A Normal Holiday

Slightly above average in terms of mayhem, but normal:

• Shootings over the Memorial Day weekend left seven people dead and another 45 wounded in Chicago, a sharp drop from last year, though almost half of this year's victims were shot the last night of the weekend.
  
  The violence this weekend was similar to three of the last five Memorial Day weekends: 53 gunshot victims in 2012, and 58 in 2015. A total of 34 people were shot in 2014, and 21 were shot in 2013.
  
  Last year's total was 71 and was the worst since at least 2012. It came during a year that saw almost 800 homicides and more than 4,000 people shot.

Let's figure this out:

• 2012 - 53 shot; 11 dead
• 2013 - 21 shot; 4 dead
• 2014 - 34 shot; 6 dead
• 2015 - 58 shot; 12 dead
• 2016 - 71 shot; 6 dead
• 2017 - 52 shot; 7 dead

Average number of people shot on a given Memorial Day weekend: 48.16
Average number of people killed on a given Memorial Day weekend: 7.66

So how much in overtime was spent? To end up at merely the six-year average? Imagine how much better the numbers might look if Rahm actually had a fully staffed, properly budgeted Department.

Close the Beaches!!!

Big police call out at North Avenue Beach Sunday afternoon.

S whole bunch of ambulances and most of the District seemed to be in attendance. The media attempted to play it off as people were "hurt by broken glass," which just makes us think:

• were these people hurt by thrown bottles? We bet they were;
• if not, where are the "sand-grooming" machines the Park District spent millions on?
• this has to be the dumbest excuse Rahm has ever come up with since the beaches were "too hot" a few years ago;

And sure enough, WGN breaks the media embargo and points out a large "brawl" took place (but still mentioning the "glass" injuries):

• There was a heavy police presence on Chicago beaches this Memorial Day after a lot of trouble there this time last year.
  
  Police are getting some pretty high marks from beachgoers for the way they handled the large crowds, but that doesn’t mean there were no problems.
  
  A few people were transported to area hospitals Monday, hurt by broken glass, and although videos show brawls on the beach police say there are no arrests.

The WGN pictures show horses - where was Summer Mobile? Were they patrolling the inland lagoons again?

Rahm Spins (Again)

Chicago is shrinking, so Rahm ignores US Census data and runs with.....a U-Haul report?

• How sensitive was Mayor Rahm Emanuel last week to the news that his city is shrinking? Enough to turn to an unscientific study from U-Haul as a rebuttal to the U.S. Census Bureau report that found Chicago was the only major city in the country to lose population in 2016. The city also lost nearly double the number of residents as the year before.
  
  To deflect attention, Emanuel released a statement lauding the U-Haul report that determined Chicago ranked No. 2 in the nation for one-way drop-offs of the company's trucks and trailers.

Even the Tribune notes that this is a silly yardstick for Rahm to use:

• Let’s unpack that U-Haul "study."
  
  The do-it-yourself moving company ranked its destination cities based on “the total number of one-way U-Haul truck rentals to a city in the past calendar year.” Chicago, the company said, ranked second, but it did not release how many rentals that ranking was based on. U-Haul did note that the number of rental drop-offs in Chicago had dropped nearly 6 percent compared with the year before.
  
  But the U-Haul study did not analyze the number of one-way rental departures out of the city -- or how many people or families left town with a truck. U-Haul even included this disclaimer in its news release: “Destination cities do not account for departing traffic and thus do not necessarily reflect growth like U-Haul Growth Cities.”

Here's our take:

• Those "one way" drop offs? Those are empty trucks coming back to town, because U-Haul is renting so many "Anywhere but Chicago" packages that they ran out of trucks, trailers, and vans to accommodate the outflow.

And guess who's leaving?

• Though Chicago’s overall population fell for the third consecutive year in 2016, U.S. Census Bureau data shows new white residents are flocking to neighborhoods adjacent to downtown while black residents are fleeing some of the city’s most violent neighborhoods in droves.
  
  “The decline in black population really accounts for a lot of the loss,” said Rob Paral, head of a Chicago-based demographic research and consulting firm. “The difference is that the white population is either growing or staying the same.”
  
  Englewood, West Englewood and Austin were home to a combined 188,992 black residents in 2000. In 2015, those same three neighborhoods had 135,831 black residents — a 28 percent decrease — according to Census data.

Chicago is getting....whiter? Or perhaps a whitish-brownish shade? Rahm is accomplishing the rarest of spectacles in politics - destroying a democratic run city by driving out the core constituency of the democratic party. Even Daley I and Daley II didn't do that, mainly by buying off the black aldercreatures to keep peace. Rahm is truly an amazing politician.

GASP!! A Parolee!

Wake up liberals:

• A 21-year-old Englewood man who’s on parole for robbery beat a woman and fractured her son’s skull during a robbery in the Gold Coast on Monday, prosecutors said.
  
  A group of men punched and kicked the 48-year-old woman to the ground in the 1500 block of North Dearborn and then took her purse around 10:45 p.m.
  
  The woman's 25-year-old son was also knocked to the ground, cracking his skull.
  
  Cops arrested Deandre Williams minutes later as he ran in the traffic lanes of Lake Shore Drive near North Avenue.
  
  [...] Williams is currently on parole after being sentenced to six years in prison for a 2012 armed robbery in Edgewater. Cops say he’s a member of the Black Disciples street gang.

If he had been serving a full sentence, he wouldn't have been out until next year, and perhaps the victims would have safely moved out of Chicago by then.

Full "Merit" List 2006 - 2017 (FIXED)

67 pages of political corruption - well, not completely. This is all of the promotional classes by year with all promotees listed - the "merit" promotions are at the tail end of each class.

Rank Order Merit List 2006-2017-Horizontal on Scribd

You may have to download it and then rotate it clockwise one quarter turn - we can't seem to get it to display properly. But as far as we can tell, it's all there.

You can disregard that one Lieutenants class - the "rank order" people all had the actual test to study from and is (hopefully) still the subject of a rather involved investigation.

UPDATE: Thanks to "D" for updating the list so you don't crick your neck.

Mass Car Theft Averted

Car rental lot in Des Plaines:

• Five teenagers were arrested and officials are still looking for another after they tried to steal cars from a rental lot in Des Plaines, according to police.
  
  Des Plaines police said a group of six teens were seen jumping a fence at Advantage Rent A Car that shares a lot with Hertz on 2170 Mannheim Road in Des Plaines.

Thank goodness car theft is a non-violent crime....according to Kim Foxxx:

• Police said they caught three of the teens inside the lot and found a backpack that contained a handgun. They found another two teens hiding and another handgun on the ground at Rusty and Parkwood, police said.

Hmmm. Well, good thing no one actually had the gun with them - that way Kim Foxxx can argue on behalf of the suburban rapscallions that they weren't actually in possession either gun as they attempted to steal half-a-dozen cars. Hopefully, this doesn't jeopardize anyone's prom night plans.

• The Daily Herald reported that the teens were 16 or 17 years old and from Chicago.

Golly....from the big city, too? Who would've thought that?

Two Dead, 10 Wounded

Oh wait....that was in Milwaukee:

• Police in Milwaukee are investigating separate shootings that left two people dead and 10 wounded.
  
  The wounded include two children. The dead include a 37-year-old Milwaukee man who was shot during an argument Saturday afternoon, and a 29-year-old Milwaukee man who was shot Saturday night under circumstances that remain under investigation.

We're guessing Milwaukee is the "go-to" vacation destination for Chicago shooters this weekend? Who knew? At least one of the dead (the one in Janesville) was from Chicago.

Is there a HeyJackass.WI.com affiliate?

