So Now What Troll?

We've been set upon by a troll this week. He/She keeps posting things like "Hey SCC, March numbers are down big - why do you think that is?" Or "SCC, homicides are down for March, why do you think that is?" Or "Aren't you going to say something about the March numbers being so low?"

Okay Asshat, here you go:

• Yay! Homicides are down in March! Perhaps the "community" finally learned how to behave!

Of course, that was before the headlines popped up just a few hours ago:

• A 23-year-old Cicero man shot Wednesday night in the Austin neighborhood on the West Side has died.
• A person was shot Thursday afternoon in the Austin neighborhood on the West Side.
  The male, whose age was not immediately known, was shot in the chest multiple times at 3:12 p.m. in the first block of South Cicero...
• Four people were shot to death at a South Shore restaurant Thursday afternoon.
  According to neighbors, at least two gunmen entered Nadia Fish and Chicken at 75th and Coles just before 4 p.m. and started shooting.
• The [pregnant] woman was found dead just after noon about a mile away. The body of 26-year-old Patrice L. Calvin was discovered in a home in the 7500 block of South Luella Avenue in the South Shore neighborhood, authorities said.

So that's six dead and one on life support in under 24 hours. You want us to cheer the "low" numbers for March again?

We've said this dozens of times - fixating on the day-to-day, week-to-week, even month-to-month trend is stupid. There could be a plethora of reasons why the numbers go up and down - weather being the main one (rain and snow put big dampers on shooters). But people might be hiding, doctors might be doing a better job, ambulances might get all green lights, the shooters might be out of ammo, no one came up short on the tip. Or maybe Rahm's hiring "wave" is having the intended effect - more visible police = less shooting opportunities. Imagine that.

Not many people look as idiotic as you do right now, praising some fleeting "drop" in killings and then waking up to 6 in under a day. Up until that point, 2017 was down 14 killings. That number just dropped to 8 and might be 7 or less by the time you wake up tomorrow.

So Troll, if you want to be Special Ed's cheerleader and bounce up and down on his lap, by all means, ride his dick until you get the answers to the next promotional exam. In the meantime, go be an asshat somewhere else and come back at the end of 2017 and we'll compare the year-to-year numbers and save the praise for then.

UPDATE: And a double in 003, that makes eight in a day, six of them in 003 alone. Do you still think crime is "down" or merely hibernating a little bit? 2017 is only down six now - not exactly something you brag about.

It's a Mystery

This is a ridiculous bit of cheerleading by Frank Main again:

• Twin brothers. Twin police districts. And twin drops in crime.
  
  Chicago Police Commanders Kenneth and Kevin Johnson’s districts have both seen double-digit percentage drops in shootings so far this year.
  
  The soft-spoken brothers are graduates of the now-closed Quigley South Preparatory Seminary — Kenneth considered becoming a priest — and both credit the seminary with their calls to public service.
  
  In August, Kenneth was picked to run the Englewood District on the South Side, and Kevin became commander of the Harrison District on the West Side, part of a major shakeup of the city’s police leadership. It wasn’t an easy assignment for either brother.

Not a word about how:

• 011 and 007 have more manpower than any other districts in the city - nearly 400 cops in 011 and well over 300 in 007, something that the FOP, the blog, and coppers in general have been clamoring for for years;
• Homan Square teams are running a number of long term investigations that are targeting gang hierarchies for the first time in years - something any street copper will tell you is essential for dismantling the gangs;
• Saturation Teams are running daily operations in these districts at the direction of the Area Chiefs - again, something commanders and cops alike have been advocating for years;

In other words, running the Department on the cheap during the McCompStat era has been proven to be a failure, along with Rahm's "do more with less" strategy. More cops, even cops just learning the job, provide a visual and effective deterrent to all kinds of crime and you'd be hard pressed to measure it, except for the supposed reductions in crime.

Frank Main also neglects to point out how politically connected family members keep getting promoted "meri-clout-oriously," but that's another story that he'll never cover.

Rahm Finds More Money!

Always for something he wants - never for something that is required by law:

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday put a price tag of $160 million on a long awaited overhaul of city streetlights, more than double what a similarly sized program in New York City is expected to cost.
  
  The mayor also said the four-year switch to 270,000 energy efficient LED lights will be managed by city’s transportation department, not the privatized infrastructure trust he once touted as central to innovative public works plans.
  
  A city transportation spokesman said the higher costs were due to a more complicated and sophisticated lighting program for Chicago than New York. Chicago’s program, he said, provides for replacing both light fixtures as well as some poles and wires.

At this rate, it'd be cheaper to actually hire the New York guys, import all of their personnel and equipment, do the job, and ship all their equipment and personnel back to New York.

24 Years

A decent outcome:

• Thomas Thompson, who was charged with disarming and attempting to murder two 20th District police officers after they detained him for shoplifting from an Edgewater Walgreen's in 2015, was found guilty and sentenced to 24 years in prison today.
  
  [...] On Valentine's Day 2015, Thomas Thompson, 33, shoplifted vitamins and supplements from the Walgreen's store at Clark and Catalpa (5440 North). 20th District police officers [...] happened to be in the parking lot when he left the store. He was followed outside by the manager on duty, Ray Robinson. Mr. Robinson alerted the officers about what was going on, and they tried to stop him.
  
  Mr. Thompson is a large man, 6-3 and 250 pounds. He fought with the officers and managed to disarm one of them. He fired a shot at them that missed. He then pulled the trigger 2 more times, but the magazine had fallen out of the gun. It did not fire. Witnesses said they heard him say he wanted to kill them, and the Walgreen's security cameras taped the whole thing.

Supposedly, this hunk of shit will serve 85%, or 20.4 years (minus the 2 years in custody so far).

Here's a Safe Bet

Remember that Casino bill languishing in Springfield?

• On March 1, 2017, the Board of Directors of Pinnacle Entertainment, Inc., a Delaware corporation (the “Company”), elected Ron Huberman to the Board of Directors. Mr. Huberman will hold office until the next annual meeting of stockholders (and until his successors shall have been duly elected and qualified). The Company has not yet made a determination as to the committees of the Board of Directors on which Mr. Huberman will serve. Mr. Huberman currently serves as Senior Advisor of PeopleAdmin, a talent management software company.
  
  There are currently no arrangements or understandings between Mr. Huberman and any other persons to which he was selected as a director of the Company and he is not a party to any transaction that would be required to be disclosed by the Company to Item 404(a) of Regulation S-K.
  
  Mr. Huberman shall be eligible to participate in all previously established and disclosed compensation and benefit plans in which non-employee directors participate. Information regarding these compensation and benefit plans are described in the Company’s Information Statement, filed as Exhibit 99.1 to the Company’s Form 10-12B/A, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 11, 2016 and is incorporated by reference.

As a commentator said a few days ago:

• Let's see who gets selected to run a Chicago Casino when it comes. Ron Huberman just got elected to the Board of Directors. My money is on Pinnacle Entertainment to end up running the Chicago Casino here. You heard it here first!

Perhaps the Pension Fund should see if there's an opportunity here?

More Merit Shenanigans

This crap again:

• Off topic:
  
  A few foia's have been submitted recently attempting to find out who received a merit promotion in the first detective class. So far the city is doing everything to avoid giving out the names. Makes you wonder who was merit that they are trying so hard to shield.

Someone related to somebody? Pretending to be a legit-by-score promotion, but in reality, snuck in as a favor for future favors to be rendered.

Remember, It's the Sentencing

And then this happens from a few days ago:

• A suspect in the murder of a 10-year-old Chicago boy is set to be resentenced this week on a lesser charge. Arthur Jones was shot to death on his way to a candy store back in October, 2007.
  
  Four alleged gang members involved in a turf battle were convicted in connection with the murder. One of them, Clarence Williams, was sentenced to 43 years, but the court of appeals has since overturned his first degree murder conviction.
  
  The court found the evidence was insufficient to demonstrate that he was accountable for the murder. Instead, the court found Williams guilty of aggravated discharge of a firearm. The sentencing range for that crime is five to 15 years. Williams has already served 10 years so it's possible the judge could set him free.

Anyone know if this asshole was charged under the "Felony Murder" statute? We certainly hope this isn't some move away from finding all the perpetrators guilty of murder if their actions directly led to a killing during the commission of a felony. This guy fired a gun - the court even said so. That alone makes him guilty of participating in the murder, even if he didn't fire the fatal round.

