Naperville Term Limits

Chicagoans can only dream:

• The Naperville City Council tonight moved closer to placing a measure on the November ballot to limit the number of terms the mayor and council members could serve.

  After an hour-long discussion, council members voted 7-1 to direct the city's legal staff to draw up a possible referendum question on term limits. Council members will review that question at their July 20 meeting. They have until an Aug. 29 deadline to place referendum questions on the Nov. 2 ballot.

  On Tuesday night, council members agreed to instruct Naperville's lawyers to develop a referendum question that would limit all city elected officials to serving three consecutive terms, beginning with officials whom voters elect in April 2013.

  The action is in response to recent efforts by the Naperville Voter Education League to gather signatures to place the issue of term limits on November's ballot.

After our last referendum foray, we realize the enormity of the task at hand in Chicago. You need professional signature collectors, lawyers versed in election law, time beyond what we have available to even hope to get to the point where a Daley-controlled Election Board would even consider granting you one of the three referendum spots available. The chances of that happening rapidly approach "zero" with alarming speed.

Reform is a long way away here.

Where's Waldo?

We mean "Where's J-Fled?"

Our fearful leader has been absent from the headlines for over a week now. No bragging about crime being down even though homicides are up, indoor v outdoor killings, blaming inanimate metal objects for a lack of impulse control, etc.

Maybe he needed a vacation after taking all of Daley's heat for the spring? As pointed out below, Shortshanks has Huberman in the pressure cooker now. It's all smoke lately with nary a mirror in sight.

Paid in Prison?

It sure must be nice to be this connected:

• After his third conviction for drunken driving, city laborer John LaGiglio was sentenced to one year in Stateville Prison.

  But that didn't stop him from keeping his $30-an-hour city job thanks to a heavy dose of timekeeping fraud, according to a report by city Inspector General Joe Ferguson.

  Ferguson is recommending LaGiglio be fired for using a combination of sick days, vacation days and personal days to serve his two-month prison sentence.

And they kept it quiet for five years.

Huberman to Destroy Schools

Not that they weren't on the verge of collapse anyway, it's just that someone is giving them a couple of good kicks to see what falls off the rotting corpse:

• The Chicago Board of Education today granted schools chief Ron Huberman authority to lay off teachers and increase class sizes, a procedural move that was met with fierce resistance from union groups.

It may all be a show though:

• The threat of class sizes of up to 35 students next fall has loomed for months due to an estimated $600 million budget deficit for Chicago Public Schools. However, more than half of the deficit comes from state cuts to education funding, which could be restored when Springfield passes a final budget.

Either Shortshanks is running a bluff, counting on Springfield to come up with the dough at the last minute, or he's making Huberman the stalking horse for a full scale attack on the Teachers' Union.

Right now, we figure it's door #2, the full scale attack. And he's got the perfect tool to carry it out - a non-educator who's managed to move from city job to city job, collecting pay raises every step of the way and leaving nothing resembling progress in his wake. Even the BreakingNews headline names Huberman as getting "the OK" to launch the offensive.

And why not? Shortshanks dragged a whole bunch of unions back to the table after the No-lympic failure for concessions, he's ordered managers and exempts to take anywhere from 12 to 30 to 40 days off, he won in arbitration with the FOP, so why not see what he can wring out of the teachers? It's not like anyone gets hurt except minority children - and they probably would have gotten shot anyway.

Whichever way it goes, Daley is making Huberman radioactive for any sort of elected office, which might be another part of the plan.

Police Shooting (Updated - Another)

Once again, an offender comes out on the losing end of a shootout:

• A Chicago police shot and wounded a person who had opened fire on the officer on the South Side Monday night, police said.

  At about 9 p.m., Calumet Area Gun Team officers tried to conduct a field interview with a male in the 6900 block of South King Drive, according to a statement from police early Tuesday morning.

  As the officers approached and announced their office, the person fled on foot. The officers gave chase into a vacant lot in the vicinity of 6900 S. Vernon Ave. As one officer emerged from the lot, he was met by the suspect, who opened fire. The officer returned fire, striking the suspect, according to the police statement.

Reports from the scene are the offender expired. Nothing official yet, but all looks good on our end.

UPDATE: More shooting down south:

• Two people were being questioned Monday night after shots were fired at police in the Englewood neighborhood on Chicago's South Side.

  Preliminary reports said shots were fired at officers about 10 p.m. in the 5800 block of South Sangamon Street, said Police News Affairs [...].

  [Police News Affairs] said police did not return fire, but took two suspects into custody for questioning. Two weapons also were recovered from the scene, she said.

Numerous 10-1's called citywide for this one. Multiple guns recovered including a rifle.

Useless Paper Continues

It has become the program that wouldn't die:

• AdMin Fax #101916 issued on 10 June
  
  REFERENCE: Revision to Department Notice 07-15, entitled Illinois Traffic Stop Statistical Study
  
  This revision extends the expiration date of the above-referenced directive from 01 July 2010 to 1 July 2015.

So a program (created in part by then State Senator Obama) that was supposed to track the racial profiling that existed in the Chicago Police Department, but which in ended up proving that the only profiling taking place was Traffic Violating Profiling, has gotten a new lease on life to the tune of five additional years.

That's five more years of a printing contract for the stickers and five more years of data collection by a local university, thereby ensuring five more years of some government subsidy and five more years of "grants" for connected professors and grad students.

Gouging Tourists

Why bother coming to town anymore?

• At a time when Chicago is trying to shed its image as a high-cost travel destination, the state and city are layering additional fees on visitors.
  
  Airport taxi ride fees are doubling, from $2 to $4; O'Hare International Airport car rentals will be slapped with a daily fee of about $8 later this summer; and Chicago is among a number of cities lobbying for a hike in the airline ticket-tax limit, from $4.50 per leg of a flight to as much as $7, and the city has stated its intent to raise it to the max.
  
  The fees come just as a new state law restructures operations at McCormick Place, with the aim of cutting costs to trade show exhibitors, some of the city's most valued visitors.

And with Shortshanks blaming texting suburbanites for lakefront problems and Chicago's crime being covered relentlessly in the national media, tourist dollars are drying up as the day-trippers go elsewhere. Add in the city dwellers shopping for everything possible outside of Chicago and Cook County, the death spiral continues.

Nothing Good Happens After 2am

Once again, proving the above statement true:

• Kevin Jones ran for cover when at least two guests at a weekend party pulled handguns.
  
  Crouching beneath a window, the 15-year-old thought the danger had passed when the guests stormed out of the apartment in the Gresham neighborhood. But as he stood up, Kevin was hit by a bullet fired from the street and he dropped to the floor, according to a witness and a source.
  
  
• Police responded at about 2:15 a.m. and found Jones -- of the 6800 block of South Wood Street -- wounded. He was taken to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, where he was pronounced dead at 2:56 a.m.

And once again, one of those "indoor homicides" J-Fled says we can't do a thing to prevent.

Oh wait, this was an "illegal" party that J-Fled says is the root of all evil and we're going crack down on to stop the slaughter of youths.

Hold on, it was in a private residence, not an abandoned factory.

At 2:15 am?

Geez, fighting crime is hard. Keeping track of all of J-Fled's variables is almost impossible.

