Second City Cop

• Aurora police officers have been issuing fewer tickets in recent weeks to protest the suburb's Human Relations Commission and its proposed subpoena powers, sources said.

  After an Aurora police union meeting March 13, many patrol officers decided to give tickets only when absolutely necessary as a way to object to the commission's proposed ability to subpoena police officers, sources say.

  The commission would hear complaints from residents who feel they were wronged by an individual or group, including the cops.

Labels: department issues

• A high-ranking Chicago Fire Department official vehemently denied allegations Thursday that he disgraced the department by inquiring about the race of a paramedic who asked to leave work to visit his child in a hospital.

  "I'm a highly decorated chief. This whole allegation is nothing but lies. It's deplorable," said Donald W. Walsh, an assistant deputy chief paramedic and a winner of an International Association of Fire Chiefs award. "I have always treated department members, citizens and the public with respect and dignity."

Labels: fire fighters, scandals

• Chicago Police Supt. Phil Cline, still fuming over Police Officer Anthony Abbate's alleged attack on a petite female bartender, said he would have liked to take a swipe at the disgraced officer himself.

  "We stripped him of his police powers. He's been charged criminally, and we're moving to fire him, and if I could hit him with a baseball bat, I would. But I can't, so I mean we've done everything we can to take the right action against him," Cline said Thursday on the Roe Conn Show on WLS 890-AM.

• When asked about the "baseball bat" comment, Cline's spokeswoman said it was a figure of speech.

  Pressed about the appropriateness of the comment, considering the department has been dogged by allegations of police brutality, police spokeswoman Monique Bond went on to say: "His comments were used figuratively. It's a colloquialism used by many and shouldn't be interpreted any other way. The Roe Conn Show is a very relaxed show."

Labels: department issues

• Thank you for providing the missing other side of the story! Something hasn't smelled right about all this finger pointing at the Grand District captain, and unlike Mr. Abbate's behavior truly being inexcusable, my feeling as an average citizen has been that not all the facts are being reported. There are no cops in my family, but one of my most meaningful experiences as part of a civic leadership program was spending an entire shift with a cop on patrol; seems to me that sitting in a squad car when pulling over a van with tinted windows ought to be a prerequisite for any reporter who covers the police.

Labels: good news

• Sneed hears the next chapter of a police scandal involving corruption in the Chicago Police Department's Special Operations Section is being written in bold print.

  • Translation: Word is when the ongoing probe is complete, it could add up to the Chicago Police Department's biggest corruption case ever . . . because the probe is moving up the ladder beyond the patrolmen involved.

• The Chicago Police Department is bracing for new corruption charges in an ongoing investigation involving several supervisors in the department's Special Operations Unit.
• The big question now is when will the charges come down? And how many people will be indicted?
• According to law enforcement sources, at least one Chicago police sergeant and one lieutenant are in the hot seat and could be indicted down the road for their alleged involvement in a corruption scandal that has already resulted in charges against seven officers in the elite special operations section.

Labels: corruption, scandals

• Desk Cops Back to the Beat! (paraphrasing here)
• Driving a Desk no More! (paraphrase)
  
• Cops - Out from under the Desks! (we're REALLY paraphrasing here)

Labels: department issues, dumb ideas

• The cost of building a new Westinghouse High School has skyrocketed, to nearly 103ドル million, far beyond the 63ドル million for Little Village High, according to plans approved Wednesday by Chicago School Board members.
• In 2004, the board agreed to pay 63ドル million for site preparation, environmental work, construction and various fees for the new Westinghouse. Later, Daley said he wanted to put a 600-student college prep school and a 600-student vocational education school in the building, forcing design changes.
• The original estimate left out some demolition, land acquisition and remediation costs, said CPS spokesman Michael Vaughn. Also, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, construction costs have spiked, adding about 20ドル million to the cost, he said.

Labels: dumb ideas

• Ms. Marin,
  
  I just finished reading your article in today's Sun-times. Once again, you're leading the charge against the law enforcement profession. I ask myself, what has made you a police-hater and when did you become an expert on police matters?
  
