Second City Cop

• The command staff is to report to HQ to get their digital radios with a special federal channel in case everything goes to Hell. (might be true)
• Cancelled days off and 12-hour days start as soon as closing arguments begin, maybe as soon as Wednesday, certainly by the weekend (probably true, but dictated by the pace of trial)
• The Jewels’ store sent out a managers memo to put all shopping carts inside at night under lock and chain to discourage expected looters from carting out merchandise and limiting losses to hand carry. Also Oscos’ will not restock any liquor this week and suspended all deliveries.(would be the smart thing to do, so maybe true)
• CPS will allow all student to participate in any manner of choosing to protest at anytime during school hours. Buses and free lunches will be provided.(so nutty it HAS to be true)

Labels: rumors

• Attorneys for the Fraternal Order of Police are accusing Cook County prosecutors of failing to provide Chicago Police officers with equal protection under the law. In a letter to First Assistant State’s Attorney Joseph Magats, FOP attorney James Thompson assailed prosecutors for denying input of police officers in prosecutions in which officers have been injured. The prosecutors may be violating state law in doing so, the attorney alleges in the letter.
  
  The letter, authorized by FOP Field Reps Bob Bartlett and Martin Preib and President Kevin Graham, taps into a sentiment among FOP members that the Cook County State’s Attorney administration under Kimberly Foxx cares more about criminals and their attorneys than police officers. The letter specifically addresses an incident in August of last year in which an officer was bit in the leg during a downtown demonstration called "Slut Walk." The demonstrator, Lee Dewey, was accused of biting the officer. Dewey was charged with Aggravated Battery of a Police Officer, a felony.
  
  Because of the bite, the officer was out of work for six weeks and ordered by doctors to take a concoction of medicines to prevent the possibility of an AIDS infection. The officer spent his time off simmering in anxiety. But a plea agreement was apparently worked out between prosecutors and Dewey. His charge was reduced to a municipal code violation: unlawful assembly.
  
  The decision was made without the knowledge of the officer, the FOP claims in its letter. The officer stated he would never have approved of such a reduction in the charge. The failure of prosecutors to inform the officer and allow him input in the process violates the Rights of Crime Victims and Witnesses Action (725 ILCS 120/1)...

Labels: un-fucking-believable

• With just weeks to go before legalization, the Vancouver Police Board approved on Wednesday a set of regulations for officers’ use of cannabis.
  
  As per recommendations laid out in an August report by the Vancouver Police Department, the board rejected a 24-hour pre-shift period of abstinence in favour of a standard that simply states officers must arrive to work "fit for duty."

Labels: out-of-state, we got nothing

• Illinoisans should prepare to pay more for online purchases from out-of-state retailers.
  
  The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in South Dakota v. Wayfair Inc. is projected to increase revenue to the Illinois state budget by 140ドル million this year. As a result of the decision, and a change in Illinois law passed with this year’s budget bill, most out-of-state retailers who sell to Illinois customers will be required to collect and remit a "use tax" of 6.25 percent on all online transactions starting Oct. 1.

Labels: money questions

• Fire has rehired 80 Firemen and 30 paramedics starting at 1200hrs on Friday. The members have been told to plan on spending the night in a camp-like situation. Seems as if strike teams are being formed, the plan is in place to combat the combatants.

Labels: events

• Mayoral candidate Garry McCarthy showed up Tuesday at a jam-packed Daley Center courtroom to demonstrate his support for former city employees fighting to restore the 55 percent retiree health care subsidy abolished by Mayor Rahm Emanuel.
  
  If he is elected mayor, McCarthy said he is determined to find the 130ドル million a year needed to restore the subsidy for retirees, 10,000 of whom started working for the city prior to April 1, 1986 and, therefore, are not eligible for Medicare.
  
  "Emotionally, it disturbs me greatly that this is the way we treat retirees. It’s not fair. You’ve heard me say we need more compassionate government. This is exactly what I’m talking about," McCarthy said.
  
  "Underneath my being a cop for 35 years, I’m kind of a sensitive person, which a lot of people don’t realize it. The more time I’ve spent with the retirees, the more it’s gotten to me. I wanted to know more about it and show my support for them. I don’t think this should have happened. It needs to be corrected. It’s just another fiscal challenge we’re gonna have to face."

Labels: city politics

Labels: events

• An argument near a South Side alternative high school erupted into gunfire near the CTA’s Sox-35th station when multiple shooters chased two boys down 35th Street, leaving them both dead Wednesday afternoon, Chicago police said.
  
  The confrontation began around 3 p.m. at Youth Connection Charter School at 10 W. 35th St. near the Bronzeville neighborhood, said Chicago police Superintendent Eddie Johnson.
  
  The victims, a 16-year-old and a 17-year-old, ran away west on 35th Street toward the Red Line and Guaranteed Rate Field as the shooters fired at them, Johnson said. Police did not yet know what sparked the argument, he said.

