Crime is.....Up?

Funny thing about that hot weather. Per HeyJackass:

• 2018 weekend tally: 3 killed, 23 wounded
• as of 1300 hours Saturday: 2 killed, 24 wounded

The exact same number of people (or folks) with extra holes in them.

If anyone else got ventilated since 11 hours ago, Chicago surpassed last year.

By the way, no police shootings, no concealed carrier shootings, and no relief from the heat in sight through the Fourth.

Scooters Rescued

Portland Oregon found a bunch of their e-scooters couldn't swim:

• A dive team recovered dozens of electric scooters and bicycles while cleaning the Willamette River sea wall in downtown Portland.
  
  KPTV-TV reports the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office River Patrol Dive Team removed 57 electric scooters and bicycles this week.
  
  [...]
  
  A four-month experiment with the e-scooters last year was successful but also generated 6,000 complaints and raised questions about pedestrian safety and the impact of the devices on public spaces like parks. The city said the scooters also led to 176 medical center visits.

6,000 complaints and 176 hospital visits is their definition of "successful"?

Oopsie Daisy

Guess who isn't where he's supposed to be?

• An Aurora halfway house is being forced to kick out 20 sex offenders.
  
  The sex offenders are all either working or living at Wayside Cross Ministries.
  
  Aurora's mayor said the order came after police realized the center was within 500 feet of a park, which is against the law.
  
  One of the sex offenders being evicted is Thomas Kokoraleis, part of the "Ripper Crew," a satanic cult and crime group, who entered the center in April after serving half of his 70-year sentence for the 1982 murder of Elmhurst 21-year old Lorry Ann Borowski.

So where are they all at now?

Fill Up Today

Gas tax doubles some Monday morning.

Anyone complaining, ask them how they voted.

"Hemorrhaging" is a Good Word

One of those articles we mean to bring to everyone's attention, but falls by the wayside during the week:

• CHICAGO — It’s known here as The Exodus.
  
  People are leaving Illinois in droves. Republicans blame the state’s high taxes and its unfunded pension liability, which tops $130 billion. Democrats believe it’s the state’s lack of investment in education and infrastructure.
  
  One thing is certain: Illinois’ population has declined by 157,000 residents over the past five years, making it one of only two states — West Virginia is the other — to lose people over the past decade.

The article relies on a lot of tired old saw, but hits a few other points that aren't brought up nearly enough.

We're just filling space here prior to the holiday week.

Kicking the Can....to Springfield

Someone want to explain this to us? It seems like a bad fantasy:

• The outlines of how Mayor Lori Lightfoot would like Springfield to help her balance her new city budget are coming into focus, and it looks like she'll be making a big, big ask.
  
  According to knowledgeable sources in Chicago and Springfield, after weeks of preliminary maneuvering the mayor is pitching nothing less than a state takeover of the city's cash-short pension funds, which under current law will require upward of $1 billion in new city tax hikes over the next three years to reach a path to full actuarial funding. Her proposal would consolidate city pension money with smaller downstate and suburban pension funds in a new statewide system. In some cases, those non-Chicago funds are even worse off than the city's.
  
  Insiders say Chicago might be willing to forgo some revenue it now gets from the state in exchange for relinquishing responsibility for the funds, which now are about $28 billion short of the assets they'll eventually need to pay promised benefits. To pay the cost, Lightfoot reportedly supports state legislation to tax retirement income of better-off seniors—taxing income above $100,000 a year would net roughly $1 billion annually, according to the Civic Federation—or extending the sales tax to cover high-end services such as accounting and legal advice.

So by spreading out the hit across the state, Lightgroot hopes to stave off the all-but-certain exodus of taxpayers fro Chicago to other tax friendly climates? We are told that there is no provision in Federal Law for states to declare bankruptcy - cities can, and have - but not states.

But we have a hard time seeing downstaters agreeing to this. They already view Chicago and Cook County as leeches driving the state into ruin.

Another Crimesha Triumph

Getting away with murder in Chicago:

• A Cook County jury acquitted a 26-year-old Chicago woman Friday of killing her romantic rival after a petty feud turned deadly.
  
  Prosecutors contended that Chynna Stapleton intentionally rammed her Jeep into 18-year-old Tatyanna Lewis multiple times. But Stapleton’s attorneys said it was a tragic accident and that she was distraught after Lewis attacked her.
  
  The jury deliberated for about four hours before finding Stapleton not guilty of first-degree murder, leaving Lewis’ supporters in the courtroom gallery aghast. Lewis, a daughter of a Chicago police officer, met up to fight with Stapleton on the Far South Side one night in May 2017. It was an escalation of a vicious social media dispute over a man, a friend of Lewis told reporters at the time.

Blowing a slam-dunk case like this? Great job there Crimesha.

We heard that OJ is volunteering his services to hunt for the real killer now.

Ship Em Out!

New York City is making our readers' suggestions into reality:

• New York City has a distinctive way of dealing with the homeless: pay for them to live pretty much anywhere in the country.
  
  Since 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration has used a program called Special One-Time Assistance to relocate nearly 10,000 homeless people to over 300 cities. The program – which directly pays landlords a year of rent upfront, free to the beneficiary – is a significant departure from past city homeless relocation efforts because it does not require participants to have strong community ties to the new destination.
  
  Under the program, which comes as homelessness is rising not just in New York but in other major cities, NYC’s homeless have moved as far away as Orlando, Los Angeles, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Birmingham, Ala.

Now how about the suggestion that the FOP buy insurance an insurance policy for everyone on the Strategic Subject List / Heat List and see if we can't collect some insurance money for dead gangbangers to prop up the pension?

Not Guilty?

So he's technically not a wife beater:

• A Cook County judge Thursday found former Ald. Ricardo Munoz not guilty of misdemeanor domestic battery, citing inconsistencies between Munoz’s wife’s account of the incident and the allegations listed on the charging documents.
  
  Munoz’s misdemeanor domestic violence charge stemmed from an alleged altercation with Betty Torres-Munoz, on New Year’s Eve.
  
  Judge Callie Lynn Baird ruled immediately Thursday after about three hours of testimony during the bench trial, which included both Torres-Munoz and the former Little Village alderman on the witness stand. The estranged couple gave different accounts of their quarrel the night of Dec. 31, which was touched off a day earlier when Torres-Munoz discovered text messages from the alderman’s mistress on her husband’s cellphone.

So now he's just a former aldercreature, latin king who used to hold guns for the gang, and part of a fake ID ring that sold thousands of "Mica cards" for tens of thousands of dollars, generating hundreds of thousands in cash for the kings who ran the protection racket over in Little Village.

Blame the Police Again

No context at all:

• The Land Rover that fatally hit a Broadview teen walking near Buckingham Fountain and fled the scene had been involved in a police pursuit and was reported stolen, according to a Chicago police traffic crash report.
  
  The vehicle, a large, black Land Rover bearing Illinois plates of Q 291833, was suspected to be stolen and was “involved in a Chicago police vehicle pursuit,’’ the report said.
  
  It was not clear if the pursuit was occurring when the wreck happened.

If you read the rest of the article, not a single witness or bystander is quoted as saying the police were anywhere in sight, arrived on scene unnaturally fast or anything else that would hint at a pursuit.

But in Journalism 101-SJW, you can put bullshit in the article as long as it fits the anti-police narrative. After all, no bleeding-heart libtard wants to actually go to the scene, ask pertinent questions, maybe pry some info from Google-me about the Who, What, Where and When the alleged pursuit took place - as in a hour before the crash or maybe it was called off five miles ago. A reporter might actually see blood and body parts lying around and that would be scary.

Anyone See the Popcorn?

We left a few bags of it around here somewhere:

• There are reports that federal agents in mid-May 2019 raided the Far South Side home of a former aide to Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
  
  According to the Chicago Tribune, the FBI conducted a search warrant at the home of 43-year-old Kevin Quinn. Besides working for Madigan, Quinn is also the brother of Chicago's 13th ward alderman, Marty Quinn.
  
  It is not clear what information the federal agents were seeking in the raid, but the Tribune reports that agents had shown interest in computers and electronic equipment.