  I find it appalling that you, and most of the other media outlets in this city, continue with your one-sided reporting. Of the 13,000+ Chicago police officers it seems that you choose to report on the .5% that are dirty. What about the rest of these men and women who risk their lives daily to serve and protect complete strangers? Oh right, the stories of those men and women do not sell newspapers or bring in ad revenues. It's as if nobody in your profession cares to get the whole story anymore. Like everything else, it's about the almighty dollar. Is that what they're teaching in Journalism 101 these days?
  
  I had the pleasure of attending a book signing last week at FOP, Chicago Lodge 7 headquarters. The authors of 'End of Watch, Chicago Police Officers Killed in the Line of Duty' were on hand to talk about the book which commemorates the lives of the 500+ Chicago police officers killed in the line of duty. What I noticed most, Ms. Marin, was that you were not on hand to cover this story. Neither were most of the other media outlets in the city of Chicago. ABC 7 was the ONLY channel in attendance. 500+ men and women! Yet those in the media continue to give the most attention to a very small percentage of officers.
  
  I preside over a public charity that each year honors two deserving police officers for going above and beyond the call of duty. Officers from the same mold as my brother Mike who was killed on duty in August 2004. Each of the last two years we have sent a press release to all media outlets. Besides a couple of local papers covering the story, I have received ZERO media coverage of the TRUE BLUE Awards. I do not have Carol Marin on hand to interview the winners. These are the men and women who should be paraded in front of the camera and written about day after day. Not the scum that have made an already difficult profession even more dangerous.
  
  Ms. Marin, my brother lived and breathed police work. He was the first person in the locker room each shift and rarely took a break while on duty. He and his partner accumulated 44 felony arrests in the eight week period before he died. Mike was truly in the zone. Yet nobody covered that story. Of course, they covered his funeral. Who doesn't want to see a grieving widow or crying child? Who doesn't want to see shattered parents and siblings? I'm sorry, Ms. Marin. My brother's life, not his death, was the story. Just like the other men and women of the CPD.
  
  Thank you for contributing to the demise in stature of our police officers. This year's TRUE BLUE Awards will be held on Sunday, November 11. I know you'll be first on hand to cover the 'story.'
  
  Respectfully,
  
  John E. Gordon
  Brother of Michael P. Gordon, CPO (EOW 08/AUG/2004)

Labels: good news

Labels: media, scandals

• "Because there's such a rush to judgment and because the overplay of something like this actually goes along with the impetus that police officers are guilty until proven innocent," said Mark Donahue, president of Chicago’s Fraternal Order of Police.
• Donahue says the constant airing of the tape is hurting police morale.
  

• While some rank-and-file officers have objected to Cline's reaction, Donahue sided with the superintendent.
• "The action caught on tape and the action taken by a captain at Area 5 [the Grand Central Area] are indefensible," he said.
  

Labels: department issues, scandals

• If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
  

Labels: blogging

• We (that is to say the persons running this blog) are off duty Chicago Police officers. We run this on our own time, away from Department computers and to voice our own opinions. Yes, as American citizens, we are allowed to have opinions and even a website to publish them on.
• We address city issues, as well as national, international, silly things, sad things, all sorts of things that interest US. The fact that we have open comments and a robust dialogue is merely a side benefit to an entertaining hobby of ours.
• We have readers on SIX continents - the final frontier being Antarctica - and about 40% of our readership comes from outside city limits. We have been averaging about 3,000 visitors a day lately, mainly due to the fact that this is a scandal driven blog. Such is life.
• We cannot prove, nor do we intend to prove, that every single poster on this site is a Chicago Police Officer. We demand no proof of employment to read, post and opine here. A list of users could be used for political purposes - and if you don't believe that, we've got some nice swampland to sell you.

Labels: blogging, department issues, media

Labels: blogging

• Is making a career that hard at the CPD?

Labels: open posts

• Does this blog creates problems?
• Does this blog shines a light on important issues?
• Who thinks we ought to moderate certain things a little more tightly?