Shot Spotter App

Someone asked in the comments about this new ShotSpotter app that is on the Department cell phones. Evidently, you can also download it from any App Store. The comment asked if they were permitted to have it. We reply:

• Are you nuts?

Officers are already being ordered to surrender personal cell phones (that you pay for) at police shooting scenes and there's no timeline for them getting them back. Officers who didn't pull the trigger, too. The Department is "mirroring" all of your activity from weeks before until the shooting, so everything you did is pretty much discover-able by any lib-tarded judge and bottom-feeding lawyer who takes a fancy to screwing the police.

Do not, and we repeat it in all capital letters, DO NOT mix your personal business with Department business. It will end badly.

Memorial Day

Remembering those who kept us free.

Postings and comments delayed slightly.

Murder Free Since....Nevermind

Over half the weekend gone before someone got killed:

• Authorities are investigating shootings that left a 15-year-old boy dead and four other people including a 16-year-old girl wounded on Sunday, police said.
  
  The boy, 15, was killed and a 16-year-old girl was grazed by a bullet in the 1600 block of South Saint Louis Avenue in city's Lawndale neighborhood about 6:35 p.m., police said.
  
  Police said the teens were in a gangway when a gray sedan drove by and someone inside opened fire.
  
  Both were taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, where the boy, who was shot in the back, was pronounced dead. The female suffered a graze wound to her back.

The counts are quite a bit lower than past years:

• At least 18 people have been wounded in Chicago shootings throughout the Memorial Day weekend, with eight victims shot in a five-hour spate of violence early Sunday.
  
  But there have been no fatal shootings since Friday evening, making this year’s holiday weekend much less violent than last year’s so far.
  
  Last year, 43 people were shot, four of them fatally, by Sunday afternoon of the long holiday weekend, which is widely viewed as the unofficial start of summer...

McCompost was overheard to utter, "It isn't the weather!"

• For some 20,000 cyclists expecting to bike for a cause Sunday on Lake Shore Drive, slippery conditions were a possibility as one of Chicago's rainiest springs neared a close.
  
  [...]But within hours of the end of the event, it was raining — again — in the Chicago area, a pattern that has made this spring one of the most rainy in nearly 150 years, according to meteorologists at the National Weather Service.
  
  From March 1to May 27, Chicago has seen 13.72 inches of precipitation, which is 4.64 inches higher than normal, or what is called "climatological normal," said Ricky Castro, a meteorologist at the Romeoville-based weather service.

Sure it isn't.

Concealed Carrier Defends Self (UPDATE!!)

Chicago licensee, in Oak Park:

• A 16-year-old Chicago boy was shot and killed this morning after attempting to rob a 24-year-old man in the parking lot of a bank near Madison Street and Austin Boulevard in Oak Park, according to a news release from the Oak Park police department.
  
  Police said that the 24-year-old man, who is from Chicago, has a valid conceal-carry permit.
  
  "The pair apparently exchanged gunfire before the alleged robber reportedly entered a waiting car and fled into Chicago," the release stated.

The wounded teen fled to Chicago, where he died, so we're not sure who's going to pick up the statistic. We don't know about you, but we'll help clean up bodies like this 24/7 if we have to.

Buy this guy a beer and a new box of ammo and send him on his way. Well done.

UPDATE: This is just hilarious if true:

• SCC,
  
  You aren't going to belive this, or maybe you will. This 16-year-old armed robber was saved by Officers on the west side not even two years ago using a tourniquet to stop him from bleeding out. To think, he had two whole years to "turn his life around" and maybe become an altar boy or something.
  
  Oh, and his accomplices took him home and dumped him on his own front lawn to die. Couldn't even abandon him at a hospital. What a great childhood.

We're just shaking our damn head.

Knife Attacks - Grant Park

Anyone know what group was playing down in Grant Park this past evening? Because about 2100 hours, the Zone lit up with calls of a group of 20 or 30 youths running around slashing concert goers. We just wanted to see if there were any t-shirts for the band.

Wilding - it's just not for breakfast any more.

Speaking of Signs...

We were headed out of town recently (no, not this weekend), and we were driving down the highway. You know those mile marker signs on the roads in and out of town?

They used to be spaced every half a mile, right? You can easily see a half a mile, maybe more, on a clear day and on any semi-straight section of highway.

Now there are mile markers are every quarter mile. Who came up with that bright idea? How many scarce tax dollars were wasted employing some connected relative to print quarter-mile and three-quarter-mile signs and install them up and down the highway? That's like installing signs in firehouses in non-public single occupant washrooms.

Social Media Again

You'll never guess what the most recent assailant of officers left lying around:

And a juvenile record longer than most peoples' arms.

Manpower "Surge"

Not really a surge, but rather Rahm throwing money at an undermanned police department:

• Chicago streets will have an extra 1,300 cops on patrol each day of the Memorial Day weekend, as the Chicago Police Department beefs up normal police presence with special units, traffic enforcement and more officers in the city’s parks and beaches, officials said Friday.
  
  The stepped-up patrols are an increase even from the number of officers deployed last year, when CPD put an extra 880 officers each day of the long weekend only to see six people killed and 63 shot from Friday evening through early Tuesday. As with most holidays in the summer months, CPD officials solicited volunteers to cover extra shifts over the weekend and canceled time off to ramp up staffing.
  
  “CPD will not tolerate violent behavior, and if you choose to put others in danger by your actions, you will feel the full weight of CPD and our partners in law enforcement,” Supt. Eddie Johnson said, reading from a prepared address to reports at police headquarters Friday.

And rest assured, if you misbehave, the CPD will yell, "Stop!" in a loud voice. And if you continue to misbehave, CPD will yell, "STOP!" even louder.

The cooler weather will undoubtedly have an effect on the totals. Tune into HeyJackass.com for the official weekend tally.

Surprise Surprise

We're pretty sure every cop we know predicted exactly this five or more years ago:

• A man who works for the anti-violence group CeaseFire is among a group of alleged gang members rounded up Thursday as part of a two-year investigation by Chicago Police and federal authorities.
  
  Federal prosecutors announced Friday that Francisco “Smokey” Sanchez has been charged with illegal possession of a firearm by a felon. Sanchez is a “violence interrupter” for CeaseFire and is part of the [g]angster [t]wo-[s]ix [n]ation street gang, according to law-enforcement sources.
  
  Sanchez, 50, is among 48 alleged gang members facing federal or state charges, the U.S. Attorney’s office announced.

This is what happens when you pretend that career criminals have something of value to contribute to the on-going crime problems - you know, like liberals think.

Firehouse Signs

This sign has started appearing in Chicago fire houses:

This is being posted in single occupant bathrooms not accessible to the public.

Why? Just another waste of taxpayer money for some inane government over-regulation.

Chicago Shrinking

The only major US city to lose population - and the rate is increasing:

• Chicago was the only city among the nation's 20 largest to lose population in 2016 — and it lost nearly double the number of residents as the year before, according to newly released data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
  
  It's the city's third consecutive year of population loss. Chicago's population fell by 8,638 residents between 2015 and 2016, to 2,704,958. The year before, it declined by 4,934.
  
  The population of the greater Chicago area, defined by the Census Bureau as the city and suburbs extending into Wisconsin and Indiana, is also declining. Numbers made available in March showed a drop of 19,570 residents in 2016 — the greatest loss of any metropolitan area in the country.
  
  Illinois' population fell by more than any other state in 2016, down 37,508 people, according to census data released in December.

Why would anyone want to leave this....this....this Paradise? The dems in Springfield just voted to raise taxes again, Rahm is about to re-instate the head-tax, Prickwrinkle can't wait to tax anything that might have sugar in it, except for those already receiving massive taxpayer subsidies, not to mention 4,400 people got shot here last year.