Occasional Drug Use

Blago's trial enters the Twilight Zone:

• Sam Adam Jr. livens up the room as his animated cross examination of Lon Monk begins. Adam's questions cut deep, to Lon Monk and Rod Blagojevich's friendship beginning back at Pepperdine Law School in Malibu, Calif.
  
  Adam says Monk and Blagojevich lived together in law school, they shared secrets, talked about girls. Monk agrees.
  
  Adam says the two of them never committed any crimes together back then, right?
  
  Monk: "Other than some occasional drug use," Monk says to some laughter by spectators. "Yes." Adam: "I'm not here to ask you about that."

And this:

• Potential jurors waiting to be questioned in Rod Blagojevich's case discussed the trial's news coverage with each other last week, apparently flouting a judge's order just days after they were told to stop reading or listening to such news, a former prospective juror told the Chicago Sun-Times.

  One of the people who was in the room during the discussion is now on the Blagojevich jury, said David Hallstrom -- formerly juror number 169.

We remember that at least one, maybe two, members of the George Ryan jury ended up having criminal records that were the basis for all sorts of political intrigue where lawyers for both sides may have known this in the hopes of throwing a wrench into things or basing an appeal on it. We certainly look like we're headed that way again.

What's This?

Department Procured Outside Employment?

• The Department and the FOP have come to terms regarding a Department Procured Outside Employment Program that is scheduled to begin in July 2010. The program will be open to all members below the rank of sergeant regardless of unit or title code.
  
  Those members that are interested in participating in this program must complete an e-Learning module that will be available on the e-Learning site in the near future. Members will sign up for a three month period. Members will be notified of opportunities that are available during this time period via CPD email. Members must possess a valid CPD email address in order to participate in this program.
  
  Members may also receive emergency communications regarding assignment by phone. It is imperative that members ensure that the phone number listed with the Department is the phone number that they wish to be contacted at. Members may change their contact number to a cell phone number by completing Personnel Change Notice (CPD 11.611). Simply check the Change Phone Number box and supply the old and new phone numbers in the body of the form.

Is this similar to that out-of-state program we always hear about where if someone needs a "police presence" at a business, event or other function, they can hire off-duty cops through the FOP? Boston or Philly or one of those east coast cities? It's been proposed here before, but never enacted because of one reason or another. Someone want to explain?

Disaster Drill

This must be part of that "overall plan" that Huberman told everyone existed, but it wasn't feasible to train the entire Department, or even let them know it existed in any particular form.

• The Illinois National Guard and local police, fire and transit departments are organizing a five-day series of drills set to test the Chicago area's emergency procedures in response to numerous simultaneous disasters, officials said in a statement today.

  The drills started today and are to last until Thursday.

  "It is a full-scale exercise, so residents can expect to see emergency responders looking and acting as if this was a real homeland security/domestic response mission," the National Guard said in a statement.

• Several simulated terrorist attacks in the Bensenville area on Wednesday.

Well, at least Shortshanks is getting some use out of all those houses he bought in Bensenville. But in reality, we haven't seen Word One on any of this for district first responders. Not a thing. It makes us wonder what they expect us to do in the event of a real emergency - run away? Die heroically? It sure would be nice to have some direction from on high.

Inside J-Fled's Brain

The new wisdom for property crime statistics (via the Policy Group):

• If you didn't have that nice house and cool flat-screen TV, then there is a good chance that a poor honor roll student wouldn't have to break into your house to get it for himself.

Open post for Monday.

3rd Suspect Charged

In the Wortham killing:

• A third man has been charged with murder in the slaying last month of Chicago Police Officer Thomas Wortham IV.

  Marcus Floyd, 19, of the 3100 block of W. Lexington St., was charged with two counts of felony murder in the slaying of Wortham and the shooting death of Brian Floyd. Brian Floyd was Marcus Floyd's cousin, and was fatally shot while trying to steal Wortham's new motorcycle outside Wortham's parents' Chatham home.

  Marcus Floyd also faces a charge of attempted armed robbery and discharge of a firearm.

Too bad we've moved beyond the days of a quick trail, a cigarette and a blindfold. This might drag out for a few years yet even though it's seems like a pretty open-and-shut case.

What is the Matrix?

Funny you should ask:

• Just as insurance companies predict the likelihood of heart attacks, car crashes and house fires, more than a dozen police departments in the suburbs and at Chicago area universities are using a similar type of forecasting on job applicants.

  The aim is to screen out candidates likely to use excessive force, abuse drugs, improperly fire a weapon or have other problems.

  The statistics-based psychological evaluation system was developed by Matrix Inc. in the mid-1990s in Louisiana.

But guess who isn't using it?

• The City of Chicago, which pays out millions of dollars a year as a result of lawsuits against police officers, doesn't use the system. Matrix approached the city in 2008, but Tracey Ladner, human resources director for the Chicago Police Department, said the department uses a more "traditional" psychological evaluation. Matrix did not submit a bid in time, she said.

And that "traditional" approach, how is that working out for you there Tracey? One has to wonder what scandals might have been averted using a program like this instead of "clout" and phone calls for hiring purposes alone.

You know what would be interesting? Having "merit" picks and command staff take this Matrix evaluation just to see where they'd land in the great scheme of things. And then maybe Shortshanks could sit for a test, too.

Odd Reporting Styles

First Fran says this on Tuesday:

• Chicago taxpayers dodged a fiscal bullet when an independent arbitrator awarded rank-and-file police officers a ten percent pay hike over five years — their smallest raise in nearly three decades.

Then she tosses in this line:

• But the pricetag is still a whopping $375 million — $160 million of it for retroactive pay.

  The city plans to finance the back pay portion by issuing $160 million in so-called commercial paper, a short-term line of credit retired by general city revenues.

Then Rosalind Rossi reports on the upcoming teacher raises:

• Chicago Public Schools officials revealed Friday that they plan to borrow up to $800 million to pay their bills -- even as they pledged to give teachers a promised 4 percent pay hike, a move designed to head off a strike.

No "dodged a bullet." No "whopping" borrowing, even though the CPS total is more than double the police numbers.

It's almost like Fran is grinding an axe for the mayor with some slanted reporting while Rossi plays off the enormity of the CPS costs. Hmmmmm.

Dumb Professor

Evidently, the bar to become a University of Chicago Chair has been lowered overly much. Get a load of this "statistician" and his methodology:

• The crowd for Friday's Stanley Cup parade and rally was huge by any measure, but at least one statistician says the city's official estimate of two million attendees is a bit overzealous.

  "Most censuses of Chicago give you three million people for Chicago," said Stephen Stiegler, the Chairman of the Department of Statistics at the University of Chicago. "Do you really believe that two-thirds of Chicago was down there? No!"

Never mind that Metra was running full cars to and from the end of their numerous rail lines. And for the first time in recent memory, lakefront parking garages were full to overflowing. No, all 2 million people came from the population of Chicago, IL.

We have our own doubts about the 2 million number being thrown around, but we base it on knowledge of faulty crowd estimates, the tendency for politicians and Department brass to lie through their teeth, and the experience we've had working events where a million people actually show up. We don't just assume two-thirds of Chicagoans took off work, skipped school and showed up downtown.

And admit it - neither did any of you, which makes every one of us at least as smart as someone running a department of a university ranked among the tops in Nobel Prize winners.

Out of Control ATV

This looks ugly (here's the link if the embed doesn't work) :



At least a dozen people, maybe more, get blindsided by this 4-wheeler. And it also shows how the cops were woefully undermanned that they couldn't maintain the barricades once the parade units had passed. Again, this could have been much worse than it ended up being. Luck played too big a role in this event.

