Ban Fists!

All the way from Alabama just to get beaten to death?

• A 49-year-old man from Alabama was beaten to death Friday night in the South Loop.
  
  Jack D. Richardson was in an “altercation” with a man at 9:50 p.m. in the first block of Ida B. Wells Drive, formerly Congress Parkway, when he was struck multiple times, Chicago police and the Cook County medical examiner’s office said.
  
  Richardson was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he died, authorities said.
  
  An autopsy released Saturday said he died from multiple blunt force injuries during an assault. The medical examiner’s office ruled his death a homicide.

So is Rahm banning fists now? After all, more people are beaten to death with fists and blunt objects in a single year than rifles, which Rahm and Jaybee the Hutt have their eyes on.

ISP Trooper Killed

Tragedy last evening on I-294:

• An Illinois state trooper who was heading home for the night in his squad car but pulled over to help at an accident scene was struck and killed by a vehicle Saturday afternoon in the north suburbs, police said.
  
  Trooper Christopher Lambert, 34, stopped to help at a three-car crash in the northbound lanes on I-294 near Willow Road in Glenview, Illinois State Police Director Leo P. Schmitz said at a news conference.
  
  Lambert, a five-year veteran, positioned his car in the lefthand lanes to protect the people involved but he was struck by a passing vehicle at 4:43 p.m., Schmitz said.
  
  Lambert was given CPR by an off-duty nurse at the scene and was taken to Glenbrook Hospital in Glenview where he died at 7:24 p.m., Schmitz said.

Other media coverage here.

RIP Trooper Lambert.

Participating Restaurants

From a helpful soul (click for larger version):

Enjoy.

Further Clarification

To the "No More Mugshots?" post from the crew over at CWB Blog:

• Hi SCC -
  
  CPD is NOT in compliance regarding mugshots and state law. They are REQUIRED to release mugshots on all offenders within 72 hours of arrest.
  
  The only change in state law is that police agencies are barred from distributing mugshots for misdemeanor offenders ON SOCIAL MEDIA, not on their official sites.
  
  See email below from lawyers for Illinois Press Association that was sent early in the new year.
  
  All the best -
  CWB

So once again, the brilliant minds at HQ (probably Legal Affairs) have misinterpreted the law in such a way as to protect criminals rather than inform the citizenry.

Help on the Way

Let's hope this doesn't fall by the wayside and officers avail themselves of the help being offered:

• Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson announced Tuesday that CPD would be adding more counselors for officers after a difficult year that saw four officers killed in the line of duty and four officers who died by suicide.
  
  [...] Officers seem to be following Johnson's lead in recent weeks with more reaching out for help from EAP counselors and the six CPD chaplains. CPD plans to add six more EAP counselors and other forms of support in light of increased demand.

The number of counselors available to a Department of some 10,000 was atrociously bad and the subject of an entire section of the DoJ report. This help was a long time coming.

No More Mugshots? (UPDATE)

The Southwest Chicago Post noticed something new this year:

• Since the Southwest Chicago Post was founded in early 2012, we have brought news of crime--large and small--to the people of the Southwest Side.
  
  That's important, we know you agree, because folks want to know what's going on. Where the garage break-ins are occurring. Where the home and business burglaries are happening. Details about robberies, batteries and assaults.
  
  Folks also want to know about people charged with crimes--who they are, where they're from and what they look like. That last bit of detail--what they look like--requires a mugshot.

Guess what they aren't finding any more?

• You see, the Chicago Police Department has decided to no longer post mugshots of people they arrest for misdemeanor crimes--in other words, for the vast majority of arrests they make. And when we say "misdemeanor," please don't think we're talking about a guy who steals a pack of gum from a store.
  
  These days, "misdemeanor" often includes burglary, robbery, assault, battery and domestic battery, weapons violations, you name it. People often charged with violent crimes.

The Department has (through spokesweasels) refused to provide the media with a satisfactory answer as to why information is not being disseminated. We know that the Department regularly distributes full descriptions of suspects to the media....who then refuse to publish the actual facts. Perhaps the Department is merely bowing to the prevailing leftist group-think and no one is actually committing crimes - property just goes missing, bullets just fall out of the sky, and two-year-old children just chop themselves into pieces and throw themselves into lagoons.