But by all means, release a known shooter onto the streets. Anyone giving odds on his survival time?

Stroller Mission

Keep an eye out for this latest model:

Seen around the city.

More Support for Criminals

Must be democrats:

• Neighbors are calling for an investigation after a northwest side man was shot in his home by ICE agents.
  
  Felix Torres, 53, was shot in the arm by Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents around 6:20 a.m. Monday. The agents were attempting to arrest a different person who lived in the home, and said someone pointed a weapon at them.
  
  Chicago police were not involved in the raid.....

And guns were found during the Search Warrant:

• Two guns were found at the Belmont Cragin home of a man who was shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent early Monday on the Northwest Side, authorities said.

Not only were guns found, neighbors revealed to authorities that one of the people in the house is suspected of being involved in a different neighborhood shooting just a short time ago. So not only are democrats supporting the open disobedience of Federal Law and the near-shooting of Federal authorities, they are doing this to protect known shooters in the neighborhood that are driving the homicide rate.

Hey Northsiders

Here's an interesting little website with all sorts of info on Aldercreature Arena.

Click here for a history of his rise and the lies, dirty tricks and skeletons he covered up to get there.

In the meantime, Ed Burke used a procedural motion to temporarily stall the CHA project building Arena (and Rahm) is trying to bring into 016 to lead to the latest round of "block busting:"

• A plan to demolish a vacant food distribution site in the heart of Jefferson Park and replace it with a storage facility and apartment complex failed Monday to win the support of the City Council's zoning committee.
  
  Although the council typically defers to the alderman of each ward when it comes to matters of zoning, Ald. Edward Burke (14th) stepped in during what had already been hours of contentious testimony about the plan to build a five-story, 68-foot warehouse at 5150 N. Northwest Highway.
  
  Burke demanded that a roll call vote be taken to determine whether enough members of the committee were present for a vote to be valid. When it became clear that there was not enough members of the committee still present for the seventh hour of the meeting, the session was adjourned — much to the delight of opponents of the development.

No idea what pressure was brought to bear on Burke for this action - he doesn't seem to care that often. Perhaps he saw the north side going renegade and voting republican for generations instead of kowtowing to the Machine.

More drama next month.

Nice Neighborhood

The degradation of formerly "safe" areas continues:

• A DePaul University student was shot in the leg Monday night as he tried to run away from would-be robbers near the school's Lincoln Park campus, Chicago police said.
  
  The 18-year-old student told police he was walking along North Sheffield Avenue near a 7-Eleven on North Lincoln Avenue around 11:45 p.m. when two men with a gun tried to rob him. Police said when he took off running, he was shot in the leg. The student drove himself to Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center. His injuries were not life-threatening, the university said in an alert. No one was in custody Tuesday.
  
  This is the fourth time a DePaul student has been victimized near the school's Lincoln Park campus in the last three months. Most of the incidents were armed robberies.

And as usual, Channel 7 provides no description of these attackers or any of the previous attackers, so DePaul students and neighborhood residents will just have to guess at whom they should be wary and alert around.

Gee, Another Payoff

There's a whole shitload of pension money invested with this company, isn't there?

• President Barack Obama's former top White House adviser Valerie Jarrett has been appointed to the board of directors of Chicago-based Ariel Investments. Jarrett was the longest-serving senior adviser to Obama, and Ariel founder and chairman John W. Rogers Jr. is a longtime friend of Obama's. Former Obama administration Secretary of Education Arne Duncan also was appointed to the Ariel board after leaving his position. Jarrett's father, Dr. James Bowman, was one of the original members of the Ariel board of directors. Prior to becoming an adviser to Obama, Jarrett had been the chief executive officer of The Habitat Co. of Chicago, which develops and manages market-rate and affordable multifamily....

The link continues to the Tribune pay site, so use the regular tricks to get around it if you need to read it. You probably don't have to - it's just another story about how the crooked and connected play with our lives and retirements while collecting a percentage for making bad trades/investments and further bankrupting our futures.

Appropriate Reply (UPDATE)

There are still some idiot bosses pushing for numbers, despite the ACLU, the previous DOJ, and a hostile States Attorney looking to jail coppers. But there are still some coppers who know exactly how to deal with that:

• Kinda on topic we still have our clueless Lt here on days here in 018. She orders the midnight housing cars drop to-froms if they come in to check off without activity. Her head almost exploded yesterday when an old timer basically called her out writing in his to from that he'll comply with her quota when she gives it to him in writing. Priceless. Was wondering when someone was gonna shut her dumb ass up. I'd love to see a copy because I heard it's pretty funny. She was pissed!! Well played officer. Can't believe there are supervisors still demanding activity. I guess when you have no skin in the game it's easy to play in the gray areas. 

Anyone have a copy of this To-From? We'll post the lieutenant's name so the ACLU and DOJ know exactly who to look for.

UPDATE: As suspected, Lt. Personality:

So as this was addressed to the Commander, can the Lieutenant face charges for not forwarding it up the chain-of-command? It was a "direct order," and the order was complied with. The end result should be that the To-From makes it to the addressed destination.

Or is there some secret mechanism in place for bosses to make Officers generate useless paper as a sort of power-trip, and then Official Documentation never makes it to where it's supposed to go? That sounds like Official Misconduct and some form of Failure to Keep Government Records.

Profiling Strollers

The ACLU will be all over this, complaining that the CPD is targeting babies:

• A woman was charged after police found a loaded rifle wrapped in blankets in a stroller she was pushing and a handgun with extra ammunition tucked into a diaper bag early Monday in the Back of the Yards neighborhood.
  
  Police were monitoring cameras in the area of 45th and Wood streets because of gunfire there about 11 p.m. Sunday and saw two women enter a house about 2:15 a.m. - one carrying a backpack and the other a bag - and leave with a stroller about five minutes later.
  
  Those officers asked officers on the street to "conduct an investigatory stop," which they did in the 4500 block of South Hermitage Avenue, about a block from where the women were first seen.
  
  After asking if there were any weapons in the stroller, which was covered, one of the women said yes. Inside, officers found a Mossberg Model 472 30-30 rifle with two rounds and a spent shell casing wrapped in blankets. Police also found a Smith and Wesson 9mm with 15 live rounds, an extra magazine (loaded with 15 live rounds), an extra magazine and a box of 9mm ammunition in a diaper bag that was on the stroller's seat.

And when the gangs start targeting other gang bangers pushing strollers, but manage to kill a bunch of infants, we're sure the "community" will be upset and wonder why the police didn't do anything.

Stupid Idea

You'll send a liaison or you'll suffer the consequences!!!

• OT but important
  
  How about this for some BS. The 1st Deputy called a mandatory meeting for certain Commanders with "Hispanic" districts. They are mandated to bring one Hispanic officer who will be the liaison to the Hispanic community. They are also being made to do interviews for a puclic service announcement declaring threat the CPD supports Rahm and his sanctuary city bull. Most coppers are saying thanks but no thanks since many of them actually don't believe in Rahms philosophy. The 1st deputy is livid that nobody will "volunteer" to help get Rahms message out and has demanded that the Commanders bring a Hispanic officer or don't show up at all!!

After the Sessions press conference, you'd be pretty soft to volunteer for something like this. And if you're drafted, you better be keeping a very detailed notebook of who told you what, when and who else was present.

Hey FOP, can the Department force cops to "give interviews" to parrot a party line for Rahm? We can't give/have political opinions on-duty in uniform due to rules and an obligation to enforce the law equally, but now the First Deputy can "order" you to give a statement supporting a position in violation of Federal Law?

Sounds like an easily winnable grievance, lawsuit and EEOC beef. Sign us up - we could use the money.

One Felon at a Time

These are the "law abiding:"

• A 53-year-old man was wounded after being shot by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Chicago's Belmont Cragin neighborhood on the Northwest Side Monday morning, according to police.
  
  The shooting happened just before 6:20 a.m. in the 6100 block of West Grand, Chicago police said. Family identified the wounded man as Felix Torres. ICE said they were not initially at the residence to arrest Torres.
  
  ICE Homeland Security Investigations special agents were attempting to make an arrest when someone pointed a weapon at them, officials with the department said in a statement.

