Wake and Funeral (Updated)

Per the CFD and IAFF Local 2, arrangements for FF Edward J. Stringer are as follows:

• Monday, December 27, 2010
  Blake Lamb Funeral Home
  4727 W. 103rd St.Oak Lawn, IL
  Visitation: 3:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
  
  Funeral:Tuesday, December 28, 2010 10:00 a.m. (Tentative)
  St. Rita of Cascia Chapel
  7740 S. Western
  Chicago, IL
  
  Cemetery: Pending

Arrangements for Corey Ankum still pending as of this posting.

UPDATE: Visitation for Corey Ankum

• Wednesday, 29 December 2010
  Apostolic Church of God
  6320 S Dorchester.
  2:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
  
  The wake will be held at the church at 10 a.m. Thursday.
  The funeral will follow at 11 a.m.
  
  Cemetery: Pending

RWOC? Really?

Someone posted this rumor in the barricade post from yesterday:

• RWOC for his efforts: wasting countless department resources, endangering the lives of all involved, threatening officers with an AK-47 and being here illegally-not from Mexico. Glad to see our system really works.

Sooooo, he was RWOC? Was he psyched? Without any type of charge at all? Is there an INS hold or notification pending? Because someone nutty enough to tie up most of a District and SWAT team for ten hours certainly deserves a little bit of scrutiny.

Injured Firefighters Improving

Good news in the wake of the tragedy:

• [...], five of the 17 firefighters who were injured in Wednesday’s blaze and building collapse remained hospitalized.

  [...] Larry Langford, the Fire Department spokesman, said it was too early to say whether the five firefighters who remained hospitalized would be back at home for Christmas.

  “The most serious was stable yesterday and is still stable,” Langford said. “The rest are even better.”

  While the injured firefighters were recovering from the physical trauma, the entire department was reeling from the experience, the worst loss of life in more than a decade.

Best wishes to the injured and hopefully, they'll be up and around in short order.

In the meantime, we'll post visitation and funeral information for the fallen when it becomes available. RIP Gentlemen.

Accounting Problems

Someone was making money somewhere. It's a giant cash business with little oversight (almost like a casino). But Shortshanks has to figure out one last scam for all the connected contractors and hidden relatives:

• Making a profit on Taste of Chicago and the city's six other annual festivals could prove difficult for a private company willing to take on the challenge, according to city documents provided to firms preparing bids.
  
  The city lost more than $6.9 million on the events the last three years, records show. So it's probably no surprise that Mayor Richard Daley's administration says companies bidding to run the events can consider charging admission fees and selling naming rights.
  
  "Ideally, these festivals would remain free, but (bidders) should submit responses that include their recommendations on the economic model which can include an entrance fee," the city bid documents state.

Given the sad state the Taste has turned into, they should have been fencing off the park and charging admission years ago just to keep out the riff-raff. God forbid anyone offend the leeches and attempt to run a professional event that might still be the pride of Chicago. Who wouldn't want the disaster it's become of people shot within sight of the Taste, bullets flying through hotel rooms and roving bands of sexual predators molesting anyone with reach.

However, it is amusing to see Daley uses the same accounting firms that tell us that movies like "Star Wars" and "E.T." never made a dime. Who does he think he's kidding?

Steve Landesberg RIP

We're a bit behind the curve this week with the holiday upon us and other family things going on. We just heard about the death of Steve Landesberg on Monday:

• Mr. Landesberg is probably best known for the role of Detective Sgt. Arthur P. Dietrich in the '70s sitcom "Barney Miller." The show, which ran on ABC from 1975 to 1982, featured Mr. Landesberg as an intellectual detective with a quiet manner who seemed to have an unrivaled knowledge of practically any topic that arose.
  
  The sitcom, set in a New York City police station, portrayed a group of wisecracking detectives who dealt with the oddball characters who would end up there. With most of the action in the squad room rather than on the street, some police officers have said that the show often better represented the real life of rank-and-file officers than many detective dramas on television.