Labels: blogging, open posts

• If, in fact, the Captain did anything to displease Cline, Daley or any other of a couple of dozen people with enough pull to actually get someone demoted, then there's really nothing to bitch about. All exempts serve at the pleasure of the Superintendent (or whomever is pulling the strings). We can't sit here and make fun of national democrats for making mountains out of molehills when Bush decides certain Attorney Generals need to be fired (even though Clinton did the same thing on a MASSIVE scale) and then claim outrage when the Superintendent (or string pullers) exercise that same right.
• This would appear to be more than just the handicap parking tickets issued to the media. If tickets were issued to the media for parking in handicap spots around 025 and Branch 50, fuck them. Is the media breaking the law or not? Courtesy is a two way street and scoring cheap points to provide a crooked administration with political cover negates the courtesy in our book. You park your media van illegally where we work, you're getting hammered. And we won't be getting demoted, that's for sure.

Labels: department issues

• BREAKING NEWS!!!
  
  This just in. . .
  
  Several news trucks covering the Abbate hearing in branch 50 were parked illegaly in the handicapped spots located in the front lot of 025. An 025th District car appropriately wrote them each a parking ticket. The news media in-turn called the Superintendent's Office and complained. Shortly thereafter, the Area 5 Deputy Chief, 025th District Commander, and 025th District 2nd Watch Commander were called down in person to Cline's office for a meeting. They were all given a severe ass chewin' by Cline, and the Captain, who is a great boss, was immediately dumped to an unknown district as punishment for his officer's actions.
  
  I can't believe Cline would take the media's side in this matter when they are so clearly wrong!

Labels: rumors

• On the heels of last year's reassessment, property tax bills in the City of Chicago are set to soar by an average 44%. CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery reports, community groups and others are hoping the General Assembly will intervene.
• the General Assembly's been deadlocked since last year on the issue. As a result, the previous 7% cap on assessment increases has expired.
• A new study finds that if legislators now do nothing, Chicago homeowners would see tax bills go up 44% on average.

Labels: general

• A man whose wife died a week after she got a piece of meat stuck in her throat while eating dinner at the Chicago Yacht Club says the Yacht Club bears responsibility for her death, since its employees tried, unsuccessfully, to perform the Heimlich maneuver on her.
• In a lawsuit filed Monday in Cook County Circuit Court, Nick Rice claims the Yacht Club, by making the attempt to save his wife's life, "assumed the duty to perform the Heimlich maneuver with due care."
• The city of Chicago is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit, but court papers do not explain why the city is being sued.

Labels: dumb ideas

• Ald. Dorothy Tillman (3rd) has made national headlines as a champion for slave reparations and sponsor of a disclosure ordinance that requires city contractors to come clean about past ties to the slave trade.
• "Dorothy is a lot of talk and little action. She announces projects, but they never come to fruition, or take years to happen. The Harold Washington Cultural Center is an example. It took 10 years to build, with lots of public money. It should be a catalyst for the economic renaissance of 47th Street. But once you go east and west of that corner [47th and King], it looks like a Third World country."
• Tillman, whose daughter runs the Harold Washington Cultural Center, categorically denied that she has ignored meat-and-potatoes issues. She pointed with pride to the three hotels on the drawing board or under construction in her ward.

• The closing of the only big supermarket in the 50th ward, Dominick's on North Damen, is now an issue in the aldermanic runoff race. Aldermanic candidate Naisy Dolar blames her opponent, city council veteran Bernie Stone, for not keeping a single major grocer in the ward.

  "When somebody has experience, they should be effective. Bernie stone has experience yet is ineffective," said Naisy Dolar, 50th Ward Candidate

Labels: elections

Labels: open posts

Labels: blogging

• The visitation will be held at Blake-Lamb Funeral Home from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Monday and Tuesday. The funeral home is located at 4727 W. 103rd St. in Oak Lawn.
• Mass will be held at Christ the King Church on Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. followed by the burial at Holy Sepulchre Cemetery at 6000 W. 111th St. in Alsip. Christ the King Church is located at 9255 S. Hamilton Ave.