Pointing a gun at any law enforcement officer will usually get you shot. Everyone claims he was unarmed - but someone had a gun:

• Family members of Torres claim he did not have a gun and is in the United States legally. His daughter, Carmen Torres, told NBC 5 the family was not told why agents were at the home Monday.

Well, they had a warrant, signed by a judge. That's pretty much all the excuse they need. Of course, the suspects chime in:

• Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa said the raid "is exactly why the City of Chicago should refuse to collaborate with ICE."
  
  "This guns blazing ICE raid deepens my resolve to organize my community so we can keep each other safe from the threat posed by ICE," Ramirez-Rosa said in a statement. "The City and State should not wait until another Chicagoan is shot by ICE to act on strengthening the Welcoming City Ordinance and passing the TRUST Act (HB 3099)."

We have yet to see a city ordinance that would supersede Federal Law, and we doubt HB 3099 is going anywhere under this president.

Rahm meanwhile, pretends he has a pair tucked away in his tutu:

• After Attorney General Jeff Sessions reiterated the federal government’s threat to block funding for so-called "sanctuary cities,” Mayor Rahm Emanuel doubled down on his own promise that Chicago will “continue to welcome” immigrants.
  
  "I've always seen Chicago as a welcoming city,” Emanuel said in an interview from the Nasdaq stock exchange in New York on Monday.
  
  “It welcomed my grandfather 100 years ago, we continue to welcome entrepreneurs, immigrants, and I would just say think of it this way: Half the new businesses in Chicago and the state of Illinois come from immigrants, nearly half,” he added. “Half the patents at the University of Illinois come from immigrants, and so we want to continue to welcome people, welcome their ideas, welcome their families to the city of Chicago, who want to build the American dream for their children and their grandchildren.”

You know what all those immigrants have in common Rahm? They were all LEGAL. They waited in line, completed the appropriate paperwork, passed a background check and did everything they were supposed to do. But now, the entire democratic party platform is based on supporting and abetting breaking Federal Law.

Mr Dean Goes to Washington

So is this the reason Rahm is so pissy lately?

• Sneed is told Chicago Fraternal Order of Police chief Dean Angelo, who represents the Chicago Police Department’s embattled and embittered rank and file, has been summoned to Washington, D.C., to meet with President Donald Trump to discuss the deadly grip gun violence has on our city.
  
  Sneed hears the meeting, which will also include Attorney General Jeff Sessions, as well as a cadre of Trump staff, is set for Tuesday.

That'd frost Rahm's ass for sure.

He's supposed to be the one meeting with Madam President and reaping all sorts of unaccountable federal grants to put a Consent Decree into place and stomp the Police Department into the ground as the liberal's final revenge for 1968. Instead, he has to watch a guy who is barely hanging onto his job (and who is actually polling behind), after Rahm already went to DC and was pretty much told by Trump's people to go shit in his hat.

What's the word we're looking for here? Oh yeah.....Priceless.

"Didn't Deserve"??

What was it William Munny said? " 'Deserves' got nothin' to do with it"

• On Saturday, for the second time in less than two years, Luciana Sanders got the news that her teenage son had been shot.
  
  Last year, Laquan Allen was shot in the thigh. He recovered.
  
  Saturday afternoon, someone came again for 14-year-old Laquan, who was on a sidewalk near a Chicago Park District playground in the 4900 block of West Hubbard Street.
  
  He did not survive.

You get shot twice in under two years, you're doing something wrong. And if the stories out of 015 are true, if you get shot within hours of being released on a PSMV charge, well, someone else probably thinks you deserve a lesson.

The ACLU has demanded that 015 stop only white people (and folks) for the next 24 hours in an effort to find the killer(s) of this poor car thief. The trouble is that they can't find enough to keep the ACLU mandated statistics completely even. The police aren't looking forward to finding the appropriate percentage of Hispanic suspects, and God only knows they're going to do when they need to find Asians.

Cardinal Butts In

Cupich is putting together a "blue ribbon committee" to address gun violence:

• Sneed hears Cardinal Blase J. Cupich, who has likened the city’s gun violence to the Great Chicago Fire, has put together a fire brigade. And he hopes to set the bells ringing before Easter.
  
  • Translation: In an effort to stem the violence stigmatizing Chicago throughout the world, Sneed is told, the cardinal ordered an inventory on all archdiocesan programs (84) dealing with strengthening families to streamline their effectiveness in dealing with violence; summoned a blue-ribbon committee of advisers to deal with stemming violence; and hopes to integrate their work with other agencies.
  
  • The team: It’s comprised of Chicago’s Catholic university heads; Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s former Chief of Staff Eileen Mitchell; Illinois Supreme Court Justice Anne Burke; Father David Jones, pastor of St. Benedict The African East Catholic Church in the violence-scarred East Englewood neighborhood; Father Scott Donahue of Mercy Home For Boys and Girls; the Rev. Michael Pfleger of Saint Sabina Church; and Msgr. Michael Boland from Catholic Charities.

Wow, that's quite the panel:

• a white woman who worked for Rahm (white guy)
• a white woman married to Ed Burke (white guy)
• a black priest
• a white priest
• a white priest who pretends to be black
• another white priest

Anyone know how soon until the ACLU demands equal representation? After all, a panel that's 83% white has pretty much zero in common with the community where the bloodshed is occurring.

Father of the Year Candidate

And the nominee is.....

• A 32-year-old man was charged with a felony count of possession of handgun and child endangerment when officers found marijuana and a gun in a stroller on Friday afternoon in the Austin neighborhood on the West Side.
  
  Officers responded to a call of a person with a gun at 3:18 p.m. in the 100 block of North Leclaire and found Anthony Kennedy in possession of a handgun as he pushed a baby in a stroller, Chicago Police said.
  
  Kennedy, who lives in the block, ran when officers approached, police said. Marijuana and a handgun were found in the stroller, police said. The baby was placed in the care of a relative.

Using the kid as cover, then leaving the kid behind when he's busted dirty and has to run.

We suppose that, to his credit, he didn't use the kid as a human shield while running from the police. But then, he probably realized it was the police and the odds of the cops taking a shot at him were much lower than if it were a rival dope dealer.

And Again....

...the complete ignorance of statistical reality to push the anti-police agenda:

• Despite a dramatic drop in the number of street stops by Chicago police in the first half of 2016, officers continued to disproportionately stop African-Americans, according to a new report.
  
  The report found that nearly 71 percent of stops were of African-Americans, though they make up only about a third of Chicago's residents.
  
  Those findings — released by city officials Friday afternoon — came in the first of a series of reports on the Chicago Police Department's stop-and-frisk practices commissioned as part of a 2015 agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois.

Last time we checked, white people (and folks) are the minority in Chicago nowadays. Just laying that out there.

And if the "reporters" had actually done some homework, they'd hop over to HeyJackass.com and note that upwards of 80% of crime victims (along with identified offenders) are so-called "minority." So it would only make sense that 71% of the stops are people fitting the description of known offenders. It simply doesn't make sense in ACLU-World to do street stops of people in regard to their percentage of the population - the population is not reflective of the reality. But the "reporters" run with this story, spreading the anti-police narrative because Rahm has a contract to negotiate this summer, and a trial, and a promotional scandal to cover up.

Cop Injured, Chase Ensues

Has anyone noticed an uptick in people (or folks) fleeing traffic stops?

• A Chicago police officer was injured after a chase that started on West Side and ended in the western suburbs Saturday morning, police said.
  
  Officers observed the driver commit a traffic violation in the 4400-block of West Lexington Avenue at about 1:35 a.m. and initiated a traffic stop in the 600-block of South Kostner Avenue, police said.
  
  The driver, identified by police as Kerry Holoman, 22, of Chicago, refused to provide his license or proof of insurance and sped away on the sidewalk, running over an officer's foot, police said.
  
  Holoman drove west on I-290 and crashed into a light pole while trying to exit the expressway at 16th Street, police said. He was apprehended after a brief foot chase in the 1500-block of Harrison Street in Maywood.

We've heard there are literally hundreds of "chases" that never make it to termination lately, mostly on the west and south sides. The word has hit the street (as predicted) that CPD cannot chase, and the criminals know there is no punishment from the Court system, so there's no downside to fleeing and eluding. Any pursuit that actually makes it to conclusion is a rarity.