Taser, Taser, Taser!

The west side was alive with the sound of electrical arcs:

• Police used Tasers in three separate incidents on the West Side late Friday and early Saturday, according to police.
  
  About 8:45 p.m. Friday in the 100 block of South Pulaski Road, police used a Taser to subdue a 49-year-old man who matched the description of a person wanted in a robbery, according to Harrison District police. After further investigation, it was determined the man had not been involved in the robbery but had an outstanding warrant for his arrest in a different area, police said.
  
  
• The second incident occurred about 10:30 p.m. in the 3200 block of West Lake Street. A 22-year-old woman was fleeing in a vehicle from a domestic dispute in which she injured another person, police said. When police confronted her, she refused to get out of the vehicle and police used a Taser to take her into custody.
  
  
• This morning about 3 a.m., police were chasing a battery suspect in the 4200 block of West Madison Street. Police discharged a Taser, but missed the suspect, police said. The man was eventually caught and taken into custody.

Fun times on the west side.

2,000,000?

It certainly felt like a crush of humanity.

And wasn't it hilarious when Shortshanks and Quinn got booed as loudly as they did? If Daley didn't know most of those attendees were suburbanites instead of Chicago voters, he wouldn't even run again. Quinn might be losing some sleep.

We continue to wonder at the Department's ability to react to a large incident though. This was a peaceful crowd. After a copper got hit during an ATV accident, the crowd continued to maintain its jovial nature and showed concern for the injured officer, but this could have turned out far differently if people had completely mobbed the buses and trampled a number of people. We hate to rain on anyone's parade, especially a Stanley Cup parade, but this seemed like we lucked out...again.

Discipline for Rifle Deployment?

No sense of proportion if true:

• O/T But I have heard it from several sources. Anyone else hear about IPRA or OPS or whatever it's called this week wanting to give the officer who was involved in the shoot out with the carbine 30 days for failure to properly secure the weapon in the vehicle. Apparently the officer who RETURNED FIRE on the offender and took him out was riding already armed with the rifle. This officer saves two officers lives who had already taken fire from the offender and they want to slap him with 30 days over some bullshit!! Anyone else have info on the truth to this? This is why they changed the carbine General Order this month and added basically a "wolfpack clause" where if there are at least two 10-4 units and a Sgt. riding together on a "mission" then one officer out of the four can ride with the carbine in the car.

Hopefully, untrue about the 30 days. Morale is a mess already.

Light Posting

Taking it easy this weekend with a few family events, get-togethers and opportunities non-blogging related. We'll continue to update comments, but posting may be lighter than normal.

Open post for the moment.

Captains to Stay?

From the comments:

• FINALLY someone who has the stones to stick up to Masters/Weis. Thats right, Dan Dugan took a stand against the dynamic duo on the issue of moving Captains around to spread around the workoload. He told Weis that if he cant run the Patrol Division then expect him to drop papers and leave. (and go to the media about manpower shortages). low and behold, J-fled backed down (once again) and now the Captains will stay put. Way to go Dugan.

Of course, if the Department doesn't make any captains, J-Fled, Masters and Shortshanks win by default. And that certainly seems to be the way they're going at the moment.

Investigative Brilliance

Stunning turn of events:

• When childhood friends Jeffrey Pinkerton and Patrick Evans were released from jail, they both said they would change their ways.

  Evans' mother said she doubted it. Pinkerton's girlfriend of seven years and the mother of his two children said she had faith that he would.

  On Tuesday night, both men were killed in the back of an East Garfield Park corner store in the 3600 block of West Ohio Street.

  [...] The shooting was gang-related, police sources said. Both men were members of the Conservative Vice Lords, the sources said.

Really, we had no idea this would turn out to be gang related. AK-47 used in a west-side corner-store back-room? How could such a thing be?

Running for FOP Spots

As a commentator was kind enough to point out:

• A note to CPD Readers, anyone who wants to run for FOP Office next year MUST Attend at least 5 meetings in the previous year to be eligible to run.
  
  Per FOP Bylaws & Regulations as follows;
  
  The elected Officers of the Lodge shall consist of a President, 1st, 2nd and 3rd Vice Presidents, Recording Secretary, Financial Secretary, Treasurer, three (3) Sergeants-at-Arms, and seventeen (17) Trustees.
  
  The term of office for elected officers of Lodge No. 7 shall be three (3) years.
  
  The duly elected officers of the Lodge and elected/appointed unit representatives by virtue of their office shall be delegates to the State and National Conference.

Start attending meetings if you want to run. See you there!

Hawks Win!

Just because it needs to be celebrated again.

Parade on Friday?

Brother, Spare a Dime?

Or 3,300,000 dimes?

• A Southwest Side man was awarded $1.3 million Tuesday after a Cook County jury found two Chicago Police detectives and a police polygraph administrator created a false confession about him in the 2001 murder of his neighbor, according to the man's lawyers.

  Donny McGee's award is to include $330,000 from the officers' personal funds, according to Loevy & Loevy Attorneys at Law.

  McGee, who spent three years in prison, was to face the death penalty in the murder of Ethel Perstlen, 76.

Polygraphs have been discredited for years now and many courts disallow any sort of testimony regarding interpretations of their data. In what might be called an ironic twist, the unreliable data produced and interpreted by the technician was turned into a "false confession" by lawyers and cost him $110,000. The detectives used the data provided by a Department trained operator and the lawyers turned it into another $220,000 payday.

Seeing as how this case only cost the city $1 million (plus lawyer costs we're sure), we could see them writing a check for their part and leaving the three CPD members holding the bag on any appeals and related costs for their $110,000 each.

Anyone want to guess what the clearance rate is going to drop to now?

Cell Scanners

If there was ever an argument for digital radios, this is it:

• on another unrelated note. scc, you need to do a post on this for all of us in blue,the new sprint phone evo49, has the police scanner on it. my wife, gave me her phone and all the zones came over the phone as clear as our radio.and its free it shows how many people in the area are listening, and it gives all zones, officer alert, the drug boys can be there on the phone in front of you and not have the scanner.the things these phone companys do to make a buck.he can stand next to you and hear every word as clear as day.this is another dangerous. tool against us.

It's not so bad if the bad guys are listening to domestic after domestic after "junior won't eat his vegetables" calls, but the dope calls and gang stuff enables the offenders to counter officer responses and we are all aware of the surprises that could be sprung on responding officers for gun, robbery or any other violence associated calls. Some of the specialized units have digital encrypted radios for long term investigations or dynamic situations (HBT). It's probably time to start looking into wider use of these with the Special Employment in the tunnels and compatibility issues with the Fire Department.

Motor Maintenance Scandal?

This is popping up in the comments:

• about 6pm tonight feds went to a/1 motor maintanance and took bunch of files with a search warrant.. no idea what is going on but about 7 boxes of files were taken from the office. When we went there to swap out a car all the workers/mechanics were outside and said that the feds were searching the place and they couldnt go back in until they were done. got a good look at the guys and they wre clearly feds. anyone else have any info about this???

Is this part of an on-going Fleet investigation? Fleet (and the Department of Transportation) have been hotbeds of Outfit influence for years. John Kass wrote many an article on the "Department of Tony" as he pointed a spotlight at corruption and pistol-carrying connected individuals.

