NY Style

Word from a reliable source says the recruits currently in their training cycles will all be assigned to foot posts at west and south side "hot spots" upon completion of the three months.

Brilliant - kids with zero street smarts and the barest minimum of training on fixed foot posts in the worst neighborhoods Chicago has to offer.  And since the FTO program is in shambles, the "minimum of training" might actually be an exaggeration.

42? Or 44?

No one seems able to count.

The media and the Department insist the total so far is 42.

But the CrimeInChicago website cites 44.

We've found one error in the CrimeInChicago site as they count they police shooting on 07 January. We're assuming the other error is the shooting on the expressway that the Illinois State Police are investigating - if it isn't a Chicago RD number, it probably isn't being counted in the stats.

We're currently researching another incident and may have some info on it later today.

Still Connected

George Ryan is out of prison....and home already:

• Former Gov. George Ryan spent just hours at a halfway house on Chicago’s West Side this morning before he was released and sent to his Kankakee home, where he will be on home confinement until he completes his 6 ½-year sentence.
  
  Ryan will not have to wear an electronic monitor while under house arrest, according to his lawyer, former Gov. Jim Thompson.
  
  "I think it was a wise decision by the Bureau of Prisons, but it's not something I asked for, it's not something he asked for. So it is in no way preferential treatment,” Thompson said.
  
  Ryan left the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind. at about 1 a.m., arrived at Thompson's home around 4:30 a.m. in sweats and changed clothes, Thompson said. He was processed at the halfway house and arrived in Kankakee at about 10:30 a.m.

Must be nice to skip what any unconnected parolee has to go through. A stay there might have done him some good.

On a happier note, Ryan's wife was there to greet him when he got out:

• Former Gov. George Ryan had been back in his Kankakee Victorian home a little less than an hour Wednesday morning, when one of his grandchildren approached, holding a golden urn.
  
  It contained the ashes of his late wife, Lura Lynn Ryan.

Rot in hell George.

Vehicle Issues?

From the comments:

• A/1 Fleet info said...Dont expect any more ford SUVs anytime soon. I work in fleet in the area 1 garage(yes, civilian) and the city has defaulted on the payments to ford for the explorers. Obviously we all first thought its business as usual just lost paperwork or slow payments from the city that works etc. Nope, the city is just no paying it. They told ford that they will pay the bill in full in six months. Ford fired back saying that no more deliveries will be made to the city of cars, parts etc until the bill is paid. City still says nope and ford is taking a hard line.
  
  So, what does this mean???
  
  First off, the city and ford have a CONTRACT that usually keeps the required parts and vehicles flowing in as we need them or order them. Now, ford is screaming foul for breach of contract.. which, this is. Im guessing if the city continues to blow them off(which seems to be their intention) then we at fleet will be at a standstill with any repairs to any and all fords for new parts that we currently dont have in stock. We will have to use the restocks of the cars we have in our graveyard to pull used parts from. This will result in cars being down longer or extremely worn out and unsafe used parts being put on squad cars. Its a mess. Stay tuned for this one...

We don't know why Ford would be surprised at this. The city never pays bills on time and a number of companies have gone bankrupt waiting for a check from the city.

Clue to the readers - if you ever go into business with the Chicago, get paid up front. It'll never happen, but you'll still have your company a few years down the road.

Three Daylight Homicides

The highest January total since 2002 - with two days to go:

• By Tuesday evening, three people had been slain — all in broad daylight — on a day in which temperatures soared to 63, a record for Jan. 29. In addition to Cannon, a 20-year-old man was shot in the head in the East Side neighborhood at about 8 a.m.; the 15-year-old girl was shot at about 2:30 p.m. a few blocks from King College Prep after finishing classes at the North Kenwood high school.
  
  With two days still left in the month, this marked the second consecutive January in which Chicago has hit at least 40 homicides. The 40 homicides last January represented a jump of 43 percent from 28 in January 2011. While Chicago never quite recovered over the rest of the year from an even sharper jump in violence over the first quarter of 2012, homicides fell or were flat in the year's last four months.
  
  Crime experts caution it's way too early to suggest the disappointing January numbers mean violence in Chicago will continue at a similar pace throughout this year.

And what can we expect from our leadership?

• Chicago’s top cop said the city’s deadly weekend wasn’t as bad as it seems when compared to last year.

Really? We're ahead of last year's pace and it "wasn't as bad" in comparison?

How does this asshat still have a job? Rahm, wake up. He isn't an effective leader, he isn't insulating you from anything any more, he's a punchline for crying out loud and has been for months. Three dead on a Tuesday after a body count of seven this past Saturday?

Lightning Strikes Again

If only there was some rhyme or reason to why this happens!

• Devin Common told his mother he was going to a nearby South Side store around noon Tuesday.
  
  Minutes later, his mother Kimberly Common saw him laying dead in the 7400 block of South Champlain.
  
  He was her second son fatally gunned down since last summer in the Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood.
  
  “I couldn’t believe it was happening all over again,” said Kimberly Common, who lost her son Antonio Common, 23, to gun violence in an alley near the corner store at 75th and Langley.

This must be the new media trend - find out how many relatives of the dead have also been killed by gunfire. Don't mention the thirty and forty arrests in 10 years since the age of 17. Don't mention the wheeling and dealing lifestyle that brings the "victims" into close contact with gun play.

No, this is a family tragedy. And we're sure someone from Rahm's office will be delivering a script to momma's house shortly about how we need more gun laws to protect these poor altar boys and honor students from the dangers of the street - you know, like just a few days ago where momma lost her four chillens to guns wielded by law abiding citizenry.

Can You Spare a Square?

The other day, it was a man shooting his brother over a request to be quiet.  Today?

• Two West Side teenagers were ordered held in lieu of $500,000 bail Tuesday for beating a 43-year-old man to death during a fight over a cigarette.
  
  Derrick Burns, 15, punched Anton Baker causing Baker to fall onto a couch at Burns’ home in the 1000 block of North LeClaire on Dec. 12, Cook County prosecutors said.
  
  Then, William Davis, 16, joined Burns in punching and kicking Baker, assistant state’s attorney Jennifer Sexton said.
  
  Baker, who was unarmed, tried blocking himself, and a witness tried to break up the fight, but the pair continued attacking the older man, Sexton said.
  
  Baker ended up falling on the ground before Burns allegedly picked up a speaker and dropped it on Baker’s head.

"You got a smoke?" Crushed skull.

"Please be quiet." KA-BLAM, shotgun murder.

"Daughter, you owe me $40." Stab stab stab stab stab.

Anyone want to call Attorney General Eric Holder and ask him when he's going to lead that dialogue about "race" that he says Americans are too cowardly to have? It would seem that the only people afraid to actually have the discussion are the ones ignoring the face looking back at them in the mirror.

Homicide Drive Off To Great Start

From the Onion, this great article:

• Having tallied a “very promising” 41 murders so far in 2013, police officials confirmed Tuesday that the annual Chicago Homicide Drive was off to its fastest start in more than a decade and was already well on its way to reaching this year’s goal for violent slayings.
  
  “It’s still January, but we’ve already seen an astounding number of contributions to this year’s murder drive,” Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy told reporters as he raised the red progress line on the Homicide Drive’s Murdometer, a 15-foot plywood silhouette of a gunned-down body that stands outside City Hall.
  
  “I don’t think anyone dreamed it would be possible to break last year’s staggering total of 506 murders, but with so many people chipping in all across the city, we may just do it. There’s a tremendous community-wide level of interest and participation in this yearly event, which is quickly becoming a treasured part of Chicago culture.”
  
  While McCarthy said he remained confident that Chicagoans would set a new Homicide Drive record this year, he cautioned that the city was beginning to face a shortage of potential victims in many of its highest-contributing neighborhoods.

The only way you could tell this was satire is the claim in the last line - "shortage of potential victims..." That was the giveaway.

Move to Texas

The envy of just about every state governor. We wish we had these problems:

• Gov. Rick Perry will use his State of the State address to call for amending the Texas Constitution to allow the state to return tax money it collects but doesn't spend back to its citizens, according to an excerpt of the speech released to The Associated Press.
  