All these near misses - let's start landing some of the big fish already.

Scooter Murder

This didn't pop up in any of our speculation - we figured the shooters would be on scooters, not the victims:

• A 17-year-old boy on an electric scooter was fatally shot on the city’s West Side Wednesday, while three others were hurt in two separate daylight shootings on the South Side, Chicago police said.
  
  In the latest outburst of violence, authorities said the teen was riding an electric scooter from the city’s pilot program on a sidewalk in the 3900 block of West Iowa Street in the Humboldt Park neighborhood just before 5 p.m. when a gunman got out of a red Hyundai and opened fire, police said. A second man got out of the vehicle, but wasn’t armed.
  
  The teen, who was struck in the head and body, was pronounced dead at the scene, police said. His identity wasn’t immediately released. Both escaped in the car west on Iowa.
  
  Police didn’t immediately have a motive for the shooting, saying the victim lacked a criminal background.

Crime is down though:

• Despite this, through Tuesday, Chicago had 157 fewer shootings than it had during the same period last year, with 12 fewer fatal shootings, according to statistics maintained by the Tribune.

Must be the poverty being eliminated.

No Bias?

In five years, not a single instance of "biased based" policing:

• There have been no substantiated instances of biased policing from New York City police between 2014 and 2018, according to a New York City Department of Investigation report released Wednesday.
  
  There were 2,495 recorded complaints from the public concerning claims of demographically discriminatory policing on behalf of the New York City Police Department from 2014 to the end of 2018, according to a report the Department of Investigation and NYPD’s Inspector General Philip Eure conducted, the New York Post reported.
  
  “NYPD officials confirmed in June 2019 that the Department has never substantiated an allegation of biased policing,” the report says.

Golly. So cops actually target law breakers based on ..... breaking the law?

Interesting. Kind of like the Obama-TSSSSS-Cards, a two year study (now in it's second decade!) that has yet to prove even a single instance of racial profiling.

Did Special Ed discover this during one of his road trips? Seeing as how CPD has been stealing NYPD ideas for most of our careers after all.

UPDATE: Link fixed)

Another Unforced Error

Groot getting more and more bad advice:

• Major organizational change taking place on Monday. Effective 01 July, all sworn members of the Inspection Division will report directly to Lemmer. Cornelia Lott is flipping her wig.
  
  Can you imagine how pleasant life is going to become for the working copper when Lemmer starts dictating the “directed missions” of the Inspectors and they will now be at his beck and call to ensure “accountability”?

Lemmer, an unpleasant human being on his best day, has ruined every unit he has ever been in. PAR forms fly like dry leaves in a forest fire wherever he appears. And it isn't because he expects people to follow the rules - it's because he's an arrogant asswipe.

That's probably why he's getting along with Groot.

Send in the Scooter Lawyers!

As predicted:

• Reports of scooter-related accidents and injuries in Chicago are mounting.
  
  At least ten people went to emergency rooms in the first six days of the city’s dockless electric scooter pilot, according to Streetsblog. The most severe accident so far was a hit-and-run on Thursday in which a scooter user on the wrong side of the road crashed into a bicyclist in Wicker Park, leaving the cyclist unconscious and badly injured, reported Block Club.
  
  “So far it’s been a mess,” said Bryant Greening, attorney and founder of LegalRideshare, a Chicago law firm that focuses on rideshare-related liability. “Our phones have been ringing because of both self-inflicted injuries from scooter riders and pedestrians and cyclists struck by riders of no fault of their own.”

The most serious injury so far:

• A scooter rider on the wrong side of the road and “weaving in and out of traffic” crashed into a bicyclist in Wicker Park and then took off, leaving the cyclist unconscious and badly injured, police and the victim’s friends said.
  
  Allyson Medeiros, the bicyclist, was hospitalized after the Thursday early evening crash. A tattoo artist without health insurance, Medeiros was left with fractured facial bones, four broken teeth, a broken nose and cuts that required more than 20 stitches...

We have reports of groups of kids numbering ten at a time flying down streets, taking up both lanes of traffic, and not a single one over the age of 12. Anyone know how they're "renting" these things?

The countdown to the first fatality continues.

Retire and Live Longer

Groot, you want to off-load high salaries?

• Imagine working as long as you possibly can, or until your maximum retirement age, to ensure you have sufficient funds for your Retirement, only to die within two years of retiring?
  
  An actuarial study conducted on some of the larger US Pension Funds including Boeing Aerospace, indicates that employees who retired at the age of 65, died within two years of retirement.
  
  Dr Ephrem (Siao Chung) Cheng provided the results from an Actuarial Study on the correlation between Retirement Age and Longevity.
  
  The studies were based on the number of Pension Fund cheques sent to Boeing retirees. The Boeing experience was that employees retiring at age 65 received pension cheques for 18 months, on average, prior to death. A similar experience was discovered at Lockheed Martin, where on average, employees received pension cheques for just 17 months.

The entire story might be behind a paywall, but there are other reports if you look around a bit.Get out while you can.

Off Duty Shot

Grave condition in the Deuce.

No further info at this point.

UPDATE: Upgraded to critical.

He is responding to family and medical staff.

Tribune coverage here.

Thirty or more shots at his vehicle.

Not out of the woods by any means.

UPDATE: Upgraded to serious.

Failing to Win the Trust

Ex-squeeze us?

• The mayor says there is no cause for celebration.
  
  But the 21 shooting victims in Chicago this past weekend are barely half the number shot on the same weekend last year, and that number is far fewer than the 58 victims gunned down -- including eight dead -- the same weekend in 2016.
  
  If it's Monday, Chicago's top cops are at City Hall to discuss what is working and what is not as Mayor Lori Lightfoot demands police become more pro-active.
  
  "I think they now are getting used to me and understanding that, kind of a superficial, light touch isn't going to do it," Lightfoot said.

More pro-active? "light touch isn't going to do it"?

Maybe we've been smoking a little too much of that legalized weed. Perhaps Groot has. But someone hasn't been paying attention to the past few years here in town. Everything has been directed to making the police do less, engage less, care less.

And it's worked:

• two page ISR's
• handing out a "receipt" with your name on it
• more cameras than London
• an "integrity unit" led by corrupt individuals armchair quarterbacking everything you do
• five or six different layers of "oversight," i.e. second-guessers
• a complete and deliberate effort to not prosecute crimes of all stripes
• a political effort to demonize the entire department
• another effort to paint every cop with the same brush
• deliberate foot dragging on anything resembling fair Contract
• corrupt discipline
• more corrupt promotional processes

Do we need to go on?

Groot does, not only returning to the same pile of shit from last week, but jumping up and down in it and flinging it at the walls:

• The mayor once again blasted police detectives for allegedly failing to win the trust of residents in the most violent neighborhoods.
  
  "Showing up when there's a murder or a shooting or any other violent act and being the first time you've set foot in a neighborhood, without knowing any of the people, the relevant stakeholders, you're never going to win the trust of the community that way to be able to solve crimes, because they're not going to view you as legitimate," Lightfoot said.

Showing up at murder scenes is what detectives do you moron.

Detectives know lots of the people (or folks) because they've dealt with them before. The stakeholders? They're cowering behind doors, curtains, under sofas and in bathtubs to avoid the gunfire. They don't come forward and detectives aren't breaking down doors to find them because that would make the "stakeholders" targets.

As far as legitimacy, what the fuck is that supposed to mean? Our "legitimacy" is derived from the badge we wear, the oath we took and the Consent of the People. How are we supposed to be more "legitimate"? Maybe drive up with chrome spinners, the crankin' sound system rattling windows and poppin a few caps at the dealers on the corner? That would make us more "legit"?

Who in the Holy Hell is advising this idiot?

Bigger Academy?

Someone pretty powerful must have a lot of money riding on this for Groot to reverse course like she just did:

• The $95 million police and fire training academy in West Garfield Park that critics called a symbol of Rahm Emanuel’s misplaced spending priorities is a done deal, but needs to be made bigger, better and, undoubtedly, more expensive, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Tuesday.
  
  After touring the current academy and seeing recruits apprehending mock suspects in a dark hallway, Lightfoot came away more convinced than ever that a new academy is essential to improve police training that the U.S. Justice Department found so sorely lacking.
  
