Detroit Tragedy

Every officer's nightmare:

• A sleeping 7-year-old girl was shot and killed when an officer's gun went off while Detroit police were searching a duplex for a suspect in the slaying of a teenager, a police official said.
  
  
• Godbee said officers with the department's Special Response Team set off a flash grenade as they entered the apartment with their guns drawn about 12:40 a.m. Sunday with a warrant to look for a suspect in the Friday slaying of a 17-year-old boy.
  
  The lead officer encountered a 46-year-old woman immediately inside the front room of the house and "some level of physical contact" ensued during which the officer's gun went off, Godbee said. The officers had identified themselves as police, he said.
  
  
• The officers had a search warrant and were looking for a 34-year-old man suspected in the shooting death of 17-year-old Jarean Blake.
  
  [...] Officers arrested the suspect during the search, Godbee said. Jones said the suspect wasn't in his apartment but one upstairs that officers raided at the same time.

Good warrant, murder suspect in the building, but someone who thinks they have a right to resist and attack the police ends up causing the needless death of a child. But guess who will get blamed?

J-Fled Watch

CBS, the national CBS, gives Shortshanks all the rope he needs to hang J-Fled out to dry by comparing Chicago to Newark, New Jersey? Good lord:

• Violent crime in this country has been declining in the past three years. Last year murder nationwide was down 10 percent. One exception to the trend is Chicago, where murder has become an epidemic. Newark, N.J., on the other hand, is turning its murder problem around.
  
  
• Since 2007, Chicago has seen its declining murder rate start to creep back up. Meanwhile, [...] Newark, N.J., is seeing just the opposite - with a drop of 25 percent, it seems to be getting its murder rate under control.
  
  
• "I believe every crime can be prevented," said Garry McCarthy, Newark's Police Director. "Every single crime can be prevented. You have to set the bar that high."
  
  McCarthy is turning things around. March 2010 was the first calendar month without a homicide here in 44 years. In the first quarter of this year, murders are down 58 percent from the 1st quarter of 2006 - just before McCarthy took over. Shootings are down 66 percent.

McCarthy? Not the same McCarthy who was a finalist for the J-Fled job? The same McCarthy who left town a wee bit irritated that he had wasted his time coming to such a bullshit interview process that was so obviously fixed? That McCarthy?

It sure is nice to see him successful elsewhere. He might have met the same fate as J-Fled if he came here. Of course, the entire CPD might have benefited from having a real leader instead of the pretender we have now. It is interesting how things turned out.

Knife Ban on the Way

Ironic in its own way:

• At least five people were injured in stabbings in the last 14 hours in apparently unrelated incidents across the city, according to the Chicago Fire Department.

  [...] Chicago Police are investigating.

Sure we are. In the meantime, word from City Hall that a "Knife Turn-In" day will be held this coming weekend.

• $5 for nail files and ice picks
• $10 for daggers and K-Bars
• $25 for Swiss Army knives ($5 bonus if it still has the toothpick attachment)
• $50 for switchblades, butterfly and ballistic knives.
• $100 for the Ginsu Knife Assortment with Block.

We just threw in that last one for kicks - we have a couple of weddings to be at next month and we're looking gifts.

Hitman Dies in Jail

Good riddance to bad rubbish:

• During the 1970s, just the mention of hit man Harry Aleman's name was enough to strike fear into those whose doorsteps he happened upon.

  "He was the hammer of the Chicago mob," said Lee Flosi, a former FBI agent who headed the Chicago office's organized crime section in the 1990s. "You never want him sitting the back seat of your car."

  But long stretches in federal and state prison and cancer took their toll on the 71-year-old. His state prison mugshot shows a man with sunken eyes, wavy gray hair and a wispy mustache.

He was an historical oddity - the only person ever tried twice for the same crime. He could have shed a lot of light on Chicago history, but he never would have talked. It certainly would have been interesting for a lot of people.

Buffer Pleads Guilty - Again

Getting kind of thin in the "buffer" area though:

• John Harris, former Gov. Rod Blagojevich's chief of staff, pleaded guilty in federal court Friday to charges that he helped Blagojevich attempt to sell Barack Obama's U.S. Senate seat.
  
  It was the second time Harris had entered a guilty plea for the same conduct. Friday's plea was a technicality.
  

• Harris was Blagojevich's chief of staff at the time that FBI agents arrested the two in December 2008.