Seeing as how the Department hasn't run it's own garages in a few years, we'd hope this isn't another brewing hit on the police. And just today Shortshanks named a new head of the Department of Transportation, so we wonder if he got another of his patented "heads up" calls from Washington.

He Hid the Dope Where?

This actually made headlines in the Springfield State Journal-Register:

• A jail strip-search of a Springfield man Sunday night revealed two bags of crack cocaine concealed in his buttocks, police said.

  Frank S. Phillips, 20, of the 1500 block of Brenda Court could be charged with obstructing justice, drug dealing and possession of marijuana.

  At about 10:30 p.m., an officer saw an eastbound Oldsmobile Cutlass swerving in traffic on Cook Street near McCreery Street. The officer pulled the car over and saw the backseat passenger, allegedly Phillips, lift his lower body off the seat while his right shoulder lowered, as if to conceal something.

  The officer said the car’s interior smelled like burnt marijuana and that she knew Phillips was on parole. During a search, a marijuana cigar was found in his pants pocket. During a strip search at the Sangamon County Jail, correctional officers allegedly found two bags of crack cocaine concealed in his buttocks. Police said the cocaine weighed about 2.5 grams.

We've brought our one-or-two-bagger dope to the desk sergeant many times and he or she always had a pair of rubber gloves right there when they asked, "Is this ass-rock?" Maybe it was the weight that merited the headline?

Don't Touch my Beer Ma

Tales of the stupid:

• It's hard to be 32 years old and still live with mom, but when she takes your beer away, sometimes you have to take it like a man.
  
  Charles Lee Dennison, over in New Port Richey, learned that the hard way this past weekend when he was arrested for calling 911 to complain his mother had poached his pilsener.
  
  Dennison was "very intoxicated" and demanded that the police arrest dear old mom when officers responded to his initial 911 call Friday night, according to tampabay.com.
  
  The sloshed son told cops that if mom wasn't arrested and charged, he'd keep calling the emergency number.

The good news is he's eligible for execution in Florida.

Game On!

One Goal.

UPDATE: Overtime Win!

What a game!

What a rush!

What a victory!

Thank you Rocky Wirtz.

Thank you Blackhawks.

Grateful fans everywhere breathe a heavy sigh of relief.

Businessman Shoots, Kills Robber

Honestly, it's like the citizens and store-owners suddenly realized that there is a Supreme Court decision about to come down justifying a Right that is enshrined in the Constitution for the sole purpose of protecting oneself:

• The owner of a Northwest Side pawn shop shot and killed one of three men who tried robbing his business at gunpoint, a source said.
  
  The 24-year-old man killed had a prior robbery conviction and was sentenced to boot camp, according to court records.
  
  The store's owner opened fire on the three men during an attempted robbery shortly before 1 p.m. Tuesday inside the Fullerton Pawners, 5900 W. Fullerton Ave. in the city's Belmont Cragin community, a source said.

And yet again, our assertion that a camera never prevented a crime...:

• A Chicago police blue-light camera sits on a pole about 10 feet away from the entrance, but it wasn't clear whether it captured any images of the fleeing robbers. Detectives could be seen taking the hard drive for the store's surveillance cameras.

And once again, this amazing insight from J-Fed:

• If that gun wasn't in the pawn shop, there's probably an excellent chance that this boot camp honor graduate would be alive today."

We may have made up that last part.

Two More "Innies;" One More "Outie"

Once again, unpreventable indoor homicides:

• Chicago police officials said two men were shot to death in a grocery store in the East Garfield Park neighborhood this evening.
  
  Police received a call about shots fired on the 3600 block of West Ohio Street at about 6:28 p.m., said Chicago Police News Affairs Officer Darryl Baety. Police were looking for one suspect who fled the scene after the shooting.
  
  Police could be seen walking in and out of the M and K Grocery following the shooting. Neighbors said the two men who were killed might have been playing pool in the back of the store.

These "indoor homicides" are saving everyone a lot of work lately. Thanks goodness this brain trust is leading us into the 21st century of policing.

And then we have this flash of investigative brilliance by our fearful leader:

• If there wasn't a pool table in that corner store/game room, there's an excellent chance these upstanding citizens would be alive today.

Honest to god, J-Fled ought to come up with a "Quote a Day Calendar." We think it would be a best seller.

UPDATE: And an outside homicide in 025:

• A 24-year-old man was found shot to death Tuesday night in the Cragin neighborhood on Chicago's Northwest Side.

  Preliminary reports said officers responded to shots fired in the 4600 block of West Belmont Avenue at about 9:25 p.m., according to Police News Affairs [...]. Arriving officers found an unresponsive man laying on the sidewalk with a gunshot wound to the head, he said.

  There was no immediate information available about the circumstances behind the shooting.

And then J-Fled spoke thusly:

• If there wasn't a sidewalk here, there's an excellent chance this man wouldn't have been lying on it, bleeding from a head wound and he would be alive today.

Words cannot describe the awe we find ourselves feeling at this moment.

Contract Up for Vote

The contract passed out of committee Tuesday. It goes to the full City Council tomorrow:

• The City Council is poised to approve a new Chicago Police Department contract granting officers 2 percent average yearly raises after a committee recommended its passage without dissent today.

  Police officers also will be subject to random alcohol testing starting in 2012 and have to submit to drug and alcohol tests if they fire their weapons on or off duty under the pact the council's Police and Finance committees recommended.
  
  Fraternal Order of Police President Mark Donahue said today his members remain frustrated that an arbitrator didn't award them larger salary increases, but said he thinks they see it as fair given the weak economy.

We're pretty sure most coppers just wanted either what the teachers got (4%) or what the aldercreatures got (6%) or what the aldercreatures staff got (5%). It didn't happen.

Three years of waiting to get crumbs though - that has to stop.

Area 2 Fixed!

We received a pair of e-mails today stating that the corroded and fractured pillar holding up a large portion of Area 2 was repaired recently. Remember these pictures?

We aren't structural engineers, but we imagine something like this would require more than just a surface application of concrete. They actually propped up the building, tore out the pillar, replaced the structural iron and put a new pillar in place, right? We'll ask that our Area 2 readers keep us informed of events as they unfold.

For our next repair trick, we have these lovely photos from an Area 4 reader:



According to our e-mailer, that is human excrement dripping from the ceiling of the 011th District female locker room. It comes from the plumbing directly above on the main floor. Our reader also relates that this has been going on for a few years now and the latest "repair" undertaken by the engineers is...wait for it... new ceiling tiles to absorb the most recent drips!

We guess the previous tiles must have been full.

Hey, wait a minute. Maybe this was the source of the 011th District gas leak that led to the evacuation of the building and cancellation of afternoon court yesterday?

It's NOT About the Money

It's all about the safety!!!

• The Chicago Department of Transportation says the City's 188 red light cameras have made intersections safer.

  But as FOX Chicago News reports exclusively, a new UIC report finds that accidents at red-light intersections have actually gone up five percent.

  Using data provided by the Illinois Department of Transportation, Assistant Professor Rajiv Shah compared the total number of accidents the year before the cameras were installed and the year after. What surprised him most is that car accidents have declined city-wide, except at red-light intersections.

How can that be? The mayor, city council and CDOT wouldn't lie to us, would they?