Chicago Dodged a Bullet

Figuratively speaking of course:

• There were 27 world records set at the Rio Olympics last year – from swimming to weightlifting, archery to cycling. These were as thrilling as they were expected. “Citius, Altius, Fortius,” is the Olympic model after all – Latin for “Faster, Higher, Stronger.”
  
  Now comes perhaps the most enduring world record of the Games: Just seven months after the torch was doused, the host country is already acknowledging the entire operation was a terrible, perhaps criminal idea. It has left them debt-ridden and without a clue what to do with already decaying facilities.
  
  Never faster has been the condemnation for hosting. Never higher has been the local outrage. And, maybe, never stronger is the lesson for the rest of the world to avoid ever getting into business with the International Olympic Committee.
  
  “There was no planning,” Leandro Mitidieri, a federal prosecutor in Brazil, said this week at a public hearing about the Olympic disaster, according to the Associated Press. “There was no planning when they put out the bid to host the Games. No planning.”
  
  And what of the majority of the facilities the country built to appease the IOC, a major part of the $12 billion cost of hosting the Games?
  
  “They are white elephants today,” Mitidieri said.

$12 Billion? Wasn't Shortshanks spouting off about $4 billion? Even with the existing infrastructure (a couple stadiums), there was no way that Chicago would have survived an Olympics with all the attendant bribery, thievery and corruption.

Great Narrative

This one is making the rounds (click for the full sized version):

Nice to know Kim Foxxxx is taking everyone's word except the police.

Nice Neighborhood

At least, it used to be:

• Chicago cops are warning residents about a series of six armed robberies that took place in nearby Lincoln Park on Monday and Tuesday. Three of the hold-ups happened during the 10 p.m. hour on Tuesday.
  
  In each case, a group of offenders approached victims on the street and demanded valuables at gunpoint. The men threatened to shoot their victims if their demands were not met, police said.

Someone in the comment section said it ended up being 8 robberies in under 12 hours.

Remember - A Car Isn't Deadly Force

So on 21 May, we had this:

• A Chicago police officer was run down by the driver of a stolen SUV.
  
  It happened just before midnight at Odgen and Trumbull. The officer was approaching the vehicle on foot when the driver hit the gas and knocked him down.

The very next day:

• A Chicago police officer was injured after being struck by a car speeding away from an attempted traffic stop Tuesday evening, police said.
  
  Officers attempted to perform a traffic stop in the 100 block of East 75th Street in the city's Park Manor neighborhood about 5:02 p.m., police said. The vehicle officers were pulling over struck an officer as it fled the area, police said, and a person is in custody.

And the day after that - yesterday:

• A person was shot by Chicago Police after an officer was pinned by a vehicle Wednesday morning in the Austin neighborhood on the West Side.
  
  The incident happened at 11:15 a.m. in the 1600 block of North Leclaire Avenue.

The damage to the pinned Officer's leg is said to be "severe." And then the Sun Times quotes Special "Asshole" Ed and his new "Non-Use of Force" policy that may have just cost this officer his leg and his job:

• If was not known if, aside from the stolen vehicle, if the suspect was armed, Nagode said.
  
  Last week, as the Chicago Police Department announced a new use-of-force policy to focus of de-escalation and the sanctity of life, Supt. Eddie Johnson touched on the possibility of an officer being injured by a vehicle.
  
  “If a vehicle is coming at an officer and that’s the only threat of force, the officer can get out of the way of it,” Johnson said.

Really Asshole? And what if he can't get out from between two cars? A car used as a ram kind of lacks the finesse of a knife or gun attack - the car moves violently after impact and the operator, concentrating solely on escape, isn't exactly following the Rules of the Road.

Four coppers injured over three days by criminals who know EXACTLY what officers can and cannot do, and they know we cannot chase and they know we cannot shoot without suffering the danger of losing our jobs. There isn't a downside for the criminal at any level. You've conceded the battlefield. Well done.

So Fuck You Ed. Fuck you, fuck your bullshit Use of Force, fuck your cheating girlfriend and her cheating buddies. This one is solely on you, Rahm, Kimmy, and your fucked-up, non-policing, throw the coppers under the bus to cater to the criminal class. You're a Grade A jagoff and the Department will be far better for your leaving.

Hi Jason!

We wouldn't want to be anywhere this guy...or have been anywhere near this guy the past few months/years:

• Federal prosecutors threw around names of three West Side politicians Tuesday during the fraud trial of a woman accused of blowing state grant funds on shoes, cars and other personal expenses.
  
  Franshuan Myles is fighting mail and wire fraud charges this week in the courtroom of U.S. District Judge Elaine Bucklo. The feds say Myles, the head of Divine Praise Inc., misused $60,000 her organization received from the state in 2011 that should have been spent on summer jobs for participants of the Illinois Youth Recreation Corps program.
  
  The names of Ald. Jason Ervin, state Sen. Kimberly Lightford and former state Sen. Annazette Collins all surfaced on the second day of Myles’ trial at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse. Ervin and Collins received money from Myles, and Myles paid for an intern in Lightford’s office in the summer of 2011, according to testimony in the courtroom.
  
  None of the pols has been accused of criminal wrongdoing.

We think the SunTimes left out the word "yet," The probably have to pretend that there aren't "un-indicted co-conspirators," "cooperating individuals" or maybe few open wires still gathering information.

Live in the Ghetto!

Everything old is new again:

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel Wednesday proposed using $3 million in city money to encourage 100 police officers, firefighters and paramedics to buy homes on the South and West sides of the city.
  
  The program — which would allow public safety officers to purchase single-family or two-flat homes in Auburn Gresham, Austin, Brighton Park, Chatham, East Garfield Park, Englewood, Gage Park, Greater Grand Crossing, Humboldt Park, New City, North Lawndale, South Lawndale, West Englewood and West Garfield Park — is designed to increase public safety and support continued economic development, according to a statement from the mayor's office.

Does this program include 8-foot fences, topped with barbed wire, pressure activated mines, sandbag emplacements, crew-served weaponry, steel windows, doors and gunports? Not interested.

Wait, this is a 10-year "forgivable" loan?

We'll just hold out for the County offer - free homes:

• Free homes would be given to teachers, police officers and firefighters under a new proposal introduced by Cook County Board Commissioner Richard Boykin if they commit to work — and live — in what he calls “endangered communities.”

How about in exchange for a fully funded pension?

Closed Investigation

Good news:

• The Chicago Police Department’s probe concluded that there was no misconduct on the part of Officer Charles Artz or any other officer involved, according to CPD spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi. "The investigation into the funds raised by Sgt. Artz and his team was closed and found no wrongdoing of any kind on the part of the officers involved,” Guglielmi told Chicagoist by email.

So a good deed actually went unpunished, contrary to the old saying.

Relapse

There's a lesson here somewhere:

• WEST BRANDYWINE, Pa. (WPVI) -- Two counselors working at a facility to help recovering drug addicts were found dead from what appears to be a lethal overdose of heroin and fentanyl, the Chester County district attorney's office said.
  
  It happened at the Freedom Ridge Recovery Lodge on Freedom Valley Circle in West Brandywine Township.
  
  According to authorities, medics were called to the facility, which is a private residence used as a halfway house, around 2:15 p.m. Sunday.

That fentanyl is a wicked high.

Cop Injured in 025

Assailant shot.

Cop pinned by vehicle (that cannot be a weapon).

Updates as able.

Prayers for the injured Officer.

UPDATE: Conflicting info on injuries - shot, run over, multiple cops?

Well Lookie Here

Pittsburgh just lost residency in Court:

• The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled Monday that Pittsburgh Police officers don't have to live inside city limits.
  
  The decision overturns a long-standing city residency requirement upheld in January by a 4-3 ruling in the State Commonwealth Court.
  