  Harris now is working as an apprentice electrician to support his wife and three children, Ekl said.

So does this "feather" in the US Attorneys cap count as a politician feather or a corrupt Chicago Police Exempt feather? We guess it's a politician feather.

And we thought the Electrician's Local had closed their apprentice program seeing as how so many of their members are currently sitting around the union hall playing cards and waiting for a call to come in. Amazing how that works.

Second City Construction

So it seems that General Services sent out an e-mail stating that the amazing collapsing station in 001 will have the center structural wall with the 4 inch cracks rebuilt so as to avoid further political embarrassment. The letter went out the day after this video was posted on our site.

We also received some updated photos from this post on 07 May

Reports are that General Services sent plumbers and electricians into 011 to take down the "drip trays" and actually repair the wiring that was somehow mixed with the water, leading to what the IBEW calls a "bad idea."

A month or so ago, we told the tale of the main door to E&RPS being non-functional for three years and that week, there were all sorts of contractors over there fixing it.

We can only conclude that the Policy Group, Mike Masters, and J-Fled himself are reading the blog, looking for construction projects to finish.

We're going to open the comment section for readers to list any and all repair jobs that have been neglected for years, even decades, and we'll see how many things we can get fixed. But don't go posting "my basement," or "my 180,000 mile pool car." We only want to list things that have a realistic chance of being repaired, like that dip on the 5th floor that Masters like to roll marbles on.

CPD Enforcers Game

Late notice, but the Enforcers are playing their only north side game of the year today:

• May 15, @ 6 pm
  Lane Tech HS (2501 W. Addison)
  vs. the Atlanta Defenders
  Admission $10 Children 12 and under free

Haven't heard if there's extra parking at 019, but come on by and support the team.

Fender Bender - Shots Fired

Ambushed following a hit-and-run:

• Three men are in custody for allegedly firing shots at the personal car of an off duty Chicago Police officer who was in the car early Friday in the Back-of-the-Yards neighborhood on the South Side.

  At 12:08 a.m. the off-duty officer was involved in a minor traffic accident at West 47th Street and South Ashland Avenue, according to a Wentworth Area police sergeant who said the vehicle that collided with the officer’s fled the scene after the wreck.

  At 12:10 a.m. a 10-1 was called -- meaning an officer needs assistance immediately.

  The officer followed the car while asking for help, issuing a description of the fleeing vehicle and prompting several other police units to begin responding, the sergeant said.

  But while the officer was at a stop sign at West 46th Street and South Paulina Avenue, four or five shots rang out from another vehicle that was behind the officer -- not the one the officer was following.

Either friends from the first car or reinforcements called after the first accident? In any event, a situation that could have turned out very badly. Be careful out there.

Two responding officers were injured during the incident. Best wishes for a speedy recovery.

Suspicious "Substance"?

Far south side:

• Officials today were investigating a report of a suspicious substance package at a Chicago police station on the Far South Side.

  Officials were called to the Calumet District police station, 727 E. 111th St., at about 5:28 p.m. after something suspicious was discovered at the station, said Chicago Police News Affairs....

We're sure it isn't another glaring security flaw in stations that are more like community centers than actual police facilities.

UPDATE: The hazardous material is supposed to be a tuberculosis infected homeless individual living under the stairs in the lobby. Situation normal. Carry on.

Suburban Shooting - in Chicago

Cops OK at last report:

• A person was taken to a hospital from the West Garfield Park neighborhood after being shot by a police officer, authorities said Thursday night.

  Preliminary details were sketchy, but Broadview police assisted Hillside police in pursuing a carjacking suspect out of Hillside, a Broadview police sergeant said. A Chicago Police News Affairs officer confirmed that a carjacking suspect made it inside Chicago city limits.

  The police pursuit ended on Keeler Avenue and Van Buren Street in Chicago. At some point, the pursuit of the suspect had proceeded onto the Eisenhower Expressway at 1st Avenue in Maywood. The vehicle exited the expressway in Chicago at Cicero Avenue, an Illinois State Police trooper said.

We're going to go out on a limb here and guess the criminals were headed home to the west side when they assumed they were "Home Free" in the city before being forcibly disabused of that notion. Best wishes to the officers involved.

Mette Suspension for Real

IPRA recommends 90 days:

• The city agency that investigates alleged police misconduct has recommended that a Chicago police officer jailed in Iowa for punching a party host be suspended for 90 days.