  Perry, who is scheduled to deliver the speech Tuesday morning to a joint session of the Legislature, will tell lawmakers that he has "never bought into the notion that if you collect more, you need to spend more."
  
  "Today, I'm calling for a mechanism to be put in place so when we do bring in more than we need, we'll have the option of returning tax money directly to the people who paid it," the governor plans to say. "Currently, that's not something our constitution allows. We need to fix that."
  
  The Republican has for weeks called on the Legislature to cut taxes and continue to hold down government spending -- even though Texas' economy is booming. He'll also use the speech to give a specific dollar amount he'd like to see in tax reductions.

Texas is looking to cut a check to taxpayers instead of funding new and unsustainable spending.

By the way, did everyone get part one of their tax bills this week? 

2013 Equals 2012

Crime is down!

• A bloody weekend in which seven people died has put an abrupt end, for now, to hopes that Chicago might be putting a lid on its homicide rate.
  
  The homicides put the total for the year thus far at 40 — the same as for January 2012. That year ended with the city seeing more than 500 homicides for the first time since 2008.
  
  With a few days still left in the month, Chicago is poised to have the deadliest January since 2002, when there were 45.
  
  Police say the violence underscores the need for tougher gun laws and tougher penalties for those who break the gun laws.

Because having the toughest gun laws so far has worked so well.

Does anyone in the media even read the crap they print any more? Or compare it to the numbers readily available out there?

UPDATE: Yeah yeah yeah...we fixed the headline.  Sleepy and tired after a string of homicides.

What a Tangled Web We Weave (UPDATED)

Gee, what's around the corner? Long delayed contract negotiations. And now this comes to light:

• It’s been nearly three years since the Chicago Police Department seized a small arsenal of weapons — including four assault rifles — from the River North mansion of James B. Finkl, a steel company heir who owned a security business with two Chicago cops.
  
  Finkl wasn’t charged. The case remained in limbo. And City Hall officials say they can’t explain why.
  
  But now, after being asked about it, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration has ordered the police internal affairs division to investigate what happened to the case against Finkl, who was in business with police Officer Daniel J. Shields.
  
  Ten months after the raid, Shields’ brother, Michael Shields, also a police officer, was elected president of Fraternal Order of Police Lodge No. 7, the union for Chicago cops.

Great. Just what we need. A gun case tied to a cop who happens to be the brother of the Union President. Not just any gun case though:

• The police raided Finkl’s home looking for an illegal, automatic assault rifle, which a tipster said he had fired in Finkl’s “basement firing range,” records show. Police reports don’t show whether officers found that gun — but they did confiscate 36 other weapons, including vintage handguns, several shotguns and four semi-automatic assault rifles, one with 40 live rounds of ammunition.

Thirty-six weapons. Resulting in what exactly?

• The police arrested Finkl at his home the following morning, May 19, 2010, on 36 counts of unlawful use of a weapon, the state crime. He also was accused of violating a city ordinance for failing to register the 36 weapons.
  
  He was taken to the lockup at the 18th District police station — which is also where Dan Shields, his business partner at the time, worked. Fingerprinted there, Finkl was released about two hours later.

Thirty-six UUW charges and a two hour stay? Wow. The inventories alone must have taken twice that. And the rest of it?

• The arresting officer showed up in court that day, and a Cook County judge continued the case, according to Melissa Stratton, a police spokeswoman who referred additional questions to the city’s law department.
  The law department responded with a written statement: “When the city was first alerted to this issue — that a court case might not have been filed or pursued after Finkl’s arrest in 2010 — the law department and Chicago Police Department immediately began to review the facts and disposition of the case.
  
  “It appears that the circuit court clerk’s electronic database does not have on record a case corresponding to the May 19, 2010, arrest date. The city is still determining why the clerk did not receive this case in their database.

It's our experience that cases involving 36 guns don't just disappear from the Cook County databases without a reason. What could possibly make anyone think that this was even remotely possible?

• Finkl, 49, is founder and chief executive officer of Finkl Enterprises, whose holdings included Jetty Security, Radar Pictures and several other businesses. Radar has helped finance movies for Radar Productions, which is headed by former Chicago Sun-Times owner Ted Field. Some of those movie deals involved Richard J. “R.J.” Vanecko, the nephew of former Mayor Richard M. Daley who late last year was charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death of David Koschman nearly nine years ago.

Are you fucking kidding us? R.J. Vanecko? Is involved with some dude with 36 unregistered weapons? Who employs a Chicago Police Officer? Who happens to be a union board member? And related to the president of the Chicago FOP? And we're about to enter the most contentious negotiations in our history with a sawed-off prick of a mayor who would gladly see each and every one of us starve while living in a cardboard box....as long as the box was still in the City of Chicago, mind you.

Someone has a shitload of explaining to do. The appearance of impropriety is a stink we don't need at this moment in time.

UPDATES: People are saying Dan was elected to his spot. Our error, post amended.  Is he inside as a field rep?

McDonald v City of Chicago was handed down 28 Jun 2010, six weeks after this case broke.  The charges for UUW seem to have been properly dismissed since then as Finkl had a valid FOID card, purchased the guns legally and did not have any "fully automatic weapons" as delineated in the Search warrant.  That looks like a huge problem for someone down the line.

As to those accusing us of taking contradictory positions regarding firearm ownership, we ventured no opinion on the guns or charges.  We weren't there.  Unfortunately, we are obligated to enforce laws that we don't agree with politically at times.  The weapons were unregistered, which was an Ordinance violation at the time of occurrence, so we kind of have to point that out.  We aren't happy about it either.  The bigger issue remains that those who are supposed to lead us, politicians, union reps, superintendents, etc., ought to comport themselves in a manner befitting the office.  That means not associating with mobsters, not being photographed with made members of the Outfit, not making $11 million off a part time job.  However, this is Chicago, Cook County, Illinois.

Looking at this whole thing after 24 hours and tens of dozens of comments, it's a bit of a stretch to make the connections the Sun Times did.  But the end result is that we, the boys and girls on the front lines, are being smeared by the Vanecko connection, a missing Cook County court file and still unexplained connections between the union leadership and a connected business.

Disarmament is the Goal

A couple people have accused the blog of being overly panicked concerning the gun debate. That all of the ongoing drama coming out of Washington is just that - drama.  Sorry that you choose to live in a bubble, but universal disarmament is the goal of the left. They may not all espouse it all of the time, but if you pay attention, enough do it to make it worth pointing out:

• San Diego Police Chief William Lansdowne is fully supportive of the Obama/Feinstein gun grab, and says if lawmakers play it right Americans can be completely disarmed within "generation."
  
  Lansdowne has gone on record saying: "I could not be more supportive of the president for taking the position he has. I think it's courageous with the politics involved in this process. [And] I think it's going to eventually make the country safer."
  
  He made it clear that it may take "a generation," but new laws could eventually take all guns off the streets.
  This is quite a departure from other law enforcement personnel we've seen around the country--particularly Sheriffs--who've come out firmly against any infringement on the 2nd Amendment. We've cheered those officials for standing with the people, and now Lansdowne has taken a position completely opposite them.
  
  Moreover, Lansdowne has also been slamming the NRA in interviews. And he seems overtly thrilled at the money the NRA is being forced to spend to get their message out in the wake of the crime at Sandy Hook Elementary. "We broke the NRA," says Lansdowne.

One guy in California, but one guy with a bit of influence -  a "useful idiot" as Lenin used to call them. And one guy who feels more than a little at ease with the direction his political masters seem to be taking.

Of course, he's completely out of touch with reality claiming "We broke the NRA" as the NRA is recruiting in record numbers (over half a million NEW members since December, on pace to break a million by March.)  And the disconnect from every single reliable study that proves more guns make for less crime is typical for a leftist such as he.

Four years ago, we would have doubted anyone was ignorant enough to think they could somehow confiscate 300 million weapons in the hands of the citizenry.  Since four weeks ago, another 50 million or so weapons have been purchased and ammo is scarcer than we've ever seen.  While we aren't members/supporters of any militia groups or "end-of-days" type survivalists, being the police it only makes sense to pay attention to what is going on right now.  If the tiny brains surfing around here think that's crazy, then we'll take crazy any day of the week.