  But Lightfoot said she is not at all certain the two-building campus to be built at 4301 W. Chicago Ave. on 30.4 acres — land that has stood stubbornly vacant for decades — is adequate to house a training facility that will be “best-in-class” — not just when it opens, but for decades afterward.
  
  “I don’t know that it’s big enough. I don’t know that the plans, particularly on the fire [department] side, are gonna provide them with the different kind of training scenarios that they need,” the mayor told reporters outside the current facility, 1300 W. Jackson Blvd.

Since reporters seem oblivious, we will (again) direct them to the NYPD Academy. It cost over $900 million a few years ago. Even if we point out that CPD is about one-third the size of NYPD, that would indicate at least a $300 million expenditure for the Police side alone. CFD is a separate line item and we won't pretend to know what they require.

The usual ignoramuses (blm, Chance the rapper, J-(look at me!)-Mal continue to insist it's a waste of money because it isn't in their pockets and they'd much rather make a living suing an under-trained police force than actually end up with a more professional force that benefits everyone...except the race pimps.

Another "Deputy Mayor"?

Money just springs into being when Groot's friends need some:

• Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s choice to be the city’s deputy mayor of public safety is Susan Lee, a senior director at an anti-violence nonprofit who says reducing violence is her mission.
  
  Lee, 51, is the senior director of Safe Chicago Network at Chicago CRED (Creating Real Economic Destiny), a nonprofit where former Obama administration education secretary and Chicago Public Schools chief Arne Duncan is managing partner.
  
  Lee has worked on anti-violence issues across the country, including in Los Angeles, and said her first priority in the new role “is to establish a basic level of safety in all communities in Chicago.”

Once again, the connected profit at the expense of taxpayer to the tune of $165,000.

Any bets on if this is the new civilian supernintendo once Special Ed is eased out or fired?

Special Ed Traveling Roadshow

Guess who missed the "Accountability Monday" meeting?

• This week’s installment of what Mayor Lori Lightfoot likes to call “Accountability Monday” went on without Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson — and it was the best one yet.
  
  A first weekend of summer that ends with “only” four people dead and 20 shot is considered good news in Chicago. That’s how relentless gang violence has been in this city.

No idea where the Sun Times is getting their numbers - it isn't from HeyJackass, but they're pulling them out of somebody's ass, that's for sure.

Where was Special Ed?

• Johnson is in Washington, D.C., for the third leg of a four-part series of recent trips. He has criss-crossed the country over the last week for meetings his office called “central to CPD’s policy and crime-fighting agenda.”
  
  The first trip saw Johnson travel to Philadelphia for the Major Cities Chiefs’ Association Executive Leadership meeting. There, Johnson spoke on “policing issues,” his staff said, without disclosing the specific topic.
  
  After that, Johnson went to New Orleans for a meeting on officer morale and suicide, a subject that, unfortunately, hits close to home.
  
  The third and fourth meetings will take Johnson to Washington twice this week. On Monday, he was in the capital for what his staff called a “series of prosecutorial meetings” with the Department of Justice and the Police Executive Research Forum.

Hmm. Nothing in Aruba. Must be a "working vacation." Groot takes those, too.

And the Numbers Are....

SCC predicted....:

• Pick your numbers - we'll guess 6 and 20....based on nothing at all.

HeyJackass.com reports....:

• Final Stupidity Tally: 5 killed, 16 wounded

And if the numbers are correct, a homicide-free Saturday night!

Woof Woof Willie

Better than nothing we suppose:

• Former Ald. Willie Cochran was contrite in a federal courtroom Monday, saying he felt “awkward and ashamed” to be facing sentencing for a public corruption conviction.
  
  “Quite a day, quite a day,” Cochran said quietly, shaking his head as he read from a sheet of paper. “Quite a time period, going through all of this. I never thought I’d be making a statement like this under these circumstances. ... I’m better than this."
  
  But minutes later after he was sentenced to a year in prison, Cochran struck a far different tone as he left the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse, accusing federal prosecutors of lying and exaggerating allegations of misconduct against him. He said he made a mistake by pleading guilty.
  
  “There’s no justice in this,” a defiant Cochran told reporters. “I’m not happy about it, my family is not happy about it. But you know the fact of the matter is it’s never gonna be right. Not under these circumstances. And everybody should be concerned. ... The Justice Department is allowing their prosecutors to tell lies and hide evidence.”
  
  In the end, however, Cochran said he has no plans to file an appeal, meaning his case will end the way so many others have before it — with a convicted Chicago alderman headed to prison.

Because you're guilty. And a bitch.

Anyone know if he's got his new city gig lined up for keeping his mouth shut?

All That Money

Nice to see CPS spending wisely:

• Chicago Public Schools staff set up tables with free lunches at 100 locations across the city for the first day of the LunchStop program this year.
  
  The lunches are served outdoors to make it easier for kids to grab a meal and are meant for all Chicago children under 18 — not just CPS students. The program aims to make healthy meals more accessible to students and the community even when school isn’t in session by bringing lunches to spaces that are familiar to children.

Government taking the roll of parent once again. Now how about Workhouses and Sweatshops so the taxpayers can see some return on their investment?

Groot's Command Staff - Part IIIa

Seems there's a second side to the story:

• This is one instance where I’ll have to go to bat for the boss as only half the story made it to SCC. The rest of the story goes lie this:
  
  - PO in question gets dumped from his team
  - PO has the audacity to aggressively approach the Deputy in his office, raising his voice while getting within inches of the boss, demanding to know why he was dumped
  - PO told he was out of line and vacate office but persisted berating the Deputy, still within inches of him
  - Deputy now wonders if he’s about to be battered and tells PO he’s about to get written up for insubordination it he persists
  - PO is still animated so deputy tells him to leave and in no uncertain terms tells him he’s “about to get knocked the fuck out” if he doesn’t back out of Deputy’s personal space
  -PO was the one to drop the “whatcha gonna do Boy”, NOT the Deputy
  
  Disclaimer: I don’t work for the Deputy or even in 005, was there on unrelated matter and had the misfortune of witnessing this while returning from the back bathroom. PO was 100% in the wrong. I was asked by 005 supervisors for my info (kinda HAVE to provide that when asked) so discipline can be started. They wanted a to from at that moment but I was on something else so they’ve reached out to me to put my observations on paper. PO is gonna get it jammed deep, but he was the aggressor for the get go and i’m surprised the deputy let it go as far as he did without knocking this dude’s teeth down the back of his throat. PO was WAYYYY out of line and honestly deserves to be made an example of.

In this case, here's hoping that the Department makes a pointed example of the officer. This is probably going to end up a "who's clout is bigger" competition. After all, if it's heavy enough, you can shoot mentally challenged teens or cheat on promotional exams and nothing happens.

Anyone have the seniority on the PO? Is this part of Rahm's lowered standards showing up finally?

Shake His Hand?

How about "No"?

• Following the filing of a dead-bang felony case against a regular customer, Crimesha Foxx ordered charges dropped and had her assistant KH tell the ASAs to apologize to the defendant in open court and shake his hand.

Running through our archives, we found a potential match for the KH in a comment dated 17 August 2017:

• It would be nice if the people of Cook County woke up and realized what they did by elected Kim Foxx and her crew. They are all public defender/Loevy and Loevy types. As a matter of fact, some of them, Katie Hill for example, most recently worked at Loevy and Loevy before Foxx brought them into the CCSAO. Their only mission is to completely decimate the CCSAO and the criminal justice system's ability to hold guilty people accountable for bad acts.

This comment seems oddly prescient nearly two years in advance.

Come on ASA's. We know there are some of you with a shred of decency left who follow the blog, hoping to maintain some sort of professionalism in an office that's burning to the ground. Which case(s) is Crimesha making you guys/gals apologize for?

Groot's Command Staff - Part III

So what happened in 005 the other night? In front of numerous witnesses?

• Well i just saw Dep Chief EH raising his voice to a PO and ask him “what ya gonna do boy?!” Right in the 005th district

We only ask because someone is offering these t-shirts for sale:

We're pretty sure a whole bunch of someones ought to be demoted over this.