Fed-Heimers Again?

This asshole did more damage to Chicago than riots, fire, disease, flood combined - and he'll never face a single consequence:

• Attorneys for Richard M. Daley said a medical condition could affect the former mayor’s deposition in a federal lawsuit alleging torture under former Chicago Police Cmdr. Jon Burge.
  
  Daley’s condition, though undisclosed, is the subject of an “Attorneys’ Eyes Only” protective order that was granted by U.S. District Judge Amy St. Eve on Wednesday.
  
  The order provides that Daley’s medical records — including his private health information, “Mental Health Communications, and/or Mental Health Records” — are to be submitted under seal, court filings show. Those records are “for no other litigation or purposes.”

You know what happens after he dies?

The line to piss on his grave is going to run around the block three or four times minimum.

Summer Preview

Fast start to a rainy weekend:

• A person was killed and 13 were wounded in shootings across Chicago during the first 15 hours of the weekend.
  
  The homicide happened just before 5 p.m. Friday in the West Englewood neighborhood on the South Side,...

It's climbed up to 15 wounded so far.

Not a Deadly Weapon

Good thing she was carrying a gun so the Tulsa police were justified in using Force below what she was threatening to use against them.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. But remember this when Kimmy and Toni and everyone else says a car isn't a deadly weapon. Ask anyone in Nice, France or London, England or even OSU.

You're Doing it Right

90% of the time, street stops are documented properly:

• Most of the stops that police officers made in Chicago during the first half of 2016 appeared to be by the book, according to a long-awaited report released Friday by a retired federal magistrate judge.
  
  Arlander Keys found what he termed a “good stop rate” of about 90 percent of the stops that he and his researchers reviewed. “This good stop rate, in isolation, certainly represents an excellent start by the CPD to documenting investigatory stops,” Keys wrote.

Of course, since stops are down 90%, it's that much easier to read all those ISR's. But this report, once again, gives lie to the ACLU contention that CPD was out of control, stopping people who were innocently walking down the street in high-crime areas, minding their own business. And even the 10% that aren't "good," might actually just be documented poorly.

But the report wouldn't be complete without throwing in some racial element - this is Chicago after all:

• But Keys noted that blacks and Hispanics are more likely than whites to be subjected to “bad stops,” in which officers failed to articulate probable cause for stopping someone. Minorities also are more likely to be patted down by officers, the retired federal judge found.

What made the stops "bad"? Was the Articulable Reasonable Suspicion not properly documented? That's a training issue. And did the intrepid Sun Times "reporters" ask how many of the pat-downs were based on consent? We didn't think so.

So we can safely guess that upwards of 95% of the stops are actually fully and legally compliant, just like with the Blue Cards that have lasted over a decade past their actual study time, that STILL haven't found any evidence of racial profiling.

So can the ACLU finally pack and leave town?

Good Question

Anyone have the number to the Inspector General?

• Anonymous said...SCC does that mean WeeZee will be charged on each question she cheated in The Lt exam , if so they'll lock her up and throw away the key!!

Does Special Ed want to weigh in on this one? What's good for the goose.....

Piling it On

As the First Degree Murder case falls apart (lack of intent), Kim Foxxx fires her Grand Jury Shotgun at the wall, hoping that something will stick:

• The Chicago police officer who fatally shot Laquan McDonald in 2014 was indicted this month on 16 counts of aggravated battery — one for each bullet fired at the 17-year-old.
  
  Officer Jason Van Dyke, 38, was indicted in 2015 on six counts of first-degree murder and one count of official misconduct. Those charges still stand.
  
  But the new charges point to possible worries that prosecutors won't be able to convict Van Dyke on the more severe charges, according to Chicago-Kent College of Law professor and former public defender Richard Kling.
  
  "There are myriad possibilities," Kling said. "Are they doing it because they realize there's a problem with the murder charge? Do they think aggravated battery is a more appropriate charge than first-degree murder? Knowing he's a police officer, do they think there's a good chance he won't get convicted?"
  
  Kling, who has handled hundreds of murder cases in his career, said the 16 aggravated battery charges could mean prosecutors are worried the original murder indictment won't stick — or they could simply signify a new legal strategy.

This new "strategy" better cut both ways. Every pull of a trigger, every swing of a fist - it all better be charged as individual crimes against everyone when it happens. We've said it dozens of times here - cops aren't above the law, but they aren't below it either. This looks like Foxxx has no clue as to what she's doing, so she's taking direction from her political masters.

No One Likes Chicago

We blame Rahm:

• Among the 19 largest metro areas in the United States, the Chicago region was the only one that did not grow in population between 2015 and 2016, according to new figures released by the U.S. Census Bureau.
  
  In fact, the Chicago region lost 19,570 residents, or .2 percent, more people lost than in any other metro area in the country, according to the data. At the other end of the scale, the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington region saw its population jump up by 143,435 people, or 2 percent, according to the data.
  
  The Chicago region includes Naperville, Elgin and parts of northwest Indiana and southeast Wisconsin. Despite the population decrease, the region remained the nation’s third most heavily populated, behind New York and Los Angeles.

And the reasons people gave for leaving?

• Taxes, fines and fees
• Real estate prices
• 9.5 digit midgets
• Crime
• Corruption

Not really surprising.

Wisconsin Shooting

Lost in the shuffle yesterday, another Brother in Blue lost his life:

• A man angry after a domestic dispute opened fire in a Wisconsin bank, killing two longtime employees, then killed an attorney at a nearby law firm and a detective trying to set a perimeter outside his apartment complex before he was finally captured, police said. His wife was unhurt.
  
  The man, whom police would not identify, was hospitalized Thursday under police guard with nonfatal wounds, police said.
  
  Citing an ongoing investigation, police released few other details of the shootings on Wednesday, including why the attorney was targeted and where the man's wife was. They said investigators had worked through the night to process multiple crime scenes and had more work ahead.

Condolences to the families north of the border.

Not My Pants!

Truth is stranger than....well, truth actually - we've heard this excuse on the streets twice ourselves:

• ANDERSON, Ind. -- A warrant has been issued for the arrest of a Madison County man after cocaine was discovered in the pocket of his pants, which his son wore to school, police say.
  
  On March 9, police were called to Erskine Elementary School when a teacher said one of her students approached her, saying another student had powder in a bag. The teacher asked the student, and he showed her two bags of white powder in them.
  
  She asked the child where the bags came from. The student said he wore his father's jeans to school and the bags were in a pocket.
  
  The student also said his father sells the white powder and keeps in a box in his closet. He told his teacher he has seen his father take it out and weigh it.

Shut up kid - take your weight!

Early Release = More Crime

This popped up in the comment section a day or so ago regarding the Wrigleyville rapist:

• To summarize 31-year-old Jarqueese Henigan's adult years:
  

  2004: Sentenced to 4 years for burglary
  2006: Released early
  2006: Sentenced to 10 years for firearms charge
  2011: Released early
  2011: Sentenced to 6 years for possessing a firearm in a robbery
  2014: Released early
  2017: Charged with raping, kidnapping, robbing Wrigleyville woman

But hey, keeping criminal s locked up is racist or something, which we're sure is a great comfort to the most recent victims of Illinois' broken system.

London Terror

Once again, it's everywhere, especially in places where an un-assimilated and un-screened population refuses to live by the laws of the land:

• A knife-wielding man went on a deadly rampage in the heart of Britain's seat of power Wednesday, plowing a car into pedestrians on London's Westminster Bridge before stabbing a police officer to death inside the gates of Parliament. Five people were killed, including the assailant, and 40 others were injured in what Prime Minister Theresa May condemned as a "sick and depraved terrorist attack."
  
  Lawmakers, lords, staff and visitors were locked down after the man was shot by police within the perimeter of Parliament, just yards (meters) from entrances to the building itself and in the shadow of the iconic Big Ben clock tower. He died, as did three pedestrians on the bridge, and the police officer.

Deepest condolences to our British counterparts.

Aldercreatures are "Troubled"

What a bunch of assholes:

• Some Chicago aldermen seem dismayed by the way police are informing local residents about sex offenders and gun offenders living on their blocks.
  
  Aldermen from two city council committees worry that not enough people are informed when such offenders move into their neighborhoods.