Double-Talk and Hypocrisy

You own a scary black semi-automatic rifle - assault weapon.

The government has a fully automatic scary black rifle - "personal defense weapon:"

• The Department of Homeland Security is seeking to acquire 7,000 5.56x45mm NATO “personal defense weapons” (PDW) — also known as “assault weapons” when owned by civilians. The solicitation, originally posted on June 7, 2012, comes to light as the Obama administration is calling for a ban on semi-automatic rifles and high capacity magazines.
  
  Citing a General Service Administration (GSA) request for proposal (RFP), Steve McGough of RadioViceOnline.com reports that DHS is asking for the 7,000 “select-fire” firearms because they are “suitable for personal defense use in close quarters.” The term select-fire means the weapon can be both semi-automatic and automatic. Civilians are prohibited from obtaining these kinds of weapons.
  
  The RFP describes the firearm as “Personal Defense Weapon (PDW) – 5.56x45mm NATO, select-fire firearm suitable for personal defense use in close quarters and/or when maximum concealment is required.” Additionally, DHS is asking for 30 round magazines that “have a capacity to hold thirty (30) 5.56x45mm NATO rounds.”

What a crock.

No wonder actions like these are starting to receive more than a little bit of notice:

• After Democrats in New York rammed a sweeping assault on the right to keep and bear arms through the legislature that failed to exempt police officers from the draconian restrictions, gun owners and even some lawmakers are planning what has been dubbed potentially the largest act of civil disobedience in state history. According to news reports, gun rights activists are urging everyone to defy far-left Governor Andrew Cuomo’s new registration mandate while daring authorities to “come and take it.”
  
  Analysts say the legislation, passed in a frenzy last week in the wake of the Newtown shooting, represents the most brazen infringement on the right to keep and bear arms anywhere in the nation. Among other points, the so-called SAFE Act seeks to limit magazines to just seven bullets, require virtually all of the estimated one million semi-automatic rifles in the state to be registered with authorities, mandate reporting of patients who express indications that they may have thoughts about hurting themselves or others by doctors, and more.
  
  Aside from being unconstitutional, experts on gun violence also point out that the draconian schemes are a bad idea: Studies have repeatedly shown that more guns lead to less crime, and the phenomenon is obvious across America — just compare Chicago or D.C. to Alaska or Wyoming. The mandated reporting requirements for doctors, meanwhile, have come under fire from across the political spectrum. Whether it will even be possible to enforce the bill, however, remains to be seen.

Even private gun clubs that used to work hand-in-hand with small police departments are drawing the line in the sand:

• A rural Vermont firing range has told the police department in Burlington that its officers are unwelcome to train at the facility because the City Council has advanced a measure to ban semi-automatic rifles and large-capacity magazines in the state's largest city.
  
  The City Council's action earlier this month threatens constitutional freedoms, Robert Boivin II, board chairman of the Lamoille Valley Fish and Game Club Inc., wrote in a letter to police department, city and state leaders terminating use of the gun range by Burlington police.

None of this bodes well for the country.

"Quiet Please!" --- KA-BOOM!

We couldn't make this stuff up:

• Bleeding from a gunshot wound to his side, prosecutors said Ronald Peters crawled to the street outside his South Side home on Friday and put his hands in the air.
  
  Larry Peters then raised a 12-gauge shotgun and shot his brother a second time, a witness told police.
  
  Ronald Peters, 50, died a short time later. His older brother is being held without bail on a first-degree murder charge. Prosecutors say the dispute started when Ronald Peters asked his brother to be quiet.
  
  Larry Peters, 63, was arrested about five minutes after the 3 p.m. shooting as police responded to the scene in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood.
  

Ask your brother to be quiet, get shot twice with a shotgun for your trouble.

Culture of death indeed.

Anyone want to tell us how a Contact Card would have prevented this?

Another Fire Rescue - by CPD

Of course, who else is out at 03:00 AM?

• Two police officers working in the Far South Side Roseland neighborhood overnight just may have saved the half-dozen residents of the building from serious injury by waking them up to alert them to a fire in the building then escorting them safely outside.
  
  At approximately 2:55 a.m., Calumet District officers Brian Rix and Jason Toliver were on routine patrol in the 200 block of West 109th St. when they observed smoke, then flames, coming from a second floor window of a building, a release from police News Affairs said.
  
  The officers quickly get into the home through a front door, and were able to awaken all the occupants. The officers then safely escorted five adults and a young child from the burning building as fire department personnel and assisting units arrived on the scene, the release said.

Well done Officers.

That Was Bad Timing

We missed this, but our sharp-eyed readers didn't:

• Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy joined forces with Sen. Dick Durbin on Friday to say he’s “positive” implementing gun trafficking legislation and an assault weapons ban in Chicago will get the city’s murder rate down.

Even though there was only a single murder committed last year with a so-called "assault weapon." But that wasn't the funny part:

• McCarthy said he believes new gun legislation will decrease the city’s murder rate, which he said was down 28 percent in January, and down 16 percent in the last few months of 2012.

"...down 28% in January..."

That was before 7 died in shootings across the city.

Well played karma.....well played.

Massive Fail

Once is happenstance,
Twice is coincidence,
Three times is enemy action.
-- Auric Goldfinger (Author Ian Fleming)


Four times is a failure of parenting.
-- SCC

In other words, you managed to raise a family of assholes:

• A man slain on the West Side early this morning had two brothers and a sister who also were fatally gunned down in the city, according to a close family friend.
  
  "He was the last one," said Laverne Smith, 30, who said his mother no longer has any children. "I know she's hurting."
  
  Smith said it's unthinkable this could have happened again to the family.

Really? We can name any number of west and south side "families" that have at least that many family members planted in local cemeteries because of poor lifestyle choices. How much did this family managed to drain from taxpayer funds during their short, brutish run on earth?

• "Nothing that anyone can say can make me feel better," said Smith, who said Chambers was on the Ricki Lake show last month and was trying to help an aspiring rapper, YK.
  
  On the Ricki Lake show, Chambers identified himself as former gang member who turned his life around and was trying to help others stay away from that kind of life.

Not only had he just turned his life around, he was helping others to turn their lives around! A humanitarian! Looks like Rahm ought to ban rap music, too.

• The shooting happened across the street from Safer Foundation North Lawndale, an Illinois Department of Corrections transitional facility for adults with criminal records, and half a block west of a fire station.

Better and better - a halfway house full of people with criminal records AND A firehouse nearby. Better ban both of those, too.

A Double Double

And another one makes five homicides in under 24 hours?

• Five people have been killed and another five wounded in weekend gun violence in Chicago — including two separate double-homicide shootings that occurred about 12 hours apart.
  
  The latest shooting was a double-homicide on the West Side around 4 p.m. Saturday. Officers, called to the 4200 block of West Congress Parkway in West Garfield Park, found a teenage boy and a man in his 30s dead in the street with bullet wounds to the head.
  
  Earlier, two men were killed and another was wounded when a masked gunman walked up to them outside a Bridgeport neighborhood hamburger stand early Saturday and unleashed a barrage of bullets. The shooting outside Kevin’s Hamburger Heaven, in the 500 block of West Pershing Road, was the second time in four months that someone has been killed outside an all-night restaurant in Bridgeport.

Sounds like someone needs to ban all-night restaurants.

• Earlier Saturday, a man was fatally shot and another was wounded while sitting in a vehicle on the West Side. It happened around 2:15 a.m. Saturday in the 1100 block of South Mozart Street in Lawndale. Ronnie Chambers, 34, was shot in the head and died at the scene, according to police and the medical examiner’s office.

So three in 011 and two in 009? That puts us right around 36 or 37 for the year. We aren't sure if you have to add in the one on the highway that the State is handling and the other one on the college campus that the State may have pulled a number for. We might be over 40 depending on how it's all added up.

Well Done New York!

Maybe we could learn something from New York? Maybe hire an expert or something from the Big Apple? What's that? McWho? No, no....we distinctly said "expert."

• They must have frostbite on their trigger fingers.
  