Labels: crime

• Under fire for how his administration handled the Laquan McDonald shooting, Mayor Rahm Emanuel in 2015 gave an emotional speech before the Chicago City Council acknowledging a "code of silence" allowed police to cover up misconduct.
  
  Since then, however, Emanuel’s Law Department on five separate occasions has fought police misconduct lawsuits with the help of a hired expert witness who has testified a widespread code of silence does not exist, according to an analysis of city records by the Better Government Association and NBC5 Investigates.
  
  The city’s efforts ultimately proved futile, costing taxpayers nearly 70ドル million in judgments, settlements and legal fees in four of those cases. In addition, the city has paid the expert witness — former Irvine, California, deputy police chief Jeffrey J. Noble — more than 165,000ドル since Emanuel gave his speech.

Labels: we got nothing

• A man wanted on murder charges in connection with the shooting death of a man in Mississippi earlier this month was apprehended in Zion Tuesday, according to the Lake County Sheriff’s Office. Deshaude Jones, 40, of Ocean Springs, Miss., was arrested by multi-jurisdictional law enforcement teams at a residence in Zion, according to sheriff’s office Sgt. Christopher Covelli.
  
  Covelli said Jones is "a documented street gang member," and is wanted on charges of murder by the Ocean Springs Police Department in Mississippi. Based on information received by the sheriff’s office, Jones allegedly shot and killed a man Sept. 14 in an Ocean City bar and grill, Covelli said.
  
  Jones was being held Wednesday in Lake County jail on 10ドル million bail pending extradition hearings.

Labels: sarcasm AND silliness

• When jurors make their decision on whether to convict Jason Van Dyke in the murder of Laquan McDonald, Van Dyke’s lawyers want them told they can’t use "the vision of 20/20 hindsight."
  
  As the Van Dyke trial continues in Judge Vincent Gaughan’s courtroom, the more arcane but critical battle over the instructions that the judge will give the jury before they decide the case continues behind the scenes.
  
  Special Prosecutor Joseph McMahon late Tuesday filed a motion challenging four instructions proposed by Van Dyke’s team as "complicated, lengthy and unabashedly argumentative."

1. They need to consider "specific acts" McDonald committed to resist arrest before he was shot
2. If Van Dyke’s decision to use deadly force against McDonald was justified, then he was not required by law to use "non-deadly alternatives first"
3. That when a person is in reasonable fear for their life, that person isn’t required by the law to "use infallible judgement" when deciding if deadly force is justified — and that "the passage of a few seconds during which the fear abates is normally not enough to hold that person guilty of an unjustified homicide"
4. Police officers often are forced to make split-second judgments about what’s reasonable, rather than with "the 20/20 vision of hindsight."

Labels: events

Labels: silly people

Labels: un-fucking-fucking-believable

• A missing semi with very expensive plane parts inside vanished, apparently taken from a secure area at O’Hare Airport. CBS 2 [...] reports, sources said police have been looking for the driver of the truck and want to question him.
  
  There is a surveillance image of the truck reported missing by PFH Air LLC. The Lake in the Hills company hauls general freight and does interstate transportation. The truck was taken from a secure area on West O’Hare Avenue at the airport on Sept. 17. It was last spotted near Washington and Kilbourn on Chicago’s West Side.

Labels: sarcasm AND silliness

• The No. 29 star of Cmdr. Paul Bauer, which he received when he attained the rank of captain, was placed by his wife, Erin, and teenage daughter, Grace, in a glass cabinet alongside those of some 500 other Chicago police officers who died while serving the city.
  
  Bauer was the highest-ranking Chicago cop to be killed in the line of duty in decades when he was fatally shot outside the Thompson Center in the Loop on the day before Valentine’s Day. The gold star Bauer was given when he became commander of the Near North patrol district was presented to his family.

Labels: officer down

• Sun Times link

Labels: events

• An off-duty Chicago police officer was shot at Tuesday morning around 11:30 a.m. while chasing three suspects on Chicago’s South Side.
  
  Police said an off-duty officer witnessed a shooting involving a 21-year-old man exiting a vehicle at 81st Street and Loomis Boulevard, in the Auburn Gresham neighborhood. Gunfire was reported from a vehicle that pulled alongside him, police said.
  
  The off-duty officer pursued the vehicle, and gunfire was exchanged, police said.

Labels: shooting

• On July 12, after multiple reports of stolen cycles on social media (and five days of me pushing for answers from the bike-share network and the Chicago Department of Transportation, which oversees the program), Divvy finally sent me a statement acknowledging that it had experienced "a recent series of thefts from stations." I was assured that it was "retrofitting all [its] docks with stronger, more tamper-proof lock mechanisms."
  
  But as more people have learned how to remove the blue bikes from their docks illegally, the theft problem seems to have only gotten worse. [...]
  
  In late August the crime blog CWB Chicago reported that, while there were only seven adult arrests for possession of stolen Divvies during the first half of 2018, there was a massive spike in arrests this summer, with 120 cases between July 1 and August 16 alone.