And how would the "distinguished" aldercreatures propose to remedy the situation? Perhaps they and their staff could go door-to-door and let everyone know? Maybe take the $1.5 slush fund money and send out a flyer via the Post Office? Maybe a public access show?

They're "dismayed" at something that they have the power to remedy - except that costs money they could spend elsewhere, like crooked contracts, feathering their nests, hiring relatives, etc.

Burke takes the cake though:

• Finance Committee Chairman, Ald. Ed Burke said he is “incredulous” that the city has registered only about 1,500 gun offenders, with another 500 who are supposed to register.

Um, they're criminals Ed. They didn't read the law to start with, and probably had no intention of obeying it even if they could read it. You expect them to suddenly register with the authorities....why? They're making bail on murder cases and walking on gun charges. Toni and Tommy don't want them in jail, so even if they get tagged for a non-compliance violation, they're shown the door within hours.

This surprises Burke for some reason.

Problem Funerals

We don't know how these asshats whine when they're the ones accepting money to bury problems:

• June Williams, director of a Gresham neighborhood funeral home, worries about getting shot at work.
  
  In the last two years, Golden Gate Funeral Home has seen several acts of violence, including an instance where a staff driver was shot.
  
  In the past, Williams said she’s had to turn over to the police funeral home guest books signed by gang members who were attending funerals of their rivals. Among grieving families and friends mourning their lost loved ones are revenge-seeking guests that compromise the safety of everyone at the funeral home, 2036 West 79th St., Williams said.
  
  “Regardless of what caused the death of a loved one, I have mothers and grandmothers that are standing with me. ... We deserve to be safe at a funeral,” said Bishop Larry Trotter, senior pastor of the Sweet Holy Spirit Church, 8621 S. Chicago Ave., in the South Chicago neighborhood, where a Tuesday press conference was held calling for legislation to keep violence out of funerals.
  
  Chicago funeral home directors and activists at the conference said they are working with Sen. Napoleon Harris, D-Harvey, on writing a bill that proposes tougher consequences for offenders who commit crimes involving a weapon at funerals. The bill will mirror the stiffer penalties for certain gun crimes near schools and along designated Safe Passage routes, Trotter said.

Because gun and drug laws work so well. Because people (or folks) aren't getting shot leaving or going to 26/Cal. Because the city isn't spending tens of thousands most weeks assigning Tact, Gang and Saturation teams to monitor gang funerals. Because out-of-control funerals though peaceful neighborhoods never result in gunfire.

How about the funeral homes be required to remit a bond to the city to cover the expected costs and misbehavior from a portion of society that can't even muster up a modicum of peace for the dead? Start the number at $100,000 for the first gang funeral they host, $250,000 for the second.

The New Fad

This must be the next "Big Thing:"

• As a 15-year-old girl was apparently sexually assaulted on Facebook Live, about 40 people watched the video — but none reported the attack to police, police said Tuesday.
  
  Ald. Michael Scott Jr. (24th), who said he was briefed by police on Tuesday afternoon, said a suspect was in custody, but that could not be confirmed with police.
  
  A Chicago Police spokesman tweeted Tuesday afternoon that police were “making good progress in identifying persons of interest” in the assault, but that no suspects had been named.
  
  Scott said police believe the girl knew her attackers and that they are all minors.

This comes on the heels of the kidnapping/beating/hate crime of the mentally challenged suburban kid, along with dozens of other crimes that pop up from time to time - the guy who broadcast his own shooting, the auntie who live-streamed her boyfriend and nephew getting killed while she got shot, at least half-a-dozen pursuits off the tops of our heads.

We would blame Worldstar, but they're just a symptom of a larger problem that no one will address.

It's for Safety - Not Money

Rahm swears it is so:

• Some red light cameras in Chicago are coming down—but they’re also going up in new areas after an independent study found they demonstrate “significant safety benefits,” the city announced Monday.
  
  The study, conducted by the Northwestern University Transportation Center, suggested the city continue the program after after it highlighted benefits such as a 19 percent reduction in serious crashes and 10 percent reduction in injury-producing crashes at intersections where cameras were present. The city says, per the study’s recommendation, it will immediately extend the grace period in which drivers are not ticketed when passing through a light that has just turned read to 0.3 seconds—up from 0.1 seconds.

This "Northwestern" place - the same establishment with the disgraced journalism program?

So where are these cameras that are coming down?

• 95th Street and Stony Island Avenue (two cameras)
  Western Avenue and 71st Street (two cameras)
  Western Avenue and Pershing Road (two cameras)
  Grand Avenue and Oak Park Avenue (two cameras)
  Irving Park Road and Kedzie Avenue (two cameras)
  Peterson Avenue and Pulaski Road (two cameras)

And going up?

• Wacker Drive and Lake Street (two cameras)
  Michigan Avenue and Jackson Boulevard (two cameras)
  Dearborn Avenue and Grand Avenue (two cameras)
  Central Avenue, Foster Avenue, Northwest Highway and Milwaukee Avenue (two cameras)
  Pershing Road and Martin Luther King Drive (two cameras)

Anyone have the dollar amount generated by the cameras coming down? And the traffic volume numbers for the intersections? And the per capita income by zip code where the cameras are going up, which has to be taken into consideration since the bribery scandals have tainted any hint of legitimacy that camera "enforcement" might have.

26/Cal Shooting

No fear of consequences:

• A 22-year-old man was shot Monday morning while walking to the Leighton Criminal Courts Building in the Little Village neighborhood on the Southwest Side.
  
  About 9:30 a.m., he was walking to the courthouse in the 2500 block of South California when someone fired shots from a white van that was driving by, according to Chicago Police.
  
  The man suffered six gunshot wounds to the groin area, and was taken in critical condition to Mount Sinai Hospital, police said.
  
  Two off-duty police officers saw the shooting and pursued the shooter, who was taken into custody, police said. Charges were pending.
  
  A weapon was also recovered from the area, police said.
  
  Police initially said the man was entering the courthouse in the 2600 block of South California when he was shot.

Shots from a white van....but police chased it on foot? Weapon recovered....hidden in a garbage can nearby? Sloppy reporting. Amazingly, Special Ed didn't strip anyone.....yet. But everyone who was late to Court can expect to get a day.

That's the second shooting associated with a court appearance recently. Are the gangs keeping tabs on court/bond dates for people they want to eliminate?

(UPDATE: Court Deviation joke added after our comedians lit up the comment section)

UPDATE II: Six shots to the groin of a running man, from a moving vehicle, over Rahm's moon-crater surface streets. Who's doing the shooting? Annie Oakley?

There Goes the Funding

Is Chicago about to get burned?

• President Donald Trump's Department of Homeland Security issued a list Monday of counties in which law enforcement agencies have refused to comply with immigration officials in deporting illegal immigrants who have been charged with crimes.
  
  Clark County, Nev., and Nassau County, N.Y., are the top two on ICE's list. Between Jan. 28 and Feb. 3 of this year, law enforcement in Clark declined 51 detainers while those in Nassau declined 38. The other counties listed declined less than fifteen.

Cook County refused a mere 13 requests - and for those 13 illegal aliens, Rahm is risking untold millions, perhaps a billion dollars in total over a decade.

The Dirty Election

So the FOP election has fallen into the "dirty tricks" category with Dean Angelo, a guy who spent 10 years on disability, came off of the disability roll when he was safe from the streets and ready to retire this June, openly questioning his opponent's residency via a media tool:

• Chicago Police Officer Kevin W. Graham once picketed with the Fraternal Order of Police carrying a sign that called for ending the residency requirement for Chicago cops: “If the city wants to save money, lift residency requirement,” it read.
  
  In 2013, he and his wife sold their split-level house in Edgebrook on the city’s Northwest Side — and bought a more expensive four-bedroom house in Lincolnshire, about 25 miles outside the city limits in Lake County.
  
  Now, Graham wants to head the city’s largest police union, aiming to unseat FOP President Dean Angelo in a high-profile runoff that ends March 29.
  
  And even though Graham has a suburban address, he insists he’s renting his sister’s Chicago condo, living there in full compliance with police department rules.