UPDATE: Comments are saying this is a change in State Law. Because a misdemeanor theft offender has never turned into a home invader. Or an opportunistic rapist. Or a murderer.

So while police are forced to be "more transparent," the justice system becomes more opaque and the sheeple are kept in the dark.

Bad Start to the Year

What is the matter with society?

• Police have released the name of the Shreveport, Louisiana, officer who was fatally shot as she was heading to work ahead of the start of her shift Wednesday night.
  
  Chateri Payne was shot multiple times while in her uniform and died within hours of being transported to a local hospital, Shreveport police chief Ben Raymond announced this morning.

Twenty-two years old and not even on the street two months. And that was only one of two rookies killed this week:

• Natalie Corona was a rising star in her police department with a sparkling smile and a huge heart who had followed in her father’s footsteps and became an officer, fulfilling a lifelong dream just a few months ago when her dad pinned the badge on her uniform.
  
  On Friday, her father and a stunned community mourned the 22-year-old who was shot and killed on duty while responding to a multi-vehicle crash in the small college town of Davis, California.

Another twenty-two year old...at a traffic accident. Two of five officers killed already this year.

Another Chapter of Incompetency

This hack can't prosecute one of the most heinous crimes in Illinois history:

• The family of a two-year-old boy who was killed and dismembered in 2015 says they have been told the charges against the man accused of the murder might be reduced.
  
  The family of Kyrian Knox says they were contacted by the state’s attorney’s office ahead of a court proceeding Wednesday to be notified the charges could be reduced.
  kyrian knox Family Outraged At Possible Change In Charges For Man Accused Of Killing, Dismembering Toddler
  
  Kyrian Knox (Source: Facebook)
  
  Kyrian was killed in Rockford, dismembered and found in a Chicago lagoon in 2015. The Rockford boy’s severed head, hands, and feet were found in the Garfield Park lagoon on Labor Day weekend, but the body parts were not identified until two months later, after a DNA match was made.

This was one of the most intense and thorough investigations the Department ever conducted. The city even drained a body of water covering several acres to recover the victim and detectives spent literally thousands of hours making the case against this asshole.

You seat the jury and you present that best case possible and trust that even in Chicago, there are twelve jurors with some humanity left in them that they would convict this waste-of-humanity within an afternoon.

"Merit" Packages Out

For Detective this time.

This usually means a class within 60 days.

The mayoral election is only 50-odd days away, which could gum up the process.

Supposedly, the "merit" board met Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday to go over captain resumes. Got to get the hacks in before Special Ed is shown the door.

And sergeants before the end of the month? All sorts of activity on the calendar.

"LOOK AT ME!!!"

Prickwrinkle taking all sorts of credit for something she had pretty much nothing to do with:

• Toni Preckwinkle was bombarded Thursday for allegedly inflating her role in exposing the deadly police shooting of Laquan McDonald to distract attention from the $10,000 campaign contribution that Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th) muscled for her from a Burger King franchise owner.
  
  Fired Chicago Police Superintendent-turned-mayoral candidate Garry McCarthy got the ball rolling by attacking the chest-pounding claims that Preckwinkle makes in her first campaign commercial about the behind-the-scenes role she played.
  
  “Instead of Toni Preckwinkle manning up and saying, ‘Maybe I made a mistake’ or doing something about it, she’s trying to distract away from her troubles,” McCarthy told the Chicago Sun-Times.

Hahaha. "...manning up...." Garry is a funny guy sometimes.

Panderers gotta pander and Prickwrinkle is a one-trick race card pony.

Thanks Crimesha

The dead asshole from the failed bus stop robbery:

• Laavion Goings Jr. was out of jail only two months when the 19-year-old walked up to a bus stop about a block from his home, pulled out a gun and tried to rob a woman on the Far South Side.
  
  But the woman had a gun too and fired first, hitting Goings in the chest, according to Chicago police. The teen ran back to his home and made it as far as a stairwell in the foyer of a building before collapsing in the 400 block of West 103rd Street.
  
  That's where officers found him shortly before 6 a.m. Tuesday, just minutes after the shooting. He died within an hour at Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn.