  The deep freeze that has New Yorkers shivering in their boots has been a crime-fighting blessing for the NYPD — and as of midnight had given the city a nine-day streak without a murder, law-enforcement sources told The Post.
  
  "Jack Frost is the policeman’s best friend," said a source. "The criminals are staying indoors."

Well that can't be. We've been told that weather has "no effect" on killings. In fact, we've been told weather has nothing to do with it many times, while in the next breath, that same person blames last year's spike on an "overly warm March."

We're so confused!

Privatization

We actually saw Rahm drooling after this came down:

• The homeowners associations responsible for managing subdivisions across the state have the power to enforce their own traffic rules through a private security force, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled Friday, overturning a lower-court ruling that found they could be unlawful.
  
  Former DuPage County prosecutor Ken Poris sued LaSalle County's Lake Holiday Property Owners Association after he was pulled over for speeding in 2008 by a vehicle with flashing lights.
  
  A uniformed officer wearing a badge and duty belt took his driver's license and Lake Holiday membership card back to his squad car and wrote him a $50 speeding ticket. The man wasn't a police officer but a homeowners association employee with little police training and no state certification.
  
  Last year, an appeals court found that the association could not stop and detain drivers for violating homeowners association rules. The court found that Lake Holiday could be found liable for Poris' false imprisonment claim and that the association's use of amber-colored flashing lights on its squad cars was unlawful.
  
  But the Illinois Supreme Court on Friday reversed each of those findings, ruling that Lake Holiday was allowed to enforce its bylaws against residents and that courts "generally do not interfere with the internal affairs of a voluntary association."

We imagine Rahm would have to surrender control of city streets and allow fenced-in communities to pop up all over the place, but that would eliminate street repairs, garbage pick-up, a whole slew of union and City Hall jobs.

Of source, gated communities would have to have their own neighborhood watches and we all know what that leads to - Trayvon Martin versus George Zimmerman.

Thanks Quinn!

And Blago.  And Ryan.  And Madigan, Daley, etc. etc.

• Illinois fell to the bottom of all 50 states in the rankings of a major credit ratings agency Friday following the failure of Gov. Pat Quinn and lawmakers to fix the state’s hemorrhaging pension system during this month’s lame-duck session.
  
  Standard and Poor’s Ratings Service downgraded Illinois in what is the latest fallout over the $96.8 billion debt to five state pension systems. The New York rating firm’s ranking signaled taxpayers may pay tens of millions of dollars more in interest when the state borrows money for roads and other projects.
  
  “It’s absolutely bad news for taxpayers,” said Dan Rutherford, the Republican state treasurer. Illinois received its bottom-of-the-pack ranking when it fell from an “A” rating to “A-minus.”
  
  That’s the same rating as California, but California has a positive outlook. Illinois’ fragile overall financial status netted it a negative outlook, putting it behind California overall. The ratings came out now because Illinois plans to issue $500 million in bonds within days.

"Death Spiral" is an apt term.

When Seconds Count...

...the police are just minutes away.  So prepare yourself:

• A Wisconsin sheriff says he released an ad calling on residents to defend themselves because the old model of having a citizen call 911 and wait for help isn't always the best option.
  
  In the ad, Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke Jr. tells residents that when it comes to personal safety: "I need you in the game." He urges citizens to learn to use firearms so they can "fight back" until authorities arrive.
  
  The ad has drawn sharp criticism from other area officials. The president of the Milwaukee Deputy Sheriffs' Association, Roy Felber, says it sounds like a call to vigilantism.
  
  But Clarke says he can either whine about budget cuts that have reduced the number of deputies or call on citizens to work with officers in some situations.

Someone who actually gets it and understands what has to be done.

Fake ID Murder Trial

Unfortunately, Aldercreature Munoz wasn't indicted as part of this:

• Six years after heavily armed federal agents stormed the 26th Street Discount Mall and seized ID-making equipment, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Nasser told jurors that grisly wiretaps, video footage and insider accounts will show how the Leija-Sanchez crew used violence and paid the Latin Kings to protect its turf for two decades.
  
  Julio Leija-Sanchez and his brother Manuel deny charges of running the U.S. and Mexican branches of the business, respectively, while Salazar-Rodriguez denies he was the enforcer who murdered Montes.
  
  But tens of thousands of fake drivers licenses, green cards and social security cards were sold at $200 a pop to immigrants out of the parking lot in front of a photo store run by Ald. Ricardo Munoz’s father, Elias, Nasser said. Illegal workers were smuggled across the border, then forced to join the business to pay off their debt, she said.

Of course, no one mentions the aldercreature's mother who was arrested with a stack of fake ID's back in the 1990's and released after phone calls from Ricardo.  And the Tribune seems to forget that they did an entire series about how the latin kings were pulling in $30,000 a month in protection money from the "mica men" back in the 1990's.  Or how the building at 26th and St. Louis burned to the ground one night - a building that housed the other Photo Estudio Munoz.  Or the little matter of a teenaged Munoz holding weapons for a certain gang making $30,000 per month in protection money.

That isn't talked about in polite company.

What's This?

Unit 026 - Executive Officers Unit?

What the heck is that?

Another School Sees the Light

The simplest solutions are usually the best ones:

• FONTANA, Calif. – The school police force in this Southern California city has acquired 14 high-powered semiautomatic rifles for officers to bring to campuses.
  
  Fontana Unified School District police purchased 14 of the Colt LE6940 rifles last fall, and they were delivered the first week of December, a week before a gunman killed 26 students and educators at a Connecticut elementary school.
  
  "I think it just further solidified the need to give our officers the tools they need to respond to an active shooter on campus," schools Police Chief Billy Green said Wednesday about the tragedy.

Question - in light of the massive upswing in school shootings (there isn't one, but the media wants you to think there is) by assailants wielding fully automatic "assault rifles" (which also isn't happening, but the left wants to frighten the sheeple), why isn't the murder capital of the United States holding training drills with SWAT, District personnel and school officials?

Won't somebody think of the children? Or is this just a political game?

HQ Loses Power

Someone want to explain why HQ keeps experiencing brown-outs and full power outages? Besides the substandard construction and crappy electrical wiring we mean.

Actually, don't. It's probably better for everyone if the building burns to the ground.

Lifetime Membership

We get e-mails:

• Just letting you know that NRA is running special for $300 lifetime membership currently and we need all the help we can get. I cant think of a reason any real cop would not support the NRA.
  
  Membership number is 888 678-7894. I just upgraded hopefully lots more will do the same if you could post the phone number. They love when you tell them you are a Chicago cop too!!!

Join today.

Clearing the Deadwood - Again?

Didn't they already do this?  Like three times?

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel vowed Wednesday to follow Inspector General Joe Ferguson’s recipe to save up to $16.6 million a year and put another 292 police officers on the street — by shifting sworn officers from desk jobs to street duty.
  
  After a “complete review of police assignments,” Emanuel said Police Supt. Garry McCarthy has already reassigned “560 to 580” officers who were previously doing clerical and administrative jobs to patrol Chicago neighborhoods.
  
  If Ferguson has identified even more police officers “pushing paper,” as Emanuel put it, the mayor said he would relish the opportunity to return those officers to street duty as well, so long as the police union contract does not prevent it.
  

All we know is we had to go to HQ the other week and there wasn't a parking spot to be found. And while we understand there are certain functions that have to be carried out by sworn police officers as required by state law (backgrounds, criminal histories, etc.) it sure seems that certain exempts are flouting McNitwit's edicts concerning numbers of office staff required.

Big Fire, Cool Pictures

Massive fire on the south side leads to cool aftermath during freezing weather:

More pictures here.

Article on the fire here.

And something to warm you up after looking at all the ice pictures:

 

Robber Stabs Accomplice

Hilarious:

• Police said a robbery Wednesday morning went sour for two attackers inside a Blue Line car when one of them tried to stab their 70-year-old victim and knifed his accomplice instead.
  
  All three men boarded the train at the Kedzie Station on the West Side, police said. The two attackers approached the victim on the O'Hare-bound train as it approached the LaSalle Station downtown about 12:30 a.m., police said.
  
  One of the men accused the victim of taking his cellphone, and when the victim began to walk away, the men pushed him to the ground, police said.
  
