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Chicago police have arrested and charged a man wanted or robbing and attacking an 85-year-old woman in a parking garage near the Magnificent Mile. Tony Davis, 45, of Chicago, is now facing felony charges of aggravated battery of a victim over 60 and robbery stemming from the attack Tuesday morning. Police say he grabbed the woman’s purse, threw her to the ground and dragged her a few feet before running off. The woman suffered a head injury as a result. Davis was arrested Friday when he was stopped for violating CTA rules. SNIP

It makes sense that not a word was spoken at the Democratic National Convention about the riots, looting, and mayhem that have ravaged some of our major cities. To denounce Antifa and Black Lives Matter would have been to denounce the Democrats’ own base. And while many a Democratic mayor is embracing the idea of defunding the police, they’ve had no hesitation calling the police to protect themselves. Citing the need for her and her family to live in peace and security, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot had the police cordon off her block to prevent protesters from coming anywhere near...

A bid by several aldermen to demand that Gov. J.B. Pritzker deploy the Illinois National Guard to Chicago in an effort to reduce escalating violence and sustained protests amid the coronavirus pandemic failed on Friday at a special meeting of the Chicago City Council. Although Mayor Lori Lightfoot dismissed the effort by Alds. Leslie Hairston (5th Ward), Anthony Beale (9th Ward), Raymond Lopez (15th Ward) and Anthony Napolitano (41st Ward) earlier this week to force the special City Council meeting as a stunt and an example of “grandstanding,” 47 aldermen attended the virtual meeting, ensuring it took place. Veteran City...

For months now there have been calls in all the major riots around the country to defund the police as a solution in the wake of the death of African-American George Floyd. Now large numbers of Black communities are coming out against that ‘stupid’ idea. . The assumption by many is that these demands were only coming from within black communities, where many of the BLM protests occur. The truth is that many community leaders and locals from these do not want this at all. Many locals feel the only thing keeping their communities safe during these times is the...

Billionaire Democratic donor George Soros bankrolled the successful campaigns of a new crop of district attorneys who now preside over big cities with skyrocketing crime and frayed relationships with police departments. Soros-backed DAs in Philadelphia, St. Louis, San Francisco and other cities have fired scores of experienced prosecutors and, as promised, stopped prosecuting low-level quality-of-life crimes such as disorderly conduct, vagrancy and loitering. Their laissez-faire criminal justice philosophy bucks the get-tough “broken windows” approach, made famous by then-New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, which targets minor offenses to cut off the criminal element in the bud. Put into practice, New...

A group of Chicago City Council members requested that Democratic Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker immediately declare a state of emergency in Chicago and deploy the national guard in light of ongoing rioting and looting in the city. The City Council held a special meeting Friday to consider the resolution. The governor was asked to deploy the national guard for a period of 4 months to assist local law enforcement in quelling the unrest. The council members also asked for monthly public safety hearings and “reports regarding the collective and unified efforts to address the rioting, looting, destruction, and most importantly,...

Judges in Chicago have increasingly ordered criminal defendants placed into an electronic-monitoring program in lieu of jail, a move police officials blame for the surge in gun violence plaguing the city. On Aug. 9, 43 people facing murder charges were enrolled in Cook County's electronic-monitoring program, a 40% increase from the same day last year. In addition, 160 people charged with robbery and 1,000 people charged with illegal gun possession are enrolled as of Aug. 9, the Chicago Sun-Times reported. The Chicago Police Department has cited the increase in program participants who would otherwise be granted high bail or remanded...

CHICAGO—Three days after his 29-year-old son was shot and killed, Keith Harris joined a group of residents who clashed with protesters during a demonstration outside the Chicago Police Department’s Seventh District station in the Englewood neighborhood. The turbulent confrontation last week pitted demonstrators seeking to defund the police against crime-weary residents who say they want the department to better serve them. “I don’t see how defunding the police is going to help anything in Englewood,” said Mr. Harris, 53 years old. A day later, Mr. Harris made funeral arrangements for his son, Keith Richmond. “I’m the last person who would...

A man in Chicago allegedly called a 14-year-old a “racist” as he stole his bike, according to CWB Chicago. Isaac Lacy, 22, has been arrested after allegedly stealing a bike from a 14-year-old outside of a Logan Square cycle shop, Boulevard Bikes, on Tuesday. According to CWB Chicago, Lacy approached the 14-year-old and another minor and asked for a cigarette. He then allegedly stole the bike while daring the “‘racist’ juveniles to do anything about it, according to the story prosecutors presented during Lacy’s bond court appearance,” the outlet reported. “You’re a racist and you ain’t gonna do shit,” Lacy...