Still probably the best police show in history.

And Then There Were....

Eight? Twelve? Five?

• State Sen. James Meeks has dropped out of the mayoral race.

  In an e-mail sent to media Thursday afternoon, Meeks — who also heads Salem Baptist Church on the South Side — said he was ending his campaign.

  Meeks met with mayoral challengers U.S. Rep. Danny Davis and former U.S. Senator Carol Moseley Braun Wednesday in a last-ditch effort to unite behind a consensus black candidate, the Sun-Times reported. Davis said after the meeting it was possible one or more candidates would drop out, but a spokesman for Meeks denied he would exit the race.

Good riddance to the so-called "reverend." Now he can go back to extorting money in the name of "education" and "the children" and whatever the grievance of the day happens to be.

Barricade Ends Peacefully

An ten-hour-standoff ends with no casualties:

• An armed man who reportedly was threatening suicide and who barricaded himself in the bathroom of an apartment in the Rogers Park neighborhood for about nine and a half hours Thursday morning, is now in police custody.

  The incident began about 12:50 a.m. in the 7700 block of North Sheridan Road, according to police News Affairs [...].

  A male armed with a gun was reportedly threatening suicide and barricaded himself inside a bathroom, according to [News Affairs].

No one shot, no one dead, no innocent victims. Stuff the Department often doesn't get (or give) credit for. It isn't part of the picture the media and politicians like to paint about out-of-control cops or blood-thirsty racial profilers killing altar boys and aspiring oncologists.

Good job Officers.

Rahm Decision Today

Is the fix in?

• Chicago elections commissioners are scheduled to vote Thursday on whether mayoral candidate Rahm Emanuel will remain on the ballot.

  The three-member elections board won't have a lot of time to consider a recommendation from Joseph Morris, the hearing officer on the highly publicized case. For the second day in a row, Morris did not release his recommendation, and a man who answered the phone at his law office said not to expect one Wednesday night.

  No matter how the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners votes, it's not expected to have the final say. The losing side has a week to appeal the board's decision to the Cook County Circuit Court. The case could take weeks to wind its way through the court system, including the Illinois Court of Appeals and the Illinois Supreme Court.

It isn't the strongest case ever presented and appeals are likely. Of more interest is the deadline for candidates pulling out of the election so as to now split voting blocs. Davis, Meeks and Braun met to discuss one or more withdrawing from the race to anoint a "consensus" candidate. But if Shortshanks hasn't given the OK, then we figure they'll all stay in so as to fracture the black vote and guarantee Rahm is one of the runoff candidates should the election go that direction.

More Penny Problems

It seems that the most recent "Joe Curtin Award Winner for Leadership Something-or-the-Other" has had the door removed from the 011th District Camera Pod room.

Not that big a deal seeing as how it might be alleged that officers were checking e-mail instead of watching the cameras.

The Big Deal part comes in when it was learned that the computers are set up so officers have to have their backs to the now un-secured doorway.

Anyone who has worked in a Chicago Police Station knows that 99% of them turn into homeless colonies come winter time. We also recall a number of incidents where people with severe mental illnesses or a desire for mayhem have brought guns into police stations and/or attacked desk crews, including one in 011 a year or two ago.

This sounds like a safety issue that needs to be addressed. Maybe we can finally have the disease ridden homeless ejected from our work environs.

Bad Timing Rahm

Once again, showing that First Responder are merely props to politicians:

• Rahm Emanuel's campaign moved quickly to correct an e-mail that went out to supporters lamenting today's Chicago firefighter tragedy while also asking for campaign donations.

  "As we celebrate this holiday season, we must remember how fortunate we are that we have brave men and women working out there every day to protect our homes, our communities and our families," the e-mail from Emanuel read. "We are eternally grateful for their courageous work, and we will never forget them."

  Included after those words was an electronic button marked "Donate."

  Emanuel spokesman Ben LaBolt said the gaffe was inadvertent and the result of using the wrong template in sending out the e-mail.