  When the victim tried to fight back, one of the attackers kicked him in the face, police said. One of the men then cut the victim's pants and took his wallet, police said. That man then attempted to stab the victim with a knife and accidentally cut his partner, a 24-year-old male, said police.

The only thing that may have made this better was if the 70-year-old had a gun to defend himself. As it was though, this was the second best outcome.

Premiums to Triple?

As everyone with a brain (which means the right side of the political spectrum) predicted, you can't get something for nothing:

• A California insurance broker, who sells health plans to individuals and small businesses, told me that she’s prepping her clients for a sticker shock. Her local carriers are hinting to her that premiums may triple this fall, when the plans unveil how they’ll billet the full brunt of Obamacare’s new regulations and mandates.
  
  California is hardly alone. Around the country, insurers are fixing to raise rates by double digits. They’re privately briefing politicians in Washington on what’s in store. Those briefings are leaving a lot of folks up and down Pennsylvania Avenue jumpy.
  
  What’s gives? President Obama, after all, said he’d prevent these sorts of prices. His new health law gave state regulators the power to block premium increases. It even created a federal agency to oversee insurance rates. But these bureaucrats are spectators to the price hikes. They’re mere wallflowers. Even in the bluest of states.
  
  Their silence is the best evidence of who is culpable for the increases. It’s the policymakers. It’s Obamacare. The President is accepting the premium hikes as an allowable consequence of his healthcare policies.

Pelosi told everyone that Congress had to pass the law to find out what's in it, because so many pages were blank and entire sections of the law were as yet, unwritten.  Now that the blanks are being filled, economic realities are setting in and the national debt, already increasing at an unsustainable $1.1 trillion per year, will really take off starting in 2014, by some counts at over $20 trillion in the first four years.

This, of course, will lead to price controls, triggering a massive economic slowdown, and end in the rationing of health care for certain "unaffordable" procedures.  And who will make these decisions for you?  Groups of bean-counters, crudely labeled as "death panels" by right wing politicians, but death panels all the same if they deny grandma treatment based on "need."

CompStat 2013

This was a long time coming:

Bad Idea? Or Badly Executed?

Getting some interest in this topic:

• Why didn't all these gold stars say anything the last two years while the dept got totally turned upside down?
  
  How could anyone in charge possibly let the dept get rid of captains and think this whole DSS thing is a good idea. Maybe if they promoted a bunch of luitenants and always have a LT there it wouldn't be a total cluster, but having sgts running a watch is just insanity.
  
  Now there's in fighting between sgts and LTs as to who's in charge and who's running things. The sgt runs things dif then the LT when LT is off so the LT bitch at sgts but truth is the sgt is in charge when LT is Rdo so he can't say shit. Sgt needs to run It the way he deems fit. See how fast this goes south?

And someone else:

• I was working special the other day and we were talking about the same thing, Sgt.s as DSS and Lt.'s not liking what the Sgt.s do and then throw in the XO.....then I was told by a copper that there is supposedly a new rank/position for XO's called the "Operations Officer for District Law Enforcement", they got one in a north side district, supposedly they had a Capt. as the XO but now this XO is the District Operatons Officer which sounded like a replacement for the DC since I was told that this position covers everything a DC is supposed to do......What you hear SCC? 

We've had sergeants acting as DSS's for over a year now.  Is this experiment a success or a failure?  It seems obvious that captains are to be phased out (again), and lieutenants are being made less prominent in the chain-of-command.  

We're of the opinion that the command structure is failing badly.

(Yes, we saw the OODLE abbreviation.  Sarcasm and Silliiess, remember?)

New Strategy

Almost unbelievable:

• SCC,
  
  Long time fan here. In 011, we have around 48 marked cars assigned to the watch. This morning, we are currently down 21 cars with no pools available citywide.
  
  Evidently, this is another crime fighting strategy by the Department. There is no crime if you can't respond to it.

We guess all the pointing out that Fleet is in disarray over the past few years has finally come home to roost.  No word if 011 District cars are going out manned three and four deep yet.  It can't be far off though, unless they're going back to foot patrols.

Marine Unit Rescues Dog!

Picking up where they left off in 2012, the Marine Unit sets a brisk pace for 2013:

• A stray dog apparently hankering for a Canada goose for breakfast found himself on thin ice in the middle of Jackson Harbor Tuesday.
  
  "The dog was sitting kind of nice and peaceful but he was far out," said Marine Unit Police Officer Nial Funchion, who helped get the pooch to safety. "I was amazed he was lasting so long. . .He was out there for hours."
  
  The dog, a 1-year-old shepherd mix, was about 300 yards out into the harbor when he caught the eye of someone on shore around 7:30 a.m., police said. A team from the Chicago Police Marine Unit arrived in minutes, soon joined by media trucks and helicopters.

The dog was eventually tranquilized and rescued

Hey, you take the good news where you can find it.

What's Happening in 006?

A lot of complaints popping up:

• I work in 006 district and have a few questions. I have called FOP and they have been complete useless to talk to. I was hoping you could shed some light for me and the fellow sixers.
  
  Since the start of the first period this year, they have stripped everybody of their partners. Officers who were in the same day off group and worked everyday together were told we couldn't do this anymore. We were told to find a third partner. If we didn't find the third to our liking, they will assign one to you. Exact words from out midnight LT M.S. "quit acting like babies, if you don't like who I assign to you, who cares, you all be happy you have a J.O.B!" So basically I had to leave my partner I worked with everyday for the past 3 years.
  
  They have also told us no more time due! According to our bosses this is a city wide order (have yet to see an order on it). They said 006 is only allowed 6 people per night to let take off. This includes people on medical, furlough extensions and even supervisors. Since 006 usually has at least 5-10 officers on medical each day, us officers are screwed. Also a sgt can bump us on the time due list at any time. Which is outrageous. I've already been denied 3 days in February. All personal days too I might add.
  
  Now last night at midnight roll call, LT M.S. stated that per the DC that we need to come in with 10 contact cards per night. How can they force us to do that? Especially expect us to do work for them after they completely throw us under the bus.
  
  I guess since 006 led the city in homicide's is the reasoning for all these changes (according to our sgts). But morale is at an all time low here in 006 and looks like it is going to keep plunging downward. Is there anything we blue shirts can do? Or are we completely screwed? I hope you have a little time to reply back to me and give me some insight, I would love to hear your take on our situation. 

These complaints aren't unique to 006, unfortunately.   Desperation to keep a gold star spot is driving already fragile egos over the edge.  And 006 isn't the only place - on north side:

• SCC, in a northside district on 1st watch the XO is sending her sgt emails complaining about activity. She has the DSS pulling midnight cars in one by one and telling them they must write 3 contact cards, 5 Parker's and a mover everyday or else. In fact the cool aid drinking sgt are supporting the XO and also warning the troops about what will happen if they bring in no activity. When did quotas return?

That would be Henny Bad Penny Trahanas popping up on the radar again. And on the west side:

• 011 Dist 2nd watch Lt has his own plan of attack!
  
  With the start of the 1st period LT JA has decided to "Shake the Tree" and shuffle just about everyone's start time and cars.
  
  He Routinely calls in officers and has a "closed door" meeting (berating and beheading) with them and THREATENS them with taking them off thier car or constantly chanigng their start time and/or constatnly shuffling them from one sector to another.
  
  He even told one officer that "all you are qualified to do is drive a garbage truck"!
  
  He has even taken it upon himself to reinstate to position of "Desk Sergeant" as he is far to busy with personal issues to do the job he is paid for.
  
  If he beleives that by threatening officers, verbally abusing them with profanity and derogatory comments that he will get any of us to produce more contact cards and anovs, then he can beleive that. But, in reality it has having the reverse effect.

This is the lieutenant who supposedly told "truth to power" with his blogging about J-Fled and according to numerous e-mails, spent a year telling all his roll calls to go out and "give the city their 1%" after the last contract.  Now he's drinking the CompStat koolaid.