• Luc Sabbatini, the CEO of PBSC, fired back that the Divvy program had been mismanaged. "The Chicago situation is unique to Chicago," he wrote. "We do not have issues with missing bikes anywhere else, including Brazil, which could be the toughest market in the world. As of August 26th we only have seven bikes missing for a long period within all our systems around the world, when the number is over 500 in Chicago alone!"

Labels: corruption, un-fucking-believable

Labels: events

• Chicago police officials on Monday said they are prepared to expand shifts and cancel days off for the entire 12,000-strong department if widespread protests occur after a verdict in Officer Jason Van Dyke's murder trial for shooting Laquan McDonald.
  
  Department officials said officers are prepared to have their usual 8 1/2-hour shifts extended to 12 hours a day, while days off would be canceled for other officers.
  
  During an interview with the Chicago Tribune on Monday at police headquarters, Superintendent Eddie Johnson would not specify whether the department would wait until a verdict before instituting the measures.
  
  "We'll monitor the court events, and as we get closer to the end of it, we'll make that decision," Johnson said.

Labels: events

• For nearly three years, the phrase "16 shots" has been cemented in the public’s mind with the police shooting of Laquan McDonald.
  
  But only one of those shots mattered, a pathologist testified Monday as Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke’s defense got underway.
  
  Van Dyke’s defense led off with Dr. Shaku Teas, who testified that a shot that tore through the right side of the 17-year-old’s chest and severed his pulmonary artery caused McDonald to die, likely within one to five minutes.
  
  "It is my opinion that this is the one that caused Laquan to die so rapidly," she said.
  
  She called the remaining 15 shots "totally immaterial."

Labels: events

• CBS 2 Investigator Dave Savini repeatedly caught a Chicago police officer driving the wrong way down busy streets, obstructing traffic and making it potentially dangerous for motorists.
  
  It might not be illegal, but drivers say it should be stopped. Savini exposes the officer’s driving and allegations about bogus parking tickets too.

• CBS 2 investigative reporter Dave Savini pleaded guilty Tuesday to driving under the influence of alcohol.
  
  Savini was arrested on Jan 4 by Naperville police after a minor car accident in a restaurant drive-thru.
  
  Savini was cited for drunken driving, hit and run, battery and child endangerment.

Labels: media

• Sneed hears rumbles former Chicago Police Board President Lori Lightfoot, an early entrant into the mayoral sweepstakes, might entertain backing Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle in exchange for Preckwinkle letting Lightfoot implement new police reforms should Preckwinkle become mayor.
  
  The rumored ticket?
  
  Lightfoot, a former federal prosecutor, would become the city’s new corporation counsel in Preckwinkle’s administration.

Labels: city politics

• Shootings across Chicago since Friday evening have killed one person and wounded at least 24 others.
  
  On Friday evening, eight people were shot between 5 p.m. and midnight, including two women caught in a triple shooting in Englewood on the South Side.
  
  The weekend’s lone homicide happened Saturday night, ending a day when 12 other people were wounded in shootings.
  

Labels: crime, stats

• Retiree Update-It is important that as many of you can, to attend the September 25 2018 hearing before Judge Cohen
  
  Participants,
  
  We’re as worked up as you all are about Judge Cohen’s ruling, and will make a strong effort in a filing Thursday or Friday, to convince him that he’s wrong in declaring that neither the Funds nor the City is obligated to provide you all with healthcare coverage; only the subsidy.
  
  We’ll send you all a copy of our motion when it’s filed. But it’s really important to show that there are really annuitants out there who are being put in a terrible situation by his rulings. It may be that this is the definitive hearing with him, and that we’ll have to appeal this one as well, but it’s absolutely worth showing up for this one.
  
  September 25, 2018 at 10:00 a.m., Daley Center, Room 2308.

Labels: pension

• the 0730 to 1930 and 1930 to 0730 hours for Second and Third watch don't allow for any street coverage as literally hundreds of cops leave the street unprotected while all the radios,Tasers, phones, vehicles, rifles and body cameras are exchanged magically among the watches.
  
  Shouldn't someone have pointed out that there should be 0600 to 1800 shift along with the 0730 to 1930 shift so the city isn't totally unprotected?

Labels: dumb ideas, events

Labels: rumors

• The national murder rate reached a modern low in 2014, capping a quarter-century decline. Then it rose across the United States in 2015 and 2016. Why gun violence increased in those two years remains somewhat of a mystery, and no single factor is likely to explain it, but there is one potential contributor that is rarely talked about: weather.

• In Philadelphia, for example, there were 2.6 shooting victims per day on average when it was cold, 3.4 on pleasant days, and 4.4 on hot ones.
  
  On average, about twice as many people are shot in Northern cities like Chicago, Milwaukee and Detroit when it’s hot versus when it’s cold...