Oh yeah, right. They would. Sorry. We forgot we were in Chicago for a second. Who was it that said this was just a money grab by Shortshanks? If we recall correctly, that would have been just about everybody.

Gotta Love Our Buildings!

Word trickling in from the West Side that there's a gas leak in the 011 District station and it is being evacuated. No injuries at this time.

J-Fled's Twisted Logic

Evidently, our brainy Supernintendo never took Logic 101. Otherwise he might understand that just because A and B are present, C isn't necessarily preordained. He unleashed this screamer at Sunday's press conference:

• At the same news conference, Weis said a Country Club Hills woman who was shot during a heated card game might have still been alive if there had not been a gun in her friend's Calumet Heights home. Patricia Clark was shot multiple times Thursday after an argument with her friend, who went into a back bedroom, grabbed a gun and fired. Clark, 51, died Saturday.

  "What a horrible loss of life over a card game," Weis said. "This is why it's so dangerous to have weapons in the house. People get upset, they get angry. ... If that gun wasn't in the house, there's probably an excellent chance that woman would be alive today."

How about this for a supposition:

• If there wasn't a deck of cards in that house, there's an excellent chance that woman would be alive today.

Honest to pete, we almost choked to death on our Sunday chips and beer after hearing this stupidity. We mean, we understand J-Fled has to toe the company line working for the delusional midget, and $330,000 buys Shortshanks a lot of liberty with J-Fled's diminishing credibility, but geez. How good does that ass really taste?

Homicides Up 4%

Shortshanks and Weis continue to play with the numbers, but the one they can't seem to fudge is the number of dead people:

• Chicago's homicides are up nearly 4 percent compared with last year, Chicago police Superintendent Jody Weis said today.
  
  While overall crime has dropped nearly 6 percent in Chicago, homicides have increased 3.8 percent, according to crime trends through the end of May. There were 164 homicides between January and May, six more than last year during the same time.
  
  "Homicides continue to challenge us," Weis said

Amazingly, J-Feld doesn't once mention his recent innovation of "innies" versus "outies." Rather, he concentrates on blaming anything or everything except what ought to be blamed:

• Weis asked parents to make sure their children comply with curfew laws as the summer approaches. In May alone, there were more than 1,600 curfew violations in the city, Weis said. Children younger than 17 are supposed to be indoors by 10 p.m. on weekdays and 11 p.m. on weekends.

  "Police shouldn't have to do the job of parents," he said. "Please, this summer, know where your kids are."

When the most influential person in a child's life decides not to do their job, you kind of run into a situation like the one here in Chicago. We can only imagine J-Fled's head is still spinning that he even accepted this job not knowing what the hell goes on at the local level of law enforcement away from the cushy federal offices.

Charity Connections

In these trying times, why is the city giving away money? Not just money, but increasing amounts of money? Especially to a charity run by Mrs. Shortshanks?

• Most city workers are being forced to take almost five weeks off without pay because of what Mayor Richard M. Daley has called the worst financial crisis in decades. At this time of record deficits, however, the city is giving more than ever to After School Matters, the charity led by Mayor Daley’s wife.
  
  The nonprofit group, founded by Maggie Daley and still led by her, was paid almost $15 million by the city in 2009, far more than the previous year.
  
  Asked Friday about the increase, Mayor Daley defended the group and its after-school youth programs. “It’s a charity for teenagers in Chicago. Are you questioning my wife now?”

Well, yeah. That's exactly what they're doing Shortshanks. You see, voters have an obligation to question their elected representatives what is going on with their tax money, especially when you're telling everyone they have to give up unpaid days off, forgo adequate police protection, miss garbage pick ups, tighten their belts, pay more in fees, etc.

You aren't supposed to be using tax payer moneys to fund charities run by relatives. And we certainly shouldn't be having to skim the pages of the New York Times to find out about it - that should have been covered by the local media, which once again, couldn't find their own asses with four sets of hands, a map and a spotlight.

Blogger Down

Since the end of the Blackhawks game last night, we haven't been able to get on blogger at all. Just in case anyone was worried (or hoping) we had been hit by a truck, we're still here, just unable to post.

It looks like Blogger is coming back on line, so we'll be attempting to post threads and comments shortly.

Blackhawks

Evidently, our silence on the subject isn't bringing them any more luck, so we might as well have a post about it.

Yes, we are among the biggest Blackhawks fans and you wouldn't believe how much it has been killing us to maintain our self-imposed exile from the hockey world. It's just that earlier this season when we wrote about them, they seemed to lose more often than they won. And being the superstitious sort, we noticed that when we weren't writing about them, they went on a tear and ended up making a serious run for the President's Cup.

In any event, it's time for the Blackhawks to stop messing around and take advantage of the first opportunity in almost 50 years to win the Stanley Cup. We don't count the 1992 Finals appearance as a "chance to win" because they were completely dominated and destroyed by the Penguins that year.

This is the chance, this is what we've been waiting for, this is the "One Goal" talked about for years now. Don't give it away.

Chicago Gun Ban Ignored

Gee, you think so?

• By one expert's estimate, there is a handgun in as many as 100,000 city households, despite the ban. And gang members or those with misdeeds in mind aren't the only ones who have them. In some neighborhoods, otherwise-law-abiding citizens feel forced to violate the gun ban, they say, to protect themselves and their families.
  
  "You've got to do what you've got to do," said a DVD salesman from Marquette Park, who has two daughters and said he bought a handgun after two thugs shot him during a recent robbery attempt. "I think people need guns to protect themselves."
  
  
• ... based on a study that Ludwig and other experts conducted in 2007 on Chicago's underground gun market, he roughly estimated that as many as 100,000 Chicago households could have handguns.
  
  "Judging from the available data, there are apparently a lot of people in Chicago who feel strongly enough they need a gun for protection that they're willing to ignore the ban," Ludwig said.

100,000? We're going to go out on a limb here and label that number the low end of the spectrum. And once the Supremes come down with their ruling and once the summer really gets cranking, we're going to call 500,000 a very low estimate as decent people who were only hesitating over the misdemeanor charge for "Failure to Register" take advantage of the change to finally buy a gun or upgrade.

People want to feel safe and they're finally realizing that Shortshanks doesn't make them any safer by restricting their options, putting up cameras, shorting them police coverage, etc. People will do what they have to to at least feel safe in their homes. It's human nature.

Drew Has Fun

Who says you can't have fun in prison? It's all a matter of presentation:

• Police spent 12 hours digging on a private farm near Peoria for a sign of Stacy Peterson Saturday, but found nothing, sources said.

  The search for Peterson — the missing fourth wife of accused murderer Drew Peterson — in the muddy, rugged terrain of a wooded property northwest of Peoria ended with police and a forensic anthropologist throwing in the towel after sifting through a 10-foot-by-10-foot patch from dawn till about 6 p.m.

• The Web site TMZ.com reported that it came from another inmate who said Drew Peterson allegedly told a fellow inmate where he buried his fourth wife, but both police and Peterson’s attorney denied the report, noting that he has been in isolation while in jail awaiting trial on charges he murdered his third wife, Kathleen Savio.

Shaved supposes, and we agree, that Drew is toying with authorities. We think he's trying to keep his name in the media so as to spin the jury pool. We had a $10 bet that Drew actually buried a barrel filled with rotten meat in Peoria just to mess with the cadaver dogs. We still think he's guilty as sin, but a psychopath like Drew is going to be a step ahead of everyone for a while yet.