• Prospect Federal Savings
  6858 S. Pulaski, Chicago, IL
  4646 W. 103rd St., Oak Lawn, IL
  11139 S. Harlem, Worth, IL

Labels: fire fighters

• Phil Cline - RESIGN NOW PLEASE

• The hampton sign issue? ZERO leadership. No one spoke up for the dead aside from a meaningless gesture that had no chance of approval.
• The rev. meeks traffic stop non issue? ZERO leadership. No one defended the sergeant's actions and instead, hung him out to dry for weeks while trips were made to the church run by a race baiter. We're still amazed the right decision was eventually made.
• Manpower allocation? ZERO leadership. Too many two-year secretaries with guns hidden in 35th Street cubicles, CAPS back offices and gold star harems. Districts operate down 50 coppers on average due to detailed out personnel so various bosses can run their little teams and fiefs.
• Promotions? ZERO leadership. No set standards for "merit" promotions and goals to shoot for. Far too often people promoted above their capabilities or ability and only due to who they know or worse. Retired personnel mandatoried off the job, then hired back as civilian exempts at or above their previously inflated salaries, all while drawing from our 50% funded pension plan.
• Actual solving crime and clearance rates? ZERO leadership. Commit murder in Chicago and there's a better than 50% chance you'll get away with it. And it isn't looking any better this year. The answer? More seat belt missions? No more "grabbing the keys and driving around." You might find actual crime that way!
  

Labels: corruption, department issues, scandals

• An attorney is claiming four men were brutally beaten a few months ago by off-duty Chicago Police officers in a bar, less than a week after an officer was charged in a similar incident.
  
  Their attorney says the attack was caught on tape, although the video has not been released.

• Prosecutors are investigating allegations that six off-duty Chicago cops were caught on a downtown bar's video camera beating four businessmen, the second such incident in recent months, law enforcement sources said.
  
  In the Dec. 15 beating at the Jefferson Tap and Grille, one alleged victim required reconstructive surgery on his face and another suffered four broken ribs, said Sally Saltzberg, a lawyer for the men.

Labels: scandals

Labels: good news

• A grand jury is investigating whether a Chicago Police officer was involved in trying to cover up off-duty officer Anthony G. Abbate's alleged beating of a female bartender, sources said Thursday.

• Investigators are trying to find out if someone intimidated a woman to keep quiet after being beaten, allegedly by an off-duty Chicago Police officer, in an attack that was caught on tape.

• A grand jury is investigating whether a Chicago police officer was involved in trying to cover up another officer's alleged beating of a female bartender. The violent attack was caught by a security camera.

Labels: scandals

• Two people have filed a federal lawsuit alleging three Chicago Police officers duct taped and beat them earlier in the month.
  
  The plaintiffs also accuse the plainclothes officers of threatening both of them at gunpoint, and beating one plaintiff with a baseball bat and burning his body with a lighter.
  
  According to the five-count suit filed Friday in U.S. District Court, one plaintiff, Tamira Smyth, was pulling into her garage on March 9 when two officers cut her car off, withdrew their guns and then handcuffed her. After leading her up to her apartment, they allegedly duct taped her hands and legs to a chair. The suit says the officers were constantly pointing their guns at her head.
• The suit accused the unidentified officers of unlawful seizure, unlawful search, excessive force, battery and infliction of emotional distress.

Labels: media, scandals

• France's national space agency has opened its UFO files to the public by launching a website which documents reported sightings over five decades.

  So many people have already tried to look at the files that it has become impossible to access the site.

Labels: silly people, we got nothing

• Chicago police fired shots on the West Side Friday evening. According to police News Affairs Officer John Mirabelli, officers fired shots at West Division Street and North Harding Avenue about 5:45 p.m. Mirabelli did not have any information on whether anyone was shot.

  The shots were fired in an alley, Mirabelli said.

  An ambulance responded to the scene, but it was not needed because there were no transports, according to Fire Media Affairs spokesman Rich Rosado.

  News Affairs Deputy Director Pat Camden was at the scene, Mirabelli said.