Desperation for numbers leads to crap like this:

• I have family on the job,and just a question, aunt and I flew in to Midway airport, aunt has heart condition felt pressure,they called the Chicago fire dept,we land the fire dept was top notch, checked everything then another guy with a department of aviation police patch took aunts drivers license, and wrote a report then a Chicago police officer came took drives license and made a contact card! Are these contact cards held in a data base for criminal checks? Why if someone gets sick does the fire department,the aviation police and Chicago police make reports? I hope my elderly aunt is not penalized for being sick! 

A contact card on an ambulance run?  Have the Midway people lost their minds?  Or is this an aftereffect of having to work for Mrs. Ric Flair for so long? 

Just when you think it can't get any goofier, it does. Can anyone spell "quotas?"  And can anyone tell the class what quotas lead to?

Good Point

Following all this to its logical conclusion:

• Attend any of these compost meetings and you will routinely hear two contradictions. First is "We need to be doing things smarter/The compstat process is all about intelligent policing/It's about having the right people at the right time in the right places for the right reasons/It's QUALITY instead of quantity" followed almost immediately with "Let's look at your numbers: ANOVS are down. Contact cards are down. Arrests are down. Now is the time to get rid of your people who are 'underperforming'; get rid of them now and replace them."
  
  So, which is it you ask? Is it 'quality over quantity' or is it 'go out and get MORE activity across the board or dump people'? Why it's both! 

 McStreetlightAssassin seems to be a series of contradictions, doesn't he?

Good Job Tribune

Anyone else remember when the Tribune used to be the voice of Midwest Republicans?  Now you have shit like this in the paper:

Newspapers are supposedly the place to get accurate information, multiple layers of fact checking and all that.  But as they've sold their souls and embraced the role as mouthpieces for the left, you get all sorts of inaccurate propaganda that passes for educated discourse among the uninformed and ignorant.

Don't Do This

You are begging for a Rule 14 and termination:

• Last week several Beat officers were called into the Commanders Office about the percentage of contact cards written off their Beats. The Officers stated that these contact cards stemmed from jobs that they were given by dispatch off their respective beats and that by G.O. a contact card was required. Her response was for the officers to put their names in the narrative and put the regular Beat Officers in the appropriate box so as to show that they were written by the adtual beat Officer.

No idea what district this is, but we have reason to suspect 015.

How Big Was This Cover-Up?

Of course, the Sun Times publishes this on a national holiday when probably over 75% of readers are staying home and won't buy a newsstand copy. Why wasn't this published on a Sunday?:

• For the 22 years he was mayor, Richard M. Daley relied upon a select group of police officers to ensure his safety and that of his family.
  The security detail was more than a palace guard. Its members routinely traveled with Daley and his family. They drove his kids to school. They ran errands for the family.
  
  Now, members of the police detail that served Daley are being questioned by Dan K. Webb, the special prosecutor appointed by a judge last year to reinvestigate the 2004 death of David Koschman.
  
  
• Webb continues to look into why police and prosecutors from the Cook County state’s attorney’s office didn’t charge Vanecko.
  
  Webb’s team has questioned retired police Cmdr. Sam Roti, who became the detail’s commander in 2004, about two months after Koschman’s death.
  
  Roti replaced James Keating, a retired police officer who is now head of security for the Chicago Transit Authority.
  
  Keating and Roti both grew up in Bridgeport, the former mayor’s old neighborhood. Each joined the detail on April 25, 1989 — the day after Daley was first sworn in as mayor.

The article also outlines how the Security Detail was the first call Grand Beach Michigan police made when Patrick and Vanecko threatened some Filipino kids with a shotgun and one of "Patrick's friends" beat another kid into a coma with a baseball bat. Funny how no one in the press wondered why anti-gunner Daley had a shotgun stored out-of-state.

Fran also does a good job describing the incestuous relationships between Daley's detail, off-duty security businesses, and future high-paying government jobs certain members of that detail had at various points in time. She only touches on the extent of the Palace Guards' duties though, missing how they were glorified go-fers for Maggie's dry cleaning, cheap day labor and errand boys, and free chauffeurs for Daley, Daley's kids and Daley's grandchildren. Politically reliable suckholes.

It has been speculated here and other places that members of the Detail were present during the Koschman/Vanecko altercation. It's possible we might actually find out.

Retired Lt. Shoots Burglars

Ed still has it:

• The retired Chicago Police officer who defended his Pottawattomie Park home from two burglars spoke out Wednesday to thank the Michigan City Police officers for their professional response and to talk about the aftermath of the shooting incident.
  
  Edward Flynn, who lives in the 100 block of Pontiac Street, said he and his girlfriend were returning home in separate cars from Al’s Supermarket at about 8 p.m. Friday when his girlfriend entered the home through the front door and immediately left, saying there was someone inside the home.
  
  
• According to the police reports, Flynn shot the suspects with a .38 special revolver as the two suspects advanced towards him while he was pointing a firearm at them inside the home.
  
  Flynn said the two were coming out of a dark area and “I wanted them to cooperate with my instructions, but they didn’t.”

Somehow, the lamestream media isn't covering how having a gun protected two people. Hmmmm.

Very well done Lieutenant. We hope retirement is still treating you well.

Three Out of Four Isn't Bad

Quick work by a responding sergeant:

• A quick response by a sergeant early today led to the arrest of three men accused of robbing a man as he was hailing a cab in the Lakeview neighborhood on the North Side, police said.
  
  A fourth suspect managed to escape after fighting with the responding sergeant, who was left with cuts and bruises but declined hospital treatment.
  
  
• The three and an unidentified accomplice approached a man and began hitting him until he fell to the ground at about 12:45 a.m. as the victim was trying to hail a cab on Sheffield Avenue near Belmont Avenue, the release stated.
  
  One of the suspects then reached into the victim’s pocket and removed a cell phone and other property, but they fled when confronted by a bystander, according to the release.
  
  A Belmont District police sergeant searched the area and found the four suspects a short distance away from where the robbery occurred.

Belmont District? Isn't that the old 019? The "closed" 019?

Nice job sarge and heal up quick.

Cold and Bloody Weekend

Shootings haven't stopped:

• Weekend gun violence in Chicago left two men dead and at least 14 other people wounded, including a man shot during a party in the Loop’s historic Palmer House Hilton Hotel.
  

A shooting inside the Palmer House? That's going to do wonders for the tourism trade.

And then a horrific homicide that falls under the radar in the face of commonplace shootings:

• The death of a 2-year-old South Side girl has been ruled a homicide, after she suffered multiple injuries from a beating, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office.
  
  The state Department of Children and Family Services is investigating allegations of neglect in the death Layla Stewart.
  
  Layla, of the 2000 block of West 69th Place was pronounced dead at Holy Cross Hospital at 2:12 a.m. on Sunday, according to the medical examiner’s office.

We think we passed the 2012 January homicide count already this year. And another month of no accountability for McCompStat and his failures, although he demands "accountability" from everyone else.

Gold Stars Growing Testicles?

Too little, too late:

• SCC, we realize that you're geared towards the perspective of the PO, but hopefully you're paying attention to the mutinous rumblings from the command staff. First, the deputy chiefs trying to explain why no watch commander is a bad idea - and getting rebuked by McMoron and his bitch Miniotis, then Walter Green's pretty accurate description of the "gold star mentality", to now Dave Jarmusz getting dumped because he called out McCarthy on his ineptitude.
  
  Is someone counting strawberries at 35th St? More importantly, is someone at City Hall gauging the feelings of the bosses at the police department?

While a parting shot on your way out the door feels good, too bad more weren't doing this before morale cratered and the Department we knew died.

What Are They Smoking?

Two interesting comments:

•  I think this may answer many of the questions we have concerning the direction McStreetlightassassin is taking our department. I heard this from a friend who works in 18. I got the real short version, but maybe someone has the full story. A midnight burglary car assigned to Michigan Av responds to a call of tagging on Michigan Av about a week ago. Catches the offender. Recovers the paint can. Gets felony approval for criminal damage to property. Instead of an Honorable, McStreetlightassassin wants him SPAR'd for not "preventing" the crime. If that's the case, I would expect the Supe to eat a bullet once homicides hit 100 as an acknowledgment that his gang strategy is a failure. By the way, I recognize the irony of McStreetlighassassin and "Honorable" in the same sentence.
  
