800 and Growing

Twelve hour days are right around the corner it seems:

• About 6% of the entire Chicago Police Department was on sick leave Monday as the COVID-19 pandemic continued to have an impact on city operations.
  
  More than 800 Chicago police employees — most of them sworn officers, though some civilians as well — were out sick with wide-ranging ailments, but the increased numbers also were likely due to employees who took time off for precautionary measures due to the coronavirus, CPD officials said.

And then this fantasy number again:

• The department has more than 13,000 sworn officers and several hundred more civilian employees.

Who keeps spreading this number around? We haven't had over 12,000 since the Clinton money ran out around 2000. Now we're supposed to believe it's over 13,000? Someone has been smoking the airport stash of surrendered weed again.

We've heard OEMC is already cancelling 4th and 5th Period furloughs in preparing for the worst case scenario.

Finalists on Tap

Why announce now? A week ago, it was indefinitely delayed due to ongoing events. Now it's front and center for some reason:

• The Chicago Police Board expects to announce its three finalists in the selection of the city’s next police superintendent by midweek, board officials said.
  
  The nine-member board was slated to announce the finalists at a special public meeting at 4 p.m. Wednesday. From there, Mayor Lori Lightfoot is expected to eventually pick one of those candidates to be the city’s next top cop.
  
  [...] The decision by the board comes more than four months after it began its national search for a list of candidates to replace Eddie Johnson, who was abruptly dismissed by Lightfoot in December.

Is there some bad news that Groot needs buried? Or is Beck getting sick of flying back-and-forth during the Time of Corona?

Schools Out for Year?

An interesting development:

• Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Monday outlined a plan for “remote learning” — including the distribution of lap-top computers to needy students — leaving one aldermen to conclude that Chicago Public Schools students have attended their last day of in-person classes this academic year.
  
  “They’re doing remote learning for the rest of the year . . . We have no expectation of them going back,” Ald. Ray Lopez (15th) told the Sun-Times after a conference call with the mayor.
  
  Pressed on whether Lightfoot said students would not return to school buildings for the rest of the year, Lopez said, “I don’t know if that was the exact words. But that’s the implication — that the rest of the school year will be remote learning. I don’t know why they’d have to go back if they’re all learning at home.”

So when can we expect a property tax rebate from the City? After all, the CPS levy has gone up the maximum for the past 100 years or so. If the schools are closed and there are no expenses associated with educating students, there ought to be a massive refund due to taxpayers.

These are tough times. We need every bit of savings that Groot can provide to her employers - taxpaying citizens.

UPDATE: This is fucking ridiculous - schools might be closed the rest of the year, but CPS is still paying teachers....and this is even being seriously discussed?

• Students won’t be forced to make up any of these missed days, but the governor’s order gives districts the option of adding days into the summer while allowing teachers and staff to earn extra pay for any added time.

Full pay for half-a-year teaching AND additional overtime opportunities? This shouldn't just be "no".....but "Fuck No!"

Union Scam

So the US Attorney says they're going to start prosecuting hoarders of supplies. Guess what turns up in storage from the notoriously left-wing SEIU?

• Extremist left-wing labor union SEIU miraculously “found” the 39 million medical face masks in its warehouses three days after U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr announced that the feds were going to start going after hoarders.
  
  [...]
  
  Well, wouldn’t you know it, but after that announcement, the extremist union “found” an incredible 39 million face masks it had in its stores that it “accidentally” forgot about.

Just for comparison purposes, 39 million is 27 million MORE than the entire US stockpile.

But don't worry - the SEIU is selling them to hospitals for $5 a piece. Which is over double what you could get them for a few months ago.

Quite a profit margin there.

Google-me Goodbye (UPDATE)

Pretty much the most incompetent, ignorant, spokesweasel in CPD history:

• The head Chicago police spokesman sent a letter of resignation to Interim Superintendent Charlie Beck Friday that declared his intention to leave the department when Beck does.
  
  Anthony [Google-me], CPD’s chief communications officer, started at the department in 2015, and at the time, he “had only committed to staying in Chicago a few months to help develop protocols to enhance the function and scope of the traditional News Affairs office," according to his letter.
  
  “While the wind and weather gave me strong encouragement to go home, it was the amazing people of CPD and Chicago that led me to stay,” he wrote.

Yeah, and the completely out-of-proportion six-figure salary for being a political mouthpiece for an already politically run department. Google-me never said anything that wasn't personally approved by a mayor and the mayor's handlers. He spouted politics, not police work (as his work history never contained anything resembling hands-on policing.)

Just another one of Rahm's carpetbagging assholes scamming taxpayers for well over half-a-mil, doing a job that a patrolman could have done for way less money.

UPDATE: Just noticed this:

• He plans to return home to the Washington, D.C., and northern Virginia area....

So he's NOT a Chicago resident? And hasn't been since he got hired in 2015?

Besides encouraging carpetbaggers, this information could be enlightening to a lot of people. We recall the media spotlighting a couple cases where high-level sigh-income people didn't move into the city as required.

More "Merit" Stupidity

Another multiple "merit" endangering lives via ignorance:

• Civilian on 2nd watch in 011 who is also military, was ordered by his military unit to self-quarantine for 2 weeks due to his unit testing positive for the COVID-19 virus. However he decided not to and instead went back to work in 011 where he works in shot spotter room. Few days ago he tested positive for the COVID-19 virus.
  
  Not knowing how many people might have been exposed to him the Lt. on 1st watch requested that a blanket exposure report be done for the whole watch to cover everyone since he worked for 2 weeks with the virus in him. Well the request was denied and newly promoted captain came to roll call couple of days ago to explain. He stated for us to be exposed “only 2” things have to happen:
  
  1. You have to be exposed to an individual for a period of 10 minutes or more
  2. Exchange bodily fluids with the person that has the virus
  
  That is it, no other way can you get the virus. He stated that the info is according to Chicago Department of Health. So basically anyone that was exposed to this guy will not be covered unless they sat in the shot spotter room with him for more than 10 minutes or exchanged bodily fluids with him.
  
  However according to CDC COVID-19 is a new disease and they are still learning how it spreads and to what extent. So far it is known that there are multiple ways that it can be spread:
  
  Person to person (between people who are in close contact with one another within 6 feet, through respiratory droplets produced when an infected person coughs or sneezes.) Those droplets can land on any surface and depending on the surface it can survive from few hours to several days. It may be possible that a person can get COVID-19 by touching a surface or object that has the virus on it and then touching their own mouth, nose, or possibly their eyes. Some spread may be possible before an individual even shows symptoms.
  
  Funny enough as soon as they learned that this guy was positive the captain went and got tested for the virus even though he has no symptoms and multiple health organizations state that you should not get tested unless you show symptoms. Last thing he mentioned is that the Commander wanted to thank us for doing great work and to keep getting event numbers for covid-19 dispersals whenever we see someone outside.
  
  For all the coppers in 011 do not worry your lives matter. On previous roll calls the captain told us that nothing else matters in 011 other than us and that they got our backs.

So this guy is spreading unverifiable info and he answers to a commander who should have been fired years ago for HUD fraud. Amazing leadership that Groot has in 011.

UPDATE: The sergeants and lieutenants in 011 took it upon themselves to do over 150 Exposure Reports for anyone who was exposed to this infected civilian. Someone is doing the correct thing.

Just a Question

Anyone know how much Groot and Fatass spent on illegal aliens for housing, food, medical care, legal assistance, that might have been better spent on masks, sanitizer, PPEs, and such for First Responders?