So is this a big deal? We can name 20 coppers right now who moved their families out of the city for assorted reasons and who maintain residences in two locations with relatives, friends or co-workers. It's nothing hundreds of our readers haven't advocated, attempted and accomplished in one form or another. Shortshanks, Rahm, Prickwrinkle, their henchmen, schools, tax policies, etc have made it undesirable (and less affordable) to reside in the city and county. And if you have a working spouse who makes decent coin, it makes economic sense, too. Coppers have won this in court. Hell, Rahm established "residency" with a wedding dress he hadn't worn in years.

So it's time to evaluate this election, not on the dirty tricks, but on the realities we see on the ground:

• Dean is the invisible president. That isn't good in the upcoming negotiations;
• Dean gave away too much - duty availability for the youngsters, tuition reimbursement limits. And asking for vehicles in a labor contract?
• The failure to advocate heavily for the casino. The unilateral extension of the pension bailout, giving Rahm hundreds of millions to spend on pet projects. Unforced errors that jeopardize an already broken system;
• Dean is mandatory retirement age this year. That means in addition to the 9 of 17 trustees being retired (and a tenth retiring this year), 2 of 3 sergeants-at-arms retired, the Recording secretary retired and Dean about to retire, 13 of 27 elected spots will be retirees, and not a single one of them can have a hand in the upcoming negotiations. How is that representative of the active membership?

That isn't to say we don't have questions about Graham:

• His roll in the Shields debacle that cost the membership legal fees and a payout;
• The end of his tenure with the state lodge under unexplained circumstances;
• The sale of his Edgebrook property to Rahm's retired sergeant uncle - that sort of thing isn't coincidence;
• His close relationship with Donahue, Dougherty and Aguilar. Two of those three shouldn't be anywhere near an inside spot ever again due to negligence, incompetence and an inability to focus on their actual job - to protect the membership and the Contract. And the other one endorsed Rahm.

We'd like to see one of the candidates confirm that those we elected are those that will serve in the office. Failing that, we're going to end up falling back on our previous advice - Patrol before Detective, active before retiree - and we'll push hard for amendments that allow the elected representatives to serve those that elected them.

Imagine That....

...another parolee:

• Prosecutors on Sunday detailed how a recent parolee kidnapped a woman in the Wrigleyville neighborhood, sexually assaulted her, then took her on a nightmarish journey in the trunk of her car that ended only after the kidnapper crashed the car in a high-speed police chase.
  
  Jarqueese O’Brian Henigan, 31, was charged with felony aggravated criminal sexual assault; aggravated kidnapping; vehicular hijacking aggravated with a firearm; robbery armed with a firearm; armed habitual criminal, and possession of a controlled substance.
  
  Cook County Criminal Court Judge Laura Sullivan ordered Henigan held without bail, calling him a “real and present danger.”

End day-for-day credit. Truth in sentencing is the only way.

FOIA Request

Via an e-mail:

• SCC
  
  just got word that the Sergeants Association filed an FOIA request for the Inspector General's findings regarding the cheating scandal. The only way they can get the IG's report is if there is a concluded investigation, so they must know something is in the works. Maybe a PBPA lawsuit to tear down the entire list?

Very interesting.

Seriously? SERIOUSLY???

The Tribune actually publishes this bullshit and calls it "news:"

• As Chicago police ramp up their ticketing of bicyclists, more than twice as many citations are being written in African-American communities than in white or Latino areas, a Tribune review of police statistics has found.
  
  The top 10 community areas for bike tickets from 2008 to Sept. 22, 2016, include seven that are majority African-American and three that are majority Latino. From the areas with the most tickets written to the least, they are Austin, North Lawndale, Humboldt Park, South Lawndale, Chicago Lawn, West Englewood, Roseland, West Garfield Park, New City and South Chicago.
  
  Not a single majority-white area ranked in the top 10, despite biking's popularity in white areas such as West Town and Lincoln Park.

And then the supposed "reporter" uses this as an example:

• African-American cyclist Patric McCoy, 70, said he's experienced the heightened enforcement firsthand.
  
  McCoy had just left his Kenwood condo on a frigid January evening to go to dinner when he was stopped by two Chicago police officers in an unmarked car. The white officers told McCoy repeatedly that he could be ticketed for riding on the sidewalk and even arrested, and McCoy said he waited in the cold while they ran his driver's license to check for warrants. Eventually, they let him go without a ticket.
  
  McCoy, who said he was only on the sidewalk in front of his own building and a neighboring building and already off the bike when he was stopped, supports enforcing the rules but said it cannot be "arbitrary and capricious."

Um....it isn't "arbitrary and capricious" if you were breaking the law. We don't have Chapter and Verse, but it reads pretty much anyone over the age of 12 (?) who rides a bicycle on the sidewalk is breaking the law.

He was justifiably stopped because he WAS BREAKING THE LAW, not because he was black. You break the law, you attract the attention of the police, who are tasked with.....enforcing the law! If you ride a bike, you are a vehicle and you are supposed to use the road and obey the Rules of the Road - that's why Rahm has been wasting million of dollars on bike lanes.

Perhaps there some sort of correlation between obeying traffic laws and certain communities? Would the media like to cover that? Because we seem to recall other "studies" that show a prevalence of traffic enforcement in those listed communities and Rahm just unveiled some plan we mentioned last week about trying to cut down on fatal accidents in...(wait for it)...those listed communities, too.

Tell you what Rahm, Special Ed, Tribune "fake news" reporters - we will ask once again, for a list of laws and ordinances that certain people (or folks) don't have to bother to obey. Just let us know, and we'll be sure to post it here so everyone can know exactly what is and isn't expected of the community. Because obviously, the cops don't know their jobs.

Hunchlab

This sounds like the Crystal Ball Unit reborn:

• SCC:
  
  Sorry for posting comment not related to the topic. But I just gotta bring this "HunchLab" bullshit that's going on in 009 to daylight and hopefully get some attention to it.
  
  We are now checking out a mobile phone everyday along with radios, taser, and bwc. And the mobile phone has this app call the HunchLab, which pulls up a map and real time gps of your location. It shows you boxes in the beat where you should go down on either a "high visibility car patrol" or "foot patrol" mission for the duration of 5 min of each box. On top of that, you are suppose to log your activity during the 5 min on a sheet of paper.
  
  What exactly does this BS technology accomplished besides making POs a sitting duck inside a box area (sometimes it's LESS than a one block radius). Is it so hard to hand out mission sheets at roll call and just draw an ev# and log it with paper and pen? I am open to technology to make the job easier, but this is such a drag and literally taking attention away from POs. This is like playing pokemon Go with a stupid phone while you are driving to hit those mission boxes. It suppose to make your job easier, not making it more complicated.
  
  In addition, we now have 2 POs sitting in that room , taking manpower OFF the street. What we need are SECURE RADIOS CHANNELS that the gangs can't listen to. I am ranting because this job is getting stupider and stupider everyday with this non-sense "predictive" technology dragging our feet. Gangbangers can always fool the shotspotter by firing off a couple round on one spot and commit to hit the actual target on another, while we are being send to the decoy location. 009 is already short on manpower, and with 2 POs sitting in the "situation room" daily, we can only hope that on one will get hurt. At least not by being thrown under the bus by the brass.

First up, why do paper for something already tracked by computer? Seems wasteful for our "green" mayor.

Second, pulling PO's off the street? This would seem like a perfect opportunity to staff an off-the-street spot with light or limited duty individuals, like Dean Angelo.

Third, is this "real-time" stuff? Because we're getting into some weird "Minority Report" type stuff, which was our main complaint with the Crystal Ball Unit. Who is determining where the "hunch" areas are? A computer? Old time gang guys with actual names and memories for what happened and when? Are they singling out individuals on the street via some sort of "algorithm" that might violate some unknown ACLU edict?

Lots of questions, not so many answers, which Special Ed might find "concerning."

This is "Progressive"?

Everyone pretty much agrees aldercreature Arena is a scumbag. Following a contentious meeting with his constituents, he issued this statement via Twitter:

He is now taking heat from Indiana:

• Insults hurled by 45th Ward Alderman John Arena at both the state of Indiana and his own constituents have triggered a detailed response by a group that studies the economic climate of Illinois and Indiana.
  
  In reaction to growing local opposition to a planned subsidized-housing development in his ward and citywide tax increases, Arena told constituents in a Facebook post, "Go ahead ... Move to Indiana and live in a Third-World economy with shit schools and low wages."
  
