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Conmen have been ripping off fans outside Chicago sports venues for years. Posing as parking attendants, they lure in drivers, take their cash, and often guide them into illegal parking spots. Those fans later find parking tickets from the city on their cars. Nothing stopped the men we uncovered running an illegal parking scam - not even the different teams of officers patrolling the city streets outside Guaranteed Rate Field. The scammers are so bold they continued preying on White Sox fans - selling fraudulent parking passes last season, right in front of authorities. What happened was a bit different...

CHICAGO -- At least 44 people have been shot, eight fatally, since Friday evening across Chicago, police said. A 14-year-old boy was critically wounded in a drive-by shooting Sunday night in Hyde Park. A 16-year-old boy was fatally shot Sunday afternoon in the Golden Gate neighborhood on the South Side, blocks away from where another teen was shot about 45 minutes earlier. Five people were shot, one fatally on the city's South Side overnight Sunday, Chicago police said. The shooting happened in the Gresham neighborhood at about 12:20 a.m., police said. Hours later, a man was shot to death early...

CHICAGO (CBS) – At least four people are dead and 30 others are wounded in weekend shootings across the city as of Saturday. Two of the victims are under the age of 18. In the first shooting of the weekend, a man, 59 was shot while outside in the Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood Friday evening. The victim was on the sidewalk, in the 6800 block of South Indiana Avenue around 6:15 p.m. when an unknown vehicle pulled up, and an unknown offender inside the vehicle fired shots at the victim. The victim was shot in the lower back and was...

CHICAGO -- At least seven people were killed and 18 others have been wounded in shootings across Chicago so far this weekend. Sunday morning, a 44-year-old man was found fatally shot in Roseland on the South Side. The man was found about 7:30 a.m. in the 10400-block of South Corliss Avenue with multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. Hours earlier, two men died during a shootout in Lawndale on the West Side. They were in a car going south in the 800-block of South Albany Avenue about 2:40 a.m. when a red SUV approached and someone...

CHICAGO -- At least 54 people have been shot, seven fatally, in 4th of July holiday weekend shootings across the city, Chicago police said. In fatal attacks this weekend, a woman was killed and a gunman was among two others wounded in a shootout Friday night in Chinatown, Chicago police said. A man and another gunman were shooting at each other about 10:50 p.m. in the 2200-block of South Wentworth Avenue, police said. A 24-year-old woman was struck in the torso and was taken to Stroger Hospital, where she died due to her injuries. Three people were shot, one fatally,...

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) over the weekend took the stage at the city’s annual Pride in the Park event to lash out at Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas for his opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to abortion. “We know what happened yesterday,” Lightfoot, Chicago’s first openly gay mayor, said on Saturday

CHICAGO — The Chicago City Council narrowly approved Wednesday Mayor Lightfoot’s plan to handout prepaid gas and mass transit cards to Chicago residents. The vote was 26 to 23.

A top CPD leader canceled days off for the city’s cops over the upcoming weekend, and sources indicate the reason is that positive COVID tests have decimated the department’s active force. In fact, the union representing front-line Chicago cops estimates 2,600 officers are currently out for medical reasons. Before COVID, the medical absence number usually hovered around 1,000, according to the union. If the union’s estimate is accurate, that would mean about 20% of the city’s police force is out on medical leave. Cops who test positive for COVID are required to take ten days off. The COVID surge is...

CHICAGO (CBS) — At least three people are dead and 14 are injured in weekend shootings across the city. One of the victims was under the age of 18. The first homicide of the weekend happened around 8:11 p.m. Friday in Gresham. An 18-year-old man was walking in the 7900 block of South Parnell when he was shot in the neck by an unknown offender, according to police. The victim was transported to Saint Bernard Hospital where he was pronounced dead. In other shootings since 5 p.m. Friday: At 5:57 Friday, a 24-year-old male was standing in front of a...

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced new COVID mitigations Tuesday, including a vaccine requirement for indoor dining at restaurants for patrons and workers. People going out to eat will have to bring in more than just their masks and wallets starting January 3. The city of Chicago will start requiring customers and restaurant workers to also provide proof of vaccination or proof of a negative COVID test. This new mitigation effort is aimed at stemming the spread of the omicron variant, which the CDC now says is responsible for 73% of all new COVID cases. "I think it'll make...

Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) attributed the recent uptick in violence in the United States’ major cities such as hers to the coronavirus pandemic. Lightfoot claimed there was “no question” there was a “COVID-related impact on the public safety system.” She also emphasized the need to fight the root causes of violence in cities like Chicago, which she said was poverty, lack of jobs and lack of hope.

Controversial Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot hit the headlines again after breaking her city's own mask rules to pose for a photo bare-faced at a basketball game. Lightfoot shared the snap of herself smiling, while surrounded by scores of fans - all of them masked - after the game at Chicago's Wintrust Arena Sunday night. 'What a moment. Congrats champs! A first but not the last for Chicago Sky' she tweeted while holding her arms in the air in celebration at Chicago's first WNBA title with a 80-74 win over Phoenix,' she wrote.

CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Friday that she took her fight with the head of the city’s police officers union to court, arguing that his call for officers to ignore the order to report their COVID-19 vaccination status was illegal. The mayor said in a statement that the city’s law department filed a complaint in Cook County Circuit Court for injunctive relief against Fraternal Order of Police President John Catanzara, whom she accused of “engaging in, supporting and encouraging work stoppage or strike.” Lightfoot asked the court to prohibit the union and its officers from “engaging in...

CHICAGO -- At least 44 people were shot, seven fatally, acorss Chicago over the weekend, police said. A One person was killed and two were wounded outside a gas station Saturday morning in Austin on the West Side. About 2:55 a.m., a man, 52, and two women, 62 and 24, were outside a gas station with about 20 other people in the 5100-block of West Madison Street when someone in a black Dodge Charger opened fire, according to Chicago Police. The man suffered gunshot wounds to the head and leg, the 62-year-old to the head, abdomen and lower backside; and...

The city of Chicago announced Tuesday an indoor mask mandate for all individuals 2 years and older, regardless of vaccination status, beginning Friday, Aug. 20. "With the highly transmissible Delta variant causing case rates to increase, now is the time to re-institute this measure to prevent further spread and save lives," said CDPH Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady in a statement. "We continue to track the data closely and are hopeful this will only be temporary and we can bend the COVID curve, as we’ve done in the past." According to Arwady, masks are required in all indoor public settings, "including...

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D) continues to defend her racist policy with reporters. Speaking to “Sway” host Kara Swisher in an interview published in The New York Times on Monday, Lightfoot explained her outrageous decision to only accept interviews from non-White journalists. “I would absolutely do it again,” Lightfoot told Swisher, who is, ironically, a White journalist. “I’m unapologetic about it because it spurred a very important conversation, a conversation that needed to happen, that should have happened a long time ago.” Pressed by Swisher to explain further, Lightfoot continued: “I’m a Black woman mayor. I’m the mayor of the...

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot reflects on her first two years in office on WTTW's Chicago Tonight. "About 99 percent of it, Lightfoot said. "Look at my predecessors. Did people say that Rich Daley held tea sessions with people that he didn't disagree on? Rahm Emanuel was a polite guy who was a uniter? No. Women and people of color are always held to a different standard."

Chicago has seen a significant increase in shootings and homicides so far this year, compared with the first four months of 2020, police said Saturday. […] So far this year, 997 people have been shot, compared with 718 last year. The city has had 87 homicides — 31 more than during the same period last year. However, police did report some encouraging news about carjackings. According to the department, since adding 40 officers and four sergeants to a task force in early January, the number of reports of vehicular hijackings has dropped more than 55%. …

Mayor Proposes Cutting 614 Positions From Chicago PD If Federal Stimulus Doesn’t Get Approved Holly Matkin Chicago, IL – Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has proposed a budget plan that includes eliminating over 600 positions within the city’s police department as part of an effort to offset the unprecedented $1.2 billion shortfall anticipated for next year. Lightfoot said that eliminating 1,921 vacant positions within city government would save a total of $106 million, WBBM reported. Over half of the jobs she plans to slash would be tied to the Chicago Police Department (CPD), which would see a loss of 614 positions...

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is considering a $94 million property tax increase, layoffs for more than 300 city workers and a gas tax hike as part of her plan to close a $1.2 billion budget deficit, sources told the Tribune. Lightfoot also is considering about $500 million in refinancing city debt to help close the deficit, sources said.