyone. He refuses to make even the smallest change. He refuses to explain why crime is up and instead insists everything is going great. He is driving the mayor crazy.
  
  City Hall is concerned that Republicans are going to start running national commercials labeling the city as crime-ridden Obama's Chicago. The ads basically say the entire country will look like Chicago if Obama gets a second term.
  
  The staff is already back door interviewing for a new superintendent and, surprise, Wysinger isn't even being considered. The requirements are not what you'd think. They insist the new superindendent is a male (any race) with at least 25 years on the job who can present a "bad ass" image for the police department, which will go from promising to arrest nobody to insisting that we arrest anybody and everybody.
  
  The 16th District Commander's name has come up more than once.

So we might finally promote internally? That might be promising. Might not be though, seeing the "quality" left over since J-Fled gutted the experience level before he left and McStarbright has done nothing to stop the brain-drain.