It would also seem to be proof of the Rahm maxim, "Never let a crisis go to waste."

It's going to take a bit more than a canned apology on this one. Something like this needs to be double and triple checked before being sent out to e-mail lists, especially when you're so obviously attempting to capitalize on a tragedy.

Firefighters Injured

Bad blaze with wall collapse this morning.

• At least four firefighters were trapped and injured after a wall collapsed in a 3-11 alarm fire at an abandoned South Side commercial building this morning, authorities said.
  
  Firefighters searched through rubble for more than an hour as the trapped firefighters were pulled out and rushed to hospitals.
  
  Police squad cars escorted two ambulances north on Lake Shore Drive to Northwestern as ramps were closed to clear it of traffic, according to fire communications. One of the firefighters there was described as "grave." The condition of the other one was not available.
  
  At least two other firefighters to taken to other hospitals but their conditions also were not known.

Updates as we have them. Prayers for our fire department brothers and sisters.

UPDATE: Two firefighters dead. Condolences to our brothers and sisters of the Chicago Fire Department.

Get Ready for Another Medal

J-Fled and Masters Masters Masters will have an entire row of ribbons at this rate:

• Reports of violent and property crimes continued to decline in the first half of 2010, according to preliminary crime report released by the FBI Monday.

  The FBI's semiannual uniform crime report shows that reports of violent crime dropped 6.2 percent from January to June and property crime reports were down 2.8 percent.

  The dip in reported crimes follows a three-year trend of decreasing crime rates despite a sagging economy.

Of course, the FBI doesn't use Chicago's numbers in their figuring because Chicago fudges the definitions of "crime," but J-Fled insisting that there were 23 straight months of reductions must be the truth, right? Why else would he be going forward with a massive redeployment of manpower resources if there wasn't any crime to fight?

Is anyone in the media picking up on this at all? If crime is down, why move police? If the police are bitching about back-up and strength, maybe crime isn't "down" at all? If the city hasn't hired but two classes in over three years, hasn't promoted a single detective in that same time frame while retirements have not only continued, but continued at a higher rate than in years past, maybe all isn't as it seems.

Oh yeah, and the mayor is a liar nine ways to Sunday. Why would anyone believe a single number coming out of City Hall?

Illinois Declines

The anti-business policies continue to strangle growth, and therefore representation:

• Illinois will lose a congressional seat, the U.S. Census Bureau announced on Tuesday; following the 2012 elections, Illinois will send 18 members to the House of Representatives, down from the current 19.

  Nationally, the reapportionment favors Republicans: states that vote Republican gained the most seats, which has implications not only for the balance of power in Congress, but in the 2012 presidential campaign, because the the electoral votes are based on the new census counts.

Illinois continues its slow slide into irrelevance. Given a few more years and a looming pension bankruptcy, Illinois will join Michigan in short order as being the only state to lose population in the census. And Michigan, as we all know, is home to what formerly great city? Detroit.

Good News!

Merry Christmas Illinois voters:

• The federal judge who sentenced former Gov. George Ryan to 61/2 years in prison in 2006 refused Tuesday to release him early from custody, saying that while she was saddened by his wife's terminal illness, Ryan was to blame for his own plight.
  
  Ryan's wrongdoing "has exacted a stiff penalty not only for himself but also for his family," U.S. District Judge Rebecca Pallmeyer concluded near the end of her 58-page ruling.
  
  Coming a few days before Christmas, the decision is a bitter blow for Ryan's family. The former governor's son and namesake, George Ryan Jr., paused to keep his composure as he started to address more than a dozen reporters and photographers in front of the family's Kankakee home and then in a shaky voice ripped the ruling as "heartless and cruel."
  
  "Is this what American justice is now?" he said.

Why, yes, yes it is.

IPRA Overreaching Again

IPRA is not your friend and is looking for any way it can to hook you up and screw you over. We're going to summarize an e-mail we received to protect the source.