Labels: crime, stats

• One man accused former Chicago police Sgt. Ronald Watts and his crew of roughing him up and planting heroin on him in an incinerator room at the Ida B. Wells public housing complex.
  
  Another alleged Watts framed him for narcotics possession because his brother had failed to pay 5,000ドル in protection money.
  
  A third said the notorious sergeant stole cash from his wallet and bought buckets of fried chicken for his team — which they ate in front of him at the station while typing up a bogus report for his arrest.
  
  On Monday, the criminal convictions stemming from those arrests will be dismissed by Cook County prosecutors, along with charges against 15 other men who also fell victim to Watts and his corrupt crew of tactical officers, the Chicago Tribune has learned.

Labels: scandals

Labels: events

• 1st and 2nd watch will be on 12 hour shifts in the Districts;
• Hours at 0730 to 1930 and opposite for 1st/3rd;
• 3rd watch is a mobile force, deploy-able citywide;
• Hours are 1330 to 0130 for 3rd

Labels: events

• After a chase that lasted less than two miles, a gunman in a ski mask walked up to a car and opened fire in the South Loop Wednesday night, seriously wounding a 6-month-old baby and a 13-year-old girl and also hitting two adults, according to Chicago police.
  
  Another child in the car, a 15-year-old girl, escaped unharmed.
  
  Police said there was "some type of interaction" between the car and the gunman's blue van or SUV that led to the chase and the shooting around 9:10 p.m. near Cermak Road and State Street.

Labels: crime

• Chicago could be the latest municipality to face diversion of state money as a result of a pension intercept law that took full effect in 2018. Under that law, municipalities that fail to make full contributions to their police or fire pension funds can see state money meant for the local government diverted directly to the pension funds instead.
  
  According to The Bond Buyer, the Firemen’s Annuity and Benefit Fund of Chicago filed two claims with the Illinois comptroller for a combined 3ドル.3 million shortage, alleging the city shorted it by 1ドル.8 million in 2016 and by 1ドル.5 million in 2017. While these are relatively small amounts for such large pension funds, there is no ignoring the city’s enormous pension problem and its crowding-out effects on core services for residents.
  
  Bond Buyer reported that the city will likely contest the fund’s claims. The amount of the full, or "actuarially required," contributions to municipal pension funds each year is determined by either the Illinois Department of Insurance or an independent actuary employed by the pension fund or municipality.
  
  Under the pension intercept law, the Illinois comptroller must withhold state funds owed to a local government once a pension fund makes a claim for pension payments owed. For most municipalities, the comptroller can intercept all money owed to local entities from the state – including sales and income tax collections on behalf of municipalities – but for the city of Chicago, the comptroller can only withhold grant money from the state.

Labels: pension

Labels: events

• Testimony is proceeding faster than some anticipated. The prosecution could rest as early as Thursday. So far, jurors have heard from 21 prosecution witnesses over three days. Still on deck to testify is the state’s ballistics expert. If this brisk pace continues, the defense may begin its case Monday. Lead defense attorney Daniel Herbert promised the jury in his opening remarks that the defense would call experts to show Van Dyke’s use of lethal force was justified.

• Is the prosecutor attempting to hang the jury?

• After listening to hours of graphic courtroom testimony and viewing dozens of autopsy photos of McDonald’s injuries, Jackson said he was struck by how intentional Van Dyke was when he opened fire.
  
  "Each shot drew blood," Jackson told reporters.

Labels: events

Labels: events

• The Chicago Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) recently filed a complaint that accuses Chicago’s SWAT team of having a shortage of manpower that endangers the public and police force.
  
  Unlike SWAT teams in other major U.S cities, Chicago’s team has no on-call system in place that guarantees a minimum recommended number of officers will respond to the taking of hostages, the threat of a suicide or other emergencies during off-duty hours, according to the FOP complaint.
  
  The complaint, a copy of which was obtained by Chicago City Wire, was filed on Aug. 29.
  
  "The situation has been addressed by members of the SWAT team with their supervisors on countless occasions in debriefs over the years," the complaint states. "As of this time still nothing has been done."

• More swat folllies. Ass clown swat sgt was involved in a road rage incident in Lake County. Or should I say "roid rage?" Didn’t know he was so special that he could drive his take home car to Lake County. Yep, that right. Driving a take come home Dept Vehicle and involved in a serious altercation. Then he tried to punk the responding units. IAD investigating which means nothing, since they are to scared to touch this guy. Goofball was bragging on how he went down to IAD and demanded answers on CR#.

Labels: scandals

• The foundation behind the planned Obama Presidential Center in Chicago has a tentative agreement with the city to pay just 10ドル to use 19.3 acres of city park space for 99 years, according to a report.
  
  The accord is described in legislation that Mayor Rahm Emanuel's administration will send to the City Council on Thursday, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
  
  If approved, the proposals will bring the estimated 350ドル million project closer to reality.

