Chicago Crime Lab

 Dear Friends and Colleagues:  

 

As all of us in Chicago try to combat a tragic surge in violence, I wanted to share a new Crime Lab analysis that shows an alarming but critically important trend: while the homicide rate has decreased city-wide since its historic high in 1991, the four most violent police districts in Chicago are experiencing a higher rate of gun violence than ever before. This gun violence has exacerbated the city’s safety gap and taken a devastating toll on Black residents.  

 

WHAT IT MEANS: For some Chicagoans, the city is more dangerous than ever before. In fact, in 2020, Black Chicagoans experienced more homicides per resident than any year on record. This violence was heavily concentrated: last year, the gun homicide rate in Chicago’s four most violent police districts was 26x higher than in the four safest police districts. In 1991, the rate was 13x higher -- meaning the safety gap has doubled in Chicago’s most vulnerable neighborhoods since the 1990s. That’s a large reason why life expectancy in these districts is 16 years lower than in Chicago’s safest districts. 

 

 

 

WHAT WE’RE DOING: We believe making data like this publicly accessible is critical to both holding elected officials accountable and helping community organizations maintain and ramp up their efforts. That’s why we created a Violence Reduction Dashboard in partnership with community organizations and the City that allows anyone to see how the safety gap is impacting their community in near real-time. We hope it informs how we collectively direct investments, scale programs, and work together to close the safety gap and create a safer Chicago.  

 

WHAT THE DATA SHOW HELPS: Kim Smith and Chico Tillmon of the Crime Lab recently wrote an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune (alongside Live Free Illinois Executive Director Rev. Ciera Bates-Chamberlain) explaining the power of targeting trauma-informed programs to Chicago neighborhoods most in need. “In the same way COVID-19 laid bare disparities in health care access,” they wrote, “the disproportionate number of Black and brown victims of gun violence reveals disparities in access to safety — particularly in a city as segregated as Chicago.” They highlighted the Crime Lab’s updated-evaluation of READI Chicago as one example of how programs can address these disparities and close the safety gap. Participants in READI -- a community-based gun violence prevention strategy -- are 32% less likely to be shot, killed, or arrested for gun violence. 

 

We hope you find this data both sobering and useful. Thank you for your continued support of our work, and more importantly, for the work you do every day. 

 

Best, 

Roseanna 

 

CRIME LAB TAKES 

 

Chicago Tribune | “Data Points: Illegal gun carrying in Chicago spiked in 2020 — and deadly violence followed” 

By Jens Ludwig 

“One of the most striking changes in crime in Chicago over the past year is something few people are talking about. It’s not the utterly tragic 55% increase in homicides in 2020 compared with 2019. It’s the nearly 110% increase in gun carrying, which itself is a major contributing factor to the rise in gun violence.” 

 

CNN | “The Great Debate on Gun Violence” 

By Jens Ludwig 

“Commentators have increasingly speculated about whether these two conversations will collide, with public safety concerns pushing criminal justice and policing reform to the side. The implicit assumption is the two are intrinsically in tension: either we can reduce gun violence, or we can reform the justice system. But, in fact, the data tell us this ‘zero sum’ view is wrong.” 

 

Chicago Tribune | How Lightfoot, Pritzker can fight our other public health crisis: gun violence” 

By Kim Smith, Chico Tillmon, and Rev. Ciera Bates-Chamberlain  

“Thanks to the American Rescue Plan, Illinois and Chicago will receive billions of dollars to counter some of the pandemic’s most devastating economic and public health consequences. As Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Gov. J.B. Pritzker strategize how to distribute this funding, they shouldn’t pass up the opportunity to combat another public health crisis COVID-19 has exacerbated: gun violence.” 

 

COMING UP

 

ALWAYS A PLEASURE TO REMEMBER THAT THIS LYING CROOKED PIG LOST

 

NOW'S THE TIME

 

CROOKED LYING DO-NOTHING

 

John Kass

 

Chicago’s rising violent crime: How to hold politicians and judges accountable? Connect the dots.