And are any reporters looking at how the people that are supposed to keep everyone else safe are so poorly equipped? Here's a hint - misspent money and misplaced priorities.

Now the ACLU Speaks Up?

So Rhode Island police AND National Guard are stopping cars with New York plates and searching houses - ordering occupants to quarantine themselves for two weeks upon reaching a destination in Rhode Island:

• Rhode Island police have begun stopping cars with New York license plates, and the National Guard will soon help officials conduct house-to-house searches to force anyone who has traveled from New York to enter isolation.
  
  “Right now we have a pinpointed risk,” Gov. Gina Raimondo (D) said, according to Bloomberg. “That risk is called New York City.”
  
  Raimondo on Thursday issued an executive order enforceable by law mandating that anyone who has traveled to New York via any form of transportation must enter into a two-week self-quarantine.

House-to-house searches of private property.

And someone woke up the ACLU:

• The American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island is questioning the constitutionality of Gov. Gina Raimondo’s directive allowing state police to stop vehicles with New York license plates to collect information from drivers and passengers in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus.
  
  The Democratic governor on Thursday called the measure extreme but pointed out that the New York City area is the epicenter of the disease in the U.S.
  
  While Raimondo has the authority to suspend some state laws and regulations to address a medical emergency, she cannot suspend the Constitution, ACLU of Rhode Island Executive Director Steven Brown said in a statement late Thursday.

But Groot and Fat-ass can involuntarily confine hundreds, perhaps thousands of homeless in empty hotels, by force of arms and Ed "can I kiss your ass mayor?" Yohnka doesn't have a thing to say.

What is She Selling?

We don't want any:

And stay off the lawn.

FOP Picks Up Its Game

A letter released earlier this week (click for larger version):

Everything we've been saying for a week now.

McCormick Place Field Hospital

Some parts of government are growing into the role after years of neglect:

• McCormick Place will be converted into Illinois’ first field hospital to handle 3,000 coronavirus patients as the state braces for a possible surge in cases in the coming weeks, officials said.
  
  “We’re not waiting for the worst. We’re preparing ourselves for the worst,” Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Saturday at his daily briefing.
  
  The governor’s remarks came a day after Army Corps of Engineers Commanding General Lt. Gen. Todd Semonite said he hoped to complete the work by April 24. The Chicago Department of Public Health said 500 beds are expected to be ready there in the coming week.

And not just McCormick Place:

• The United Center also will transform into a logistics hub for Chicago’s coronavirus response — used for food distribution, first responder staging and collecting medical supplies.

Police station lobbies remain open to any and all who want to come in, make reports and cough all over officers and staff.

Gas Mask Fit Testing

Seems the last minute fit testing up north is as expected - a disaster:

• Word of advice to everyone going to get N95 mask trained at Belmont & Western... When they put the hood over your head and spray the solution into it for the "test" part, when you put your mask on and fit it, NO MATTER WHAT, DO NOT say you "taste" the solution! Say you have a perfect seal! I "failed" the test because apparently I couldn't get a good enough "seal" and admitted to tasting the solution they sprayed, then I was told to throw my mask in the garbage can behind me. I do it, I ask "ok where do I get my replacement mask?" Figuring it's procedure to throw away all opened masks. P.O. says "you don't get a mask because you failed". They fill out a card saying you failed their (scientific? 100% fool-proof?) Test?! And I walk out without ANY mask!

The shortfalls in preparedness we've been seeing the past few weeks is nothing short of criminal

• No N95 masks, 
• eight year expired sanitizer, 
• not securing lobbies, 
• no quarterly drills, 
• no gas-mask fit testing since NATO, 
• cancelled days off with almost no notice
• cancellation of the cancellation with zero notice,
• OEMC on the verge of collapse, 
• no solid medical protocols in place for exposed officers

The list is damn near endless. This comes from years of misplaced priorities and spending practices on things that buy votes - nothing on keeping the population safe.

Groot Memes

These are a thing we're told:

The Slum Times even did an article on them:

• Now that Chicagoans have nothing to do but stay inside and scroll social media platforms like Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Reddit, memes that only locals would appreciate are inevitably cropping up.
  
  The latest trend pokes fun at the harsh new reality by photoshopping a stony-faced Lightfoot blocking entrance to the outdoor spaces her administration has closed.
  
  In one photoshopped image, Lightfoot stands in front of police barricades blocking the lakefront trail from rule-breakers, emitting the vibe of a middle school principal who just walked into a classroom that’s gone off the rails.

Or a power-mad dwarf over-reacting once again to supposed slights to her authority.

Jail Coronavirus

That guy in the background knows what's what:

We're getting quite a few e-mails about guards in the jail being ill-equipped to deal with sick inmates, hence the rush to get the inmates out into the public realm....where they can be untreated by closed clinics for meds and addictions.

This is Disturbing

We routinely delete nazi comparisons, because they are inevitably overkill. People forget that there were actual nazi's in the middle of last century and somewhere between 75-to-85 million dead can be laid at the feet of their twisted ideology. Just tossing out the comparison is insulting to the memory of so many dead.

But this is certainly eerily reminiscent of the recent past:

• When Mayor Lori Lightfoot this week announced the city will pay five hotels about $175 a night for thousands of guest rooms to house COVID-19 patients, the arrangements sounded pretty comfy. The deal, designed to provide relief for hospitals that may run out of beds, has been heralded as providing “temporary accommodations” a “housing option,” and “a sanctuary for those who need it during this difficult time.”
  
  COVID guests will get a comfortable hotel room and three meals a day on the city’s dime.
  
  But, CWBChicago has learned, these guests will also encounter some unorthodox amenities. Not the least of which will be the security guards and Chicago police officers who are on-property to ensure that the “guests” don’t “check out” until the city says so. And some Chicago cops who may be called on to physically restrain uncooperative hotel guests are raising serious questions about the arrangements.

There's a name for places like that. Where the agents of the government can keep you from leaving by use of force without being convicted of any crime. People leave hospitals all the time without being cured. It's called "against medical advice." It isn't smart, but you can't legislate stupidity out of existence.

The CWB blog asks some actual cops what's going on:

• But a Chicago cop told CWBChicago this week, “officers are concerned for several reasons. They are inside a location with confirmed infected people without any personal protective equipment (PPE) unless they need to go hands-on.”
• But the cop had another concern: “Not complying with quarantine is only a Class A misdemeanor. The whole thing is a disaster waiting to happen because, at some point, an officer is gonna go hands-on [to keep a “guest” from leaving] and there is no way in hell the city will back them.”

Anyone else worried about this overreach on the part of Groot and her bureaucratic minions?

UPDATE: Someone located the list of Fat-ass's Executive Orders and only one (Order #8) deals with restricting movement:

• Orders residents to stay at home, barring exceptions such as essential travel for essential work or supplies, exercise and recreation, through April 7.

A lot of legal wiggle room for someone being "detained" in a hotel that isn't their actual residence. Corporation Counsel would lose this one in a heartbeat and offer up your house to placate Loevy and Loevy.

You Are Being Manipulated

These numbers came out of New York yesterday:

• So far, New York has clocked 37,258 confirmed cases and 385 deaths from COVID-19.

Using that Devil's Device (math) we divide 385 deaths by 37,258 reported cases and come up with:

• 0.010333

Multiply by 100 and the death rate for New York as of a day ago is 1.0333% - right in line with all of the Illinois numbers we posted yesterday. The article is pretty much Gov Cuomo speculating that there may have been a teeny bit of overreaction on the part of state government:

• Sweeping statewide quarantine orders may not have been the most effective strategy to combat the coronavirus, Gov. Andrew Cuomo conceded on Thursday, as he weighed plans to restart the economy.
  