  In a summary of its decision made public today, the Independent Police Review Authority sustained four of the seven allegations against Officer Michael A. Mette.

J-Fled objects:

• So when Chicago’s Independent Police Review Authority late last year recommended an unpaid 90-day suspension for Mette, Weis strongly objected, sources say. That wasn’t the end of the matter, though.

  Under the ordinance that created the Independent Police Review Authority, disagreements between the superintendent and the agency over punishment go before a three-member panel of the Chicago Police Board.

  The superintendent’s office is expected to argue against suspending Mette. A hearing isn’t scheduled yet, sources said.

And a guy who just wanted to be the police, served 11 months in prison for a crime that didn't actually occur, and is currently honoring the deceased of this Department and others by participating in the Memorial Bike Ride, is stuck in the middle again.

Politics Drives Investigation

And Channel 2 injects race into it all:

• Chicago congressman Bobby Rush calls it a case of political hot potato. First he sent a letter about Kyser to the Cook County State's Attorney's Office. He says that office put it off on police. So he sent a letter to the police, accusing the department of ignoring a homicide. Kyser's ex-wife believes that to be true.
  
  
• The police initially said it was accident, but the department late Thursday says it has an "active" investigation open.
  
  
• Balboa says things may have turned out differently if her ex-husband had been white.
  
  She's not alone. Rush sent a letter to Superintendent Jody Weis and says his department is ignoring murder.

Rush has a helluva lot of nerve after his history of advocating murder and mayhem. But the only tune Rush knows is "racism."

Ten bucks says J-Fled collapses and Alvarez follows suit.

Special Evil

Like him or hate him, you have to appreciate the sort of twisted thinking that goes into a stunt like this:

• In the name of “transparency,” Mayor Daley on Thursday got some measure of revenge against the investigative reporters who’ve made his life miserable by digging up dirt on the Hired Truck, city hiring and minority contracting scandals.

  He revamped the city’s new website to include a log of all Freedom of Information Act requests. The list includes the name and organization of each applicant, documents demanded and dates the information was requested and is due to be released.

  A new state law merely requires city departments to maintain such a log — not to post it on the Internet to tip investigative reporters about the trail being followed by competitors.

So no one will have an scoop if everyone else knows what documents they are looking at for a hot story. Does Shortshanks thinks everyone will disband their investigative reporting bureaus? Whether they do or not, he's thrown a wrench in things.

And Another TIF

More money funneled into Shortshanks' greedy paws:

• A city panel on Tuesday approved $96 million in tax-increment financing to help pay for a major shopping center and nearly 1,000 homes on the massive South Works property on the south lakefront.

  The unanimous vote by the Community Development Commission marks a major step forward for Chicago-based developer McCaffery Interests Inc., which has been planning a development on the vacant steel mill site for more than five years. The TIF grant would help fund the project’s initial phase on the northwest corner of the 530-acre lakefront site, which sits between 79th Street and the Calumet River.

• Overall, McCaffery and U.S. Steel plan to build 13,575 residential units, 17.5 million square feet of commercial space and a 1,500-slip marina at South Works, a process that could take as many as 45 years to complete and cost more than $4 billion.

Forty-five years? 13,575 residential units? 1,500 boat slips?

Are these people high? Have they even seen the number of board-ups across the city? The market is saturated with houses that won't sell. Retail space is standing empty and has been for years. No one is buying boats and the suburban owners are moving to cheaper slips out of the city. This has "long-term disaster" written all over it.

Get Off My Lawn

Shades of "Gran Torino:"

• A former Marine who neighbors say obsessed over his University Park lawn is being held on $3 million bail, accused of gunning down a neighbor whose puppy urinated on the man's well-manicured grass.

  Charles J. Clements, 69, had won the south suburb's beautification and lawn upkeep award but also was known for threatening people who dared to set foot in his yard, neighbors said.

In his defense, it is a nice lawn:


But still, it's just grass.

CVS Lawsuit

Anyone not see this one coming?

• The father of a shoplifting suspect allegedly strangled to death by a CVS employee as an off-duty Cook County Sheriff’s officer stood yards away filed a wrongful death lawsuit Wednesday against the convenience store.

  Michael A. Johnson claims a CVS manager strangled his son, Anthony Kyser, while attempting to arrest him for shoplifting, according to a suit filed in Cook County Circuit Court.

• The suit claims the manager assaulted and battered Kyser, and the store is responsible for the manager’s actions.