• On 06 December 2010, a accidental discharge occurred at the Area 3 Range during the 3.5 hour Firearms Training Course. An officer fired a round while bringing his gun up on target that struck the concrete floor, causing fragments to spray himself, the instructor and another officer. Minor lacerations and no small embarrassment resulted, and all the officers were taken to the hospital to make sure no fragments remained embedded. They will be fine.
  
  Notifications were made to the upper echelons, an ET was ordered and the cumbersome paperwork was begun that always follows such an incident. Somehow, IPRA ended up in the loop and demanded a CR number be generated. The District Commander said "no" as it was a training exercise. IPRA went around his back and contacted the ADS of the Academy, who also said, "no." So IPRA did what they seem to do best and generated their own CR number (and possibly an additional U-number), thereby injecting themselves into a non-criminal incident that they have no authority or directive to investigate.
  
  IPRA investigates police shootings and allegations of misconduct, not training accidents. IPRA is attempting to interpret their rules as "all shootings resulting in injury" will be investigated by them regardless of the circumstances of the shooting. This is not a good thing.

It certainly isn't, and anyone being approached by IPRA either in person or via To-From Witness statements should immediately contact the FOP and have legal representation available. We've published reports previously that IPRA is attempting to question officers out of the presence of representation by not identifying themselves as IPRA investigators or passing themselves off as detectives. Now it seems we have to watch our backs even for training accidents.

Wait, the Mayor Lied?

Oh, the humanity!

• More than a year after he took his own life, new details are emerging that show former Chicago School Board President Michael W. Scott had been under growing financial pressure.

  Scott — a developer, close friend of Mayor Daley and onetime Chicago 2016 Olympic organizing committee member — was found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound on Nov. 16, 2009, in the Chicago River west of the Apparel Center. He was 60.

  About two weeks before Scott’s suicide, a development company that had been paying him $10,000 a month “for consultation in regards to future projects involving the possible Olympic Games in Chicago” canceled his contract, according to new details from the Chicago Police Department that officials previously had refused to release. Scott lost that lucrative part-time job because the city failed to land the 2016 Games, according to an unredacted police report on his suicide obtained by the Better Government Association.

• The new information about Scott’s consulting contract appears to contradict statements that had been made by Scott and Mayor Daley that Scott wasn’t planning to cash in on his dual roles as an Olympic organizer and a real estate developer.

Let's get real here - everyone and their brother was set to cash in on Shortshank's No-lympic dream. There are only two things that are surprising here:

• that no one has been indicted yet for all the money thrown around in an effort to win the crookedest sporting event known to mankind and
• that there haven't been a dozen other suicides related to this debacle

Daley's legacy of bankrupting the city will be felt for decades yet to come.

Probation?

At least granny got a measure of vengeance though:

• Two schoolboys who threw bricks at an elderly South Shore homeowner have pleaded guilty to aggravated assault of a senior citizen and criminal damage.

  But the 12- and 13-year-old boys will be sentenced to probation and won’t be locked up in the Cook County Juvenile Detention Center, Judge Andrew Berman said Monday morning.

  The case hit the headlines in September when the boys’ 68-year-old victim, Margaret Matthews, shot the 12-year-old boy in the shoulder as he lobbed bricks at her from the roof of a shed at her home in the 7600 block of South Cole.

Get a load of this part though:

• Matthews and several neighbors were ready to testify at trial Monday morning that both boys had terrorized the neighborhood for months, before Matthews finally snapped and opened fire as they smashed her windows. But both boys agreed to a last-minute plea deal.

  Prosecutors agreed to drop felony aggravated battery charges against the boys in return for their guilty pleas to misdemeanor aggravated assault and criminal damage,

The victim and her witnesses are ready to go to trial. Slam-dunk verdict, right? Wrong:

• Speaking outside court, Matthews said “I don’t feel like justice has totally been carried out.”

  Probation and restraining orders preventing the boys from contacting her or any of the witnesses were “not such a big deal,” she said, adding that she thought the boys needed “some stronger order in their lives.”

  Neither the boys nor their families have apologized to her, she said. “They’re in denial,” she added.