• The foundation said in May 2017 that Obama’s official presidential library will not be housed at the Jackson Park campus. A permanent location for the Obama Presidential Library is still being determined.

Labels: we got nothing

• Maui Hawaii Mayor Alan Arakawa answers some of the most-asked questions submitted to his staff.
  
  Aloha Mayor,
  
  Q: I was awarded a Section 8 voucher for Maui for me and my son. We live in Rockford IL. I was very excited about being able to live in paradise just to find out that there aren’t any homes or apartments available. Why are you giving out Section 8 vouchers if you have nowhere for people to live?
  
  A: I have to admit that I was a little puzzled at first as to why out-of-state residents were being given Section 8 vouchers for housing in Maui County, especially since our housing inventory is very low. But after checking with our departments, I was reminded that this is a federal program, and by law, it is open to any eligible applicant no matter their state of residence. But although that is true, it is also true that just having a voucher does not guarantee you housing. This is unfortunately the case for voucher holders all over the United States, not just here on Maui.

Labels: we got nothing

Labels: un-fucking-fucking-believable

• FBI forensic examiner Mark Messick made a slowed-down version of the dashcam video with arrows pointing to where he believed the bullets hit. But later he said on the stand he was not an expert in ballistics and that the arrows could only really indicate where he saw puffs of smoke. After a tense cross-examination, Gaughan ordered that his testimony be stricken from the record, so that jurors cannot consider it as evidence at all. "He has no background in what the smoke means," Gaughan said.

Labels: events

• Chicago’s new Amazon Go store, marketed as "just walk out" shopping, drew curious downtown workers and passersby with its novelty and cashier-less convenience on Monday, its first day of business.
  
  To shop, customers first had to download the Amazon Go app — a process made easier with free wi-fi provided by the company.

Labels: dumb ideas

• Aldermen gave the go-ahead Monday for a 16ドル million payment to the family of a woman fatally shot by a police officer who was firing at a teenager carrying a baseball bat, after the city’s top attorney said the "tragedy" of her death could have prompted a jury to award even more money if the case went to trial.

Labels: we got nothing

• Fifth-grader Henry Klucznik has a lot to look forward to this school year, his last in elementary school at St. Benedict’s Preparatory School on the North Side.
  
  Though he’s only a few weeks into the new year, the 10-year-old is already involved in cross country and will be part of the school’s math club. He’s also learned what to do in the event that an armed intruder shows up at the North Center parochial school, which recently spent nearly 90,000ドル on a security system designed to quickly notify police if an active shooter is on church or school premises.
  
  The more than 700 students enrolled at St. Ben’s this year were greeted by 30 new bright blue pull boxes on the walls, fixtures installed because of concern about the possibility of a deadly school shooting. The school also spent 40,000ドル on new security cameras.

• (12 Sept 2017) Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich has issued a decree banning guns in all parishes, schools and other facilities across the archdiocese.
  
  The decree, effective Thursday, echoes statements the cardinal has made over the past two years in support of banning guns from churches. It stipulates that anyone found with a gun on archdiocesan property will be asked to remove it from the premises and won't be allowed to return until it's gone. Clerics and staff members also will face disciplinary action.

Labels: sarcasm AND silliness

Labels: events

• Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle will announce her run for mayor this week, the chairman of the City Council’s Black Caucus said.
  
  Ald. Rod Sawyer (6th) told the Sun-Times he talked to Preckwinkle on Monday and the veteran County Board president told him she plans to enter the crowded race.
  
  Another alderman, who asked not to be identified, also said they’d been told by Preckwinkle she is in.
  
  A spokesperson for the Preckwinkle camp, however, would not confirm any plans. Other sources said Preckwinkle’s announcement is scheduled for Thursday at 3 p.m.

Labels: city politics

• On 15 Sep 2018 a PPO was the victim of an armed robbery in the 8900 S. Blk Blackstone Ave in the early morning hours. There were shots fired at the PPO too. This was reported under JB436092.

Labels: info for the police

• Two fresh hires at City Hall will help steer Chicago through the most momentous legal issue the city has faced in decades: reforming the Chicago Police Department.
  
  Tyeesha Dixon and Katie Hill this summer joined Chicago's 280-attorney Law Department. Hill, 39, who most recently was policy director for Cook County State's Attorney Kim Foxx, will hold the department's No. 2 job and report directly to Corporation Counsel Ed Siskel.
  
  Hill, who oversees all 15 of the department's divisions, has dealt with criminal justice issues for much of her career, including as a litigator at Loevy and Loevy, a plaintiffs firm that rose to prominence winning multimillion-dollar verdicts against the city for police misconduct.
  
  Dixon, 33, is taking on a newly created role as deputy corporation counsel for public safety reform. She previously was a senior associate at Washington, D.C., law firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, on the team of lawyers representing the city during the U.S. Justice Department's probe of its policing practices.