Labels: shooting

Labels: fire fighters

Labels: open posts

• More than 130ドル million in unpaid Cook County hospital bills have been found stuffed into boxes -- and officials said 40 or 50 more boxes could be stashed somewhere else.

  While finances and bookkeeping were long known to be a problem in the hospital system, County Board members learned Tuesday just how big the problem had become during the tenure of ex-Board President John Stroger.

  The 77 boxes recently discovered were each stuffed with about 2,500 billing forms.

  And hospital chief Dr. Robert Simon said there could be another 40 or 50 similar boxes hidden elsewhere.

Labels: county

• At issue is a 2003 order of protection sought by a woman against Fioretti. A judge vacated the order a week after it was issued upon learning Fioretti and his girlfriend had filed criminal complaints against the woman the year before for allegedly making unsolicited advances toward Fioretti.

  The woman was a court reporter who saw Fioretti in courtrooms where he appeared as an attorney. They had no relationship -- sexual or otherwise, Fioretti said.

• Haithcock would not back down from the charge in an increasingly ugly 2nd Ward campaign a day after NOW reinstated an endorsement of Fioretti. When the allegations surfaced on the weekend before the Feb. 27 election, the group withdrew its backing. Following a review, NOW reinstated support in advance of the April 17 runoff election.
• Haithcock has put out a campaign mailer calling Fioretti "a stalker of women." On Tuesday, she reiterated the charge, defended the mailer as "factual -- not sleazy" and said she would continue to hammer away at the issue.

Labels: elections

Labels: terrorism

• The head of the state's child welfare agency told lawmakers Tuesday he was "horrified" by allegations that a Chicago company with a no-bid contract billed the state more than 2ドル million for drug tests it never conducted.
  
  Acting director Erwin McEwen told a Senate appropriations committee he could not explain why there hadn't been more scrutiny of the contract that K.K. Bio-Science Inc. had since the mid-1990s with the Department of Children and Family Services.

• In 1995, the firm lost a contract to screen Chicago police and fire employees following allegations it was not licensed by federal authorities to conduct urinalyses. In 1992, federal authorities accused the company of cheating on test results to pass federal licensing examinations.

Labels: department issues, scandals

• Mayor Richard Daley's administration agreed Wednesday to a court settlement aimed at replacing the decades-old federal consent decree that bans political influence in almost all city hiring and firing decisions.
• The city will create a 12ドル million fund for people who claim that they have been discriminated against on the basis of politics. Michael Shakman, the lawyer who sued the city over patronage, said he expects thousands of people will apply for individual awards of as much as 100,000ドル.

• A federal judge has blocked the city from suspending two police supervisors who won a discrimination lawsuit against the Chicago Police Department.
• "By attempting to follow through with suspensions against the plaintiffs despite the jury's verdict, the city has conclusively made the case against itself that its retaliatory conduct is likely to persist in the future," Magistrate Judge Jeffrey Cole wrote in a stinging opinion signed last Thursday.

Labels: corruption

Labels: shooting

• Chicago -- This wasn't any barfight caught on tape. An angry man pummels a much smaller female bartender. As it turns out, he's a Chicago police officer and late Tuesday night he was taken into custody.

Labels: scandals

• The governor says he has heavenly help as he pushes for the largest increase in taxes and spending in the history of Illinois.
  
  As CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery reports, Gov. Rod Blagojevich says he is "on the side of the Lord."
  
  The governor called his campaign a "crusade," declaring that, as he sees it, he is on the side of God in offering Illinoisans more access to medical insurance and better schools.

• "We salute this budget proposal that is hitting deep pockets and we are saying to Corporate America, if you don't support the plan, we will take to the streets and we know how," said Rev. Janette Wilson, Ministers Alliance.

  Dozens of Chicago-area ministers are threatening boycotts and demonstrations if that's what it takes to convince corporations and lawmakers to support Governor Blagojevich's plan for a new tax on business revenues to raise 6ドル billion a year for schools and health care.