  [...] The 12-year-old and his family declined to comment as they left court, but the 13-year-old’s mother said “he never did anything,” before leaving without further comment.

"Never did anything," except learn a lesson in how to manipulate the system and duck all responsibility for his actions, which we are sure will serve him in good stead as he begins his lifetime of passing through the criminal justice system until someone else finally finishes the job Mrs. Matthews wasn't able to do. She's irritated:

• Matthews said she would “be keeping my eye out” for both boys and wouldn’t hesitate to call police on them again, though she hoped “they do something better and constructive with their lives.”

Don't hold your breath Mrs. Matthews. But do keep your gun handy - you're going to need it again, probably in short order.

The "Tolerant" Leftists

Remember, the Tea Party is full of terrorists and radicals. Everyone else is just exercising their own Freedom of Speech:

• A Statement from Chicago Tea Patriots founder Catherina Wojtowicz concerning the events on the night of Friday, December 10, 2010.
  12/16/10
  
  "We were the target of an arson Friday at our Christmas Party.
  
  At approximately 8 p.m. smoke began to fill the rooms of Dugan’s Irish Pub where we hosting our Christmas Party. The entire bar soon became engulfed with thick, heavy smoke and the bar was evacuated. Within moments the Chicago Fire and Police arrived and began to clear and secure the premises. We were detained outside while firemen cleared the bar. After waiting an hour outside, with other dozens of other bar patrons, we were allowed back in to gather our belongings. The bar was covered in soot and patrons had great difficulty in breathing. Bar management had to close the bar for the night, thus losing revenue during the busy Christmas season.
  
  Tuesday I received a phone call from detectives from the Chicago Bomb and Arson Department who informed me that four devices, which appeared to be roadside flares, were taped together and left lit and smoldering in the trash can of the men’s bathroom. On the lid of the toliet seat, written in red, it read: F#CK THE CHICAGO TEA PARTY
  
  Bomb and arson police have deemed this an arson and are now investigating.
  
  [...] Because the devices were left in the bathroom it will be difficult to deduce who is the offender from videos and because nobody was killed or harmed (thankfully), fingerprints will not be processed for anywhere from six months to a year. However, if an offender is found, they will be charged with a felony.

Dugan's is also a popular hangout for coppers. We don't recall seeing a word about this in any of the media, but seeing as how 90+% of the bar occupants would have been people the media routinely portrays as less than human, we aren't surprised.

Nice Shooting Tex

We need more of this up here in Illinois:

• In the back room of a humble jewelry store and pawn shop in Houston's East End Thursday afternoon, a gunman tied Eva Castillo's wrists tightly — too tightly. She complained of the pain, so he loosened the bindings. Then Castillo's husband was ordered at gunpoint to put his hands behind his back.

  But Ramon Castillo had a surprise for the gunman and two cohorts, who had announced they were robbing the business.

  Castillo pulled a pistol from his waistband and shot the gunman dead. Then he grabbed a shotgun from his office and engaged in a shootout with the other two armed robbers.

  When it was over, all three robbers were dead — and Castillo, though shot at least three times, was still standing, having successfully defended what was rightfully his.

Daley's head would explode seeing as how at least two of the dead were illegal Honduran immigrants and therefore, potential Rahm Emanuel voters. Of course, death has never been an obstacle to democrat voters in Cook County.

Favre to Start

They might as well be playing tonight's game on an airport runway:

• The Vikings and Bears are playing at the University of Minnesota's outdoor stadium because the Metrodome's roof collapsed last weekend after a heavy snowstorm. The roof's failure caused the Vikings-Giants game to be moved to Detroit, but the university was able to get its two-year-old stadium ready to host the Bears.

  Snow started steadily falling in the Twin Cities on Monday afternoon and forecasts called for wind-chill temperatures well below zero by game time, conditions that Favre got to know well during 16 years with the Green Bay Packers.

With Green Bay losing, the Bears can clinch a playoff spot that we were sure was out of reach this year.