Note that the Tribune has started with the "teen" description again instead of "armed offender" or something similar. And they don't mention the woman's gun was legally obtained, registered, and she had undergone training until paragraphs later. This wasn't the offender's first run in with wrong choices though:

• The teen had a record of arrests, mostly for drug charges. But last June, he was charged with attacking a sergeant and a police officer after he and his father were arrested during a narcotics raid in Englewood where the father lived, according to court records.
  
  [...] As police escorted the younger Goings downstairs, he became “very irate, stiffened up’’ and “pushed”’ and “grabbed’’ a sergeant, the report said. Another officer got him under control and into a police car.

Was he charged?

• Goings was charged with six counts of aggravated battery to a peace officer...

Six felonies? That's fantastic. He should be in jail for .....wait a minute:

• ....but they were dropped in October after the teen pleaded guilty to a drug charge. He was given probation and released from jail in early November, just days before his 19th birthday.

Great job there Crimesha. Six felonies pled down to "dead in a justified bus stop shooting because no punishment equals no feeling of consequences."

More please.

Another Dreary Prediction

Zero Hedge is doom and gloom a lot. This hits close to home:

• While the federal government is slowly careening toward permanent, fiscal disaster, many state governments (which don’t have the power of the printing press) are already staring into the abyss…
  
  Take Illinois, for example. It’s the most broke state in the US with nearly $250 billion in debt. And it only brings in enough in taxes each year to cover 92% of its expenses… so the problem is getting worse.
  
  Good thing Rahm “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste” Emmanuel is the current Mayor of Chicago. You may remember, the above quote was from Rahm’s days as Obama’s Chief of Staff, as told to the Wall Street Journalduring the depths of the Great Financial Crisis…
  
  What followed was the greatest monetary experiment known to man.

The "experiment" is outlined in the linked article with all sorts of references and sub-links to stuff. It's not a pretty picture.

Culver's Steps Up

This coming Monday (click for larger version):

The address on this poster is for the Franklin Park location but hopefully, it's all of them.

A quick search shows a bunch of locations in nearby suburbs surrounding the city.

Ed's Hail Mary

Probably not going to pull it off, but you never know until you try:

• Eddie Johnson hopes to remain city’s top cop after mayoral election
  
  Chicago Police Supt. Eddie Johnson on Tuesday said he learned early on in his three-decade career as a cop that it’s best to not worry about things beyond his control.
  
  Taking questions from reporters after he addressed the City Club of Chicago, Johnson was asked if he’d like to stay at the helm of the CPD after the upcoming mayoral election.
  
  “I took this job because I love this city. I want to see this city safe,” Johnson said. “The political part of it, that’s out of my control. One thing that cops recognize early on, we don’t worry about things that we can’t control.”

Ed, you didn't even apply for the job, and you've lurched from one crisis to another without any sort of direction that wasn't given to you by the sawed-off dwarf at City Hall. The things you did deal with involved covering up for the incompetency of your predecessors and their "study group" that your girlfriend benefited from.

Hopefully, we're somewhere under sixty days of your reign.

Nice Shot Lady

Someone buy this woman a box of ammo:

• A man was shot to death Tuesday morning while attempting to rob a woman in the Fernwood neighborhood on the Far South Side, police said.
  
  About 5:45 a.m., the man, 19, approached the woman, 25, in the 400 block of West 103rd Street, displayed a weapon and tried to rob her, Chicago police said.
  
  The woman, who was a concealed carry holder, took out her own weapon and fired one shot, striking him in the neck, police said.
  
  The man left the scene and was found a block away, police said. He was taken to Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he died, police said.

Notice how the Slum Times calls the offender "...the man, 19,..."? We're thinking there's a not-so-hidden agenda at work here. We also notice that they're specifically avoiding the term "victim" as an armed offender is anything but.

If we're counting correctly, the CCL body count is up to three (one dead, two wounded) and the cops killing the "just-turning-their-life-around" crowd is.....zero.

In the meantime, perhaps a GoFundMe site for buying Concealed Carriers some replacement ammo? And perhaps the FOP could pitch in with a gift certificate to one of the finer local gun ranges?

More Missing the Point

The media just loves play with shiny objects that Rahm waves in front of them:

• Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Tuesday announced the rollout of the first of 200 new “license plate reader” police cars that will be able to quickly identify and recover stolen cars and maybe reduce carjackings.
  