Labels: dumb ideas

Labels: open posts, we got nothing

• Not even a month after the Cook County Board made massive cuts to pass a 3ドル billion budget, next year's deficit is already in the millions.
• The county had lowered its expectations for cigarette sales, from 223ドル million expected last year to 175ドル million this year, but it's falling short of that mark already.
• County Finance Chairman John Daley wasn't alarmed by the numbers, though he said the recorder's shortfall "is unusual and we're going to have to address it." Though Recorder Gene Moore did not return calls, Fratto said that drop is likely based on slow home sales.

Labels: county

• Suspected members of extremist groups have signed up as school bus drivers in the United States, counter terror officials said Friday, in a cautionary bulletin to police. An FBI spokesman said, "Parents and children have nothing to fear."

  Asked about the alert notice, the FBI's Rich Kolko said, "There are no threats, no plots and no history leading us to believe there is any reason for concern," although law enforcement agencies around the country were asked to watch out for kids' safety.

• Gunmen storm a school, killing on site security (if any) and any number of adults on scene.
• Any males who might be perceived as a problem will be summarily executed as a warning to anyone else who might cause problems, especially anyone perceived as a security threat.
• Children will be rounded up from the classrooms from where they have been locked down to "protect" them from rampaging gunmen. The locks will prove no obstacle to the hostage takers and they'll grab 30 to 40 children at a time who have been so conveniently boxed up for them
  
• Any other males will be forced at gunpoint or by a few more summary executions to fortify/secure defensible positions, such as an interior library, office or gymnasium. Upon completion of the fortifications, these males will also be executed.
• Should the situation run any length of time, adult females and some adolescents will be separated from their students for two purposes: to increase the uncertainty and fear among the children and to provide "entertainment" for their captors.
• Once an unrealistic set of demands are issued, children will die. Plain and simple. Lots of children will die. Teachers, too. And probably more than a few policemen.

• A bus route, manned by one or more of these "extremists" who the FBI claims there is nothing to fear from, fails to deliver one or more busloads of children to school on time. The GPS that is supposed to be in the bus has mysteriously been deactivated.
• While police are called and the bus company contacted to determine who the driver is, what the bus number may be, what was the route taken, who was the last child picked up, etc., somewhere behind a warehouse or on some deserted railroad tracks or in some abandoned building, "extremists" are making snuff films for internet distribution to completely shock and frighten America.

Labels: terrorism

• For nearly 70 years, the Second Amendment has been the Jimmy Hoffa of constitutional provisions -- missing, its whereabouts unknown, and presumed dead. [...] But recently, a federal appeals court did something no federal court had ever done before: It struck down a gun control law as a violation of the Second Amendment.
• Even some liberal constitutional experts now agree that gun ownership enjoys constitutional protection. The most notable is Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe, who once subscribed to the collective rights theory. The amendment, he writes, recognizes "a right (admittedly of uncertain scope) on the part of individuals to possess and use firearms in defense of themselves and their homes." The appeals court agreed, striking down D.C.'s prohibition of handguns in the home, as well as regulations on other guns.
• It would be a stunning turnabout if the Supreme Court adopts that view. It would remove some of the most extreme laws from the books -- such as the virtually total ban on handguns in Chicago and some suburban communities. Gun rights advocates would feel sweet vindication.

• Our good and well-meaning friends in Chicago, Wilmette and other towns that have outlawed the possession of handguns, even in the sanctity and privacy of the home, might want to notice that the nation's second-highest court has tossed out a similar weapons ban.
• This doesn't mean that the D.C. decision applies here, but the conflicting rulings invite the intervention of the U.S. Supreme Court, where three sitting justices--Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Antonin Scalia and David H. Souter--said in a 1998 dissent that "bearing arms" goes beyond a collective right in the context of a well-ordered militia. Combined with the votes of recent conservative appointees, the high court could sweep away draconian laws that don't even allow the possession of a handgun to protect yourself and your family in your home.
• I'd add this to what the court said: Arguing that you have only a "collective" right to bear arms as part of a militia is as ludicrous as saying that the Bill of Rights protects your free speech rights only as a part of a larger group, such as the American Civil Liberties Union.