Labels: blogging, events

• Michael Gentry has received two year’s probation for burglarizing a Wicker Park home in August 2017. Notoriously, Gentry was located by police because he took time to stop and masturbate in a nearby gangway after breaking into the home, according to prosecutors.
  
  Judge Lauren Edidin approved the plea deal that reduced Gentry’s charge to attempted burglary. His sentence will run concurrent to another two-year probation term that he received for head-butting a glass window in the Leighton Criminal Courthouse last year.
  
  A Wicker Park resident called police around noontime August 13, 2017, after he saw Gentry enter his home and steal an iPad in t But instead of he 2000 block of West Le Moyne.

Labels: county

• Six people were attacked in back to back robberies in South Loop and Hyde Park Friday night and early Saturday morning.
  
  According to police, the offenders are a group of two to four men between the ages of 18 and 25 traveling in a gray four-door vehicle. Victims told police one of the suspects has dreadlocks.

Labels: crime, sarcasm AND silliness

• [...] One took his life while on duty in his squad car, the other two in the parking lot of the Calumet District station on the Far South Side. The cluster of deaths has brought renewed attention to the Chicago Police Department’s mental health services — an area criticized in a 2017 U.S. Justice Department report [...].
  
  A proposed consent decree filed last week requires the department to reform its mental health outreach and counseling services. It must staff 10 clinicians for its employee assistance program by 2020 and ensure that officers have access to non-emergency counseling within two weeks of a request, and emergency counseling within 24 hours.
  
  The department says it has already hired additional clinicians and undertaken a campaign to educate officers on options for seeking help.
  
  Still, law enforcement and mental health experts say meeting the terms of the consent decree is just a start to addressing the needs of roughly 12,000 officers and their families. Ten clinicians is likely not enough for one of the largest police forces in the country, they say.
  
  And adding more mental health professionals doesn’t address the problem if the department doesn’t lessen the stigma of seeking therapy and doesn't reach out to officers.

Labels: we got nothing

• Attorneys for the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) threatened a defamation lawsuit against an attorney and his clients for claiming that police shot and killed a youth on the West Side this summer.
  
  In a letter authorized by FOP President Kevin Graham, FOP attorney Tim Grace warned attorney Andrew M. Stroth from the Action Injury Law Group that statements made by Stroth and his clients claiming the police shot Steve Rosenthal on August 17 are defamatory.
  
  [...] Grace attacked these statements in his letter to Stroth. Grace warned that if Stroth or his clients continue making such statements, Grace will take legal action on behalf of the officers.

Labels: FOP

• The Chicago Police Department provides no clear directives on how it selects, trains and evaluates officers assigned to patrol public schools, according to a report released Thursday from the city inspector general.
  
  CPD doesn’t even have up-to-date staffing rosters and legal agreements with the Chicago Public Schools system for its school resource officers, Inspector General Joseph Ferguson’s office said.
  
  The department’s lack of guidance and structure over school resource officers underscores what Ferguson’s office describes as a "high probability" that students get unnecessarily entangled in the criminal justice system. The IG said it urged authorities to immediately create formal standards and responsibilities for school-based police officers by the start of classes this fall.

• an institutionally conservative CPD enforces the law
• an institutionally liberal CPS teaches typical leftist bullshit

Labels: we got nothing

• On Thursday, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Mayor Rahm Emanuel filed a proposed consent decree for the Chicago Police Department in federal court. Absent any major changes from Judge Robert M. Dow, Jr., who still has to approve the proposal, this 227-page document will chart the course for CPD reforms for years to come.
  
  Neither Madigan nor Emanuel are running for re-election, so they both will be out of office by the time most of the consent decree’s mandates take effect. As with most cities, Chicago will be placed under the authority of an independent monitoring team to ensure the city makes the changes required under the consent decree.
  
  Nine teams responded to a request for proposals to become CPD’s independent monitor. Most of the teams are led by attorneys—including former federal prosecutors, former judges, and a former mayor. Many of them include retired police executives as full team members or subject matter experts. Three of the nine lead monitors are based in Chicago, but the others are spread across the country, from Oakland to Cleveland to New York.
  
  Over the past two decades, as the number of police consent decrees has increased, a cottage industry has cropped up to serve as monitors. Some of the teams that applied to be Chicago’s monitor include well-known players in this field. Others are relatively new. All teams have experience conducting government or corporate audits.

Labels: department issues

• Former U.S. Commerce Secretary Bill Daley will announce Monday that he’s going to run for a job once held by his brother and father — mayor of Chicago.
  
  Daley would mark the first big-name candidate to officially jump in the race since Mayor Rahm Emanuel made the stunning announcement earlier this month that he would not seek a third term. Daley, whose nascent campaign confirmed Friday he would run, succeeded Emanuel as then-President Barack Obama’s White House chief of staff after Emanuel left the job to run for mayor in 2010. He also worked as commerce secretary for more than three years under former President Bill Clinton.