  “We closed everything down. That was our public health strategy,” said Cuomo during an Albany press briefing. “If you re-thought that or had time to analyze that public health strategy, I don’t know that you would say ‘Quarantine everyone.'”
  
  It’s the third day in a row that Cuomo has publicly mused about quarantines and how best to eventually restart the Empire State’s shattered economy.

No one in the left-wing media is covering this either:

• On Thursday Dr. Fauci co-authored a report on the coronavirus in the New England Journal of Medicine. In the report Dr. Fauci now argues that the mortality rate of the coronavirus may be much closer to a very bad flu.

Just four days ago, Fauci was declared the leading expert on the coronavirus outbreak by the media, but now (with increased data) he's walking back his predictions (which the media won't cover). Oh, and about that data?

• Neil Ferguson at Imperial College London gave evidence today to the UK’s parliamentary select committee on science and technology as part of an inquiry into the nation’s response to the coronavirus outbreak.
  
  He said that expected increases in National Health Service capacity and ongoing restrictions to people’s movements make him “reasonably confident” the health service can cope when the predicted peak of the epidemic arrives in two or three weeks. UK deaths from the disease are now unlikely to exceed 20,000, he said, and could be much lower.

This after a prediction of over half-a-million deaths in Britain and two-million plus in the USA, now he's completely retracting those assertions - after the world economy collapsed.

Future Supe Tests Positive

This could be another reason Beck is sticking around:

• The mayor and police chief of west suburban Aurora have both tested positive for coronavirus, city officials said in a news release Friday.
  
  Both Mayor Richard Irvin and Police Chief Kristen Ziman were tested Saturday after an Aurora police supervisor contracted the virus.
  
  Chief Ziman and her command staff began self-quarantining on the morning of Saturday, March 21, following the recommendations after the police supervisor was tested for coronavirus the prior evening, according to the news release.

Get well soon - Beck will keep the seat warm for you.

These are Our "Leaders" (UPDATE)

We were watching a replay of Groot's presser from yesterday, and there were some real laughers in there, including when Charlie Beck said there are "13,600 officers" here to enforce the Will of Groot.

We haven't seen 13,600 since the Clinton money ran out back in the 1990's.

And this one from Aldercreature Hopkins:

• “The police have obviously canceled all vacation. Pre-approved leave has been canceled. People are already wracking up overtime. We’ve just suspended the VRI initiative, which is the supplemental police that kind of stand around on Michigan Avenue. They’ve been re-deployed into patrol,” Hopkins said.

Really? Vacations cancelled? Who is telling him this bullshit? Does the FOP know about this? And if they do, shouldn't they be negotiating something like double-time-and-one-half for this like every other union in existence gets?

This one is shocking though:

• Normally, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois would be knee-jerk opposed to the blanket closing of Chicago’s most popular gathering spots. Not this time.
  
  “Let’s see how this is enforced. Let’s see what this looks like in a week. But if decisions are made on the basis of advice from public health officials to try to address this pandemic situation, those are things which are likely to be permissible,” said ACLU spokesman Ed Yohnka.
  
  “We’re living in an unprecedented time of a pandemic. There are going to be limitations on our movements as a result of that. It’s a step that was taken that, perhaps, will make people pay attention and, maybe at the end of the day, doesn’t last or is necessary for a protracted period of time, but sends a signal about what’s important.”

You just know if this was a Federal order given by a Republican president, the ACLU would be pissing all over themselves trying to get in front of a judge from the Ninth Circuit to slap a nationwide injunction on efforts to contain the virus. But let a social justice warrior mayor give this sort of order and Yohnka can't wait to kiss her feet, ass, and any other body part that Groot feels needs the loving touch of the ACLU.

UPDATE: The Sun Times has "memory-holed" the entire article, making aldercreature Hopkins quote disappear from their site. At the moment, the only existing record is a GoTechDaily.com which has the guts of the original article, so whoever was asking for a link for the FOP, there it is. Get it quick before they take that one down.

New 3-1-1 Setup

Here's what it looks like so far:

Where's the sneeze-shields?

Simple Math for Tiny Brains

We were invaded by a couple of tiny brains who (A) deliberately lied about what we wrote, (B) tried to claim we were downplaying the risks of COVID-19 or (C) just wrong about the math. Addressing these in order:

• To the softball who claimed we were wrong about the "pandemic count," you can search until you're blue in the face, but you will never find the words "pandemic count" in any of our posts. Read Rule #9. The count goes up as more cases are discovered. That's simple - sort of like your mental processes.
• To those who say we're downplaying the risks, again, you will find no such claims anywhere in our postings. We are treating this as a public health concern affecting First Responders particularly as our jobs don't really let us sit at home. What we aren't doing is fanning the panic.

Lastly, we're going to do some math here for those insisting we're wrong about the lethality dropping. Death Rate is figured by (deaths divided by reported cases). We'll use little numbers so the tiny-brains can keep up:

• If one person gets COVID-19 and dies, the death rate is 100%
• If one person gets COVID-19 and lives, the death rate is 0%

Are you with us so far? One death divided by one case equals one. Multiply by 100 (because you're dealing in percentages) and you get the death rate. Let's try a bigger number

• If two people get COVID-19 and both die, the death rate is still 100%
• If two people get COVID-19 and one lives, the death rate is now 50%

You see how we did that? One death divided by two cases equals 0.5. Don't forget to multiply by 100 (we're still dealing in percentages) and you get 50%.

Now let's try the numbers for Illinois for the past week (all numbers cumulative):

• 20 March - 11 deaths, 585 cases - .01880
  21 March - 12 deaths, 753 cases - .01593
  22 March - 13 deaths, 1049 cases - .01239
  23 March - 16 deaths, 1285 cases - .01245*
  24 March - 19 deaths, 1535 cases - .01237
  25 March - 23 deaths, 1865 cases - .01233
  26 March - 26 deaths, 2538 cases - .01024

Don't forget to multiply those numbers by 100 to get percentages (the first one is 1.88%). 23 March is the only day were the the death rate went up - and that was by six-thousandths-of-one-percent.

More cases are going to be discovered, probably thousands. And there's almost no way to track the people who are asymptomatic or recover without seeking medical help. But more cases doesn't translate into a higher death rate, especially if the medical community keeps up with or gets ahead of the sickness. More cases not resulting in death lowers the death rate even further.

Our statement concerning the death rate is accurate. We've taken courses in statistics. This in no way diminishes the suffering of those stricken and we hope they all recover as soon as possible. But attempting to attack us over the numbers provided by the Illinois Department of Public Health is silly. The death rate is trending downward.

Time Machine - 2003

Remember the last time the CPD followed orders that everyone thought were completely lawful?

• America's eight-year war in Iraq officially ended in December. It took two additional months for the city of Chicago to end its legal battle with demonstrators arrested for protesting on the first day of the conflict.
  
  Actually, the litigation still isn't over. On February 8 the city agreed to pay $6.2 million to settle one lawsuit, Vodak v. City of Chicago, filed by more than 700 protesters. A related case involving another 16 demonstrators and bystanders, Beal v. City of Chicago, is expected to be settled soon for $2 million to $3 million.
  
  In addition, the city spent at least $3.8 million on outside legal help, records show. That brings the total cost of fighting these cases to roughly $12 million.