Labels: gun issues

• A Chicago man, whose car was stolen at gunpoint, was himself arrested after making up a story to police.
• The man told officers that his two children were inside the car when two armed men stole it early Monday morning near the intersection of 66th Street and Indiana Avenue.
• It turned out that his children were actually safe at home.
• The man said he made up the story because he had expensive rims on his car and he wanted police to find it quickly.

Labels: dumb ideas

• Washington DC Police Memorial Trip - Informational Get Together
• When: Wednesday 28 Mar 07 1830 hours
• Where: Dugan's on Halsted 128 S. Halsted
  
• Everyone planning on attending this year's Police Memorial Service in Washington is invited to join us for a casual gathering at Dugan's. We'll have information available regarding things to do in DC, Maps, informative web sites, etc. Hopefully any questions you have about the trip will be answered. It's also a great chance to meet other memebers who will join us in honoring our brothers and sisters who made the ultimate sacrifice.
• BYOB (Buy your own Beer)

Labels: info for the police

• Chicago Police issued a community alert Saturday for a man suspected in four knife attacks in the Edgewater neighborhood.

  Three men and one woman were attacked. All four were walking alone. The most seriously injured victim was hospitalized overnight. The rest suffered minor cuts.

  Police said the attacks were at 1200 N. Victoria, 5800 N. Hermitage, 1300 W. Catalpa and 1500 W. Edgewater within the last few days. The latest was at 8 a.m. Saturday.

  The assailant is described as a Hispanic man, 23 to 25 years old, 5 feet 6 inches to 5 feet 8 inches, weighing 140 to 150 pounds. He has dark brown eyes and a light complexion and was last seen wearing a black hooded sweat shirt and black jeans.

Labels: crime

• Hundreds of protesters calling for the end of funding for the Iraq war or the immediate return of U.S. troops marched Sunday and converged on a park near the United Nations headquarters.
  
  Union members, representatives of Rev. Jesse Jackson's Rainbow-PUSH Coalition, war veterans and others joined the demonstration, one of several staged during the weekend across the country to mark the fourth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Labels: info for the police, national politics

Labels: crime, department issues

Labels: officer down, we got nothing

• Chicago Police were investigating a gruesome fatal stabbing of a 19-year-old man found by his roommate Thursday afternoon in their Uptown apartment.

  Johnathan Fields suffered dozens of stab wounds and his stomach was sliced open, a law enforcement source said.

Labels: crime

• You think it's bad now? Wait until the latest scandal breaks and the SOS disaster heads to trial. You ain't seen nothing yet.
• Specialized units, tact/gangs, mission and saturation teams are going to find it even harder to recruit bodies as unrealistic expectations and more mission goofiness (wolfpacks?) are stacked on them - and the summer silly season is just beginning.
• Numerous aldercreatures were complaining about the lack of traffic enforcement? If the cameras actually do make it to 280 more beat cars, the only traffic activity you're going to see is the seat belt missions.
• Contract negotiations are coming - anyone want to bet not only will very little be happening for the next year and a half, we'll get screwed something fierce when we finally get a contract sometime in 2009.
• The new Superintendent will be more of the same political shenanigans.
  

Labels: department issues

• The Roanoke Times published an editorial about Virginia's Right-to-Carry laws, actually naming several local politicians and high-profile residents, and stating whether or not they had a Right-to-Carry license.
  
  That was bad enough, but the paper went on to publish an online database of every Right-to-Carry holder in the state of Virginia, complete with home addresses! And they did it all while proclaiming the freedom of the press.
• As you can imagine, gun owners let the paper hear their fury, and a day later the database was taken down. But the damage had been done. Who knows how many criminals started making a shopping list of homes where they could expect to find firearms and ammunition? Who knows how many would-be rapists and stalkers learned that their prey weren't on the list of Right-to-Carry holders? Who knows how many lives are in danger because of the arrogance of the Roanoke Times?
  

Labels: gun issues, media

• The electronic leash is tight. Supposedly, anyone caught more than 2 or 3 blocks outside of the DOC mission area has to drop paper. And the Deputy Chief himself is enforcing this one.
• Canine Units have to be in motion on their way to roll call by their assigned start times or else they get a call from the Deputy Chief's office asking why they aren't on the way.
• Paper records are being compared against computer records, including addresses where cars stopped, arrests submitted by the officers and any TSSS/contact card info generated.