  Attorneys representing local police argued now and in the past that officers should be allowed to live outside the city for their own safety. KDKA reports that included the freedom to be more selective when considering area school districts.
  
  Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto said in a statement Monday that he disagrees with the high court's decision.
  
  "We want our police officers to continue to live in the neighborhoods and communities that they serve," he said. "We defended the will of the residents of Pittsburgh, all the way to the Supreme Court, believing that the law that allowed Pittsburgh to become a Home Rule Charter city should have taken precedence."

And they beat it over Home Rule?

This comeback from the local communists is hilarious:

• Brandi Fisher, director of the Alliance for Police Accountability, echoed Peduto. She said having officers live in the city creates a sense of community.
  
  "Building real relationships happens when you can see people at the store, when you live in the same neighborhoods, in the same communities," Fisher said.
  
  It's ironic, she said, that officers would choose to live outside of the city to access better schools and housing.
  
  “It just goes to show a mentality towards the people in the city," Fisher said. "If your feeling is that its poor housing, poor communities, poor schooling, then you already have ... some sort of disdain in the way that you’re looking at these communities.”

So, "We've done everything in our power to neuter the police, make your job as dangerous as possible, demonized you from the elderly all the way down to the children. We've ruined the schools, taxed you to the eyeballs and celebrate when you get shot, maimed or killed. Now you cops have the audacity to want a better life? You better sit right here in Shits-burgh and be miserable with all the rest of us!"

Aldercreatures are selling out the formerly "quiet" neighborhoods favored by cops, firemen and other city workers.

This is a non-starter in Springfield, but we've said it before - everywhere a local FOP has sued, they've eventually won.

Clear Enough?

So certain exempts are still pushing numbers at their staff meetings. Some have made supervisors leave their cell phones away from meetings, and some use a dry erase board so all evidence of the illegal orders can be concealed from Special Ed's staff. So this came out:

That seems pretty straightforward. Any idea if Esca-merit got the memo?

Summer Wilding Season

This story came and went pretty quickly...almost like Channel 7 didn't want to broadcast it too much:

• A man says he was attacked by a group of teen while walking near Chicago's iconic Buckingham Fountain, resulting in fractures to his face.
  
  The attack left Jay Parsons with a facial fracture and injuries to his hand. He's still trying to make sense of it all 24 hours later.
  
  "I'm still pretty shocked. You go to these busy areas, tourist areas. You don't expect to get hit and then it happens," Parsons said.
  
  Parsons said he was walking on the lakefront path north of Buckingham Fountain around 6:20 p.m. Sunday evening. He said of 10 to 12 high school-age teenager, boys and girls, were walking towards him as a group. One of them peeled off from the pack.
  
  "I heard him say to his friends, 'Hey, I'm going to go swimming now.' And he kind of ran off to the side, and then he must have peeled back, and that's when he hit me," Parsons said.

Neither the victim nor Channel 7 managed to get a description of the attackers. Channel 7 also couldn't be bothered to post any links or photos of the video that numerous passersby managed to record of the attackers. Funny how that happened. In any event, Wilding Season is here and visitors to the city would be well advised to prepare (and arm) themselves accordingly.

Gentrify? De-Gentrify?

This is priceless:

• Concerned about a nearly 50 percent surge in home prices along the wildly-popular 606 trail, a pair of local aldermen have a plan to stop that gentrification dead in its tracks.
  
  At Wednesday’s City Council meeting, Aldermen Proco Joe Moreno (1st) and Roberto Maldonado (26th) want the city to impose dramatically higher demolition fees along the trail and impose a new “de-conversion fee” whenever developers try to turn multi-family housing into more lucrative single-family homes.
  
  Housing prices west of Western Avenue have increased by 48.2 percent since ground was broken on the 2.7-mile urban oasis, according to a study by the Institute for Housing Studies at DePaul University.
  
  The converted elevated freight line has become a mecca for bicycle riders, skaters, runners and pedestrians. Housing prices east of the trail are up by nearly 14 percent.

So aldercreatures are attempting to influence market forces via a questionable series of fees to discourage gentrification.

Compare this to what alder-asshole Arena is doing up north, building a pair of multi-story monstrosities to de-gentrify a huge swath of the Bungalow Belt and importing people who can't afford to live there while calling any who oppose him "racist."

Why Not Tax It?

Rahm is taxing everything else - why not the whores?

• The city would come down harder on sham therapeutic massage parlor operators who are really in the business of prostitution under an ordinance drafted by a Southwest Side alderman.
  
  Ald. Matt O'Shea's proposal would increase fines and tighten regulations in an effort to get tougher on the owners of places of ill repute while also allowing human trafficking victims working for them to avoid conviction.
  
  The idea is to go after "the people that are organizing this, the people that are financially benefiting from it, not in some cases where we know it's been innocent victims," said O'Shea, 19th. "We want to go after the cowards."

Most politicians are basically whores anyway - Aldercreature (and felon) Troutman spoke of it over 10 years ago - right before she got indicted for taking bribes. The City has already de facto legalized weed. This is right up their alley.

Attacks on Police Up

We're pretty sure this trend is nationwide:

• According to the Little Rock Police Department, active aggression against its officers is up 134 percent from 2015 to 2016. That oftentimes forces officers to respond.
  
  “I like working the streets,” said Officer Stephen Gorbet. “You get to see all walks of life… there’s no such thing as a routine stop.” Officer Gorbet learned that very quickly into his 27-year law enforcement career. He was forced to shoot and ultimately kill someone his first year on the job.
  
  “I stopped a guy for running a red light and we got into a struggle,” Gorbet said. “He began to beat me with a fence post and unfortunately, I had to shoot him.” Since then, Officer Gorbet has had to resort to deadly force one other time with minor uses of force, like his baton and pepper spray, sprinkled in. “It seems like everybody is kind of against the police, especially the last two years,” he said.
  
  Little Rock police records back that up. From 2015 to 2016, reports of active aggression against officers skyrocketed from 65 to 152 or 134 percent.

The Department used to come out with a colorful bulletin years ago, outlining the Uses of Force, attacks on Officers, TRR's filled out, etc. We haven't seen one in years now, maybe ten or more years. Did they stop printing it? Or did they (read Lewin) just hide it among the electronic clutter of stats and graphs so no one could see how attacks on Officers have risen dramatically?

Apple Worth More Than Chicago

So is Google:

• If Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook wanted to, he could, in a sense, make the Windy City his new corporate headquarters—all of it.
  
  Technology companies have grown so large that they’ve surpassed the economic values of major American cities, according to data from Bank of America–Merrill Lynch, which compared company market capitalizations to metropolitan gross domestic product.
  
  At current levels, Apple Inc’s market capitalization of about $803 billion is 38% larger than the real GDP of Chicago, $581 billion in 2016. Apple isn’t the only Silicon Valley notable to top Chicago (and all other U.S. cities save two), either. Google parent Alphabet has a market capitalization of $657.9 billion, making its pockets about 13% deeper than the GDP of the home of deep-dish pizza.

There's even a handy little chart:

We see a number of the listed companies surpassing Chicago in a few short years.

60 Minutes Slobber Job

If you can stomach it, this is the link to the transcript. They make Dart out to be some sort of New-Age turnkey, when in reality his policies are a contributing factor to the skyrocketing shooting and homicide rates. He also misses the point of jail:

• On any given day we have probably 2 to 3 hundred people that if they came up $500 they would leave here but we find that if you have access to money wherever it may come from, and frequently it's coming from your gang and if you happen to be the guy in your gang who is the guy who does most of the shootings, you're a very valuable person, they want you back out on the street. But you have some individual who's in here who's never been a danger to anybody, he can't come up with a hundred dollars. He's sitting…the guy with the gun, he's out the door.