Or knocked into next week.

Let's go Lori.

UPDATE: More to the story? See the comment section and tomorrow's AM post.

Nashville Cancels Scooters

Following a death:

• Mayor David Briley announced his intention to remove all electric scooters from Nashville streets.
  
  In a press release on Friday, Briley said his decision came "after careful consideration," following his 30-day notice for a potential scooter ban on May 23. Briley did, however, mention that he will "consider adding back one or two operators to provide a limited number of scooters" should they meet Metro's proposed requirements for safety and accessibility.
  
  [...] Briley's 30-day ultimatum came one week after an accident involving scooter rider Brady Gaulke, 26, who died from injuries sustained during the crash three days later.

We haven't heard of any deaths in Chicago, but we have noted more than a few ambulance calls on the zones regarding scooter injuries versus vehicles, pedestrians and curbs, so we suppose it's only a matter of time.

Does anyone know if there's a count of scooters "missing" yet or is that going to be revealed in the fall when the pilot program ends and all the casualties are tallied up?

Big Oops

Great job by the ATF again:

• ATF agents across the country have been working to track down thousands of guns and firearms parts that had been seized by law enforcement and were supposed to be destroyed but were stolen first, according to sources familiar with the effort.
  
  The agents are searching for some of their own retired service weapons as well as guns from other federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI and DEA.
  
  All of the weapons had been sent to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' National Firearms and Ammunition Destruction Branch in Martinsburg, West Virginia, to be shredded, according to court documents and congressional letters.
  
  A longtime guard at the ATF facility has admitted to carting off thousands of firearms, gun parts and ammunition and selling them over several years.

What types of guns?

• According to the report, a contract security guard at the facility has been stealing federal property since 2016, including automatic rifles, semi-automatic handguns, Glock slides, magazines, and scopes. The ATF is being cagey about how many firearms the guard stole, but his plea agreement indicates that he nabbed at least 3,000 Glock slides, over 4,000 firearm parts, fifteen rifles, eighty handguns, and nine NFA Class III firearms.
  
  The ATF hasn’t said how many of the firearms and parts it has recovered, but the Journal Sentinel reports that the stolen firearms have been recovered across the country, in Mexico and the Caribbean, and at crime scenes. All 25 ATF field offices have been tasked with recovering the firearms.

Great. Just great.

Unseen Photos

A glimpse into history:

• Archivists who bought a stash of CDs at a house clearance sale found 2,400 photos of Ground Zero in New York taken following the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
  
  They appear to have been taken by an as yet unidentified construction worker who helped to clear up the wreckage of the World Trade Center towers and surrounding area.
  
  The CDs were in poor condition but the data was ultimately retrievable.

The photos can be seen at this link here. Some are blurry, some are repetitive, but all hint at the scale of destruction that many can't even begin to comprehend.

Groot's Command Staff - Part II

Who's got the scoop on this one? Any Indiana Troopers reading?

• Did you hear Commander Wodnicki lead the Indiana State Police on a five mile chase doing 114mph to only stop because the spikes were layed out. His response to the State Trooper was he was going to an emergency that didn't exist. Staples was called from the scene and reluctantly got a CR number. All in his company car.
  
  Poor Ed was let go and the investigation continued as it was a felony to travel that fast and elude law enforcement.
  
  Don't worry. Calls were made to Troopers and they are no longer pursuing this. IAD called in to cover it up.
  
  Is this the reform you speak of Mrs. Lightfoot?

And do we have to bring up this again?

• What about Escamerit? Guy was found basically guilty of being a mad scientist, experimenting on his own child. He gets a three week stint in Boston for “leadership training” paid for by the tax payers. What does he do when he gets back from leadership training?

This after he brags about talking a Deputy Chief into giving him a "merit" bump - the first of two for two guys on the same team investigated by IAD for "holding" guns in lockers and threatening bangers with jail if they didn't come up with "something."

As you might guess, the problems with the CPD start at the top, not the guys and gals pushing beat cars.

Opening Weekend Salvos

Monday's "accountability meeting" is going to be interesting:

• Four people were killed and 12 wounded in shootings on Friday across Chicago, including a pregnant woman who was among four people shot in Parkway Gardens on the South Side.
  
  Just after 3 a.m., someone walked up the back alley stairs of a building in the 6300 block of South King Drive and fired shots into an apartment, according to Chicago police.

Obviously, another crime of poverty. We know this because Lightgroot said so.

And we think we recall seeing something like this in poverty stricken third world shitholes:

• Five men with guns robbed a bar early Saturday on the Northwest Side.
  
  About 12:25 a.m., the robbers entered the establishment in the 2900 block of North Pulaski and brandished guns at the customers inside, according to Chicago police. They were all wearing black and two of them wore masks.
  
  They demanded that everyone get on the ground, then took their property, police said. One of the men fired his gun at a wall. Three women and seven men were robbed, police said. No one was hurt.

These so-called "take over" robberies are a staple of South and Central America ghettos. There are videos all over YouTube. We're thinking the robbers aren't paying attention to the "No Gun" signs posted all over the bars - if they did, there wouldn't be robberies....right?

Crain's Sees Arbitration

Crain's has some speculation on the Contract:

• Chicago's new mayor certainly has her hands full these days with preparing her new budget and striving to control gang street violence. But she's going to have to find time to deal with two huge pending labor issues: new contracts with the Chicago Teachers Union and the Fraternal Order of Police that could bust her budget and worsen the city's murder wave.
  
  Where do those negotiations stand?
  
  After a week of chest pounding and brushback pitches all around, my sense is that a new CTU contract is within reach without a strike this fall—if everyone is reasonable. A police union deal, however, is probably headed toward arbitration, and that's not good news for a city that needs everyone on the same page to fight crime even in a year in which summer seems to have forgotten Chicago.

They see negotiations dragging out into next year before an arbitration deadline is set, so be prepared for a mess of a summer.

Groot's Command Staff

Rules? Rules are for little people:

• So while at today’s 0700 start at the academy for PJ2, everyone arrives on time except for Captain Karen Murphy of the Integrity Unit. Gets there an hour after it started, and sat, phone in hand for the better of 75% of the class. We get an hour for lunch, she takes 1.5 hours. This is someone slated to attend, from the INTEGRITY UNIT, and she’s too important to be bothered to listen or offer any opinions during class unlike the rest of the 28 or so attendees. I should know better by now to think that the “entitled” needn’t follow the rules but c’mon!!!

We were also provided with pictures of Captain Murphy on the phone but we'll hold that for later. Glad to see that the Integrity Unit is taking training so seriously.

Special Prosecutor

Is Judge O'Brien (retired) running for office?

• A Cook County judge on Friday ordered the surprise appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the sudden dismissal of all charges against Jussie Smollett, saying the short-lived prosecution may have been legally invalid from the beginning.
  
  Judge Michael Toomin ruled that State’s Attorney Kim Foxx had the right to withdraw herself from overseeing the prosecution of the onetime “Empire” actor but held no legal authority to then delegate that responsibility to her top deputy.
  
  With the deputy holding no real authority, the Smollett case made its way through the court system without a prosecutor at the helm, the veteran judge said.
  
  “There was no master on the bridge to guide the ship as it floundered through uncharted waters, and it ultimately lost its bearings,” Toomin wrote in the 21-page opinion. “… The unprecedented irregularities identified in this case warrants the appointment of independent counsel to restore the public’s confidence in the integrity of our criminal justice system.”

Some high powered legal minds think this is an entire "do over" for the case since there was no actual States Attorney in charge except the one who had "recused" herself. That means a Grand Jury and charges. And this time, there better be a "guilty" plea to negate the inevitable lawsuit over "The police are picking on me" lawsuit that is sure to come.

This really ought to be before the ARDC for possible disbarment of Crimesha and before the County Board for removal from office.