It was dicey for a while, but not a single officer paid punitive damages.

Does anyone really think that would be the case if it happened today?

Perhaps we missed it working the hours we do, but has Legal Affairs come out with any sort of bulletin about this order by the governor? There are procedures in place for emergencies, but we aren't sure those hurdles have been cleared in the legal sense of the word. Just because Groot and Fat-Ass say something doesn't negate the procedures and legal steps. There are deadlines and limitations and restrictions on what can and cannot be done and no one in the media seems to be asking any of these questions.

You know who asks these questions? Plaintiff lawyers. The ACLU. Federal Judges. And if they're asking, does anyone think that Groot will be sitting at the defense table with you?

Stir Crazy

As predicted, even a hint of warm weather and guess what happens?

• Chicago saw a significant increase in gun violence Wednesday with 12 people shot, the most violent day since the city issued a stay-at-home order over the weekend to combat the spread of COVID-19.
  
  The day’s last reported shooting left a 24-year-old woman in critical condition in Little Village on the Southwest Side. She was in the back seat of a vehicle about 11:50 p.m. in the 3100 block of West 25th Street when someone in a white SUV fired shots, Chicago police said. She was struck in the head and rushed to Mt. Sinai Hospital.

Not a single shooting on the lakefront or the 606 trail, so Groot's threats of ANOV's and arrests must be working.

Great Job Dart

So a bunch of sheriffs and more than a few inmates scheduled for release have now tested positive for COVID-19. Dart claims that he was releasing inmates to protect them from the disease....

....but weren't they already quarantined? Segregated from society at large? And with a hospital already on the grounds of the jail?

Now a bunch of them are walking amongst the populace for no apparent reason except to make the social justice warriors feel better, while police stations lobbies are (still) open and cops are getting infected daily.

Golf Courses?

This game is the epitome of "social distancing."

• State officials have reversed course and decided to shut down golf courses in Illinois.
  
  The governor’s office revised its stay-at-home executive order Thursday. While restaurants and liquor stores can remain open, recreational sports businesses — including golf courses — are “not considered essential businesses” amid the shutdown because of the coronavirus pandemic.
  
  That message was delivered to golf industry professionals in a letter late Thursday afternoon. The letter was signed by four groups, including the Illinois Section PGA and Chicago District Golf Association.
  
  The decision is a blow to the golf industry, which is reeling from the effects of COVID-19, and golfers who believe they can maintain a safe social distance while playing.

If you're closer than ten feet to another golfer, you're doing it wrong. But liquor stores are "essential."

VRI Suspended

Indefinite or not?

And is this a prelude to 12-hour days?

Expect word later today.

Or, seeing as how we have the most useless leadership in the world, expect word Friday at 2100 hours for Saturday RDO's cancelled.

Another Layer of Bureaucracy?

This would be a truly dumb idea:

• Anonymous said...
  
  When the announcement is made, it is going to be Ernie Cato as the Superintendent. The surprise part of the announcement is going to be the appointment of Kristen Ziman as the first Chicago Director of Public Safety. Ms. Ziman will carry huge whack but will not be burdened by the day to day crime trends as Ernie Cato will be.

Chicago, Cook County, Illinois and the nation have just taken massive hits to their bottom lines. We've outlined (dozens of times) ways to cut the fat and trim expenses, mostly involving the removal of entire layers of useless exempts and redundant supervision.

Adding a brand new layer of "supervision" for whatever reason is just stupid in the extreme and fiscally irresponsible. We'll certainly be hoping this rumor is just another pile of crap.

Get Off My Beaches!

Groot is angry - so angry that she's falling into a very bad idea:

• Four days into a statewide stay-at-home order, Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Wednesday scolded restless Chicagoans who have taken advantage of spring weather and packed local parks, trails and the city’s lakefront despite growing numbers of people infected by the coronavirus disease.
  
  Standing alongside interim police Superintendent Charlie Beck and public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady, the mayor threatened to “shut down our parks and the entire lakefront” if residents continue to flout Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s stay-at-home order aimed at getting people to practice social distancing. Lightfoot and Beck also warned residents that those who don’t listen could be ticketed $500 for a first offense while repeat offenders could be arrested.

You cannot protect people from being stupid. You'd be idiots to try. And the governor did tell people they could go out to parks, walk dogs, etc., just don't gather in large groups. People are social animals and they are getting bored a few days into a "pandemic" that is statistics show is rapidly decreasing in lethality, despite what the media is hyping.

And after years of taking away the tools we could have used to encourage people to go home, now we're supposed to be the heavies?

• “If there are people out there, and unfortunately there are, who are determined to do whatever they want despite orders. These are not recommendations. This isn’t guidance. This is an order that’s enforced by law,” a visibly frustrated Lightfoot said at an afternoon news conference. “We’re going to give you an admonition and if you don’t turn right away and head home then you’re going to get a citation. And if worse, yeah, we will take you into custody. I hope that it doesn’t come to that. I hope I don’t have to shut down the lakefront, and shut down all the parks, but I will if we cannot get compliance.”
  
  [...]
  
  Underscoring Lightfoot’s urgency, Beck said the city is entering a new phase in enforcing the governor’s and mayor’s orders.
  
  “Whenever a new order, new law, new direction is put in place there’s three phases. There’s the educational phase, there’s the warning phase, and then there’s the enforcement phase,” Beck said. “The educational phase of these public health orders is over.”
  
  Earlier in the day, Beck said, he spoke with top cops and said people who don’t heed warnings from police not to congregate and stay at home then they will be ticketed.

And when they refuse to sign for the ticket? Arrest and transport to a facility most likely contaminated by Groot's refusal to secure according to Best Practices. We can hear the ACLU salivating from all the way over here over First, Fourth and Eighth Amendment grounds. Hopefully no one gets shot over an Ordinance Violation.

These are also exactly the people you don't want turning against the police and the political order...if you expect to maintain order and elected office. Why pick this fight unless she wants to further turn the populace against the CPD?

Another Asshole

On the west side again:

• A man allegedly coughed at the front desk staff of a Chicago police station Monday night amid an outbreak of the lethal coronavirus, police say.
  
  Lythel Miller, 52, entered the building about 10:50 p.m. in the 3100 block of West Harrison Street and abruptly coughed in the direction of the crew, Chicago police said in an emailed statement.
  
  The incident happened at the 11th District station on that block, a police source said.
  
  Miller left the building but was arrested shortly after.
  
  He was charged with a misdemeanor count of reckless conduct, and was released from custody on his own recognizance, according to court records.

This after the other night when an arrestee spit all over the station, officers and up to fifteen squad cars. bringing a District that routinely leads the city in crashes dangerously close to being on foot patrol.

You know what would have stopped this one? A closed lobby.

Draw!

Those "No Gun" signs on the CTA are working wonders...along with the few hundred officers assigned to the trains and tunnnels:

• Two men fired guns at each other on a CTA Red Line train at 79th Street Tuesday afternoon.
  
  At 3:49 p.m., two men got into a quarrel on the Chicago Transit Authority train, ad each took out guns and fired them at each other, police said.
  
  The train stopped, and both men ran off, police said.
  
  No injuries were reported.

Good thing the CTA is operating at something like 25% of normal capacity.

Welcome Fall Guy

It's easier to keep Charlie around in case shit goes south - he's easy to blame:

• So much for Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to have a new Chicago police superintendent appointed and confirmed in plenty of time to draft a plan to combat the traditional summer surge of violence.
  