  
• For all the troops out there, Compstat Commandant said he wants ANOV's to "be through the roof" by March. You will all be the lucky viewers of a new training video on the subject.
  
  And he wants the ANOV's written for pissers, gamblers, and DOPW, so when the fines aren't paid you can lock up people the next time you see them. Is this guy delusional or what?
  
  He said if the members of the tac teams aren't getting the job done then they need to be replaced.
  
  He also wants contact cards to "be through the roof" by March, and you better be out of your cars and "hands on". 3 contact cards a day is UNACCEPTABLE!
  
  According to McDumbo, Jan/Feb/March are when "we" should be "setting the standards" for later in the year.
  
  Heard it straight from the horse's ass at Compstat on Thursday. I think he actually believes the shit he's trying to peddle. Treat the blue shirts like dogs and yet expect them to produce these huge numbers for him. What incentives has he given? None.
  
  Good luck with that. I wouldn't write another ANOV ever. Or contact card. Hand in 10 blank contact cards with 'REFUSED' on them.

Anyone want to let us know if there's a grain of truth to rumor #1.  Rumor #2 sounds exactly like a few stories we heard Friday.

Gun Map Taken Down

Someone finally realized that the liability factor was becoming real:

• A suburban New York newspaper that outraged gun owners by posting the names and addresses of residents with handgun permits removed the information from its website Friday.
  
  The Journal News took down the data just three days after the state enacted a gun control law that included privacy provisions for permit holders.

And guess what else? The momentum is shifting:

• Nearly twice as many voters say there would be less violent crime if more law-abiding Americans owned guns, than if guns were banned.
  
  In addition, while American voters generally favor strengthening gun laws, 71 percent do not think tougher laws can stop shootings like the one last month in Newtown, Connecticut. Some 22 percent say new laws can prevent the next Sandy Hook.

Overreach by the left is leading to a realization that blaming everyone and everything except the criminal committing the crime is a bad idea.

Hockey Time

Can't help it. 

We've been waiting a long time for this season to start. 

We'll be gone all afternoon.

Discipline Revamp?

Where to even begin with this:

• In the wake of the City Council’s approval of almost $33 million to settle two police misconduct cases, city officials on Friday announced an outside review of the disciplinary process for cops.
  
  Police Supt. Garry McCarthy and Corporation Counsel Stephen Patton said experts will look into what’s being done to prevent police misconduct, how it’s reported and how it’s investigated. Mayor Rahm Emanuel called for the review several months ago, they said.
  
  A.T. Kearney, a management consultant firm, will conduct the review for free, Patton said. Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Ron Safer, who is with the law firm Schiff Hardin, will focus on the legal issues surrounding police discipline.
  
  Last week, the City Council approved a $10.25 million settlement for a wrongfully imprisoned man and $22.5 million for a mentally ill woman who was attacked and left severely disabled after police released her in a high-crime area.
  
  And in November, a federal jury said the city should pay a female bartender $850,000 for the beating she suffered from off-duty Chicago Police Officer Anthony Abbate.
  
  The jury found a “code of silence” in the department protects rogue officers like Abbate. Future lawsuits against the city could cite the verdict as evidence of a “pattern and practice” of police misconduct, legal experts say.

As covered here and elsewhere, the supposed "code of silence" protects only the politically connected. We've covered dozens of cases and everyone has a dozen more where bosses and the favored few have cases swept under the rug until someone somehow reveals where the bodies are actually buried and then the city wrings its hands a wonders how this could have happened. Abbate is just the best known because there was video.

The multi-million dollar payouts are a direct result of Shortshanks's desire to settle everything so lawyers and law firms got rich. J-Fled, for all his faults and cowardice, proved that if Corp Counsel actually fought a large percentage of these suits, they won and saved the city money as a result. Rahm, in his wisdom, discontinued this practice, in part because outside firms he didn't control, got paid. And guess where we're headed again? Paying out massive lump sums.

But any current exempt member who is part of this disciplinary restructuring ought to be asked about what they've helped cover up in the not so distant past.

Idiots

This is what happens when lawmakers pass laws in the middle of night after deliberately disobeying safeguards in place (72 hours for debate) in some desperate attempt to be seen as "doing something" instead of actually "doing something correctly:"

• A troubling oversight has been found within New York State's sweeping new gun laws.
  
  The ban on having high-capacity magazines, as it's written, would also include law enforcement officers.
  
  Magazines with more than seven rounds will be illegal under the new law when that part takes effect in March.
  
  As the statute is currently written, it does not exempt law enforcement officers.

That's kind of a big "oops" as it essentially makes all LEO's guilty of misdemeanors and if left in place, makes every officer in New York state "undergunned" to the criminals who, by the way, won't be turning in their 10, 12, 15 or 19 round magazines.

Supposedly, a fix is on the way, but it's crap like this that makes it obvious left and Right will never see any room to compromise on gun issues.

Ban Basketball!

A shooting following a basketball game between Morgan Park and Simeon results in one death. Reading about the incident. one has to wonder why these schools are allowed to meet at all:

• The university released a statement Thursday morning saying it was "deeply saddened by the tragic shooting death."
  
  “(Chicago Public Schools) periodically uses the university’s athletic facility to provide a neutral setting for student sporting events. This is the first such incident to occur on the campus of Chicago State University where CPS students have played many times over the last three years," the statement said.
  
  "Additional security is provided by the university and all external partners during high school sporting events. Arrests have been made and university officials are awaiting the outcome of a full investigation to learn details about the shooting incident.”

"Neutral setting?" So this wasn't unexpected it would seem.

And then we get this comment:

• Per news reports: There were over 40 security personnel at the Simeon basketball game, including on-duty CPD and ISP. For one basketball game? Really? My kids play basketball and there is 0 security at their games and no one has ever gotten shot?

Forty security guards? For a basketball game? Sorry, at this point, the risks and costs outweigh any benefit of actually having a "game." And you know that taxpayers are on the hook for all those costs. Hopefully, not for any creative wrongful death lawsuits though.

Gun Map Strikes Again

You may recall the "gun map" published a week or two ago showing the locations of pistol permit holders in a three country area in New York. A few days ago, a house on the list was broken into, the burglars found the gun safe in the home and attempted to make off with it. Nothing else was disturbed. Suspicion is that the map assisted the criminals in choosing their target.

Now, a second incident has resulted in a successful theft of weapons and accompanying permits:

• Two handguns and two pistol permits were stolen from the New City home of a man whose name and address are listed on the website of a local newspaper as possessing gun permits, police said. The thieves ransacked the house Wednesday night, breaking into two safes on the home's third floor and stealing a third safe. The guns were in the stolen safe, police said.
  
  Clarkstown police said they had no evidence the burglary was connected to the controversial map.
  
  "The burglary is still under investigation and there are no facts to support this correlation at this time," Clarkstown Sgt. Joanne Fratianni said in a statement. "If the investigation develops further information, it will be released accordingly."
  
  [...] "At this early point in the investigation, we believe it is a random crime and the home was not targeted," Clarkstown Det. Lt. Charles Delo told News12.

We though Chicago had some pretty heavy denial issues, but that is some bad "head-in-the-sand" thinking right there.

Another Brilliant F@#$ing Idea

Where do they find these people to elect?

• A South Side alderman is asking for City Council hearings on an unorthodox gun control measure that would allow for GPS tracking of firearms.
  
  WBBM [...] reports Ald. Willie Cochran (20th), a former police officer, has suggested that global positioning system chips be embedded in new guns, and retrofitted on existing firearms, so they could be located if they go missing.
  
  “Just like if your car gets stolen, OnStar can tell you where your car is. If your gun gets stolen, and you report it, we should be able to find that gun,” he said.
  

Let's see - power source needed, has to be inaccessible for removal, have to convince the criminals to turn in their guns for retrofitting, etc.

Thank goodness Chicago hires the mentally handicapped - otherwise, who knows what trouble they'd get into.