Irony

Almost the exact definition of "irony" as found in the dictionary:

• A teenager was shot while he was reportedly handing out flyers for an anti-violence event.

  The shooting happened shortly after 5 p.m. Friday at 67th Street and Blackstone.

  Police say the 18-year old suffered a gunshot wound to the head.

We're speechless.

Satan?

Gruesome:

• Mixed martial arts fighter Jarrod Wyatt is charged with the murder of his sparring partner, Taylor Powell.
  
  Wyatt, 26, allegedly cut an 18-inch hole in Powell's chest and removed his heart, tongue and most of his face.
  
  Wyatt reportedly was under the influence of psychedelic drugs and had been increasingly focused on Doomsday scenarios leading up to the March 21st murder.
  
  Del Norte County Police Sgt. Elwood Lee responded to the scene and said that Wyatt told him "Satan was in that dude."

We were under the impression that the Dark Prince had taken up residence in Shortshanks' body and that his "speaking in tongues" was a result of Daley's feeble struggles to reassert control over his body.

But this guy seems to be a better candidate for demonic possession.

Nice Driving

Dallas Fort Worth:



And all she suffered was a broken wrist - and multiple DUI charges.

Dead Felon Avoided Gun Charge

From the comment section:

• Surprised it hasn't leaked yet, so now I'll do it -- officers in 013 picked up the shithead that the first "armed and dangerous 80-year old" killed as he was burglarizing the vet's home. Seems they caught him breaking into a car near a building housing senior citizens and in the car with him was gun.
  
  The ASAs REFUSED to let the officers charge him with UUW because the gun wasn't actually in his possession.
  
  So, depending on how you look at what ended up happening to the shithead, ASAs either fucked up again or inadvertantly ridded the world of another criminal parasite.

Maybe the ASA's are in on a plot to keep violent felons on the street where they might run into a few armed citizens and come to a fitting end? That would take a lot of coordination though. Can't argue with the results though.

Cop Shoots Gunman

Her husband?

• An off-duty Chicago police officer shot and wounded her husband at their Far South Side neighborhood home in a domestic-incident early this morning, police said.

  The husband had fired first at a male friend of his wife's who was there but missed, police said in a statement.

Whoops.

Dead Angel?

Not quite. Here's the story from a day ago:

• Police are seeking witnesses to the slaying of a CPS 10th grader who was gunned down in front of a middle school in the Humboldt Park neighborhood on the West Side Wednesday night.

  At 9:30 p.m. police responded to a call of shots fired at 4211 W. Thomas St. and when officers got there they found a 15-year-old boy lying on the sidewalk with a gunshot wound to the head, according to Harrison District police Capt. [...].

Both papers and most of the news stations had video of the community protesting the killing of another future cardiologist and brain surgeon. But we got this e-mail today:

• Unbelievable coverage of the shooting in 011. This kid was a hard core gangster at 15. The graffiti all over the Piccolo School the news won't show is all four-corner-hustler bullshit. It was so bad overnight, the district had to dismantle the sidewalk memorial and call for an emergency "graffiti blaster" to wash down the walls and sidewalks for all the gang b.s. Now we found out that the "victim" had been shot on April 2 under similar circumstances. Sorry to say, but this wasn't unexpected.

Once again, half the story from the media.

UPDATE: Mope-rah claims the little angel had "...no run-ins with the law..." We'd say that being shot on 02 April and then refusing to help the police is kind of stretching the "no run-ins" claim. But again, it's Mope-rah and truth is a foreign thing to her and her ilk.

Castle Doctrine Again?

If this keeps up, maybe crime really will drop:

• A South Austin resident shot and wounded a man who crashed through the window of his home while fleeing police early this morning, officials say.
  
  The resident had a valid Firearm Owner's Identification Card and police are not pursuing charges against him, police said.
  
  This is the second time in little more than a week that police have chosen not to pursue charges against someone who shot an intruder, despite Chicago's ban on handguns. On May 26, an 80-year-old East Garfield Park homeowner shot and killed a suspected burglar.

Maybe the Department can start some kind of promotion to encourage this sort of thing?

Shoot three fleeing felons and get a free box of ammo!

Free toasters for dead home invaders?

Eight Hours in School?

Seriously?

• What's not to like, some parents and local school council members said about the Chicago Public Schools' proposal for a pilot eight-hour day at 100 struggling elementary schools.

  But some educators said the plan won't work.

Of course it won't. The Teachers Union would never go for this, not without massive increases in pay.

• Unionized teachers slammed the proposal, which CPS says would use computers, software and non-teachers to supervise the extra two hours.

  "To put an uncertified person in front of students should not be called education, that is called baby-sitting," Chicago Teachers Union President Marilyn Stewart charged.

Same thing with the CPS engineers, maintenance, janitors. This is another "smoke and mirror" proposal that hints at possible changes without anything substantial behind it. Kind of like Shortshanks touting 44 extra cops on the street in the face of a thousand retirements this year alone.

Lawyer Loses His Cool

Feeling a little stressed there Counselor?

• A Cook County assistant public defender was arrested after he pushed and choked a prosecutor following a hearing at the Criminal Courts Building today, officials said.

  The assistant public defender, 47-year-old Henry Hams of the 600 block of East 32nd Street, was charged with aggravated battery and resisting arrest, both felonies.

  He was upset about a hearing date a judge had set and complained to the assistant state's attorney in the case outside the courtroom, according to a source.

  The prosecutor "apparently said, 'Too bad, that's the date the judge set,' and (Hams) just lost it and shoved (the prosecutor) against the wall," the source said.

It's kind of amazing to see how attacking an ASA results in instantaneous felony approval while the CPD has to jump through dozens of hoops and literally suffer grievous bodily harm to get any sort of charge even considered. And then it's still only about a 10% chance of getting anything approved.

Cordero Benefit

PO Jimmy Cordero from 025 has been battling Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma since February of 2008. Following a stint on the Medical Roll and surgery to remove a tumor, medical bills are piling up.

• Friday, 25 June
  6pm until 11pm
  at the FOP Hall

Contact the 025 District desk for tickets.

McShane Fundraiser

Good news coming out in small portions:

• Natasha McShane has started talking for the first time since she was brutally beaten with a baseball bat while celebrating with a friend in Bucktown, her family says.
  
  "She's whispering," her grandmother Bernadette McShane said today. "She's trying to talk."
  
  Natasha McShane is speaking "odd words" like "yes" and "no" - not sentences - but slow progress is still progress, her grandmother said.

And there's a fundraiser for Ms. McShane tonight:

• Please join us for a benefit in honor of Natasha McShane on Friday, June 4, 2010, from 5-9p.m. at Local 399’s (Operating Engineers) event hall, located at 2260 South Grove Street, Chicago, IL 60616 The event includes live entertainment, food, drinks and special guests. All funds raised will go directly to the Natasha McShane Fund, which was established to assist the McShane family with the expenses related to this tragedy.

If you can't make it, you can donate at the above link.

FOP Reply

Before we begin this rebuttal, a few facts and points:

• We deleted about 90 comments in the "Question for the FOP" thread. We won't be posting any there either, mostly to spare everyone the rash of vitriol. We tallied them up before flushing and we seemed to be on the losing end by a narrow margin. However, the comments seemed to come in waves. Thirty-plus comments posted between 1100 and 1230, all using the same style of capitalization, grammar, style and naughty words. Another twenty or so went up between 1700 and 1800. The other forty were questioning the whole website deal, which was exactly the purpose of the post.
  