Tell you what there Tommy - come up with the money out of your pocket. Or some of the media spouses with the six-figure jobs - you can call it "Sponsor an Inmate" and they can go home and meet the family or something.

The reason they can't come up with $500 is they're a drain on society and chose not to live by civilized rules. The law says there has to be a cash retainer to guarantee their appearance in Court and guess what? That guy with the Probation Violation? We don't care if he's non-violent - he obviously can't live by the rules, so he sits until someone somehow makes it uncomfortable enough for him to learn that abiding by the rules is cheaper than not.

Dart's supplying people connected to the media with jobs is paying dividends, so he must be thinking of higher office.

ET Car Notice

This is "fucking golden," to quote a former governor.

That last portion is "concerning."

Is the City fining CTA bus drivers for triggering red light and speed cameras? What about garbage trucks? Streets and San supervisors running around in those leased vehicles from Indiana? Fire trucks that aren't responding to calls, but rather returning to quarters?

We're pretty sure none of those Departments are tagged for improper operation of vehicles - perhaps administratively, but there was a union that fought the actual fine and won it.

Anyone have any guidance from the FOP on this? Because the way the City is drilling down responsibility, we wouldn't be surprised to claim the ET's are personally responsible for any fender bender, property damage or personal injury accident that occurs in a leased vehicle.

Memorial Day OT

This isn't really a "big" holiday coming up, yet the Department is offering OT to everyone who has a regular day off Memorial Day weekend. They're even calling people on furlough and saying you can work all of your days off if you like.

If they don't get enough volunteers, the Department is going to go by reverse seniority to cancel days off - which leads to a few interesting questions:

• PPO's can't volunteer for the OT initiative - but can their days off be canceled or "adjusted" in the middle of a police period to screw them?
• PO's with under four (or is it five?) years do not get Duty Availability (thanks Dean Angelo for screwing the youngsters). So can the Department cancel their days off using reverse seniority? They aren't available contractually. Do they pick the guy/gal with 5 years? We'd imagine that would make for an interesting grievance should the projected numbers be adequate.

And not that it's in effect at the moment, but can you imagine the Automated Timekeeping trying to keep up with this rolling disaster next year?

4 and 34

The Sun Times says 4 dead, 30 wounded, but HeyJackass.com has it a bit higher:

• Four people were killed and at least 30 others, including a 9-year-old boy, have been wounded in shootings across Chicago since Friday night.

Pending any late tallies, HeyJackass has the total number of persons shot this past week at 96. Let that sink in for a moment - ninety-six. And we're willing to bet a sizable number of toothpicks that the guy with the Chicago address found up at Old Orchard with a bunch of bullet holes in his noggin was yet another pending statistic here in town.

Out On Bail Again?

Does anyone else think the lamestream media will ever get tired of sitting on stories like this? Does anyone else think the citizens might eventually catch on? DNAInfo.com is realizing there are stories here:

• The armed man who carjacked a Dodge Durango in the South Loop last month was free on bond for a pending gun case at the time, prosecutors said Friday. Phillip Smith, 25, is accused of carjacking a 2014 Dodge Durango about 3:30 a.m.
  
  April 11 in a "bump and run" attack in the 600 block of South Wabash Avenue, court records show. Police believe Smith was armed with a silver handgun.
  
  At the time of the attack, he was free on bond for a pending 2016 gun case, court records show. Bail was set in that case at $75,000 in September; Smith posted $7,500 (the requisite 10 percent needed to go free) by December.

Another low bond, courtesy of Dart, Prickwrinkle and Evans, another violent crime committed by someone that should have been sitting in County.

Boystown Mayhem

Summer is around the corner and the predators are already stalking the Happy Hunting Grounds:

• In late 2015, Crain’s Chicago Business politics writer Greg Hinz wrote a column under the headline, “What's happening in Lakeview is a crime.”
  
  [...] 18-months after Hinz’s column, the cafe that he wrote about—Nookies Tree at 3334 North Halsted—no longer closes at 10 p.m. It now closes at 3 p.m. Every day.
  
  And there are indications that Nookies may be closing permanently, though its owners did not reply to an inquiry about their plans.
  
  Things have not been improving along Halsted Street.
  
  Last week, we reported on the re-emergence of nighttime street fights along Halsted. The brawls are no longer limited to weekend nights. You’re just as likely to find yourself amongst one on Tuesday and Wednesdays now.

The CrimeInWrigleyvilleAndBoystown blog provides independent reporting, links to numerous videos, and OEMC radio transcripts that show a formerly peaceful neighborhood descending into a crime-ridden hell hole.

At some point, Rahm's biggest monetary contributors are going to get fed up with what their neighborhood is becoming.

Incomplete?

How about "Incompetent?"

• With little fanfare, Attorney General Lisa Madigan recently confirmed she plans to run for re-election in 2018. If she wins and completes another term, she will finish her 20th year on the job.
  
  Twenty years is a long time. The year Madigan was elected attorney general, the trajectory for Illinois governance bent skyward. Citizens felt more confident in state leadership after a felony-prone governor, George Ryan, departed.
  
  Democrats assumed control of the legislature and governor's office with a new governor, Rod Blagojevich, vowing to reform a government nakedly intertwined with contract steering, bribery, patronage, obstruction, lying and money-grubbing. Nearly 80 defendants, including Ryan himself, were convicted as part of an exhaustive federal probe that put a focus on the Illinois culture of political sleaze.
  
  Illinois voters swept Madigan into office along with dozens of reform-minded lawmakers on promises they would clean house. Ethics topped the list of concerns for voters. Trust. Not budgets or pensions or debt. Madigan, who was then a 36-year-old first-term state senator, spent most of her campaign reassuring voters the attorney general role would not create conflicts of interest with her father, Michael Madigan, now the longest-serving House speaker in the nation.

Well, she certainly lived up to that promise. Not only hasn't she "create[d] any conflicts of interest with her father," she hasn't created a single conflict of interest with the entire Chicago Machine or the Illinois Combine. Not a single corruption investigation has crossed her desk while Illinois continues its death spiral into insolvency, abetted by massive corruption and crooked contracting.

Trick Bag

Interesting case in West Virginia:

• A former West Virginia police officer is suing the city where he was employed, claiming that he was fired for not shooting a 21-year-old suicidal black man.
  
  When Officer Stephen Mader saw the gun in RJ Williams’ hand on May 6, 2016, he raised his duty weapon in defense. But then Williams said something that gave Mader a new understanding of what was going on.
  
  “Just shoot me,” he remembered the visibly distraught Williams saying.
  
  Mader, an Afghanistan war veteran, deduced that Williams was attempting suicide by cop, a suicide method in which a person engages in actual or apparent danger to others with the desire to be killed or injured by law enforcement.

The cop used his training and personal war experiences to deduce that the subject's actions were a desperate cry for help. So he did what he thought best - negotiated...or if you like, "de-escalated." So he's a hero, right? A shining beacon of police work held up as an example to all, right?

Well, no. He's fired.

• The two argued back and forth — Williams asking to be shot, Mader asking that he put down the gun.
  
  But when another cruiser approached, things escalated. Williams began waving the gun around toward Mader and the other officers, who immediately fired.
  
  “Within seconds, shots were fired and the last shot fatally wounded Mr. Williams to the head,” Mader claimed.

And the kicker of it all?

• When they inspected Williams’ pistol, they found that it wasn’t loaded.

So now the whole thing is in court. The cop who fired the fatal shot wasn't dismissed but is alleged to have sent a number of threatening messages to the fired cop about cowardice. Past incidents of "failure to report" are being dredged up to sustain a case for firing the non-shooter (sound familiar?) and the ACLU of all people is involved with this argument:

• Under the law, an officer is only allowed to use deadly force when he or she perceives a threat.
  