By John Kass

Over the Labor Day weekend, the people of Chicago will have two things on their minds:

What to grill.

And how not to get killed.

Like that Sox fan  driving home from a baseball game, getting caught between street gang crossfires on the expressway, with more than 150 expressway shootings already this year, more than double since last year.

Or they might get shot off their porch. Or stabbed in the neck in a bank lobby downtown or perhaps, murdered by some repeat violent offender waiting trial, out now on low or no bail or electronic home monitoring because the politicians showed him mercy.

Not mercy for you. No mercy for the public. But mercy for repeat violent offenders.

That’s where we are now, facing the consequences of those good liberal Democratic intentions that have helped pave Chicago’s Road to violent crime hell.

Violent crime is the number one issue in Chicago. There is no other issue.

The city is suffering a 50 percent jump in murders compared to 2019, and thousands of shootings. Carjackings have tripled. And all the media and political cheerleading about the wonders of the once-wonderful city won’t make people forget how they feel.

They feel afraid. And they have every reason to be.

Just the other night on the 400 block North State Street, two men were beaten and robbed, slammed to the ground, and kicked, all of it recorded on that viral video so many are still talking about,

It’s all in that video reported by CWB Chicago, my go-to source for crime news. The video CWB presented shows the merciless beating, and a group of women off the side twerked up a storm, working their pelvises while the beating victims are humiliated, robbed of their money, even their shoes.

It was horrific, the demons unleashed, like something out of Hieronymus Bosch.

But it wasn’t Bosch. It wasn’t art. It was real and happened on the 400 block of North State Street just a short stroll from what once was Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. And things like this kill the city.

The other day on The Chicago Way podcast, Jeff Carlin and I were talking with Kristen McQueary about how best to cover crime.

McQueary is my former editor, and the editor of the editorial page at the Tribune. She should be running a news shop in this town.

“There are entities on Twitter that do a better job of explaining what happens in bond court than the newspapers, or tv stations or radio stations,” she said. “Every time someone is released on electronic monitoring or commits a violent act but they’re bonding out, the name of the judge should be in the paper, the circumstances.

“Those should be the stories we’re seeing every day so that there’s more connecting of the dots and holding individual judges accountable. They’re elected officials too. And I don’t think there’s enough exposure there as well.”

One of those entities is CWB. And CWB connects the dots while reporting on its growing list of people charged with violent crime while out on bail while charged with felonies.

I just wish the other news shops would, too.  I know there’s a shortage of reporters, and those who remain are completely overworked, as are assignment editors and newspaper editors.

Chicago media makes do with a weekend’s litany of the dead.

But litanies of the dead simply aren’t enough to hold elected officials, and elected judges, to account.

A few days after that River North beating, my wife and I were at a friend’s birthday party just a few blocks to the northwest from where the beating took place. We sat at a restaurant along the river at dusk, the food was superb, as was the wine. On the far bank I could see the printing plant of the paper I once worked for.

And all anyone was talking about was violent Chicago crime and how the politicians aren’t being held accountable.

They talked about that CWB video.

“They kept beating them and beating them,” said a Chicago woman who loves the city and aches for what it’s become. “And the women twerking. Twerking while men were being beaten? It was hideous.”

It is hideous. And it’s Chicago. Not the Chicago you’ll read about in cheerleading stories. The Chicago that people live in, or run from.

A friend owns a restaurant in River North. The constant threat of street violence is killing his business. His is a great restaurant, one of my favorites. He’s so particular about the food he serves that he’ll take three days to prepare demi-glace just for the peppers and sausage.

But customers now avoid the area for good reason. They don’t feel safe.

“I’m not a cop, but this ain’t rocket science,” said Ald. Brendan Reilly in a tweet. “Put foot patrols back in River North to get this s–t under control.”

It’s not under control, Ald. Reilly. We all know it’s not under control.