Labels: city politics

• A dozen years ago, five financially strapped city of Chicago pension funds invested 68ドル million in a shaky real estate deal put together by a former boss of President Barack Obama and a nephew of Mayor Richard M. Daley.
  
  It was a high-risk investment. Allison S. Davis — a longtime Daley ally who once headed a small Chicago law firm that gave Obama his first job out of Harvard Law School — and Daley nephew Robert G. Vanecko even warned in the prospectus that the pension funds could lose their entire investments.
  
  But, with Daley in office and three top officials in his administration in on the decisions, the city pension funds agreed to give Davis and Vanecko’s DV Urban Realty Partners the money, which they said they would use to buy and develop properties in struggling Chicago neighborhoods.
  
  Eleven years ago, the Chicago Sun-Times exposed the deal, which quickly turned sour. The mayor publicly distanced himself from his nephew, whose pension deals created friction in the Daley family.
  
  Vanecko pulled out of the partnership with Davis and his family in June 2009 — 12 days after a federal grand jury issued subpoenas for DV Urban’s records.
  
  Three years later, the pension funds dumped Davis and seized control of the real estate portfolio DV Urban had put together, with lawsuits filed in Illinois and in Delaware.

Labels: corruption

Labels: events

• A Cicero police officer was shot during an exchange of gunfire near the border between Chicago and the west suburb late Thursday afternoon that left a suspect in serious condition and at some point involved a citizen with a concealed carry license, authorities said.
  
  The shootout happened near the Cicero exit on the Stevenson expressway around 5:05 p.m. during the evening rush hour commute, Cicero police said.
  
  Cicero police officers tried to stop a vehicle for a traffic violation in the 3900 block of South Cicero Avenue when the driver took off, according to Cicero police superintendent Jerry Chlada, Jr.
  
  Officers boxed the vehicle in on the southbound ramp of the Stevenson, Chlada said, and the male driver got out and fired multiple rounds at officers.
  
  Officer Luis Duarte, 31, was hit multiple times, officials said. He was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital and his condition was stabilized.

• The alleged shooter then ran north on Cicero, and fired at another officer that chased him, Chlada said. A man with a concealed carry license driving south on Cicero in heavy traffic exited his vehicle and fired at the suspect, Chlada said.
  
  "We were lucky enough to have a citizen on street that is a concealed carry holder and he engaged in gunfire with this offender who was struck one time," Chlada said.

Labels: officer injured, suburban

• On his way out of office, Mayor Rahm Emanuel is set to create a task force that would consider whether to make monthly no-strings-attached payments to a group of Chicago families to help them make ends meet.
  
  "Universal basic income" is an idea that has been gaining traction recently among progressives, and North Side Ald. Ameya Pawar introduced a resolution in June calling on Emanuel to launch a program to pay 1,000 families 500ドル every month.
  
  Now, Pawar, 47th, says he will be part of a panel Emanuel will convene to figure out whether such a program can be implemented in Chicago.

Labels: dumb ideas

• A Chicago police officer who admitted to paying for sex with girls as young as 14 — including one with braces on her teeth — was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in federal prison.
  
  U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall also ordered 62-year-old William "Willie" Whitley to pay 240,000ドル into a trust fund for his four victims, one of whom faced the 26-year CPD veteran at a hearing last week.

Labels: scandals

• A Chicago police officer committed suicide in the parking lot of a Far South Side police station early Wednesday.
  
  The officer, a 54-year-old woman described by police as a "veteran" of the department, is the second member of the Chicago Police Department to take her own life in that parking lot since early July and the third Chicago police officer to commit suicide in the last two months.
  
  She was found in her personal car and her name was not released as of Wednesday afternoon, according to police. The department said it was making counselors available to officers in the Calumet District, where the deceased officer was found.

Labels: department issues

• It’s the most crucial strategic decision so far for Jason Van Dyke’s defense team — and his lawyers could be forced to make it as early as Thursday.
  
  Should they put the fate of the indicted Chicago police officer in the hands of the jurors they’ve spent two days questioning? Or should they ask Cook County Judge Vincent Gaughan to decide whether Van Dyke murdered Laquan McDonald?
  
  That decision looms because 10 of the 12 jurors who would hear the case have now been chosen. Five were picked Wednesday — a black woman, who is the first African-American on the jury, a white man, a white woman and two Latina women, one of who is applying to be a Chicago police office and wanted to be a cop since she was 12.
  
  On Wednesday, when Dan Herbert pressed the judge about their deadline to make a decision, the judge told him, "when we get to 11, you’d better make a decision." The judge soon relented, and said he’d give the defense team a night to think about it.
  
  They fell one short of 11 jurors Wednesday, but one more pick could put Van Dyke’s lawyers on the spot — especially if it comes early Thursday.

Labels: events

• The Chicago Board of Election Commissioners on Wednesday upheld a hearing officer’s finding that a petition to hold a referendum on term limits for Chicago’s mayor was legally invalid.
  
  The referendum will not appear on the November ballot, the board ruled.
  