  Like almost everything else in Chicago during these extraordinary times, the appointment of a permanent replacement for fired Supt. Eddie Johnson is on hold as City Hall marshals all of its resources on the war against the coronavirus.
  
  Until the pandemic, the Chicago Police Board had vowed to complete its nationwide search no later than the end of February and announce the names of three finalists from which Mayor Lori Lightfoot has promised to choose.
  
  By most accounts, the search is over.

But why risk having the new girl (or guy) start off with a potentially disastrous pandemic, an uptick in shootings, potential dead bodies, with a decimated police force unable to do much in the way of stopping the violence.

Of course, maybe it all works out and Beck leaves with a glowing letter of recommendation for his next carpetbagging job.

3-1-1 Moving?

Interesting rumor:

• Tho no official word, heard from numerous po’s, 311 sworn will be taking calls from Academy starting Friday. Construction workers been working round the clock to get’r done.
  
  Answers PLEASE
  1) has entire academy been disinfected?
  2) how do we know these workers aren’t infected or intentionally infecting area?
  3) any truth to this virus having ability to flow thru air duct systems?

So Alternate Response is infected, though the City won't admit it?

Nearly 2,000 NYPD Out Sick

Over 6% of the force:

• As coronavirus cases in the New York City continue to rise, there is growing concern over the safety of essential workers.
  
  Essential employees working in grocery stores, pharmacies and different city departments are required to report to work, including the police department. The police department says many of its employees are getting sick.
  
  It says that as of Monday, more than 2,000 employees were sick, which police officials say accounts for about 6% of the department’s uniformed workforce. So far, 100 uniformed officers, and another 29 civilian employees in the department have tested positive for coronavirus.

And Groot has declared CPD lobbies will remain open anyway,

UPDATE: Eleven Chicago cops, firefighters and paramedics:

• The total number of Chicago first responders who have tested positive for COVID-19 rose to 11 on Tuesday, as a mix of Chicago Police detectives, patrol officers, firefighters and paramedics became sickened by the coronavirus.
  
  Six of the cases are in the Chicago Police Department, and five in the Chicago Fire Department, leaders of the two departments said.

Speedy recovery wishes for the guys and gals.

UPDATE: Rumor that 006 has ten people out with "symptoms." Is Gresham Ground Zero?

Corona-virus as a Weapon

Two local incidents that we know of - here's the first:

• A 21-year-old college student from Wilmette allegedly coughed in the face of a Chicago police officer and said he had coronavirus.
  
  Anthony Ponzi struggled with police who stopped him at the scene of a two-car collision in Rogers Park around 7 a.m. Sunday in the 700 block of North Wolcott, Cook County prosecutors said. Officers said Ponzi was “slurring his speech and was profusely foaming at the mouth” as he yelled at police and another driver, according to a police report.
  
  Officers smelled alcohol on Ponzi’s breath, but Ponzi denied he’d been drinking, prosecutors said Monday. When officers reached to check Ponzi’s eye response, Ponzi allegedly yelled “Corona, ok!”, stepped toward the officer and coughed in his face.

The booking photo is just what you'd expect. However, this is outrageous:

• Judge Charles Beach granted Ponzi released on his own recognizance, noting he had no prior criminal convictions.

Virus or no, previous convictions or no, this is still an Aggravated Battery of a Police Officer, which should be treated as one of the highest crimes there is - especially during a pandemic.

We can't "shelter in place."

We can't just sit at home and collect a paycheck like teachers.

We can't police via video feeds - like the judge held the bond hearing.

The second incident is still on-going according to a bunch of e-mails. Overnight, following an arrest, the offender decided to spit all over officers on the west side, resulting in half the building being shut down, ten exposure reports and ten IOD reports.

Crimesha's office is - so far - refusing even look at felony charges. The offender will probably walk out before noon today.

Hotels?

Ok, we could see this as a viable strategy:

• The city of Chicago is considering making hotel rooms available to homeless people during the coronavirus crisis to try to prevent the spread of the disease among that particularly vulnerable population.
  
  Homeless services providers were informed of the city’s emergency planning during a webinar presentation Friday conducted by officials from three city agencies.
  
  Several California cities have taken steps toward using hotel rooms to house the homeless during the crisis.
  
  Chicago officials are exploring the availability of other facilities that could be used temporarily to get homeless people off the street or out of crowded shelters.

If only we had the owner of a giant hotel chain running things in this third-world state who wasn't making any money because all the convention business had dried up. But then again, this looks like it could be a violation of any Emoluments Clause in the State Constitution.

Outdoor Roll Calls

The unions were pushing for this and it looks like someone listened:

• Twenty or more coppers in a tiny room with minimal ventilation, sitting in close proximity to one another has been banned. Now we're having Roll Call outside in the fresh air.

Still no word about closing stations to the homeless population sleeping in the lobbies though.

Magical Red Tape

Our money is still on 002 being the breakout location for the virus epidemic:

• So in 002 today a prisoner on 2nd watch alleged to have the coronavirus. He was coughing and sneezing all over the place until they decided to take him to the hospital so now god knows how many people are infected.
  
  The commander JW still doesn't have the stones to kick people out of the lobby that are here just to hangout and are not seeking any police service.
  
  In addition to being inept, Commander JW also decided to place red tape at the doorstep of every room in 002 to instruct people to stay out....you know....instead of just closing doors. Somehow the red tape possesses anti-viral properties that are known to kill any strand of coronavirus within sight or sound of this special red tape.

Here's a couple pictures:

It's like magic.

News from the Jail

Deputies are being told at Roll Call that one-thousand inmates have now been released by Tommy Fart Dart to "ease" corona virus fears.

Fears of what? They were safer in jail and the community was safer with them in jail.

The last time anyone tried something like this, robberies, rapes and murders went through the roof over the summer.

Other Departments

NYPD is starting to see a bunch of cases and resultant quarantines:

• The NYPD now has 98 confirmed cases of coronavirus — and double the average number of cops calling out sick, officials said Sunday.
  
  In one Brooklyn precinct, the entire detective squad called out Sunday, one police source told The Post.
  
  Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said 70 uniformed members of the NYPD and 28 civilians employees have tested positive for COVID-19. One person was released from the hospital Sunday while three remained hospitalized, according to Shea.

Detroit is getting hit hard, too:

• Detroit Police Chief James Craig announced on Friday that five Detroit Police officers and one civilian contract employee have tested positive for coronavirus and more than 150 are being quarantined for possible exposure.
  
  Craig made the announcement on Friday, saying he expects those numbers to increase in the coming days as more tests are conducted.

We are hearing (unconfirmed) reports of three total cases here - the original Homan Square detective, a sergeant at Area Central and an officer far south.

However, station lobbies remain open, officers are being denied necessary information concerning possible exposure and the "deep cleaning" that is taking place in a few places involved crews with no training, poor materials and masks that don't even protect from drywall dust.

While this is going on, inspectors are our looking for officers not carrying Tasers (with everyone working their days off, there aren't enough to go around) and Beck was reportedly furious at a social media picture of an officer working out to relieve some of the massive stress, he ordered commanders to secure, tape and lock gyms across the city. God forbid someone try to maintain their health while a corona virus seems to kill the unhealthy at higher rates.

UPDATE: Four cases that the media knows of:

• Chicago Police on Sunday announced three more cases of COVID-19 among sworn officers within the department.
  
  [...]
  
  On Sunday night, [Google-me] announced that a fourth officer had also tested positive. That officer is assigned to a South Side patrol district, and there is no indication of how the case is connected to the other three...
  