  “Once he made the decision Williams was not a threat, the U.S. Constitution says he’s not allowed to shoot,” the ACLU of West Virginia executive director, Joseph Cohen, told HuffPost. “Not only was his belief reasonable, it was objectively correct. The gun was unloaded.”

So the ACLU is saying that one officer's decision (or PERCEPTION) is valid, while the other officer, arriving on scene and being threatened with the same gun, well, his PERCEPTION is invalid because the gun ended up being unloaded. Remember, these are the people who just helped write gut the street stop order, the ISR disaster and the Non-Use of force order, judging an incident that took seconds to unfold.

Discuss. We've made no judgements and provided the link so you can read it. To us, it seems like yet another set of rules that allow the progressives to harshly judge a dynamic situation with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, simply to screw coppers attempting to do a difficult job.

Summer Mobile Cars

This sounds like another well-thought-out idea:

• OT: Kind of applies to the city and their ability not to think things thru. There are thirty, yes 30, rental vehicles on the 2nd floor of the 009th District parking garage. What are they for you ask??? Summer mobile!! Now mind you, these aren't Taurus' or Explorers. They are various types on Nissans. And who's going to drive these you ask?? The P.O.'s detailed to summer mobile. They have no emergency equipment, no CPD markings and out of state plates. Please tell me how that is going to work out???? I smell a disaster.

Someone else claims that these cars are going to be replacements for actual marked units coming to the Summer Mobile detail. So where are those 130,000-mile marked units coming from? Who has actual marked cars to spare nowadays? We know Deano gave away the store for a few hundred cars last Contract, but how many of those went to the D-unit, how many went to specialized units, how many went to assorted exempt members? Because Deano didn't specify and no one we know ever saw an actual accounting of vehicle purchases, so a brilliant move by the previous administration - Trust Rahm! He'd never screw the police!

Watch the HQ Brain Trust to come up with magnetic signs for these cars, like a pizza delivery vehicle.

UPDATE: The Department stripped all the marked cars from Forensic Services for Summer Mobile? There isn't a Forensics car that has less than 130,000 miles is what we've heard.

Fox News Request

Looking for an old timer who worked the Humboldt Park riots:

• SCC
  
  A humble request for information that would be most helpful:
  
  Know any old timers who remember the FALN bombings here in Chicago in 1976? I can’t wait to put a microphone in front of federally convicted FALN bomb maker, Oscar Lopez Rivera, today at his homecoming parade and street naming ceremony but I’m betting he will not be making any first time confessions. But I’m going to ask him anyway. The interview I would rather get is with a police officer, or a family member of someone injured in one of these bombings. Particularly the one outside of the very theater where Hamilton is now playing and whose star, Manuel Miranda has promised to play the leading role if his idol, Mr. Rivera, would like to attend the showing. It will take some hunting to track down the relatives, but I’m working on it. In the meantime, if you know anybody and could pass on a name or phone number I want to interview someone who can tell the real story. Forty years is a long time, so I could use the help finding a copper who might remember something and could share it.
  
  Madelin.Fuerste@FOXNEWS.COM

Given the recent accolades heaped on this convicted and unrepentant bomber, we encourage any veteran to get the real story out there.

Stiffed by Lolla?

Did the City get stiffed for Grant Park damages?

• Rahm donors c3 were supposed to pay for Lolla grant park damage. A Foia from the park district came back stating the park district had no information regarding this and was appealed to AG who agreed that no documents exist for the work. In other words have a fundraiser for mayor pay to play...no need to fix the damage. Mark brown got the story and was afraid to write it.

We certainly hope this isn't true. What kind of media type would sit on a story involving Chicago taxpayers getting screwed? Oh yeah, all of them.

Someone also posted that the media is running with another story from our comment section about Dart's "merit board" being improperly constituted. That'd be another $50 for the Chaplains Ministry if true.

UPDATE: Here's the Dart story - looks like the Trib owes the Chaplains.

Evans Suit Derailed

From late last week:

• A federal court judge has thrown out a lawsuit filed by a high-ranking Chicago police officer who alleged that the Independent Police Review Authority retaliated against him and set him up for criminal charges by leaking to the media.
  
  Glenn Evans, a controversial former South Side commander, sued after he was acquitted by a Cook County judge in 2015 on felony charges that stemmed from allegations he shoved his service gun down suspect Rickey Williams' throat. Williams' DNA was found on Evans' gun.
  
  Evans, who is now a lieutenant, alleged that IPRA investigator Matrice Campbell still harbored a grudge 15 years after he wrote her up for insubordination while they both worked at the Wentworth District police station and so leaked the DNA results to a WBEZ-FM reporter who then broadcast stories about the investigation.

There's still a chance going forward in the Cook County Courts, but that might be bucking a stacked deck. The Machine isn't likely to award damages against itself. But we'll see.

Sheriff Shooting (UPDATE)

Off-duty shooting in Englewood claims the life of another rocket-scientist:

• An off-duty Cook County sheriff’s deputy fatally shot a 17-year-old robbery suspect at an Englewood hair salon Wednesday afternoon, officials said.
  
  The boy, Rashad Wells, of the 6900 block of South Harvard Avenue, was pronounced dead on the scene, according to the medical examiner's office.
  
  Two people entered Marquita’s Hair Salon, at 132 W. 69th St., around 1:40 p.m. and announced a robbery, police said.
  
  The female off-duty deputy shot one of the robbers and the other one fled, according to Cara Smith, chief policy officer for the sheriff's office.

As usual, the family is up in arms:

• A woman who identified herself as the mother of the person shot, who would not spell her name, said she believed her son had been at school.
  
  "My baby was coming from school. I know he was. I dropped him off this morning. To go to school," she said.
  
  "So they shot the wrong person?" A TV reporter asked during a brief interview with relatives who asked media to gather after yelling at police.
  
  "I wasn't here," she said.

The community is angry...at the wrong department:

• Afterward, relatives yelled at police and reporters — for telling lies, for leaving the body on the ground, for having shot the boy in the first place, for locking up black men but not white men.

Our e-mail lit up with pictures of the young rapscallion before the family managed to purge all traces:

We're told there are also numerous videos, Instagram and Facebook posts. That sure is an interesting school he goes to, handing out pistols to juveniles.

Good shooting there Deputy.

UPDATE: And he was one of Tom Dart's "Electronic Monitoring" babies. How is that working out for you Dart? What exactly is the bracelet "monitoring"? He got a gun, stuck up a store, got shot - seems it isn't working. Maybe someone can ask Mark Brown to do an article about releasing predators back on the street to rob, rape, pillage and kill?

Nice Week There Ed

Monday into Tuesday, 17 shot:

• The 27-year-old man was among 17 people shot across the city over 15 hours Monday through Tuesday — 11 of them wounded in just five hours.

 Tuesday, 1 dead, 15 maimed:

• A man was killed and at least 15 other people were wounded in shootings Tuesday across Chicago.

Wednesday starts fast, ends with another 4 dead, 12 wounded:

• Four people were killed and at least 12 others were wounded in shootings Wednesday on the South and West sides.

So roughly 50 shot. In 3 days. In May.

Good thing that cold front is coming through for the weekend - looks like another Department Commendation for Tommy Skilling.

One Way to Fight Crime

And it involved a chase of all things:

• Three burglars died and a suspect escaped after their car crashed into a Georgia pond while on the run from police on Monday.
  
  The police chase began after officers received a call about a burglary at a Sprint PCS store in Fayetteville around 4:30 a.m., Fox 5 Atlanta reported. When they arrived, they chased a car with four men that was leaving the scene.
  