Worst Idea Ever

If you'd like to read a well written take down of the Grassroots Alliance for Police Accountability, follow this link:

• For Chicago residents lulled into believing the May 20 coronation of Lori Lightfoot as mayor is a harbinger of sweeping change, dramatic reform, an end to bureaucratic corruption, and a decline in violent crime, think differently. Although Ms. Lightfoot avoided overburdening her inaugural address with pompous language, her fifteen-minute speech evoked memories of the former mayor, Rahm Emanuel, who, while manipulating facile rhetoric and serving up hollow promises in two swearing-in ceremonies in 2011 and 2015, droned on endlessly about a better Chicago, inclusiveness, equality, opportunity, education, and reducing crime. Well, welcome to 2019, where little has changed.
  
  While there was nothing original, creative, or interesting in Mayor Lightfoot’s vision for the Windy City, when the former Police Board president addressed the scourge of crime and violence, she spoke of bridging the divide between Chicago police and residents. Boilerplate rhetoric to which she appealed throughout the campaign, Lightfoot was coy in her oration, but did mention her administration’s aim to offer further training and wellness support for police officers. When confronting the ongoing debate over policing, Lightfoot opaquely referred to her intent to lend support for a proposed police oversight panel as providing the “best-quality supervision available.” A colloquialism for turning the screws on Chicago police, Ms. Lightfoot’s alluding to “supervision” over police is a potent signal she intends to sanction the creation of the Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability.

It's a lengthy read - eight or ten minutes - but thorough. Groot is prepared to destroy the Department in a manner never before imagined and a cost that will be measured in hundreds of millions of dollars....and thousands of lives.

Contract Rumors

What's the deal with these rumors popping up?

• Expect an announcement soon from City Hall announcing the first step in our contract negotiations will be fought in the media with a 2% PAY CUT to the police. Lightfoot believes the police need to prove they EARNED a raise. Her advisors hope this will force out the most experienced and bitter officers and create massive hiring of SJW’S. A pet peeve of the Mayor has also been addressed with all press conferences to be conducted by a uniformed officer wearing their hat. She wants that image to be the face of what she believes are the wrongs of the department. The officers at News Affairs by the way are all White and this is what Lori hopes the public sees. She honestly believes the police are evil.
  
  
• Yesterday behind closed doors a package was prepared by Mayor Lightfoot and her closest advisors calling for an astonishing 2% pay cut for all members of the C.P.D. and the immediate cancellation of contracts to purchase new unmarked vehicles for the department. Expect Detectives to be ordered into uniform and put into marked vehicles. The Mayor believes more foot patrols in districts and the dollars saved by not purchasing unmarked vehicles along with the millions saved by pay cuts will fill a budget shortfall and get more bang for the buck with the department. From a close and unnamed source in the know, Rahm disliked and didn’t respect us but Lightfoot hates and actually starts shaking when discussing C.P.D. Guys she hates us and it isn’t a secret. We’d better get to an arbitrator soon.
  
  
• Word is spreading all through City Hall that our new Mayor is calling for paycuts to the police and fire. She brought up layoffs but was shot down for now. She supposedly called CPD useless. That is a declaration of war.

We're pretty sure crime is down - Special Ed says so at every opportunity. He wouldn't lie, would he?

FOP, you want to chime in and calm the waters?

Weather to Spare Groot Again?

Climbing temps all weekend, but rain starting Friday and continuing through Sunday.

But then a warm week with schools out - 80's all week.

Might be interesting.

Pick your numbers - we'll guess 6 and 20....based on nothing at all.

No Calls for Resignation?

A bunch of people have been wondering why Groot hasn't called for the resignation of aldercreature Carrie Austin.

Give it time - it was only a raid. No indictment yet, so no calls for resignation.

Besides, Groot has to start interviewing worthy successors.

No need to rush.

Officers Cleared

The media is calling this a "controversial shooting:"

• Two police officers have been cleared of wrongdoing in the fatal shooting of an African American man in the Mount Greenwood neighborhood that sparked days of protests and unrest after a year of upheaval surrounding the release of video of Officer Jason Van Dyke shooting teenager Laquan McDonald 16 times.
  
  The Civilian Office of Police Accountability found the use of deadly force in the fatal shooting of 25-year-old Joshua Beal by Sgt. [...] and Officer [...] was “within department policy,” according to a recently released report.
  
  “All 18 shots fired by Officer and Sergeant occurred within a very brief timeframe, and the last eight or nine shots were fired within an even briefer period of time," according to the report. Even if Beal was no longer a threat, there would not have been enough time “to perceive and process that the threat had dissipated,” the report said.

Does anyone know how this:

is controversial in the least? That's a gun he's pointing. He later pointed it directly at other people, including officers, who are trained to respond to threats of deadly force with.....deadly force!

This is far from "controversial," except for the fact that the media refuses to tell exactly what the story is - an asshole with a gun, acting like an asshole with a gun (and not for the first time either), won't ever be an asshole with a gun again.

Another Wisconsin Death

Wisconsin is having a bad week:

• Milwaukee Police say an off-duty officer was killed after a crash at 60th and Capitol early Tuesday morning.
  
  He’s been identified as 27-year-old Officer Kou Her.
  
  Police say at 1:35 a.m., the officer was hit by a suspect at the intersection while driving home from work.
  
  Witnesses tell police the suspect was traveling "at a high rate of speed" and drove through a red light, hitting the officer's car.
  
  Police say witnesses not only stayed at the scene, but were able to help officers take the suspect into custody by telling them where the driver was heading.

And big surprise here:

• Police didn't say if the suspect was operating while intoxicated at the time, but did say he has four OWI convictions in the state of Wisconsin, the most recent in May 2017. He's on probation for that conviction.

Prayers and condolences to our Milwaukee PD friends.

Tone Deaf Much Groot?

We're going to run out of nicknames to come up with at this rate:

• Mayor Lori Lightfoot met Mayor Bill de Blasio at Gracie Mansion; huddled with a top deputy at NYPD headquarters; did political fundraising and defended her travel, telling me on Tuesday, “from time to time, I’m going to leave town.”
  
  And if that is a problem for you, “so be it,” she said.

In other words, "Go fuck yourselves peasants!"

Seriously, we know Chicago is an international city. Has been for years. Travel is part of the job, and holding "meetings" to make it look like at least some of it is "Official Business" is part of the game.

But Rahm spent every weekend traveling, and when he wasn't traveling he was at his hideaway over at Van Buren and Green while countless man-hours were spent (and continue to be spent) on an empty residence. Chicago needs a mayor who spends time in town handling local problems that were ignored by the past two idiots and not by some wanna-be jet-setter testing the national waters for another job.

Dominos Start to Fall

More please:

• FBI agents executed a search warrant Wednesday morning on the Far South Side ward office of Ald. Carrie Austin (34th). The search marks the latest step in ongoing, widespread federal investigations of Chicago aldermen.
  
  Three aldermen who were once the City Council’s most powerful — Edward M. Burke, Danny Solis and now Austin — have either been charged or implicated in the biggest scandal in the City Council’s sordid history of corruption.
  
  So far, Burke (14th) has been indicted on political corruption charges, and former Ald. Solis (25th) has cooperated with the investigation by wearing a wire for the feds and secretly recording conversations. Burke has denied any wrongdoing, and Austin has not been charged with any crimes. Austin, 70, is second in seniority on the City Council after Burke.
  
  After the Sun-Times first reported that Solis was wearing a wire, Austin told reporters: “Not about Danny. I might cry,” Austin said. “You don’t do that. You just don’t.”

Why Carrie? Because you're all over those recordings?

We're betting the answer to that is "yes," and wonder of wonders - Groot will get to start handpicking aldercreatures in short order.

No Hits

Attempted robbery:

• A Chicago police officer exchanged fire with a suspect in an attempted robbery Wednesday in Morgan Park on the Far South Side.
  
  A female victim was getting into her vehicle just after 8 a.m. in the 10700 block of South Morgan Street when a white SUV pulled up and someone inside told her to “give us whatever you have,” according to Chicago police. She then ran back into a house to get help. CPD spokesman Anthony [Google-me] tweeted that an off-duty officer intervened in the attempted robbery, was shot at by the suspect and returned fire.
  
  The officer and the suspect each fired one round and no one was hit, police said.

Be aware.

Info for Retirees

From the comments:

• OT for retirees...Pension board sent out signature forms which must be notarized and returned by 30 June...12 days, hope none of the people in Arizona or Vegas went on a road trip this week...