  The CPD now has four cases with others being tested.

Best wishes to the stricken.

Our Mayor?

Can someone verify if this is a real photo of Groot or just some sort of photoshop job?

Is she shrinking or something?

There are like a dozen tailors within walking distance of her house.

This is Going to Get Worse

Two days into a "shelter in place" order and people/folks are getting stir-crazy:

• Chicago police broke up at least two house parties Saturday night as dozens of people there defied orders to stay at home and keep away from large groups during the coronavirus pandemic.
  
  Police got a call about a party in the Noble Square neighborhood. Officers showed up around midnight and found dozens of people inside a home near Greenview Avenue and Blackhawk Street. Officers then told everyone to leave. One woman leaving the party said around 30 people, mainly family and friends, attended.
  
  Not too long after that police got a call for a large gathering in the Austin neighborhood at an apartment building in the 4900 block of West Van Buren. Two men leaving the party were even wearing protective face masks.

And again we ask - what happens when someone says, "No"? When someone insists that the Fourth Amendment against unreasonable search and seizure, not to mention being secure in their homes reigns supreme?

Anyone heard from Legal Affairs about any of this?

Mope-rah the Moron

Scratch a liberal and find a totalitarian.

We'll take the most offensive passage from her blathering (no link for Mopey because she sucks):

• Seemingly overnight, Americans are being denied the right to assembly, to travel, to attend church and school and to entertain themselves in an effort to save lives.
  
  Similarly drastic measures could be used to curb the gun epidemic that claims lives every day.
  
  Don’t take this wrong.

What other way would you have everyone take it Mopey?

You were one of the loudest shrieking voices when the police were allegedly stopping people based on skin color, allegedly profiling, allegedly engaged in all sorts of malfeasance.

Now, during a medical "emergency," you want to take what are Constitutionally questionable practices (being used to slow the spread of a disease) and apply them to whom exactly? Because the violence you are supposedly fearing isn't happening in the paler neighborhoods and the brown communities aren't anywhere near the rates in your community.

And this?

• If we can fight a war against an enemy we can’t see or touch, we certainly could use draconian measures to fight the gun violence in our schools, in our workplaces and on our streets.

"....draconian measures...." Are you even listening to yourself? Everything you excoriated the police for...for years...now you want to use it?

Mopey - you ignorant brain-damaged moron.

Really Dumb Ideas

Here comes the stupid:

• A number of Cook County Jail detainees — including “serial stowaway” Marilyn Hartman — have been quietly ordered released this week to help relieve jail crowding amid the coronavirus pandemic.
  
  The hearings to formally release the detainees began this week, unannounced and separate from the two duty courtrooms that remain open to hear emergency matters during a widespread court shutdown.

And guess who is attempting to get released while this is all going on?

• When Kanye West visited the White House in 2018, he thanked President Donald Trump for supporting legislation allowing inmates convicted of drug crimes to seek reductions of their prison sentences.
  
  In that same meeting, the rapper encouraged the president to commute the life sentence of Larry Hoover, co-founder of the Gangster Disciples, the notorious Chicago street gang.
  
  Trump didn’t commute Hoover’s sentence. But a couple of months later, the president signed the bill West was pitching, the First Step Act, allowing the gang kingpin and others to seek shorter prison terms.

The number of bodies directly attributable to Hoover and his band of thugs easily numbers in the thousands. If you could put a dollar value on the misery inflicted, figure tens of billions.

Just to Repeat

Libraries - closed. Movie Theaters - closed. Bars, Sport Venues - closed. Hospitals - closed. City Hall - closed. Europe, Asia, Australia - closed.

Chicago Police station lobbies - open for anyone to wander into, infect people who work in close contact with many dozens of other people, day in and day out.

Epidemiologists worldwide are amazed.

Grasshoppers and Ants

Something we doubt you'll see on the news (click for larger version):

Any other reports? We heard a few dozen yutes exited the Red Line downtown Friday night and started attacking anyone in sight that wasn't fast enough (or smart enough) to leave.

Cancellation of the Cancellation?

So the entire Third Watch is either gone or on the verge of walking out the door and suddenly, Waller puts out an order at 2330 hours saying in essence:

• District personnel who were RDO cancelled on Sunday are now RDO

Are we getting this correct?

Just when the CPD Clown Car couldn't get any goofier, Waller heads into the basement and starts digging for more goofiness.

We said sometime last week that "merit" has doomed us to the point where no one in charge can make an intelligent decision.

Ladies and Gentlemen, we present Exhibit A - Fred Waller.

Infected PPE Kits?

Yesterday, we posted a picture of these "kits."

This is truly "inside baseball" type stuff to the outsider, but Chicago Police will recognize the lower portion of the bag these "kits" arrived in. That's a Currency Inventory Bag, cut down to size and heat sealed on three sides, bagged with the "equipment," a list of contents run off a copy machine, and heat sealed shut. These were packaged at HQ just last week by the recruits (now in every District). Someone says that there are pictures of them doing it on the CPD Twitter feed (we don't tweet) and Beck is in a few pictures "helping." We'll bet Google-me purges the feed within hours of this post going up.

These are by no means sterile....in any sense of the word.

We have lots of contacts at HQ. And one tells us this:

• While they sent most recruits to districts (to do nothing except clean infested squad cars), they re-assigned them to HQ 2nd floor to assemble PPE kits. They made thousands of them (see CPD Twitter feed). The best part? A recruit went to the hospital with COVID-19 symptoms and is possibly infected. Test results pending. The same recruit that touched potentially hundreds of these kits that got sent out for officers to use. Next time you’re in a district, put a mask on and get infected, you’ll know where it came from. Huge thanks to the exempt staff for cooking this dumpster fire of a plan up

So we get eight-year-old hand sanitizer, PPE's that aren't PPE's even in a third world shithole, packaged by someone who was coughing and feverish while assembling these things, while Groot is letting it be known she is never five feet from a bottle of hand sanitizer.

We remember a time when Royko, or even Kass, would be all over this shit.

Anyone know if the CDC has a local contact here in Chicago? Because our own Patient Zero is almost certainly walking around at this very moment infecting countless members of the Department.

FOP Election Counting Delayed

No reason not to vote. HOWEVER...

• SCC,
  
  The election committee voted 3-0 to delay counting the ballots for president. The firm running things needs quite a few people to ensure the integrity of the election (I heard up to twenty three people). Add that into the higher than normal number of people who want to be present for the count at the Hall, you are running into a crowd well in excess of the governor's restrictions.

We're assuming the ballots will be left secured in the PO Box that they go to and counted at a later date. We don't know how this affects the other elected members, nor in-person voting that would have taken place on the last day of deadline.

Here's to hoping all parties involved work together to get the membership through the emergency and into arbitration in one piece.

Interesting

This isn't going to make this alderman many friends:

• Chicago’s 53 elected officials — including Mayor Lori Lightfoot — should forfeit their pay for 15 days to generate $374,642 to purchase protective gear and other supplies for first-responders on the front-lines on the war against the coronavirus, an alderman suggested Friday.
  
  Ald. Ray Lopez (15th), one of Lightfoot’s most outspoken City Council critics, said the pandemic requires the mayor, city clerk, treasurer and 50 aldermen to “lead by example.”
  
  With $6.5 million set aside annually for Chicago’s elected officials, the 15-day furlough would generate just $374,642.
  
  But Lopez argued that in a crisis like this, “Every dollar matters.” He wants to re-direct the savings to the city’s Office of Emergency Management and Communications to purchase supplies for police officers, firefighters, nurses and other first-responders.