  Former Gov. Pat Quinn and his Take Charge Chicago group, which gathered signatures in an effort to get the referendum on the ballot, promised to take the matter to court.
  
  Quinn argued the Chicago City Council should not have been allowed to crowd the binding referendum on term limits off the ballot by approving three advisory referenda questions, which he described as a deliberate "sabotage tactic."

Labels: city politics, corruption

• This one was so easy to see coming we can only say, "Duh," instead of our usual "Told you so." Last year, Chicago lawmakers wanted a way to soften the blow of the city’s recent property tax increases, or at least make it look softer. Singling out the city wasn’t workable, so they got Springfield to pass increases in the homeowners and senior exemptions for all of Cook County.
  
  The Chicago Tribune last week detailed the actual results. The broadened exemptions merely shifted the tax burden to to other properties. Many properties were taken off the tax rolls entirely, leaving the remainder to pay the bills. The levy — total taxes raised — didn’t drop. The consequence has been a "perfect storm," the Tribune says, for many communities already in a property tax catastrophe.
  
  We weren’t the only ones who saw that coming. The Daily Herald and Illinois News Network, among others, wrote about it. We said it was a wonderful illustration of rampant idiocy in the Illinois General Assembly.
  
  The actual effect of the stunt has been particularly pronounced in Chicago’s south suburbs, which are largely working class and African-American.

Labels: money questions

• Projects relevant to the forthcoming Obama Presidential Center in Chicago’s Jackson Park will cost taxpayers 224ドル million, according to the Washington Examiner.
  
  This includes 174ドル million for roadwork in and around Jackson Park and 50ドル million for renovations to the Garfield Green Line station, two miles from the presidential center. Illinois taxpayers will be on the hook for 199ドル million of the total cost, with 25ドル million of the Garfield station renovations funded through a federal grant, according to the Washington Examiner.
  
  Unfortunately, Illinois taxpayers would have no way of knowing this money was flowing to the presidential project from looking at the state’s 1,245-page budget, which makes no mention of the Obama Presidential Center. That spending is hidden, but has been confirmed by political figures such as Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

• Illinois’ state budget might not be the only source of taxpayer money for the center. Chicago residents may face a property tax add-on, as the General Assembly amended the state’s Museum Act in 2016 to permit such a tax to help finance the center. Alterations to the Museum Act also allowed lawmakers to grant the parkland transfer to the Obama Foundation. That transfer is the subject of a federal lawsuit filed by the nonprofit Protect Our Parks. Protect Our Parks claims the city and the Chicago Park District broke state law through their transfer of the parkland, and also argues using tax money for the center’s construction is compelled political speech and a violation of the First Amendment.
  
  Hidden money for the Obama Presidential Center is a consequence of the state spending plan’s opaqueness. The negotiating process in drafting of the budget took place outside of public view and state senators were given five hours to read the massive document before taking a vote. By the Illinois Policy Institute’s estimate, the spending plan exceeds realistic revenue estimates by as much as 1ドル.5 billion.

Labels: money questions, scandals

Labels: promotions

• The Los Angeles Police Department on Monday released graphic video footage of July 28 shootout that occurred during a routine traffic stop that resulted in the injury of an officer and the death of the suspect.
  
  The police officers seen in the video were not identified and the events leading up to the shooting appeared routine. The female officer-- who approached from the drivers' side-- worked in the gang unit and apparently knew the suspect.
  
  The officer asked the driver to exit the car, at which point he could be seen pulling out a .380-caliber handgun and firing just inches from the officer. She could be seen falling to the ground and her partner-- who was at the passengers’ side-- returns fire, mortally wounding gang member Richard Mendoza, 32

Labels: officer injured, out-of-state

Labels: terrorism

• 3 "merit" lieutenants - 2 from units, 1 from a District
• 30 "merit" sergeants - 19 from units, 11 from Districts (6 were FTO's)
• 25 "merit" detectives - 12 from units, 13 from Districts

Labels: un-fucking-believable

• Two local legal scholars who examined thousands of police misconduct allegations have determined that taking those complaints more seriously "could substantially reduce the most serious incidents of police misconduct." Northwestern University law professor Max Schanzenbach and Kyle Rozema of the University of Chicago examined 50,000 misconduct complaints lodged against members of the CPD between 2002 and 2014.
  
  They found that "citizen allegations are a valid predictor of serious misconduct" by police officers.
  
  In a soon-to-be-published paper, the two write that, when it comes to racking up misconduct complaints, an officer’s assigned district does not matter. Schanzenbach and Rozema found that officers who were the subject of misconduct complaints in more violent areas of Chicago were just as likely to be the subject of complaints in safer parts of the city.

• The two concluded that "removing the worst 1 percent" of Chicago Police officers — about 120 people — and replacing them with "an average officer" would have saved Chicago taxpayers more than 6ドル million in payouts between 2009 and 2014.

Labels: department issues

Labels: promotions