Chicago police’s largest union donated $57,800 to Kim Foxx’s challenger in the Cook County state’s attorney’s race. In addition, the former judge looking to unseat the Democratic incumbent this November received $5,000 from the Chicago Police Sergeants Association Fund. “Kim Foxx doesn’t have the experience or judgment to run an office in regular times, and in times where there are events which obviously would test anyone, she certainly has failed that test,” O’Brien said. “There certainly is more of a feeling that I’m getting from business leaders and from individuals that they are sick and tired of favoring the criminal...

Four Chicago aldermen on Wednesday called for a special meeting of the City Council to consider a resolution asking Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker to declare a state of emergency and deploy the Illinois National Guard to the city over recent violence and looting. Alds. Leslie Hairston, Anthony Beale, Raymond Lopez and Anthony Napolitano issued the call in a letter to Chicago City Clerk Anna Valencia. The letter calls for a special meeting of the Chicago City Council at 10 a.m. on Friday to take up a resolution calling for the state of emergency and to hear from city and Cook...

In the ongoing effort to get control of the city’s streets, Mayor Lori Lightfoot staged a news conference last Friday that was meant to make a statement. Standing on a platform in Olive Park, offset by a sapphire Lake Michigan on a topaz-sky day, the Magnificent Mile’s skyscrapers served as backdrop. Aldermen, clergy, federal and state law enforcement officials all stood as socially distanced props. Lightfoot even invited Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx to stand within shouting distance of her new police superintendent, David Brown. Days earlier, Foxx had called out Brown and Lightfoot for “dishonest blame games,” after...

Foxx, the Cook County state’s attorney, has been publicly called out as a liar for her handling of that disastrous Jussie Smollett fake hate crime case. She bent backward for the celebrity entertainer, and she accepted phone calls from people with Obama White House clout. Then she tried to make the case go away. Now she’s been called out as a liar by liberal pundits, distinguished editorial boards and even by other lawyers. Foxx made up nonsense about why she was dropping charges against Smollett, after she indicted him on 16 counts of faking a hate crime that he blamed...

Mayor Lori Lightfoot defended the Chicago Police Department banning protesters from the block where she lives, citing her right to safety.

In the aftermath of the George Floyd killing, protests erupted across dozens of cities in California with hundreds of thousands of people taking to the streets, and despite the raging coronavirus pandemic they were cheered on loudly by the state's liberal elite with some of the most prominent Hollywood actors taking daily turns to voice their support for the protesters while condemning anyone who did not side with the BLM movement, even when so frequently it devolved into violent rioting and looting of innocent bystanders. All of that abruptly ended, however, when BLM invaded Beverly Hills chanting "eat the...

Lightfoot refused to elaborate on the specific threats, but said she receives them daily against herself, her wife and her home. Comparisons to how the Police Department has protected previous mayors’ homes, such as Rahm Emanuel’s Ravenswood residence, are unfair because “this is a different time like no other,” Lightfoot told reporters.

The Chicago Police Department has effectively banned protesters from demonstrating on Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s block in the Logan Square neighborhood, ordering officers to arrest anyone who refuses to leave, the Tribune has learned. The directive surfaced in a July email from then-Shakespeare District Commander Melvin Roman to officers under his command. It did not distinguish between the peaceful protesters Lightfoot regularly says she supports and those who might intend to be destructive, but ordered that after a warning is given to demonstrators, “It should be locked down.” Since the order, and even for a time just prior to its writing,...

Who needs conventions, who needs crowded arenas? Democrats used the magic of technology and clever casting to give their party a passable first night. Forced by the coronavirus to create a make-believe gathering, planners employed all of Silicon Valley’s bells and whistles to present a simulated intimacy involving both ordinary people and party stars. Minus a few glitches, the flow was seamless, sometimes too smooth to be credible. We saw more of Joe Biden via taped videos than we have in the last four months of the campaign. In the real world, he’s been hiding in his basement. Monday night,...

Five people were killed and 46 others were injured in Chicago violence last weekend, according to ABC 7, as widespread looting continued in the downtown area. Included in the injured were 6 teenagers and a 12 year boy who is the son of a Chicago firefighter. In an interview on MSNBC this week to talk about the rampant violence in her city, Mayor Lori Lightfoot sought to cast blame elsewhere. “Sixty percent of the illegal guns that come into Chicago every year are from out of state, from Indiana, from Mississippi, from other states that have lax gun laws,” she...

With the last effects of Chicago’s looting sprees, it’s a tense time near the Loop and the Magnificent Mile, not only for the businesses that were hit but also for everyone who lives and works in the city. Now more problems could leave people to leave these neighborhoods. The city’s second ward alderman said he knows many people are on the edge and poised to leave, but it wouldn’t mean just empty units or storefronts. A mass exodus could gut Chicago’s tax base, causing a citywide ripple effect. Drive onto the Mag Mile and at first all seems normal. Keep...