The Slum Times paints him as an "outspoken City Hall critic," but it's going to take a lot more than that to impress us.

Nice start though.

No Dope Arrests

Directly from the States Attorneys office (click for larger version):

Signed by Crimesha's deputy and combined with the State Crime Lab refusing to test any inventoried narcotics at all, crime will certainly be down if you don't prosecute it.

UPDATE: The Slum Times covers the amnesty:

• Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx is halting prosecutions of narcotics and cannabis cases amid the worldwide outbreak of COVID-19, according to a letter obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.
  
  First Assistant State’s Attorney Joe Magats sent a letter Thursday to First Deputy Supt. Anthony Riccio of the Chicago Police Department, telling him that because of an Illinois State Police directive suspending lab testing of narcotics, the prosecutor’s office was left with “no good faith basis to proceed with these cases.”

Any guesses as to what the defense attorney arguments are going to be once prosecutions resume?

Ticket Lies

Seems like someone didn't get the message:

That's the 0-100 block of East Wacker on Friday afternoon, and just about every car there is ticketed for a meter violation - hardly a "public safety" violation as Groot had promised.

PPE's Issued

After Groot's lies the other day about everyone being trained and everyone having safety equipment, most personnel were issued these:

As someone noted:

These suits aren't re-usable. You use them once, they're done. Contaminated. And the Wuhan virus is scheduled to be here for the next few weeks at a minimum. If there aren't ten-or-twenty thousand of these on hand, then the Department isn't any better off than it was weeks ago.

Recruits Scrub Cars

We're surprised that the unions over at Fleet haven't raised a stink about this:

• The recruits sent to all the districts are being utilized to "sanitize" squad cars between shifts. They have buckets, a few spray bottles of lord knows what, gloves and a box of rags.

At least they're learning that the City doesn't give a rat's ass about them and their chosen careers.

UPDATE: Here's what they got from Equipment and Supply:

Good luck kids.

So Much Dumb

We're linking to the same article as the previous post because there's just so much stupid in it that we have to break it up into bite-sized pieces:

• In terms of enforcement, Lightfoot and Pritzker agreed the order amounts to “asking people to do what they know they ought to,” but said police will be vigilant.
  
  “If [officers] see somebody who maybe is violating this order, they would talk to them and ask them not to,” Pritzker said. “Last resort, really, there is the reckless conduct misdemeanor that someone could be charged with. But we anticipate people will follow this order.”
  
  People spotted potentially violating the order by Chicago police will “get an admonition to go home, and for most people, that’ll be enough,” Lightfoot said.

Really? After the public flogging we've taken in the past few years for over all manner of bullshit, now you want us to go out and confront citizens?

Because this isn't "engagement." This is confrontation during an "emergency." Groot has stated this isn't "martial law," so Civil Rights haven't been suspended. People are allowed freedom of movement and freedom of association, no matter how dumb or ill-advised it may be.

We have heard no reassurances that the mayor or governor have our backs and will be paying any punitive damages assessed against the police for carrying out these vague and almost certainly improper directions. Protect yourself, your continued employment and the safety of your family above all other considerations.

Smart Idea, Really Dumb Idea

Someone is actually sort of thinking ahead:

• The Department is easing into twelve hour days. First cancel days off, evaluate, then if need be, deploy units, then Districts to 12-on-12-off.

But then, after closing sporting events, restaurants, bars, schools, parades, and all sorts of  large-crowd events, Groot does something extremely dumb:

• Metra has announced plans to sharply curtail service in response to the precipitous drop in ridership even before the governor’s order. But the CTA is planning no service cuts even though ridership Wednesday was down 75 percent on rail and 59 percent on CTA buses.
  
  “Public transit is an essential service, and it’s important to keep it moving for those who need to travel for necessary reasons, including health care providers, emergency personnel and others who rely on transit,” CTA spokesman Brian Steele wrote in an email to the Sun-Times.

There's an invitation to disaster if ever we saw one. Have you seen Michigan Avenue tonight?

Those aren't boarded up because they've been looted. Those are boarded up to protect the empty stores from crowds of otherwise unoccupied CPS students who are out of school for the next thirty days.

Groot's CTA is giving them easy access to an empty Mag Mile....and that is going to further stretch already thin CPD resources, because the governor's and mayor's declaration to stay home is falling on deaf ears and empty skulls.

Days Off Cancelled

But only for this weekend (so far) and no 12-hour shifts yet.

Governor Fat-ass has ordered a "soft lock-down:"

• Now Gov. J.B. Pritzker is ordering all residents to stay at home beginning Saturday, in the most serious effort yet to combat the spread of the coronavirus in Illinois.
  
  Pritzker issued the stay-at-home order alongside Mayor Lori Lightfoot Friday afternoon...
  
  [...]
  
  “Essential services” like grocery stores, pharmacies and gas stations will stay open, as Pritzker has said, but most other places that don’t sell food or medicine are expected to be shut down.

Just a word of warning - this emergency is playing havoc with all our schedules. We are as susceptible to the vagarities of the Department as all of the readers are. Comments are going to be moderated sporadically, postings may be delayed. There might even be an evening or two where nothing gets posted at all. Shit happens.

19 COVIDs and a Cover-Up

So during Groot's portion of Governor Fat-ass's press conference she said that she has plenty of sanitizer in her office - there's a bottle "every five feet."

Which makes the CPD receiving eight-year-expired (and likely ineffective) sanitizer that much more unforgivable.

In the mean time, perennial mayoral candidate Willie Wilson delivers a few thousand N-95 face masks to the FOP and radio host Mancow comes up with hundreds of bottles of hand sanitizer for every District in the city. Ebinger Grade School up north donated all sorts of bleach wipes and sanitizer to 016 since they aren't open to use it.

Seems these folks are doing a far better job than Groot.

Positive COVID Test

Homan Square of all places (link via the CWB blog):

• A Chicago police officer has tested positive for COVID-19, Interim Supt. Charlie Beck said in a letter transmitted to CPD employees around 11:30 this morning. The affected officer is assigned to a detective unit that is based at the department’s Homan Square facility, 1011 South Homan, according to a report. Beck did not confirm that detail in his message.
  
  The deparment learned of the officer’s condition today, Beck said, adding that the officer last worked on Sunday.
  
  “This individual will remain at home on quarantine until a clean bill of health has been issued,” Beck wrote. “All members who work in close contact with this individual have been notified and advised to continue to report for work and self-monitor for any symptoms.”

Groot and others are telling all Chicago employees to stay home if they are experiencing symptoms. But we're hearing from the Fire side that if you aren't running a fever of 100.4 or better, you better be at work or face discipline. This while the virus still has an indeterminate incubation period of two-to-ten days.

And has anyone seen that video from Google-me? With the cubicle sneeze shields at HQ, elbow-bumps, PPE's in boxes and the video clip of someone handing out the (expired, ineffective and eight-year-old) sanitizer to cops? We still haven't seen a single PPE, bleach wipe or face mask that we didn't buy ourselves, but Google-me is claiming that every member has been issued equipment? Anyone have a link to this horseshit propaganda?

UPDATE: Keep working!

• The Chicago Police Department is telling officers to keep coming to work, despite their exposure to a confirmed case of COVID-19.
  
  [...]
  
  Dr. Robert Murphy, executive director of the Institute for Global Health at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine said the decision to tell people who have had direct exposure to a case of COVID-19 to keep coming to work is “wrong.”
  