Our comments will be in the bold:

• I am well aware that many FOP members read the Second City blog. I, for one, do not.

Bullshit Rich. But if true, you're missing a good time, good info and some of what truly concerns the members.

• Today, I was made aware that the FOP website was the subject of a posting on the blog. There was much innuendo associated with this posting.

Again, bullshit. There was a listing of facts and a question posed, all in just over 200 words. If there was any innuendo, it was all in your head. Or are you claiming you don't get E-5 pay, you don't get stipend for Committee service, you don't get reimbursed dues and you don't receive another stipend for visiting Roll Calls?

• These are the facts.

Oh goody. We like facts.

• Prior to 2004 the Lodge was paying an outside vendor to host the website. A webmaster was paid for the maintenance and email fees. The website expenses for the Lodge totaled approximately $3600 a year which was not unreasonable considering the size of the site, the hours required for updates, and the hosting and email fees.
  
  I redesigned the FOP website, took over maintenance of the site, and moved the site to a different hosting company in 2004. Blueline Webs was listed as the creator of the site at that time. I am Blueline Webs. I have maintained the site since that time. The yearly expenses for the website have dropped to $259 per year. This includes all hosting, maintenance, and email fees for the FOP main site, the Gift Shop website, and the FOP Stars Hockey Team website.

Well, if you had read our question, which you couldn't since you allege that you don't read the blog, you cover all of the points quite nicely. You saved the organization around $3341 per year. Bravo!

• Since 2004 I have never accepted or been offered any remuneration for my services either personally or through Blueline Webs. It was always my intent to draw on my services to the FOP purely as a referral at the time of my retirement from the Department.

And again, if you read the last paragraph we published, which, again, you couldn't as you claim not to read the blog, you'd see this - "If he's doing this for free, three cheers for him. If he's doing it for publicity, well, no one is blaming him for planning ahead, but should he be advertising on our site?"

Three cheers for your free work Rich - hip hip hooray! (x3).

• Rather than publish an article on the Second City blog that is based merely on innuendo, the webmaster of that entity could have made one simple phone call to satisfy his curiosity.

Here's where we're going to have to take issue with you. We've been around 5 years the other day, not that you would have seen the post. We save just about everything and we happen to have around 5,000 e-mails in various forms, and among those e-mails is an entire series of letters sent to you and the FOP a few years ago. Guess how many replies we got?

Zero.

And again, since you don't read the blog, you wouldn't know that we don't do phones. Phones are traceable. People answering phones like to have names. Names manage to leak out, even if it's the wrong name that your operator keeps giving to callers, opening up the FOP to a real possibility of a slander suit, especially when it's the wrong name. There's a former IAD lieutenant who ran an illegal First Amendment investigation into a few of those names without proper notifications involving some improper surveillance. Things like that reek of Red Squad and C-5 days and happen when names are bandied around.

In any event, however inadvertently, you answered the question we posed. A small suggestion - instead of linking to what might someday be a for-profit enterprise of web design, how about a little post at the bottom along the lines of "Site Design Provided Free-of-Charge by Blueline Webs." It would make you seem altruistic and eliminate any questions of the nature that we posed.

As for those demanding apologies, many of which seem to have originated from the same IP address within the span of 37 minutes, we didn't realize that we weren't allowed to pose questions to our betters who run an organization that we happen to pay dues to. We suppose it's like anyone questioning Shortshanks - just shut up, submit your taxes and pay no attention to the odd things that catch our eye and just seem to require further explanation.

Shame on us.

Wow! 44 Officers!

What is this goof smoking?

• Mayor Daley today ordered 44 Chicago Police officers working desk jobs and in the arson unit reassigned to street duty to solve a severe manpower shortage caused by a two-year slowdown in police hiring.

  Together with 86 police recruits due to graduate from the police academy on July 14, the depleted ranks will be bolstered by 130 officers by mid-summer, when the homicide rate traditionally rises and violent crime normally reaches its peak.

  Fraternal Order of Police President Mark Donahue dismissed today’s announcement as a “Band-Aid.” He noted that 16 percent of officers assigned to police districts were “detailed out” — moved to other units — as of May 25, up from 12 percent a year ago.

16% detailed out. That's a rather large number. Then there's the position that those officers are being counted twice. Once in the District complement and once in the unit of detail. So if you have 300 officers assigned to District 000, that's one set of numbers. And the 48 officers detailed out are counted again in TRU, MSF, Vice, where ever they happen to be serving their time. Then the Department denies officers a chance to bid for those "vacant" spots in the district by claiming the district is "up to strength."

And the Department continues to offer overtime initiatives in lieu of hiring. It's going to get far worse before it gets any better.

I've Been Shot - Hurry Up!

This is the first time we've seen this appear in the papers:

• A man whose car was stolen allegedly admitted to police officers he made a false call to 911 claiming he had been shot so officers would get their “asses” to the scene faster.

  “ 'I’m the one who called,' ” Joshua Coleman told police when they spotted him at Englewood and Normal Tuesday afternoon, according to a police report. “ 'I said I got shot to get your asses here quicker. Are you gonna do anything about my car?' ”

  Coleman, 21, an admitted gang member, first called emergency dispatchers to report that his car was stolen, Assistant Cook County State’s Attorney Erin Antonietti said.

  When police didn't arrive immediately, he “was not pleased” and proceeded to place another 911 call, this time telling dispatchers he was shot in the leg in the 400 block of West Englewood, authorities said.

This is a constant state of being on the south and west sides. Everyone claims someone had a gun, flashed a gun, fired a gun, shot at someone, all to get police to respond faster. There are probably a hundred or more intersections coppers could rattle off that always seem to be full of invisible guns that are only visible to persons who can't even tie their shoes without police assistance.

We'd like to see calls like these result in more arrests, but we don't think the courts will treat it seriously.

Question for the FOP

We notice the FOP site has a new site design. We aren't sure if this is related to the site failure the day of the contract announcement, but it's a new design in any event. The contact person for the FOP site itself is raguilar@chicagofop.org.

The new design company is advertised at the bottom of the main page. Clicking on the link we find the bluelinewebs.com website which boasts the design of the FOP site, the FOP gift shop and the CPD hockey team. To e-mail the webmaster, there's a convenient link that is addressed to raguilar@bluelinewebs.com.

So the question is this:

• Is an FOP Field Rep, who already makes E-5 Captain's pay (D-5 for you old timers), receives a stipend for Committee service, is reimbursed dues money for attending a minimum number of meetings and another stipend for visiting roll calls, also being paid by the membership to design and maintain a website through a company he owns?

We think it needs an explanation at the very least. If he's doing this for free, three cheers for him. If he's doing it for publicity, well, no one is blaming him for planning ahead, but should he be advertising on our site? And if he's doing it for money, someone ought to wonder.

Mope-Rah Makes Sense?

We still won't link to her because we hold grudges, but Mary Mitchell appears to be coming down on the side of the NRA on this issue all of the sudden:

• When Mayor Daley starts blaming "texting" and "drinking" by suburban high school students for a string of North Avenue beach arrests, it is time for the citizens to seriously get on his butt.