  Three of the men were identified as Mark Anthony Mathis, 19, Eddie Alford, 21, Devongelo Hunter, 19.
  
  The police pursuit continued to Clayton County where the suspected burglars' car struck another vehicle, went airborne and crashed into a pond, police said. The car was submerged within 15 minutes.

Well they certainly won't be doing that again!

CPS Edjamikation

This sign says it all:

To be fair, it may not have been an actual teacher putting up the sign. But it was undoubtedly seen by dozens of teachers, hundreds of students, and approved by the principal - none of whom noticed the error which stayed up all week and the following week, too.

Non-Use of Force

Remember, all actions will be judged in the harshest possible light, weeks and months afterward, subject to the changing narratives of the "community" and by people who have never been the police, nor made a life altering decision under extreme duress:

• The Chicago Police Department will implement a new use of force policy, focusing on “the sanctity of life,” Supt. Eddie Johnson announced Wednesday.
  
  Training of officers will be put into place by this fall, said Johnson, who called the reforms “a needed change.”
  
  Officers will receive a total of 12 hours of training as the department works to rebuild public trust in the years since the release of the harrowing Laquan McDonald video.
  
  Johnson said the deadly shooting of the African-American teenager was an incident “we all learned from.”

Yeah, we all learned how a political decision to withhold video can be blamed on an entire Department and how one of the guys who labeled the shooting "Justified" can somehow escape scrutiny and rise to a position to cover for his test-cheating girlfriend and her fellow cheating test takers. It was quite an educational year when you look at it that way.

Electronic Timekeeping is Here!

For the ...what? Fourth time? Fifth?

• The Chicago Police and Fire departments — which together spent nearly $200 million on overtime last year — are finally coming out of the Dark Ages when it comes to employee time-keeping.
  
  Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration has awarded a $594,000 contract to GMS Consulting to implement an “automated time and attendance system” that uses biometrics in the Police Department.
  
  The Fire Department’s transition to electronic time-keeping was handled in-house and completed late last month.
  
  Police personnel will not be “fully enrolled” until the end of 2018.

And this system sounds like a real winner:

• The transition requires city staffers to enter each employee’s timekeeping identification number into the system, then biometrically enroll each sworn officer and civilian employee at their home clock at the beginning or end of their shift.
  
  The Department of Finance also must train more than 30 timekeepers and hundreds of supervisors — including 1,200 sergeants, 275 lieutenants, 36 captains and 48 commanders — on how to enter furlough and other paid time off and how to run manpower and overtime reports as needed.
  
  The process is time-consuming because police employees represent nearly half of the city workforce and they’re spread out across many locations and multiple shifts.

Supervisors are going to do all the data entry that was previously done by the Watch Secretary? But the Department got rid of Watch Secretaries years ago (or so we heard). And the Administrative Sergeant spot is another "hidden" gem that was supposedly done away with back in the early 2000's. We can't wait to see supervisors fucking up late lunches and late requests for an hour on the end.

There are still multiple bio-metric readers in many stations, side-by-side as silent reminders of previous failed efforts.

Suggestion to everyone - hit your timekeepers up for a complete audit of your time card before this new company fucks up everything again.

Fentanyl Again

Ohio this time, and a very lucky copper:

• A police officer ended up in the hospital after overdosing by accidentally touching a highly potent drug.
  
  Chris Green, an officer from East Liverpool in Ohio, US, collapsed after he handled what was suspected to be Fentanyl.
  
  The substance, a painkiller also used as a recreational drug, is 50 to 100 times more powerful than fellow opioids morphine or heroin.
  
  Mr Green had searched a car on Friday night after the driver carried out an alleged drug deal.
  
  The officer had worn gloves and a mask when searching the vehicle but, when he returned to his police station, a colleague noticed Mr Green had white powder on his shirt.
  
  He instinctively brushed off the powder with his bare hand and, within a few minutes, began to collapse.

The ambulance crew and hospital had to give him FOUR shots of Narcan to bring him back. Something like this makes us believe that our opposition to Narcan in the squad cars needs a tiny little adjustment - save it for the copper who in unfortunate enough to have contact with this crap, not the junkies.

God Forbid More Police!

Neighbors concerned enough to call a meeting:

• The Town Hall (19th) Police District, which serves most of North Center and Lincoln Square, has 50 more officers than it did a year ago and yet residents still feel vulnerable, particularly in the wake of a recent spate of crimes — muggings, businesses being robbed and a sexual assault. "Long-time neighbors, they've told me this is different than anything they've seen before," said North Center resident Michael Menelli.
  
  The perception that crime is becoming increasingly violent in the neighborhood prompted Menelli to organize a public forum, held last Friday night at Welles Park.

Then aldercreature "I'm running for Social Justice Governor" chimes in:

• The sense that more crime is spilling over into previously insulated neighborhoods — something Pawar said he hears from several of his North Side peers on City Council — can be directly linked to the decimation of social services, he said. The agencies that provide job training, counseling, mental health services and violence prevention programs have been gutted, Pawar said. "Once the social safety net crumbles, you see more strong-arm robberies. It doesn't excuse the fact that it happened, but it's connected," he said.
  
  The solution? Not what people want to hear, the alderman said.
  
  "I would be lying if I just said there is a four-point plan and it's going to take effect" in some set amount of time, Pawar said. The easy answer would be to put a cop on every corner, a suggestion that, even if practical, wouldn't produce the desired effect, he said. "I can't sit back and just say it's a police issue. We could hire 50 percent more police and we wouldn't see a 50 percent reduction in crime," Pawar said.

How about actual prison terms? CrimeinBoystown tracks tens of dozens of crimes committed by parolees and persons out on bail all year.

How about higher rates of Concealed Carriers in the neighborhood?

How about a few democratic politicians losing their jobs over these issues and more?

From the Comments

One of the better comments we've had appearing lately:

• Any officers still working beyond answering calls, even if you are assigned to the district you live in are out of your minds. If you think you are "holding the line" you need your head examined. You have a mayor, county board president, states attorney and sheriff who are all anti-police. They are grown up and empowered 60s radicals. I have hated "dogs" my entire career but that is not remotely the issue any longer. Until society understands that a small and predictable segment of the the population is violent and incapable of conforming to civilized rules of law without strong enforcement, it is us and not them that will continue to be the only ones to be subject prosecution.

It's going to have to get a lot worse before it gets better - fortunately:

• It is interesting that [...] a civilian with a concealed deal, to an extent which is becoming clearer every day--- has more privilege to light up asshole light a Christmas tree; than a pol[ice] officer does. No mo lightin us up office. May as well put a rubber gun in my holster

 Not that bad yet, but getting there.

The Anti-Quota Boss

Amusing that this would come out of the NYPD, after the entire CompStat system was built on quota based policing:

• NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill vowed to discipline any supervisor who puts quantity before quality when it comes to summonses, it was revealed Friday.
  
  “This department does not and will not use quotas for enforcement activity,” O’Neill said in a message distributed to every command citywide on April 28. “Supervisory personnel who use quotas or encourage or reward numbers for the sake of numbers may be subject to department discipline.”
  
  O’Neill said he will also bring the hammer down on supervisors who “punish members who fail to meet a quota, or who threaten to retaliate against any member who reports the use of quotas.”

Here, you have bosses pushing quotas in writing in the hopes of getting promoted. When caught, they have Media Affairs deny, deny, deny, then hold a meeting reiterating quotas where they take away pens, paper and cell phones lest word get out again. Then they have a Captain offer a bounty to other cops to snitch out whomever revealed the original quota. Meanwhile, upstairs in the same building, reports of four cops dumped from Saturation for failing to bring in enough activity to keep their spots.

Hey Ed Burke?