  Michael Lucci of the Illinois Policy Institute, a Chicago think tank, said his accusations about Illinois' neighbor were not only false, but that Indiana's economic climate is better than that of the Prairie State.
  
  “Arena shouldn’t describe it as a Third World country," Lucci told the Chicago City Wire. It’s ironic that he uses that phrase to describe Indiana when it’s not the case. Wages and income are growing faster in Indiana than Illinois.”

We're going to guess Arena hasn't attended a Chicago Public School in quite some time. He also seems to have failed basic economics and doesn't notice how many subcontracted employees and their vehicles seem to bear Indiana license plates nowadays.

If you had any doubts, get a load of his wife in this video, ripping on protestors and call them all......wait for it....RACISTS! for daring to oppose her husband's attempt to import an 8-story Section 8 project building across the street from 016.

Cubs OT Tab

Nearly $19 million:

• As the Cubs made history last fall, the city of Chicago paid overtime — lots of it.
  
  The city spent more than $18.8 million on overtime for public safety, traffic management and street cleanup during the Cubs’ march to their first World Series title in 108 years, according to records released Friday afternoon by City Hall in response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed months ago by the Chicago Sun-Times.
  
  [...] The vast majority of Cubs-related overtime also came in the police department: $17.2 million. The title run also cost the city about $840,000 in overtime for the Office of Emergency Management and Communications and $743,000 for Streets and Sanitation, which provided extra traffic management and garbage collection, records show.

And this includes shelling out a few million for non-clinching out-of-town games that shouldn't have even been on the radar, a legacy of the most incompetently run events we've ever seen.

That being said, we appreciated the check.

No Good Deed..... (UPDATE)

Great job there Klimas:

• The Chicago Police Department is investigating one of its officers after he helped three young girls found living in an abandoned home. The officer set up a GoFundMe page for the girls who were known as the Englewood Angels. The police department said the officer violated its policy by helping the girls.
  
  Chicago Police Sergeant Charles Artz is learning that no good deed goes unpunished. After discovering the deplorable conditions the girls were living in, Artz launched the effort to raise money and supplies for the kids and the grandmother who agreed to take care of them. Dolores Anderson has a roof over her head and, for now, enough food and clothes to help raise her granddaughters who were found living in squalor just a few months ago.
  
  [...] Anderson said she would be homeless and the girls would be living in foster care if it wasn't for the generosity of 7th district Chicago police officers. With approval from his superiors, Artz spearheaded an effort to raise money through a GoFundMe page. Now, Artz is under investigation for violating police department policy.

So who are the "superiors" who granted the approval and why aren't they stepping forward to take their share of the hit? Are these teflon-superiors? Special lieutenants from some special units? The commander is one of the twins running the two worst districts in the city. It would seem that this one didn't get his fair share of testosterone in the womb.

• "I believe it is waste of time, energy and money because he is a good man. I have good feelings about people and he is one of the best," Anderson said.
  
  Artz is accused of violating rule 52 which prohibits officers of seeking or soliciting contributions of any kind from anyone. The complaint against him was lodged by CPD Internal Affairs Commander Robert Klimas.
  
  Calling the policy obscure and outdated, Chicago police sergeant's union president Jim Ade said the investigation is just another nail in the coffin for police morale. "Take a guy running across the street saving someone from a burning building and three months later he gets a ticket for jay walking, that is what the department is doing," he said.
  
  And saving the three young girls is exactly what Anderson and Artz's supporters said he has done. Now the police sergeant has a complaint on his record. "He didn't discharge his weapon on nobody, he didn't beat nobody, he didn't curse at nobody, I mean, he stepped out to help some babies," Andrew Holmes, community activist, said.
  
  Holmes and the police sergeants' union said the Artz investigation sends the wrong message during a time when police superintendent Eddie Johnson is calling for more positive interaction between police and the community. Even if Artz is exonerated, he will always have a complaint logged on his record.

The grandmother isn't complaining. The community activist isn't complaining. No one in Englewood is complaining (which is a miracle in and of itself). The only one complaining is the Commander of IAD, a Bureau currently in the crosshairs of the biggest (known) promotional scandal in Department history.

And if Special Ed had a single hair on his sack, that commander would be back in a District working midnights by this weekend. You want "positive interaction" Ed? And this stroke files a complaint against the sergeant? You and he can both go fuck yourselves if this isn't remedied immediately.

UPDATE: Comments are saying that this is the last of the feebs that J-Fled brought over to run the department, and he can't be demoted. That brings up a whole new theory. He isn't (and can't) get a pension from CPD, and he can't collect unemployment unless he's fired, so he did this to piss off everyone, up to and including Burke and Rahm, who already signed off on a City Council resolution saluting his "community interaction."

Voila! Fired....and an unemployment check! Is that plausible?

Training Bulletin

A new bulletin, just issued:

Thanks to multiple e-mailers for passing this one along.

Great Job Englewood

Keeping it classy:

• A 3-year-old boy was shot on Chicago’s South Side Thursday afternoon and was in critical condition, police and fire officials said.
  
  Police said the shooting appears accidental.
  
  The shooting took place on the 6200 block of South Aberdeen Street about 4:58 p.m. in the city’s Englewood neighborhood, according to police.

If only there were some sort of laws on the books regarding safe handling and storage of a legally owned weapon.

Johnson vs Sessions

We're sure Special Ed told Sessions exactly what he expected and who's running things in Chicago!

• Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson traveled to the nation’s capital Thursday to meet new Attorney General Jeff Sessions and discuss how the federal government can help combat violence in Chicago.
  
  A spokesperson for Supt. Johnson said he plans to ask AG Sessions for the following:
  
  *More federal prosecutors detailed to Chicago to focus on prosecuting felons in possession of illegal guns.
  
  *More ATF, DEA and FBI agents so additional CPD task forces can be created in active districts to focus on gangs and gun crime
  
  *Equipping Chicago ATF agents with lab technology that helps build stronger gun cases by processing evidence from shootings and tracing guns faster.
  
  *Refocusing the federal High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Agency around targeting gun crimes and violence.
  
  *Resources for programs to expand the Mayor’s mentoring, economic development and community building efforts.
  
  Supt. Johnson said the meeting was productive and that Sessions was receptive. The U.S. Attorney General said he learned a lot during the meetings with Johnson and other police chiefs from major U.S. cities.

Funnily enough, Special Ed didn't ask for more anti-corruption dollars - Rahm must have a handle on all that.

No Representation for You!

Water cooler talk:

• FYI - Fenner, Ward, Hall, Carter and others contacted their union for legal representation for the ongoing investigation into the cheating scandal. All were denied union lawyers because they were sergeants and cheating is outside the scope of official duties.

You really should check around the corners when you're chit-chatting. But this might also be part of the HQ buzz as the investigation winds up.

Any reporters have the balls to investigate? The blog and the readers have done all the heavy lifting for nearly a year now. Quick, swoop in and pretend you actually know what an Investigative Reporter looks like.

Shorthanded?

Perhaps the off-duty coppers can start a Citizens Patrol?

Four cars up. No supervision. But don't worry - as soon as that worthless aldercreature gets his Section 8 building installed, we're sure that calls for service will go through the roof and maybe 016 will have eight whole cars up overnight.

Still the Sentencing

Day-for-day credit has to go:

• In June 2014, Roger Lakes and two other men beat and robbed a man in the 900 block of West Belmont, prosecutors said. He probably wouldn’t have been caught if he hadn’t returned to the scene of the crime two days later while observant police looked on.
  
  Lakes was sentenced to five years in prison for the robbery and four years for severely battering his victim.
  
  Now, sit down for this part: Lakes was released on parole last November and he’s been arrested again for robbing yet another victim in the 900 block of West Belmont—this time outside of Alderman Tom Tunney’s flagship Ann Sather Restaurant.

We suppose if he's only robbing and beating Tunney's constituents, no one will pay much attention. It isn't like they are active politically or contribute millions to mayoral, aldermanic or statewide campaigns.

Standoff Ends Peacefully

Long night for the SWAT people and others:

• A "distraught" off-duty Chicago police officer surrendered to police late Wednesday morning after a 12-hour standoff with a SWAT team in the Edison Park neighborhood, officials said.
  