Is this a regular thing, Proof of Life?

If you take a picture of yourself holding up the daily newspaper will that satisfy the Pension Board?

Is there some scandal brewing about Indicted Johnson collecting and cashing dead coppers pension checks? We're hearing the Pension Board was inundated with calls regarding their completely unreasonable deadline considering that it's summer travel season, especially for retirees who don't have to return to the job.

Car Jacker Shot (UPDATE - on Bond?)

Can't even go to lunch without risking your property:

• A Cook County sheriff’s deputy wounded a teenager who tried to steal his sports car Monday at a car wash in Little Village, police said.
  
  The man had just stepped away from his 2015 Chevrolet Corvette in a parking lot in the 2500 block of West Cermak Road when the teen got in the car, Chicago police said.
  
  When he returned at 8:35 p.m., the 50-year-old man pulled out a handgun and fired shots at the 16-year-old, striking him in the shoulder, police said. Police said the deputy told them he saw the teen reaching for something, but it was unclear what that was.
  
  The man was on-duty at the time but was on a break, according to sheriff’s spokesman Sam Randall. He’s a 28-year veteran and works at the county’s main criminal courthouse, about a mile southwest of where the shooting occurred, Randall said.

Well done Sheriff.

We certainly hope the bloodstains weren't overly spread around the 'vette. If there's a GoFundMe for the cleaning costs, we'll let everyone know.

UPDATE: Subject out on bond for a previous carjacking? Cook County Courts Strike Again!

Racine Officer Killed

Off duty taking police action:

• An officer was shot dead Monday while intervening in a robbery in southern Wisconsin.
  
  Officer John Hetland was off-duty when he approached an armed robber at Tezzer’s Tavern in Racine, Wisconsin, the Kenosha County sheriff’s office said in a statement. The suspect fatally shot Hetland and fled the scene, Racine police said. The shooting happened about 9:40 p.m. in the 1900 block of Lathrop Avenue.
  
  The sheriff’s office released a video frame of the gunman entering the bar. Hetland was a 24-year veteran of the Racine Police Department, according to a statement from Racine Chief Arthel Howell.

Crista Noel was unavailable to spout her usual bullshit.

God bless the fallen and deepest sympathies to our blue family up north.

Special Ed Back to Work?

This was our expression when we heard he was returning:

Seriously Ed. Take some time off.

Maybe take a trip to Aruba or something.

Crime is Down! Only 32 Shot

It's truly a sad state of affairs when the mayor and her people have to claim that 8 dead and 24 maimed this past weekend is actually an improvement over the last three years.

But it does nothing for Groot's daily averages.

Scooter Casualties

The City rolled out the Divvy scooters or Ride-Share scooters or whatever they're called. Ten separate companies are vying for the eventual Contract to waste tens of millions of taxpayer money. Here's how some of it went down:

Read all about it at the link here. This all just seems like a silly idea - how soon until the hospitals start getting skull fractures and the Marine Unit starts dredging these out of the lagoons and river?

Interesting Scandal

Once again, a "merit" white shirt gets caught in an investigation of their own making:

• Chicago police are investigating if an on-duty sergeant forced a transgender woman to perform a sex act in a marked police vehicle in a secluded West Side location, according to documents obtained by the Chicago Tribune.
  
  The woman reported the sexual assault at Rush University Medical Center shortly after the alleged incident in March, police reports indicate. At the same time, she handed over what she said was DNA evidence implicating the officer, the reports show.
  
  But police weren’t able to talk to her until several weeks later. She told detectives that she had been sexually assaulted by a “white shirt” — a common reference to Chicago police supervisors because of their uniform. He had threatened to arrest her unless she performed the sex act, she told authorities.

Rather than face an internal investigation, he resigned.

Who keeps recommending these idiots for "merit" promotions? Do they even bother to look at job histories?

• Documents obtained by the Tribune through a public-records request show this same officer had been recommended for firing more than 20 years ago after an investigation by the department’s Internal Affairs Division. That investigation found the officer and a partner had threatened to throw a convicted felon back into prison on bogus drug charges unless he handed over an illegal gun.
  
  The officer was ultimately given just a 30-day suspension.

Shouldn't that disqualify someone for "merit" consideration? In this case, it appears to have been a recently retired Deputy Chief of CAPS / former 011 District commander who recommended the Sergeant for promotion. Which is interesting because the retired Deputy Chief also recommended the Baby-Sitting Pilot Program Commander for lieutenant years ago. We have numerous witnesses who related how this Commander laughed at how easy it was to trick the Deputy into recommending him over other candidates.

The Baby-Sitting Pilot Program Commander was also investigated while on tact in 011 for planting guns on felons to the point where IAD cut his locker open, recovered contraband and opened a rather largish CR investigation. We haven't confirmed this, but we're told that the Baby-sitting Pilot Program Commander and the alleged Tranny Assaulting Sergeant were on the same team at the same time and were part of this same investigations.....before both being recommender for "merit" promotions.

As the World Turns.

Riccio Safe....for Now

Tony's job is safe while he fills in for the recovering Special Ed:

• The No. 2 man in the Chicago Police Department will not be suspended, fired or removed for taking a family vacation in early June — approved and paid for in October — in violation of Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s edict that no top brass take time off during the summer.
  
  During an exclusive interview Monday, Lightfoot told the Chicago Sun-Times the controversy caused by Anthony Riccio’s June 1-to-7 trip to Aruba to celebrate his daughter’s graduation is “over for now” and she’s prepared to move on.
  
  “I’ve had an opportunity to get fully up to speed on what happened. We’ve dealt with it internally and I think it’s over for now,” the mayor said.
  
  Lightfoot was pressed to describe how the matter was resolved without punishment when she hinted strongly last week that Riccio would pay a price for the ill-advised vacation. “I wanted to make sure that I understood what had happened and the circumstances. As I understand, it was a pre-paid vacation that was paid last fall and already approved,” she said. “I’ve emphasized to him and to the superintendent that it’s important that they lead by example. So I think we’ve come to an understanding and I’m ready to move forward.”

Whoa whoa whoa...."lead by example"? Seriously? You might want to rethink that statement. After all, "leading by example" has led to all sorts of problems here. Perhaps you ought to review who your exempt staff has been recommending for "merit" promotions the last decade or two.

Priorities Groot, Priorities

What position did she get elected to exactly?

• I voted for her as a vote against Taxwinkle. Lost all respect for her both by her idiotic comments and her inability to attend a CFD Candidate graduation so she could instead be at some democratic anti Trump fund raiser in California. 9.5 was (is) an a$$hole, at least he always was able to pin badges on the new guardians of this once fine city. Lori, you too have now proven yourself to also be an a$$hole. Why dont you make a habit of missing all police and fire graduations. We can happily find the few brass members left that still have the earned respect of the troops, it would mean something more to us, instead of something that is just an inconvenience to you.

Lightgroot hasn't met a bridge she couldn't burn yet, and it's only been a month?

Lt Assignments

They started Sunday?

Five brand new Lieutenants going to 006? Not surprising - anyone who can gets out of 006 as soon as possible.

Three going to 011? Were they short? They have more officers and sergeants than any district in the city. Is the new commander driving out the lieutenants that don't transfer to Harvey?

Only two went north of Division Street.

Groot Goes National

Our friend Jack Dunphy hits another home run:

• [We quote from the middle of the article where it calls out Lightgroot - read the entire article at the link up top. It is completely worth your time - SCC]
  
  Appearing on a local cable news show on May 30, Lightfoot made the astonishing allegation that the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, the union representing rank-and-file officers, had instructed its members to be passive when dealing with crime over the Memorial Day weekend. “But you know,” she told interviewer Ken Davis, “there were rumors floating around about — and I didn’t verify this — but rumors floating around that they were telling their officers, ‘Don’t do anything. Don’t, over Memorial Day weekend, don’t intercede. If you see some criminal activity just lay back, do nothing.’ I hope to God that wasn’t true because, man, oh man, if that happened, there’s going to be a reckoning.”
  
  There’s going to be a reckoning, all right, Madam Mayor, it just won’t be the one you thought it would be.
  