Solve This One GMac

Some readers have been complaining we're too hard on the Supernintendo. We prefer to think of it as pointing out a myriad of shortcomings that he has demonstrated, coming from another agency and being completely unfamiliar with the politics of the CPD. So we've come up with a simple, yet pressing problem plaguing the Districts. Let's see how it gets addressed:

• Hey SCC, on Zone 10 right now, we have 12 cars down on school crossings. Is this an efficient use of manpower? How come Crossing Guards don't get perfect attendance ribbons like us?

This complaint has been going on for years. It runs contrary to Rahm's and Garry's specifically stated goals of getting more police on the streets and freeing up officers from the mundane tasks that are better handled by an unsworn employee. Who needs a $70,000 per year crossing guard?

Yet on one radio zone, we have reports of 12, sometimes more, sworn police officers tied to a corner for an hour or more. Twelve cars is an entire district worth of manpower, and that's just one zone. Citywide it has to be close to 100 officers covering corners per day.

Ideas? We've suggested those "parent patrols" do the crossings. We've suggested removing crossing guards from the police department and sticking them over a Traffic Management Authority facilities - they can handle sporting events and school crossings and they can be responsible for subbing in the hundred no-shows that occur on a daily basis.

What do you say McThinkOfTheChildren?  Is this worthy of your time?

Ban Everything!

Aldercreature Burke is evidently taking his cues from Bloomberg in New York:

• Chicago would ban the sale and distribution of high-caffeine energy drinks — not just to minors, but to consumers of all ages — under a surprise crackdown proposed Thursday by the City Council’s most powerful alderman.
  
  Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th), chairman of the City Council’s Finance Committee, proposed the blanket ban, citing the popularity of drinks such as Red Bull, Monster, Full Throttle and 5 Hour Energy among teenagers and young adults and the dangers those drinks can pose to their health.

Because energy drinks have been implicated in ....what exactly?

Two Deaths = 60 Day Suspensions

Seriously?

• Two Cook County prosecutors have been suspended for failing to file charges against a man who had threatened to kill his family -- three months before he set them on fire, killing himself, his wife and one of his young children.
  
  The prosecutors had declined to file felony charges against Nathaniel Beller, 29, in September after he was accused of filling a bathtub with gasoline and threatening to kill his family, according to a Cicero police report.
  
  Cicero police officers said they forced their way into the apartment after negotiating with Beller to release his two children. At one point, Beller lit a cigarette while in the apartment, according to the police report.
  
  An assistant state’s attorney interviewed Beller at the hospital and later informed police that no charges would be filed, according to a Cicero police report. Another prosecutor, according to the report, cited a “lack of evidence” and the lack of cooperation from Beller's wife Taniya as reasons for not approving felony charges.

"Lack of evidence?" A tub full of gasoline, a kid soaked in gasoline, acts of furtherance with a lit cigarette.  Move along, nothing to see here. At least, not until 90 days later when three people are dead and another burned almost beyond recovery.

Since there won't be any prosecution, we doubt anyone from Anita's office had to actually see pictures of the aftermath or listen to the screams of a child. You know, the way the responding fire and police personnel did.

Sleep well counselors. Hopefully, someone acts to disbar these morons.

Pigeon Solution = Crime Solution?

This deserves some deep thought. It begins with a simple idea:

• Chicago’s great pigeon problem may have eased slightly, but it also has some residents crying foul over the fowl removal.
  
  Social worker Steffeny Smith was disturbed by what she saw last Friday in the 4700 block of North Broadway Avenue from an office window. As she describes it, two men shot a large net over 60 to 70 pigeons, trapping them.
  
  The birds reacted with great distress, thrashing violently.

But don't worry. These pigeons are being taken to Indiana...alive. For what purpose we don't know. Maybe someone needs live bait for eagles or something. Channel 2 has video up of catapult net in Spain. Here's the full video from YouTube:

Now we need some ideas on how to expand this into crime fighting ideas. We're sure the Department can get their hands on some super-strong netting. Maybe "Vanecko Nets and Fencing" can supply us with something.

Now we just need some bait. Air Jordans, cases of Modelo, bottles of Wild Turkey and 6-packs of Miller Lite, bundles of unsigned city contracts?  We just have to find locations where the undesirables congregate, trigger the trap and then work on a disposal method.  Shipping everything to Indiana might work for a little while, but there's no telling what Indiana might ship back at some point.

Downtown Shooting

The Tribune took all mention of the East Bank Club out of its coverage.  The Sun Times throws it right out there though:

• A man was shot in the head Wednesday morning outside 350 West Mart Center, formerly known as the Apparel Center, as commuters were walking to work.
  
  The shooting happened shortly before 6 a.m. in a docking area behind the building across the street from the upscale East Bank Club, 500 N. Kingsbury St., where Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Oprah Winfrey and other celebrities have worked out. Among the tenants of 350 West Mart Center are Holiday Inn, Ogilvy & Mather, Comcast SportsNet Chicago and the Chicago Sun-Times.
  
  The 47-year-old man suffered a graze wound to the head and held up a thumb as paramedics rushed him into an ambulance headed toward Northwestern Memorial Hospital, authorities said. His injuries are not believed to be life-threatening, police said.
  

But an inch or two to the left and Rahm is walking though this guy's brains on the way to stretch at the barre.

Sequence is Important

We just haven't seen this expressed so blatantly:

• Efforts by the legislature to expand casino gambling to Chicago and other locations is a secondary issue behind attempts to deal with the state’s unfunded pension liability, Gov. Pat Quinn said Tuesday.
  
  The Democratic governor's comments drew a rebuke from state Rep. Lou Lang, D-Skokie, a major supporter of expanded gambling. Lang contended Quinn was treating the issue “as if it’s some toy we’re playing with and he’s going to withhold toys from children until they eat their vegetables.”
  
  Quinn, speaking to reporters after appearing at an unrelated event, called gambling a “secondary issue to the most paramount issue we have to face and that’s the whole pension reform.” A day earlier, on WTTW's "Chicago Tonight," Quinn likened pension reform to some lawmakers as having “to eat our spinach and our Brussels sprouts and everything else before you can have any kind of dessert like gambling.”

Quinn, of course, is full of shit. The problem is that Quinn (and Rahm and Madigan and everyone else) want pension "reform" before the public discovers that a giant new revenue stream might alleviate (or solve) a certain problem.

A Chicago casino would draw gambling money from across the state and drag in Indiana gamblers. Quinn and Rahm want control of this money held in a very narrow set of trusted hands. They don't want the unions and pension funds that have been looted demanding repayment for the past decades worth of excesses, so they push "reform" and cuts while pleading poor, delaying the casino that they want for the money it'll bring to the connected.

Look at All That Marijuana Money!!!

You aren't going to see much coverage of this in the Chicago media - it might embarrass Rahm and Garry:

• Since the city of Chicago implemented its new marijuana ticketing law early last August, it has reportedly issued nearly 400 citations and netted nearly $98,000 worth of fines for low-level possession of the drug citywide.
  
  According to RedEye, 380 citations, which come with a fine ranging from $250 to $500, for marijuana possession up to 15 grams were issued between Aug. 4 and Dec. 25. August was the month during which the most tickets were issued.

Wow. 380 ANOV's (Administrative Notice Of Violation for you non-police readers). That's almost 3 tickets a day!

• Of the 380 cases, administrative law judges found 138 of those accused were liable, meaning they violated the ordinance. Nearly all with the exception of two were slapped with a $250 fine.
  
  People failed to show up for 128 cases and all but three were hit with the maximum $500 fine.
  
  The city’s attorney decided not to proceed with 32 cases, and 55 others are pending.
  
  Hearing officers dismissed 27 cases, finding them not responsible for the violation.
  

All that for $98,000.  And for all you budget geeks keeping track:

• Danny Solis in November 2011, Solis said the city would stand to gain as much as $7 million in additional annual revenue from marijuana citations capped at the possession of 10 grams. Though the marijuana ticketing law ultimately approved last summer actually increased the maximum amount of cannabis that one could be ticketed, rather than arrested for, from 10 to 15 grams, the city is still lagging far behind Solis' estimated revenue boost.
  
  Once the 2012 citation figures are extrapolated, the city is only on track to take in about 3 percent of Solis' $7 million figure in the law's first year.

Oops. Someone call Rahm's number crunchers - we think we just found another $6 million hole in his budget.