  The technology will allow police to match license plates against the list of stolen vehicles so officers can quickly respond.
  
  The city already has 40 vehicles equipped with license plate reading technology. With the additional vehicles, each of Chicago’s 25 police districts “will get roughly six cars for continuous patrols,” Chicago police spokesman Anthony [Google-me] said Tuesday on Twitter.
  
  “The cars build on the city’s larger strategy that has resulted in an 18 percent reduction in incidents of carjacking, and a 31 percent increase in arrests compared to last year,” the mayor’s office said in a news release.

We guess we're back to 25 Districts again. Must be part of the Rahm hiring wave that "filled" the ranks. As for the reductions that Rahm is hoping for:

• part of that "decrease" was reclassifying carjackings and car thefts, like when the car was left running - which we actually agreed with.
• the plate readers can only compare/match plates that are actually listed as "hot." So if you get jacked, (A) the crime has already occurred and a plate reader didn't prevent shit and (B) if you don't know your plate, it might be hours before it gets into the system, during which your car can travel past all two hundred plate readers and not a single "ding" will alert officers to it.

You know what would really deter/reduce carjackings?

• apprehending carjackers
• extensive prison time

But given the current Chase Policy:

and the fact that Crimesha refuses to prosecute carjackers until their twenty-sevens conviction, we imagine plate readers will only be good for recovering cars that have already been used for shootings or other robberies.

Dean Cleared

Inside baseball stuff running behind the scenes:

• Former Chicago Fraternal Order of Police President Dean Angelo, Sr. was cleared Tuesday on charges brought against him by the union he once lead, sources said. FOP 2nd Vice President Martin Preib filed a charge against Angelo on Oct. 5 — the same day Jason Van Dyke’s guilty verdict was announced — alleging Angelo was out of line when he spoke to reporters at the Leighton Criminal Courthouse during the high-profile trial.
  
  Angelo could not be reached for comment Tuesday afternoon, but sources close to him and the FOP told the Sun-Times that he was cleared of wrongdoing. In December, a three-member panel of the FOP recommended that Angelo — who is still a voting member of the FOP board — not be disciplined, an FOP source said.
  
  Tuesday, the full board — aside from FOP President Kevin Graham, who abstained from voting — cleared Angelo of wrongdoing, though the vote “wasn’t unanimous by any means,” according to the FOP source.

Lots of fractures in the current Board.

This Sounds Familiar

Where have we heard this one before?

• Given all the graft and corruption over the years, mayoral candidate Bill Daley says it’s time for Chicago to overhaul its government, starting with reducing the number of aldermen from 50 to 15.
  
  There is, of course, some irony in Daley, the brother and son of two former mayors who held the office for a combined 43 years, saying it’s time to restructure City Hall. After all, the Daley machine grew from a fiefdom in the heavily Irish 11th Ward in Bridgeport to, under Richard J. Daley, a political power structure of national significance.
  
  Bill Daley, however, argues that times have changed and the days of “50 mini mayors” running the wards no longer exist. He argues the city’s neighborhoods are better connected these days through technology and a more centralized City Hall and that many of the powers aldermen used to enjoy have dissipated. Those that do remain — such as veto power over zoning and permits in their wards — often lead to corruption, Daley argued.

We seem to recall a number of blog posts and a petition drive by....wait a minute. This was an idea by our readers! And the blog assisted in gathering around 11,000 signatures if we recall correctly. It was tens of thousands of signatures short of even getting near a referendum (and the Board of Elections would have killed it anyway), but it would seem that the Tribune is hitching its wagon to the Daley Machine once again.

Rifle Again

Be careful out there:

• A man was killed in a shooting Monday afternoon in the West Englewood neighborhood, police said.
  
  Two males walked up to the 23-year-old about 4:35 p.m. in the 2000 block of West 63rd Street and fired at him, according to Chicago police. He was struck in the chest and taken to University of Chicago Medical Center, where he died.
  
  The Cook County medical examiner’s office has not confirmed the death.
  
  Investigators found cartridge casings for a handgun and rifle at the scene, but no weapons have been recovered, police said.

Anyone know if one of those AR-pistol platforms? We'd think that even in Englewood, someone would notice a walking around with a full size carbine.

005 Changes?

A Rule 14 scandal about to break?

The clouted must be protected!