  As Rudy Giuliani knew, and as Lori Lightfoot does not, it takes a motivated police force to take the steps necessary to drive down the level of violence seen in Chicago. “Cops count,” as William Bratton has preached for years, but in order for them to make a difference, they have to have the expectation that if they act within the law and department policy, their superiors and their city government will back them when controversy arises. Cops in Chicago have no such expectation, and it appears unlikely Mayor Lightfoot will even try to instill one.

He also points out the failed Cook County "justice" system and Crimesha's criminal neglect of her duties and rightfully asks what's Lori going to do about this since she already torched the entire "honeymoon" period typically afforded to the newly elected.

FOP Fires a Broadside

But not signed by the FOP president:

• Chicago’s rank-and-file police union fired back against Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Friday with an open letter marking the latest volley in a rhetorical battle between the new mayor and her longtime political nemesis.
  
  The Fraternal Order of Police slammed the “inflammatory and false allegations” they say Lightfoot has lobbed against the officers’ union, most recently during the City Council meeting on Wednesday when she said she’d sit down for contract negotiations with the FOP “any time you’re willing to move forward on reform and not block every single issue.”
  
  Union leaders insisted they have “accepted reform” following the scathing 2016 Justice Department report on CPD policies, though their letter immediately goes on to note a potential federal consent decree was rejected by ex-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and then calls the ensuing decree agreed to by the city and state “a host of senseless policies and bureaucracy imposed upon our officers that will only handcuff the police.

A cope of the entire 3-page letter is at the link or at the FOP site if you don't want to give the Slum Times clicks.

Could someone in a position of knowledge:

• tell us exactly what "reforms" have been proposed?
• what "reforms" have been obstructed or blocked?

And maybe tell us where the money is going to come from for all of this "reform"? Since the Department of Justice has removed itself from the process, there is nothing in the way of Grants or subsidies forthcoming from Washington DC.

Not Guilty?

Hey Lightgroot? You want to see why cops are staying fetal?

• An 18th District police sergeant is being recognized for rescuing a woman from her "altered state" boyfriend who was found choking and biting flesh from the woman’s face in a Streeterville apartment. The Chicago Police Memorial Foundation (CPMF) today named Sgt. Andy Dakuras and two patrolmen as the charity’s officers of the month.
  
  Around 9:45 p.m. last June 23rd, Dakuras responded to a “person calling for help” dispatch in the 400 block of North McClurg. Stepping off of the elevator, Dakuras heard the 27-year-old victim crying, “Please help me. He is killing me. Please help.”
  
  Dakuras forced his way through the reinforced door and found the woman sitting on the kitchen floor with her boyfriend choking her from behind with his forearm and biting the flesh from her cheek and face, the charity said in a press release.
  
  The sergeant realized that the boyfriend was in an “altered state of mind” as he tried various tactics to free the woman from the man’s grip. Eventually, Dakuras grabbed his pepper spray and discharged the entire can into the boyfriend’s mouth, which caused the man to loosen his grip on the woman and lean back on the floor.

Note: At this point, the sergeant could have killed the offender and there isn't a single sustainable charge that could be brought against him. Not only that, he'd still be hailed as a hero. The sergeant didn't do this:

• The boyfriend continued to struggle as Dakuras tried to handcuff him. At one point during the six-minute fight, the man bit down on Dakuras’ forearm. The boyfriend kept his mouth clamped on the sergeant’s arm despite Dakuras’ attempts to free himself by pushing on pressure points, including the man’s eye sockets.

Note: Once again, the sergeant could have legally and justifiably killed the offender and so could the two responding officers arrived to assist in the arrest. This did not happen. We won't judge, nor will we permit any comments to appear that second guess the officers, but here's why cops are remaining fetal:

• Court records show the boyfriend, Gregory Jackson, was charged with three counts of aggravated battery of a police officer; aggravated battery - strangulation; and resisting police.
  
  In a bench trial overseen by Judge Thomas Byrne on May 8th, Jackson was found not guilty on one count of aggravated battery of a police officer. Byrne found him not guilty of all other charges by reason of insanity.
  
  Byrne granted Jackson conditional release and ordered him to undergo five years of outpatient mental health services and to meet other requirements.

Really? He chews off parts of his girlfriends face and tries to remove a chunk of the sergeant's arm and he walks out of court?

So Lori, you going to talk to Crimesha and Judge Timmy to figure out to make that side of the equation? And are you going to thank the Sergeant for not justifiably killing another "community" member?

Four Officers Hurt

Ridiculous:

• A Lakeview man who initially refused to press charges after being beaten with a hammer during an online hook-up Friday evening had a change of heart and decided to prosecute after the alleged offender injured several officers during a confrontation in the heart of Boystown hours later.
  
  Police say 29-year-old Cedrick Johnson of Uptown met a 47-year-old man in the 600 block of West Aldine on Friday evening. At some point, Johnson, who used the name “Lamar” online, struck the victim repeatedly in the head with a hammer and stole property, including the man’s cellular phone, according to a police report and a source.
  
  About two hours later, the victim told police that he no longer wished to pursue charges against his attacker and officers canceled evidence technician services for the scene, where a hammer was found and blood was spattered on walls and throughout a bedroom, reports show.
  
  The victim was treated and released from Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center for multiple “indentations of the cranium,” an officer said.

So the victim, with multiple "indentations of the cranium," initially decided to drop the matter. Fine. But later:

• Later, around 12:50 a.m. on Saturday, the victim called the police again after he tracked his stolen phone and discovered that it was pinging near a convenience store in the 3400 block of North Halsted.
  
  Responding officers were flagged down about 20 minutes later by the victim who pointed them toward Johnson. After a short foot pursuit, Johnson attacked one of the cops by striking him in the head and spraying him with pepper spray, police said.
  
  “The offender then hit the officer in the head with the pepper spray [can], causing it to explode,” a police spokesperson said. Three additional officers and at least one bystander were overcome by the effects of the spray. Johnson punched officers as they tried to take them into custody, according to a CPD statement.
  
  One sergeant and three patrol officers were treated and released at Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center, police said.

A change of heart and four injured officers later, eight felony charges for a convicted felon.

Expect him to be I-bonded Monday morning.

(story from CWB Blog)

This is Some BS

Can someone explain to us how the teachers can threaten to strike if their non expired Contract isn't renegotiated and signed before the new school year but the FOP has to sit and beg for a new Contract that's two years expired? And the PBPA is three years gone.

The CTU hasn't put out a decent product in our lifetimes with "graduates" reading at levels unseen outside of most Third World shitholes, but somehow have the audacity to demand raises. At least the police kept homicides somewhat stagnant for a time...even with the lies told to the media and at CompStat meetings.

Morons

Where do these people come from?

• Attorneys who won a consent decree in federal court requiring reforms in the Chicago Police Department are threatening to have the city held in contempt over a half dozen citizen deaths.
  
  Attorney Alexa Van Brunt, with the McArthur Justice Center, said she’s deeply concerned.
  
  “The consent decree explicitly requires respect for sanctity of life, as well as specific mental health measures; and Myles Frazier was in mental health crisis when he was shot and killed in his own home by a SWAT team. So, I think the evidence is in the killings The evidence is in the lack of response from our leaders," she said.
  
  The city, she said, could be held in contempt.

Among the alleged "six" deaths, they're counting the recent death of the nurse killed by the cop just charged with DUI. What that has to do with the Consent Decree we have no idea at all. HeyJackass only has four total deaths attributed to the police and all were armed, either with guns or knives.

Guess what the response is from these idiots?

• “You do not have to shoot to kill. It is not necessary,” said Crista Noel, with the group, Women’s All Points Bulletin. “There aren’t any police officers being killed. As a matter of fact, they’re the only people getting to go home to their families. None of these individuals got to go home to their families.”

Everyone's an expert - even this moron.

California Crashing and Burning

This isn't going to end well at all:

• The state of California has made no secret that it wants to let as many people out of prison as possible.
  
  From the early release of inmates through AB 109, to filling parole boards with felon friendly commissioners, to decriminalizing a litany of felonies and drug offenses with Props 47 and 57, Sacramento lawmakers are bending over backwards to dramatically reduce the state’s inmate population.
  