• While preventing the city's downtown from becoming a ghost town like the downtown areas in so many other cities, Daley is faced with another daunting challenge: How to keep huge chunks of Chicago neighborhoods from becoming crime-ridden ghettos.

  But Daley's stubborn defense of his handgun ban is clouding his judgment.

• There aren't enough police officers to protect and serve; enough good parents to raise the children; enough jobs; enough recreational activities or enough grandparents to take up the slack.

  Today, there is a noticeable lack of the things that keep communities safe

Yeah, no shit Mary. If you had been listening to us and our readers three years ago, you'd have been ahead of the curve instead of playing catch-up today. We and others pointed out the poorly thought out stance the "reverends," community activists and media were taking years ago painting the police as the enemy and ignoring the elephant in the living room on the south and west sides. Now it's bedlam and everyone is realizing it isn't going to get better without some real solutions starting with cops and armed citizens. Cameras, prayer vigils and more misspent money isn't going to do it.

Welcome to the party - finally.

More Guns = Less Crime

So says the FBI:

• ....on Monday the FBI released crime statistics that should cause the applauding anti-gunners to sit on their hands. The statistics indicate that between 2008 and 2009, as gun sales soared, the number of murders in our country decreased 7.2 percent. That amounts to about an 8.2 percent decrease in the per capita murder rate, after the increase in our nation's legal and illegal population is taken into account. And it translates into about a 10.5 percent decrease in the murder rate between 2004, when the ban expired, and the end of 2009. And finally, it means that in 2009 our nation's murder rate fell to a 45-year low.

Shaved had this up earlier and the original article is actually from the NRA-ILA website. The McDonald decision is expected shortly from the Supreme Court, possibly as soon as today.

Don't expect much coverage from the local Daley-controlled media about guns reducing violence, but you can bet they'll be all over the USSC decision should it go against Shortshanks while screaming, "Think of the children!"

No Coverage by Media?

Well, very little coverage at least:

• On the way home today from work Gary Meier/WGN was saying that someone shot 6 times at the WGN/Michigan Ave. studio window. Anyone has any more info. on this? He was saying that this didn't even make the paper or TV. Incredible that even WGN was trying to play this down.

Six holes in your window isn't six stray bullets. That's someone shooting at the bright lights just to see what happens. And you get a five minute mention on the radio? We think this is called "willful blindness."

Miranda Clarification

Good news from Washington DC:

• The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that suspects must explicitly tell police they want to be silent to invoke Miranda protections during criminal interrogations, a decision one dissenting justice said turns defendants’ rights “upside down.”

  A right to remain silent and a right to a lawyer are the first of the Miranda rights warnings, which police recite to suspects during arrests and interrogations. But the justices said in a 5-4 decision that suspects must tell police they are going to remain silent to stop an interrogation, just as they must tell police that they want a lawyer
  

  The officers in the room said Thompkins said little during the interrogation, occasionally answering “yes,” “no,” “I don’t know,” nodding his head and making eye contact as his responses. But when one of the officers asked him if he prayed for forgiveness for “shooting that boy down,” Thompkins said, “Yes.”

  He was convicted, but on appeal he wanted that statement thrown out because he said he invoked his Miranda rights by being uncommunicative with the interrogating officers.

  The Cincinnati-based appeals court agreed and threw out his confession and conviction. The high court reversed that decision. The case is Berghuis v. Thompkins, 08-1470.

At least we don't have to read minds anymore.

Thank Tommy for the Rain

Once again, after a second violent night in Chicago....

• At least 12 people were reported shot and three of those victims died from their injuries following separate shooting incidents throughout the city.

  The shootings started Sunday afternoon and continued into Monday morning on the South, Southwest, West and North Sides.

.... Tommy Skilling rides to the rescue and brings on a mix of showers, lightning and storms to wash away the lion's share of the mayhem.

And here's a laugher:

• No one is in custody for any of the shootings. Wentworth Area, Calumet Area, Belmont Area, Harrison Area and Grand Area detectives are investigating.

Gee, that's Area 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Looks like a sweep!

Tragicomedy

Maybe it isn't the guns at all? Maybe it's just people with no sense of proportion, moral compass or little voice inside that says, "Maybe this isn't such a good idea"

• Three women were shot -- one was seriously wounded -- while walking down the street with “new” male companions early Monday on the Far South Side, police said.

  The victims are between the ages of 23 and 27 and were walking with male companions at 131 W. 113th Pl. about 12:20 a.m. when the incident occurred, according to police.

  The shooters who all are acquainted with the women, apparently didn't like the fact they were walking with “new” men and began firing, according to police.

  Police said the gunmen were “probably” trying to harm the men, but wounded the women instead.

That's great.

At least this is understandable:

• A man who was shot dead by someone he had been playing dice with after an argument in the Englewood neighborhood on the South Side Sunday night.

  The man was shot in the chest about 11 p.m. near the intersection of 61st and Bishop streets, police News Affairs Officer Ron Gaines said.

  A Wentworth Area detective sergeant identified the victim as Larry Marble, and said he was playing dice or a game of chance with another person when a disagreement erupted between the two over the game.

  The gunman "got mad" and shot Marble several times about the body, according to the sergeant who did not have a description of the assailant immediately.

Actually, no it isn't. What the hell is wrong with people today? Don't answer that.

Only on the South Side

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up:

• An off-duty police officer was sitting on his porch with his wife on South Leavett and West 90th when they saw a 30-year-old man break into a car. When the officer attempted to make an arrest, a short scuffle happened.

  The man allegedly threatened the officer, saying, ''I know where you live now and I'll come back and kill you.'' The suspect also threatened to injure the officer's wife.

  The suspect managed to break free and began running toward nearby woods, shedding clothing in the meantime. A police sergeant spotted the suspect at South Western and West 90th, and the man was apprehended.

  The suspect is facing charges of burglary and aggravated assault to a peace officer, the Morgan Park district desk sergeant said.

  As police were making the arrest at 1:13 a.m., a drunken motorist driving a 2004 Ford Escape plowed into a police car at the scene. The force of the impact caused that car to hit another squad car head-on, injuring a police sergeant.

  Among his charges, Paul Daniels, 26, of South Holland, was cited with two counts of driving under the influence. As police responded to that crash, a male driver told police his male passenger had been shot at South Western Avenue and West 79th Street.

That was truly a bad set of coincidence. Best wishes to the injured sergeant.

Mystery Solved - Sort Of

Hillbuzz is having a field day with this one.

The registered owner info popped up there, here and a couple of other blogs. TheExpiredMeter opines this might be a mistake - there is no signage designating a "No Parking Zone," but the yellow line on the curb is usually indicative of some sort of restriction (distance from hydrant, crosswalk, etc.) Now here's another twist:

• Hop over to the City of Chicago "Pay Parking Tickets On-line" site;
  
  
• Enter the plate and last name (X550474 - Davis);
  
  
• Scan the list of tickets issued

Out of 30 tickets issued over 2 years, 18 are listed as "dismissed." 60% of tickets beaten - not bad. We haven't heard of a dismissal rate that high since the judges stopped taking bribe money at Traffic Court.

Also, the last ticket issued was late in 2009. Nothing since. It certainly lends credence to the allegation made by a Traffic Aide that her hand-held ticket writer has that plate labeled as "Do Not Write." Hillbuzz blog did numerous walk-bys and took a bunch of photos of the car still parked illegally over the past day or two. It must be nice to be that clouted that you can just create your own parking spots.