  Police were dispatched to the 6500 block of North Onarga Avenue just before 11:40 p.m. Tuesday, police said. The man turned himself in about 11:20 a.m. Wednesday.

Again, EAP is a better option.

So Which is It?

Two articles in the Tribune (sorry about the paywall). First, something we covered a while back, that no one seems to get fired from the Academy:

• Standing before nearly 100 newly hired Chicago police recruits on their first day at the academy, Cmdr. Daniel Godsel issued a stern warning about the next six months of training.
  
  "It's going to be very difficult, physically and mentally," he told the recruits last month. "You're going to find conditions at the academy strict and demanding. We're gonna hold each of you to the very highest of standards, and we
  will not tolerate anything short of excellence."
  
  Yet the Police Department's own numbers show that the recruits have little reason to worry about washing out.
  
  In fact, all but a relative handful of trainees graduate from the academy and become cops, raising concerns about how rigorous and selective the department is in inducting new officers.

The trouble wasn't all the Department - the trouble was the City's "Human Rights" board who forced the Department to take all comers, regardless of whether or not they could pass the Academy...or the background checks. The most infamous was the kid who couldn't pass the firearms course unless you put two targets down range so he could aim at the second target to hit the one in his lane. We figure that one is only a matter of time until the City pays out an 8-figure settlement.

The second article completely contradicts the point just made by the first article:

• Chicago police rarely weed out recruits, but even a trainee booted from the academy can still wind up on the force.
  
  Officer Peter Palka was fired from the department while undergoing training in 2007 after academy staff said he'd been unprepared, dishonest and a poor marksmen who repeatedly failed the shooting test, city records show.
  
  However, after nearly a decade of persistence and legal action, he returned to the academy in 2016 after a favorable ruling by a Cook County judge, according to court and city records. He's now assigned to a Near North Side police district.

So now a judge, who can't be sued, has placed someone who failed back into the Academy.

Maybe, just maybe, it isn't the Department itself that is broken - it's still full of honorable men and women striving to do right by the citizenry - but the system it answers to that is so fucked up beyond repair.

And how does all of this mesh with what Rahm and the aldercreatures want with lowering the standards? This should be amusing to see the politicians dance around.

ACLU "Blindsided" by Fardon

Well, we can pretty much assume that Fardon kept his mouth shut and prosecutors out of City Hall because he knew he'd make his masters unhappy if he got too nosey. His exit letter was amusing as hell though:

• The American Civil Liberties Union on Tuesday blasted former U.S. Attorney Zachary Fardon for what it characterized as a "blindsided attack" on a 2015 agreement curtailing the Chicago Police Department's use of stop-and-frisk measures.
  
  In an open letter released to the media after he left office Monday, Fardon said the ACLU's settlement had "swung the pendulum hard" away from pro-active law enforcement by "telling cops if you go talk to those kids on the corner, you're going to have to take 40 minutes to fill out a form, and you're going to have to give them a receipt with your badge number on it."
  
  Fardon said the new procedures for street stops, as Chicago police call them, were a key reason for the spike in violence that began in early 2016 and had a chilling effect on many police officers who "no longer wanted to wear the risk of stopping suspects."

No shit? Isn't that what we have been saying for over a year now? And our readers? And the unions? And anyone with half a fucking brain?

The ACLU was none too pleased:

• In response Tuesday, Karen Sheley, the police practices director for the ACLU of Illinois, said Fardon's opinions were out of line with the Justice Department's own investigation that found widespread constitutional abuses of citizens, particularly in low-income minority neighborhoods where the majority of street stops occur.
  
  Fardon also "wildly exaggerated" the time needed to fill out the form and ignored "the real impact and harm of these stops," which occurred far too often and under suspect or unconstitutional circumstances, Sheley said in an emailed statement.

This from someone who never filled out a card - obviously. And who actually has the audacity to claim the DOJ report, which was written by ACLU flunkies, matches the ACLU findings for some odd reason.

The "real impact and harm" rings hollow in the face of nearly 800 murders and over 4,000 maimings - actual harm as opposed to a minor inconvenience. If documentation was better, we'd bet that fully half of the "unconstitutional" stops would fall within Constitutional limitations. ISP and numerous suburban departments seem to do fine with an Investigatory Stop Report that is similar to our old Contact Card, without 76 boxes to fill out. How many of them are under Federal Consent Decrees again? None? Wow.

Great Preparations!

The knew the snow was coming. They have thousands of tons of salt all over the city and state property waiting to be spread on the slick roads. And CDOT and IDOT blew it:

• Seven people were taken to the hospital late Monday after 35 vehicles were involved in two separate chain-reaction crashes less than a mile apart on the Kennedy Expressway.
  
  Both crashes, involving a total of 35 vehicles, happened about 10:30 p.m. in the inbound express lanes of Interstate 90/94 between North Avenue and Division Street, according to Illinois State Police.

That was Monday night. Tuesday morning, the commute times ran upwards of three HOURS - even an Obama motorcade didn't back up the expressways three hours. Slick ramps, jackknifed trucks, bridge decks as skating rinks. And the local streets were barely better. Nice to see Rahm and Rauner had everything ready to go for a storm that had only been predicted for a week. Good thing it's going to be 40 degrees and raining Friday.

002 Lobby

Forwarded to us - how is this even allowed?

Hey FOP? Safety Grievance? How many lice or scabbies are breeding right now in this pile? Airborne diseases being coughed out on unsuspecting coppers? Contact sicknesses, too.

Is the 002 District a place of business or what? Who the fuck allows something like this to occur?

New York Again?

Why don't we just import their command staff? Oh yeah, we tried that - FAIL:

• Even before President Donald Trump tweeted a threat to send “in the Feds” to curb Chicago’s gun violence, he was saying on the campaign trail that there was a simple solution to the bloodshed: police should get tougher.
  
  Chicago should follow the lead of New York City, Trump’s administration has said, and crack down on even the smallest offenses.
  
  It turns out Chicago Police Supt. Eddie Johnson visited the New York Police Department weeks before the Trump administration advice. But what he gleaned from a city that has achieved long term success in fighting crime was more nuanced than a Trump-inspired police crackdown.
  
  Johnson came home with ideas aimed at increasing community trust by using technology to get Chicago police officers out of their squad cars, and putting new cadets in neighborhoods to walk the streets and talk to locals.

CPD tried that, too - the new kids were skipping (delaying) their training cycled due to not having enough FTO's, running around the west and south sides, unsupervised, in some of the most violent areas of Chicago, generating thousands of what turned out to be improper Contact Cards. Fucking brilliant that was.

• “We are only as strong as the faith the community has in us,” Johnson said.
  
  Gaining that community trust will be a tall order in a city suffering from a toxic brew of rising violent crime in some of its poorest neighborhoods along with anger at police after the release in 2015 of a video showing a white police officer shooting black teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times.

And again - one cop, one incident, hardly indicative of the Department as a whole...unless you accept the narrative being peddle by the media, the ACLU, Sparklefart's administration, assorted "revunds" with axes to grind and the activists looking for the next big pool of grant money.

• That lack of faith has had grave consequences in Chicago where many people living in high-crime neighborhoods are reluctant to help police solve them. While the number of homicides surged to the highest in nearly two decades last year at 762, the percentage of those murders solved by police fell ten points to 26 percent, according to a University of Chicago Crime Lab study. In New York, police solve about 70 percent of homicides.
  
  “We need them (witnesses) to come forward and give us the information so we can put these bad guys in jail,” Johnson said.
  
  In one example of Chicago’s dilemma, the police department is struggling to draft a new policy on the use of force. An October proposal prompted concern from the police union that the restrictions were so tight officers would put themselves in danger to comply. A new draft released Tuesday would give police more latitude in deciding when to fire their weapons, which pleased the police union but prompted concern from community activists about excessive force.

An excessive force problem that still hasn't been proven to exist by any legitimate data...just the declaration by the ACLU and the unsubstantiated, uncorroborated and unattributed stories told to an outgoing Department of Justice determined to put another feather in its cap.

Does anyone ever wonder how many DOJ investigations DIDN'T result in a finding of unconstitutional "patterns and practices?" We'll give you a hint - it starts with a "Z" and ends with an "ERO." That tells us the fix was in the start.