  The eight-count suit, which also claims false imprisonment, is seeking more than $400,000 from Highland Park CVS and the unidentified manager.

Nothing but a waste of air and space in life. Nothing but a lottery ticket in death.

Guns Found

We suspect an inside job:

• Federal agents today discovered a cache of weapons they suspect were stolen from the Harvey Police Department’s gun range, officials said.

  The weapons were found in a wooded area near 148th and Rockwell in the south suburb, officials said.

  “After some really awesome investigating this afternoon, many of the stolen weapons were recovered, along with many other items that were stolen out of the gun range,” Harvey spokeswoman Sandra Alvarado told reporters. A citizen’s tip led to the weapons, she said.

Yeah, let's steal guns and leave them in the woods. No one will suspect a thing and when the heat dies down...

$16.5 Million for What?

Half-a-million people with their hands out:

• The City Council Finance Committee today recommended the city pay up to $16.5 million to settle a class-action lawsuit accusing Chicago police of civil rights violations, and more than half a million people could be eligible to apply for an award.

  The case was filed in 2004 on behalf of people who claimed they were held too long or otherwise improperly treated by Chicago police during a span of more than a decade.

  If approved Wednesday by the full council, up to 512,000 people would be eligible under the federal settlement to seek payments of between $90 and $3,000.

• The class includes up to 12,000 people arrested between March 15, 1999 and Feb. 10, 2008 for alleged felonies who were not given a probable cause hearing within 48 hours. Awards in those cases would be limited to $3,000.

  The class also includes people held between Oct. 21, 2001 and March 10, 2010 in interview rooms for more than 16 hours without a mattress or pad to sleep on, regular meals or sufficient bathroom access. Those plaintiffs would be eligible for rewards that top out at $2,000.

  Also include are those held overnight in lockups between Oct. 21, 2001 and March 10, 2010 without a proper overnight bedding. Their payments would be limited to $90.

No word yet on the payout date.

We would suggest that the dope boys have enough weed, blow and rocks around for the day the city cuts these checks. Also, the Department should draft an emergency plan for the uptick in domestics, disturbances, robberies and thefts that are bound to occur once the checks get cashed. And perhaps an aspiring sociologist can prepare a master's thesis on the effects of $16.5 million being dumped into a narrow slice of the socio-economic pool. The results could be fascinating.

Harvey Weapons Stolen

How did anyone think this might be a good idea?

• Nearly two dozen weapons, including high-powered assault rifles, were stolen from a shooting range belonging to south suburban Harvey police, prompting a statewide alert this week.

  At least 21 weapons, which included handguns, MP5 and AR-15 assault rifles, were reported stolen from a trailer on the semi-wooded property of the shooting range at 153rd Street and Campbell Avenue about 9 a.m. Monday, according to Harvey police and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

• By Tuesday evening, mere hours after Cook County sheriff's officials agreed to join the probe on the sole condition that their investigation be independent of Harvey police's, sheriff's officials had pulled out of the investigation, claiming that Harvey officials weren't cooperating, a spokesman said.

  Sheriff Tom Dart has been critical of Harvey's internal operations and his department was part of a task force that raided Harvey's police station in January 2007, seizing evidence from unsolved crimes. Investigators from state police and the state's attorney's office subsequently filed murder and attempted murder charges using the seized evidence.

  Law enforcement sources said the shooting range wasn't a secure facility and isn't equipped for storing weapons.

Yeah, no shit. The Harvey "range" was pretty much sand piles pushed up about 30 feet high with what looks like a broken concrete tennis court for a firing line and a bunch of semi-trailer modules for storage.

Whatever happened to the state-of-the-art range we were supposed to get years ago? While it's amusing that a major metropolitan police department had to go most of 2009 without an active range and the supposed rehab continues on numerous other ranges, it kind of crimps firearm training to have to use the Harvey gravel pit instead of a facility we would own.

Bad Doctor

Fakes his own attack on the river walk:

• Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis lashed out at a University of Iowa physician who allegedly stabbed himself and then claimed he was mugged on the downtown Riverwalk.

  “He embarrassed the city with his story. It cast the city in negative light,” Weis said today of 63-year-old Dr. Gary Hunninghake’s “bogus” tale to police.

We have our hands full with our own politicians, superintendents, fire chiefs and assorted minions embarrassing the city Dr. Hunninghake. We'll thank you to keep your "bogus" tales over in Iowa where they appreciate the street theater.