  “I mean, if we want to get rid of this thing, everybody in close proximity to that person should be quarantined at home,” Murphy said. “We're so behind in the testing still. But anyone with close contact has to be in self-quarantine. I mean, that's just, I don't think there's any question.”

Look, we get it. You can't just shut down an entire police department piecemeal as officers are exposed here and there. But if that's the case, we should have the requisite safety equipment and proper training, which as of this writing, we aren't anywhere close to having.

Good thing we're all up to date on "Procedural Justice,."Use of [No] Force" and all sorts of Consent Decree training.

Lost in the Shuffle

Someone filed a FOIA request regarding the recently passed Part One of the Sergeants Test. We're going to type out the text here since his name is prominently displayed in the screen-cap that was sent to us and we don't know if he wants it blasted all over the place:

• Dear [removed]
  
  In response to the clarification of your FOIA request:
  
  The number of candidates that sat for the Chicago Sergeant's Exam that took place in December 2019 was 3867. The number of candidates who passed the exam is 3365.
  
  Thank you
  
  Maureen

That's a pass rate of 87.02%. So either we have the smartest cops in the universe or this was the most useless test given in recent memory. Seeing who's running the place today, we're going to go with the second option.

Refused Exposure Report

So who are these idiots?

• Let’s say that I’m ordered to take a prisoner to a hospital for treatment. And while at that hospital I become aware from staff that the ER has seen over 100 people for COVID-19 symptoms. Let’s say I immediately notify my Sgt of the situation and that I’m going to need both an exposure and IOD completed. Is it customary for the sergeant to punt and say he must first confer with the lieutenant? Then these two in concert decide that I need to give them a to-from report explaining why I feel said reports are justified? And that an exposure and IOD would be completed once they determined my to-from passes muster?
  
  Seem far fetched?
  
  Not in a certain district that falls between 016 and 019.

We'd say do the To-From.....and lick it before submission.

Mount Sinai Hospital has told CPD to stop bringing dope-sick prisoners in for the duration of the emergency, seeing as how they're a bit busy with other actual issues. We'd suggest having a bottle of Dramamine at the Desk, but we'd probably have to buy that ourselves, too, lest Groot supply us with some that's ten-years-old.

Officer Safety Alert

Be aware if you happen to run into this piece of shit:

• "Go shoot the nearest police officer in the face" these are the words of a prominent activist and Bernie Sanders volunteer Yusuf Naqvi, a Chicago-based contract lawyer.
  
  “They are the bottom enforcers of a system that profited from such poverty and decay that we are now jobless and homebound with no income nor healthcare to help us through this crisis Go shoot the nearest police officer in the face,” he wrote on Twitter.

There are pictures (and captured tweets) of him at the link so you can know what he looks like. He's a lawyer, too, so be doubly aware and check your wallet if you're unfortunate enough to have contact with him.

Perhaps an ARDC complaint also? We recall they have disbarred other attorneys for things not nearly as bad as this. And if anyone has his employers contact information, we'll be sure to publish it.

Groot Press Conference

So Lori has known about the COVID-19 for four months?

And we're getting hand sanitizer that expired in 2012?

So it's not Trump's fault at all. It's another failure of local government....like Hurricane Katrina was.

And we saw a PPE suit yesterday....there were two....in our Sergeant's car. The listed date of manufacture was 2009. Yesterday, she supervised 14 Officers in two sectors.

With leadership like this, who's to say we aren't safe?

UPDATE: Schools closed until late April. We're guessing no proms, no graduation ceremonies and probably mailing everyone their diplomas.

Correction to Yesterday's Post

So the City started issuing this to individual officers:

We had information that the sanitizer had expired back in 2018 based on lot numbers.

Someone went a step further and contacted the manufacturer.

This particular product hasn't even been produced since 2012, eight years ago.

WGN picked up on it.

Now the national media outlets have it.

Not only is it expired, it may actually endanger officers.

So Groot is trying to sicken and kill us all?

Shit About to Get Real

Suburban Departments are closing their lobbies.

Major urban Departments are securing their buildings.

CPD is getting eight-year-old hand sanitizer, no protective gear for the street people, and attempting to force CRISIS trained officers into a Coronavirus role that they aren't trained or equipped for.

Where's this supposed press release that claims officers have been issued PPE gear? Because we still haven't seen a single bit of gear. Anything we have, we bought.

Keep an eye on Groot's press conference scheduled for tomorrow. We're getting info that she's going to announce some sort of lockdown/curfew similar (if not directly copied from) to what San Francisco is attempting.

Anyone want to confirm this one?

• I’m at call back 2111 W. Lexington. They are saying one of the 311 dispatchers tested positive for COVID19 and another is currently being tested. Police officers share that building with the 311 dispatchers. Share same bathrooms, entrance and exit. There is no wall barrier or any form of separation between officiers and civilians. It’s an open area. Everyone is being very secretive on the 311 side about this situation. First they say someone tested positive then that they are being tested. How do we find out if true. Also wouldn’t everyone have to be quarantined, also 2111 w. Lexington throughly cleaned? They want to keep quiet because this is the back up of OEMC. So what can we do?

If the OEMC alternate goes down before OEMC.....

And here's a question we haven't seen addressed by anyone yet:

• What happens when Chicagoans say, "No"?

Seriously. The media, social justice types, progressives and Groot (and Sparklefarts) spent that last few years demonizing the police, destroying morale, and placing targets on our backs. Now you're going to want us to enforce some sort of order/curfew/lockdown?

Are we going to be fully indemnified? Are we locking everyone up? On a charge we know Crimesha won't prosecute, but that we WILL be sued for? Anyone want to explain this one to us?

Even Less Money

Why not just forgive everything?

• The city of Chicago will ease up on its debt collection practices to give people a break on certain ticket violations as part of an effort to help residents amid the coronavirus outbreak, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Wednesday.
  
  Through at least April 30, Lightfoot said the city will suspend booting, late fees and defaults on payment plans for all city debts, and is suspending city debt checks for ride-share and taxi drivers, she said. The city also will be limiting ticketing, towing and impounding solely to what she said are public safety-related issues.

Does anyone realize that all this money will have to be made up somewhere, somehow, some way? Layoffs, wage freezes, service cuts, un-payable bonds, maybe even defaults.

Police Memorial Cancelled

Late yesterday afternoon, the FOP announced that the annual remembrance in Washington DC was cancelled:

We expect other cancellations, including the Memorial in Springfield to be forthcoming, if not already announced.

Please Stop Shooting

So Baltimore is discovering that if you don't enforce the law, more people break the law. Also, if you make enemies of the police, they tend to enter what is known as self-preservation-mode AKA "disengagement."

Now the mayor is resorting to begging the thugs to stop shooting each other:

• Baltimore Mayor Jack Young urged residents to put down their guns and heed orders to stay home after multiple people were shot Tuesday night amidst the coronavirus pandemic.
  
  Young said hospital beds are needed to treat positive COVID-19 patients and not for senseless violence. Seven people were shot Tuesday night in the Madison Park neighborhood, as Baltimore reported its fifth positive coronavirus case Wednesday.
  
  “I want to reiterate how completely unacceptable the level of violence is that we have seen recently,” Young said. “We will not stand for mass shootings and an increase in crime.”

That ship already sailed mayor. Baltimore made their bed, and now the politicians don't like that they have to sleep in the pile of shit they created.

Baltimore was one of the first cities to embrace "progressive" social justice. We aren't that far behind.