Remember that "support" we were getting from Burke and some other aldercreatures about rifle training? A commentator brings up a good point:

• This fucked up City just makes me sick. A couple of weeks ago, there was Ald. Burkie, "the police need the right tools, AR-15's to do the job and protect themselves," and reading this about an essential part of the police department SWAT being fucked with its just crazy. I don't think it's just about having a first watch working, but there are all the other factors. Lack of training, no ammo, vehicles in disrepair, and simple minded merit hacks running the show. Looks like the department is killing the SWAT culture, just like they did to the Detective's culture some 15yrs ago.

And now we're on the verge of some truly bizarre SWAT restructuring that will do nothing to enhance the readiness of the unit and in fact, would seem to degrade it on numerous levels. Sometimes the solutions are staring you right in the face, yet no one does anything about it:

• Ok, just so I understand this.
  Swat is a unit that responds to HBT and other instances, where a team with heavy weapons is necessary. So the city believes that they do are not important enough to have take home cars to respond to a situation quickly. Yet, narcotics unit 189 has take home cars? Why does narcotics need take home cars? Will they be responding to a drug deal in progress from home?
  
  Police department is ass backwards

We don't know how many years ago it was pointed out by our readers that certain people at 35th Street from the Finance Division of all places, had take home cars. Why? We think the funny comment that followed was wondering if there was an emergency overtime check to be cut, would the people from Finance rush into the write it?

We can't think of a single reason that anyone from Narcotics should be getting a take home car. Do you really want some jagoff from the south side following the "buy" car to your house? And is there going to be an "emergency" buy" on the west side that would necessitate some form of call-out? And don't argue that it's paid for with 1505 funds - it's a wonder that there aren't a hundred people in jail over the way that money is acquired, (not) accounted for and spent.

Chronic mismanagement is like a resistant strain of disease around here.

UPDATE: Looks like Fox32 has joined in the "Steal stories from the Blog" movement. That'll be $100 to the Chaplain's Fund.

UPDATE: We had forgotten about IAD confidential having take-home cars. Again, why? If they're conducting a surveillance on someone, that car should be a covert and stored somewhere like 51st Street. Has anyone ever heard of an "emergency call out" for IAD? If they get called out off-hours, it's for a shooting, and in that case, the "immediacy" part is long over by the time IAD even gets called.

Safe Passage Route?

We certainly hope not:

• A man was shot to death outside Frazier International Magnet Elementary School in the Lawndale neighborhood on the West Side Tuesday morning, police said.
  
  The 34-year-old man was found in the 1100 block of South Karlov Avenue about 11 a.m. with wounds to the head and torso. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
  
  Police closed Grenshaw Avenue from Pulaski Road and closed Karlov from Roosevelt Road. Police hung tape from the fence enclosing Frazier's playground. Students did not come out for recess.

And it was such a beautiful day on the west side.

It's shaping up to be a particularly bloody week.

Armed Carjackings

How can this be? Juveniles getting guns? There are laws against this you know!

• Vehicular hijackings in Chicago nearly doubled between 2015 and 2016 — and so far this year, the city is holding pace with last year.
  
  Police say juveniles who are targeting high-end vehicles are the main reason for the sustained number of carjackings.
  
  Through May 8, 270 carjackings were reported across Chicago, according to city crime data. Of those, 158 involved a weapon.
  
  In 2012, 487 vehicular hijackings were reported across the city. Over the next three years, that number fell to between 300 and 350.
  
  Then, in 2016, the total shot up to 661, records show. With 270 carjackings reported through early May, Chicago is keeping pace with last year’s spike.

Shooting crimes might be fractionally down, but carjackings, with the accompanying fleeing-and-eluding, and continuous non-charging by Kim Foxxxx's office for "property crimes" is yet another reason why intelligent people are getting and carrying guns.

"Wring" his Neck

Imagine if Rauner had said this about a female black aldercreature:

• The head of the Chicago City Council Budget Committee on Tuesday sought to point the blame at Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner when it comes to finding a way to avoid a looming financial meltdown at Chicago Public Schools, saying in the often-blunt language she's known for that "somebody needs to take Rauner by his neck and wring it."

The media and their political masters would have been up in arms with "lynching" comparisons.

Rauner is completely correct in blaming CPS for its own financial mismanagement. We've outlined step-by-step the crooked contracting that goes on citywide. We've posted e-mails from School Officers who have seen pallets of textbooks and equipment collecting dust and being thrown away at year's end completely unused.

This is what happens in an inefficient bureaucracy with a "spend it by the end of the year or lose it" philosophy. If they don't spend the money on frivolities, it gets taken out of their budget, but somehow, it never seems to go back to the taxpayers who were forced to contribute the money in the first place.

Blue White House

As Police Memorial Week events wrap up, a sign of support that's been missing for nearly a decade:

• In addition to the flag flying at half-mast on Peace Officers Memorial Day in memory of all who have fallen in the line of duty, the White House will be illuminated in a bluish hue.
  
  “During Peace Officers Memorial Day and Police Week, we honor the men and women of law enforcement who have been killed or disabled in the course of serving our communities. Police officers are the thin blue line whose sacrifices protect and serve us every day, and we pledge to support them as they risk their lives to safeguard ours,” Trump said in the text of the proclamation.
  
  According to The Hill, the proclamation noted the 118 officers who died last year, with 66 referred to as “victims of malicious attacks.” The statistic is a 40% increase from the previous year, according to the administration.

Thank you Mr. President. God Bless the Fallen.

So How Many Retired?

No specific word from our contacts at the Puzzle Palace. We've seen comments ranging from 170 to well over 240.

We know more than a few went in April from our Districts and nearly double that in May. There's still a few who put in for retirement before the Contract expires.

So who has the real number?

Not Our Culture?

Rahm spouts this tired old saw again after a scandal hits:

• Inspector General Joe Ferguson uncovered racist and sexist emails circulating in the Department of Water Management while investigating allegations that the son of a former alderman had used his city email account to sell guns, City Hall sources said Monday.
  
  Paul Hansen, a now-fired, $122,280-a-year district superintendent in the Department of Water Management, is the son of former longtime Ald. Bernard Hansen (44th). The elder Hansen presided over Wrigleyville during the Cubs’ marathon battle for lights at Wrigley Field.
  
  On Monday, Paul Hansen refused to comment about the gun or email investigation before hanging up on a Chicago Sun-Times reporter. His checkered past with the Department of Water Management includes allegations that his political clout helped him get his job back after a DUI conviction.
  
  [...]
  
  Emanuel was tight-lipped when asked Monday to define the role he accused Murphy of playing in the email scandal. But he referred obliquely to the broader investigation of alleged gun sales.
  
  “We were made aware from an IG report on one particular employee. But in that process, it exposed a culture in the Water Department and in the workplace that, in my view, does not represent what the city’s values are,” the mayor said.

We'd certainly welcome a clarification of Chicago's values as defined by Rahm:

• Rahm claimed Chick-fil-A didn't reflect Chicago values because their company owners ascribe to the Catholic view of marriage - not that they discriminated (they didn't), but that they believe in it; Rahm then welcomed Louis Farrakhan, one of the bigger racists in our lifetimes, to the violence plagued streets of the south side;
• Rahm got outraged when someone with pirated radio uses racial slurs over a police zone, but his people hire back a known drunk who dealt guns over the city's e-mail system and spread racist e-mails to subordinates and supervisors;

Rahm doesn't seem to have a handle on "values" at all.

UPDATE: More Chicago "culture:"

• bribery for speed/red light cameras that enrich connected companies;
• passing a one-day amnesty for an aldercreature to register guns;
• crooked contracts that got the head of schools 7 years;
• establishing "residency" via a forgotten wedding dress;
• cheating on promotional exams;

The list is near endless.