Labels: department issues, rumors

• Another 280 Chicago Police squad cars will be equipped with video cameras — at a cost of 2ドル.2 million — expanding an experiment that began with allegations that a sergeant mistreated state Sen. James Meeks.

  The 280 cameras will bring to 310 the number of cameras installed in squad cars to record traffic stops. That’s enough to equip the beat car in every one of the city’s 280 police beats.

Labels: department issues

Labels: promotions

• How would you feel if a cashier made you swipe your own groceries because of his/her religious beliefs?

  I'm a reporter who covers Target for the Star Tribune and the other day, I got a call from someone who said that an employee at the Target store downtown refused to run his bacon through a scanning machine. He was mighty upset, arguing that the cashier had "no right to work as a cashier at Target" if she wasn't prepared to swipe his groceries.

  But he was a little vague on the details, so I decided to check it out myself. At the Target store on E. Lake Street, a cashier wearing a hijab looked uncomfortable when I showed up at the cash register with a frozen pepperoni pizza. She immediately called for help, and another employee rang up the pizza and placed it in the basket.

  I asked her if it was because she was Muslim, and she nodded her head. "I can't even touch it," she said.

Labels: dumb ideas

• Don't get Mayor Daley started on Chicago having the nation's worst mail delivery.
• "I'll write a book on the federal government. It's basically become a dysfunctional [organization]. Everybody knows that. Go to [the federal response to Hurricane] Katrina. Go to the Iraq situation. Everything we do with the federal government -- it's so far afield from having real customers," Daley said.

  "Washington, D.C., is like a ... foreign land for us. It's so far afield that it has no relationship to us -- the average person. It just represents [the fact] that the government is just too, too, too big."

Labels: corruption

Labels: promotions

• Mayor Daley said Tuesday he knew "at the beginning" that city tax dollars would have to guarantee Chicago's Olympic operating budget, but he didn't fess up about it because "we're not putting any actual money up."
• In a stuttering response to a reporter's question, Daley said he knew "at the beginning" of the bidding process that city money would have to be put on the table. Daley said he kept it quiet -- not because he wanted to get past the mayoral election -- but because "we're not putting any direct money into it."
• Despite overruns that nearly tripled the cost of 475ドル million Millennium Park and 400ドル million in overruns at O'Hare Airport, Daley said he is confident Chicago taxpayers will not be left holding the bag.

Labels: corruption

• Congressional Democrats are in full cry over the news this week that the Administration's decision to fire eight U.S. Attorneys originated from--gasp--the White House. Senator Hillary Clinton joined the fun yesterday, blaming President Bush for "the politicization of our prosecutorial system." Oh, my.

  As it happens, Mrs. Clinton is just the Senator to walk point on this issue of dismissing U.S. attorneys because she has direct personal experience. In any Congressional probe of the matter, we'd suggest she call herself as the first witness--and bring along Webster Hubbell as her chief counsel.

  As everyone once knew but has tried to forget, Mr. Hubbell was a former partner of Mrs. Clinton at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock who later went to jail for mail fraud and tax evasion. He was also Bill and Hillary Clinton's choice as Associate Attorney General in the Justice Department when Janet Reno, his nominal superior, simultaneously fired all 93 U.S. Attorneys in March 1993. Ms. Reno--or Mr. Hubbell--gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.

Labels: national politics

• Nine years after Chicago Police fired dozens of bullets into a car full of 11 people in the pandemonium after the Bulls won a world championship, the last of the victims settled a lawsuit against the city for 1ドル.75 million.

  Anton Brown, who was sitting in the car's open trunk on June 14, 1998, was shot four times and still has a bullet next to his heart and another next to his spine, attorney David Cerda said. Tiffany Crawford, Michael Johnson and Joe Rice, who were on the hood, were all shot twice, he said. Damien Moore, who was sitting in the back seat, was grazed by a bullet.

Labels: department issues