  Despite all of these efforts, the number of inmates hasn’t dropped dramatically enough to satisfy the state’s ruling Democrats, so they’re kicking tires on a new approach — rigging the jury system so no one gets convicted in the first place.
  
  This most recent push is Senate Bill 310, authored by state Sen. Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, and would allow Californians who have prior felony convictions to serve on juries.
  
  In a press release promoting the proposal, Skinner wrote, “SB310 will help ensure that California juries represent a fair cross-section of our communities…People with felony records have the right to vote in California. There is no legitimate reason why they should be barred from serving on a jury.”

Except for the fact they'd be more willing to excuse behavior that ought to earn prison time. They'd be hanging juries constantly and nullifying the entire process, making the already near-impossible task of holding criminals accountable that much more impossible.

Hypocrites

This crap is unbelievable:

• Mayor Lori Lightfoot joined the Rev. Michael Pfleger and hundreds of anti-violence activists Friday night for the outspoken priest’s annual anti-violence march through Gresham, rallying for citywide peace as shootings in Chicago tick upward along with the rising temperatures.
  
  “We must teach our young people different ways to resolve disputes. We must teach our young people that this growing community of victims is not a place where they want to be,” Lightfoot said on the steps of Saint Sabina Church.

Like this shit just a few days ago?

• The man was arrested last summer after he got into an argument with a woman in a White Castle on the South Side and was accused of snatching the receipt from her hands, according to a police report. The 24-year-old woman, who was with her 3-year-old niece, said the man then threatened to kill them and said, “I’m a police officer. Meet me outside. See what’s gonna happen,” the report states.
  
  A witness recognized the man as a security guard at St. Sabina Catholic Church on 78th Street, where police took him into custody.

Pfather Pfelcher has surrounded himself with gun-toting "bodyguards" for years and as we pointed out yesterday, one finally went off the rails and executed a shoplifter, and we have yet to hear a single incident of condemnation.

Lightgroot has made every single wrong move so far, whether by accident or design remains to be seen, but it's hard to believe anyone could be this stupid by accident.

Lightgroot "Cares"

What did we say the other day - "Don't Make Plans....Ever:"

• The No. 2 man in the Chicago Police Department is in hot water with Mayor Lori Lightfoot for taking a family vacation approved and paid for months ago but now in violation of the mayor’s edict that none of the top brass take time off during the violent summer months.
  
  Lightfoot refused to say whether First Deputy Superintendent Anthony Riccio’s job was in jeopardy after he took a trip during the first week of June. But it sure sounds like it.
  
  “That would be incredibly disappointing to me if that happened because I gave a very specific directive that no exempt should be taking vacation during the summer,” Lightfoot told reporters at an unrelated event Friday.
  
  “If that happened, that’ll be something that we have to have a serious conversation about,” she said

Keep this in mind when the orders come down about "restricted time due" and "cancelled RDO's" and whatever else the City and Department can do to make you miserable and disallow you the meager-est amount of time off - even when planned, paid for and approved two-thirds of a year in advance.

We guess the papers are calling him the "No. 2 man in the Department" because he's about to get shit on by a worthless politician who has already been on one west coast and one east coast trip to collect campaign cash from people she doesn't work for.

UPDATE: And as pointed out all over the comment section, Summer doesn't start for another week or so.

Memphis

Just so we have this straight:

• named offender in a Mississippi shooting flees to Tennessee
• makes a video saying how he's not going down without a fight
• is tracked down by US Marshals - not Memphis PD
• rams numerous law enforcement vehicles
• exits car with a gun
• is sent to meet his maker - Satan we're assuming

And the Memphis "community" decides to riot over this piece of shit, injuring two dozen officers?

Story here.

The media calls them "rowdy protestors" and are attempting to bury any extensive national coverage of the entire incident.

Special Ed Thoughts

We're going out on a limb assuming he actually has thoughts of his own occasionally:

"What am I still doing here?"

We don't have any answers for that either Ed.

Hey Phleger?

Any comment about this asshole?

• The night manager of the Walgreens was having problems with a woman he suspected of shoplifting, so he called someone who lived around the corner and used to work for a security firm.
  
  The ex-guard arrived at the Northwest Side store within minutes Wednesday night and started struggling with the 46-year-old woman, finally pushing her to the floor and shooting her once in the head, according to a law enforcement source. She was carrying five boxes of leggings and a black T-shirt.
  
  The gunman picked up a single shell casing, walked out and drove off in his SUV, police said.

Sounds like a straight up execution. And it turns out he has a connection to to phreaky pfather:

• The man was arrested last summer after he got into an argument with a woman in a White Castle on the South Side and was accused of snatching the receipt from her hands, according to a police report. The 24-year-old woman, who was with her 3-year-old niece, said the man then threatened to kill them and said, “I’m a police officer. Meet me outside. See what’s gonna happen,” the report states.
  
  A witness recognized the man as a security guard at St. Sabina Catholic Church on 78th Street, where police took him into custody. The charges were later dropped when the accuser did not show up in court, according to Cook County court records.

Perhaps Pfleger will offer him sanctuary?

Prayers for NYPD

A third suicide within a nine day span:

• A New York police officer killed himself Friday, marking the third officer to die by suicide since last week.
  
  The 29-year-old officer died outside a New York Police Department precinct in Staten Island, marking the third police suicide over the last nine days, NYPD Commissioner James O'Neill confirmed in a statement Friday. Authorities did give information about the officer's identity.
  
  "This cannot be allowed to continue," O'Neill said in a statement. "Cops spend so much of their days assisting others. But before we can help the people we serve, it is imperative that we first help ourselves."

This is as bad a stretch as we've seen in some time.

Special Ed Hospitalized?

Rumor mill kicking up all of the sudden:

• Anonymous said...BREAKING NEWS..... Superintendent Johnson is hospitalized, needs emergency surgery.

Hopefully, nothing serious, but he's been looking like shit lately. Maybe this is the push needed for him to retire.

And with Staples supposedly retiring and Riccio on the outs.....

Don't Be a Candyass Lightgroot

Just do it - prove you mean business!

• Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Thursday renewed her threat to remove police officers from public schools on the heels of a blistering audit that accused the Chicago Police Department of continuing to operate the program without oversight and training.
  
  Lightfoot’s transition report recommends “encouraging Chicago Public Schools to work with individual schools to define the mission, goal and scope” of school resource officers and tailor that role “to the needs of each school’s student body.”
  
  But months after a confrontation between police officers and a student at Marshall High School, Lightfoot hinted again Thursday that the days of having Chicago police officers stationed inside Chicago Public Schools may end on her watch.

We've been advocating to get out of schools for at least a few years now. Even McCarthy toyed with the idea. But we don't think Lori has the balls to do it, especially after twenty-eight parents and students went to jail the other day.

Gory Lori

An interesting stat from one of our friendly neighborhood bloggers:

• In the first 20 days since Lori took office, there has only been ONE DAY was homicide-free.

It's true. Here's the breakdown:

• Date (Killed) Wounded
  20 May (2) and 5
  21 May (1) and 6
  22 May (2) and 7
  23 May (2) and 10
  24 May (1) and 7
  25 May (2) and 10
  26 May (3) and 14
  27 May (2) and 2
  28 May (3) and 6
  29 May (5) and 5
  30 May (2) and 10
  31 May (4) and 11
  01 Jun (3) and 24
  02 Jun (3) and 8
  03 Jun (1) and 7
  04 Jun (1) and 8
  05 Jun (3) and 5
  06 Jun (2) and 13
  07 Jun (0) and 10
  08 Jun (2) and 25

So the 20 Day Running Totals work out to be:

• 44 dead and 193 wounded

Lori's Daily Average of Carnage works out to be :::::drumroll sound effect:::::

• 2.2 Homicides and 9.65 Maimed PER DAY!

That's a pretty piss poor showing by the new mayor and Special Ed. We aren't sure what Rahm averaged, but we know the totals were in the thousands. Perhaps our friends at HeyJackass can come up with something close? Or at least over the past couple of years of Rahm's term since they didn't exist that far back.