As I write this, Chicago has a new downtown murder to talk about:  Jessica Vilaythong, 24, an employee of Chase Bank, at 600 N. Dearborn. She was stabbed in the neck by a random goon in the lobby, and on Friday as I write this news is breaking that she died. Police were questioning a person of interest.

But she’ll be forgotten through Chicago’s defense mechanism: forgetting the names of those who float away in the city’s river of violence.

The people know the criminal justice system is broken, but they don’t know who to hold responsible for breaking it, or who is refusing to fix the system so that it works for the law-abiding. To the political class, they just don’t count.

And though news shops in town are understaffed, the politicians have plenty of people to spin the news their way, and taxpayers pay for the privilege of having these distractors wave shiny objects even as they’re slapped in the mouth.

My friend Jeff Carlin, a longtime Chicago radio producer and co-host of The Chicago Way podcast says that as local news shops continue to thin out, there is no real mechanism left to hold elected officials accountable.

“They [elected officials] have walled themselves off behind phalanxes of coms teams, adjusting their messages and putting out their own stories timed with keywords specifically to get above the other stuff, outthinking the zeitgeist and keeping the status quo in check,” Carlin said.

Bingo.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot takes the heat for rising crime. And yes, she should take that heat. She’s the mayor and her idiotic war with rank-and-file cops, demonizing police, hasn’t helped. But she’s not the only one.

What of Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, the catch-and-release prosecutor?

In a recent WGN TV/Emerson College news poll, violent crime is the number one issue in Chicago. Lightfoot is under water, with some 46 percent disapproving of the job Lightfoot is doing, and only 42.5 percent approve.

Only 34.7% of Chicagoans polled approve of the job Foxx is doing, with 47.7% disapproving, and 15.9% unsure or have no opinion.

Foxx reacted to the poll by reverting to failsafe ploy, the race card.

“And we need to stop oversimplifying the criminal justice system and critically examine all the factors influencing violence in our communities. This means not relying on data from a cherry-picked poll that only examines two actors in a broad system and who happen to be Black women.”

Pathetic, yes, but effective in Cook County where Democrats rule and play race like maestros play music. She’ll play the race card for as long as can get away with it. And she’s been getting away with it for years.

Lightfoot takes the heat and stands by impotently as the Obama Machine and former Mayor Rahm Emanuel and his money guys groom another hapless suit for the job:

Former Obama Education Secretary, Arne “The White Shadow” Duncan.

Duncan gets glowing media. And Lightfoot, scowling, wears the jacket.

And Foxx? She just won re-election with Lightfoot’s endorsement. And she’s backed by her political patron, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, the boss of the Cook County Democratic Organization. Foxx’s qualifications for the post of top prosecutor? She was Preckwinkle’s gofer.

Whoever wants to be mayor will kiss Preckwinkle’s ring. And Preckwinkle—credited for emptying the Cook County jail, reshaping the new social justice bond court, and elevating Foxx—can slide away.

And what of Cook County Chief Judge Tim Evans, who gutted his bond court and installed new “compassionate” judges who’ve put so many violent repeat criminals on his electronic home monitoring program?

He slides away, too. Tim has always been good at sliding away from disasters he helped cause.

What I don’t see:

I don’t see packs of reporters hounding Foxx, Preckwinkle, and Evans on the crime issue. Like Carlin says, they wall themselves off behind phalanxes of comms teams, and let Lightfoot take the beating.

“There should be an outside-the-box way of covering crime,” McQueary said. “We’re contributing to the numbness that allows this to continue to happen, among the electorate by just reporting every Monday or Friday, the numbers. you know, treating human beings and tragedies as numbers that go up and down, comparing them to the previous year. Little nuggets about where and when something happened, the age of the victim, you know a bulleted countdown of people killed over the weekend.”

But that’s not enough.

Like I keep saying, people vote with their feet. Or they vote with their wheels.

And they just drive away.

(Copyright 2021 John Kass)

BILL BARR IS A CROOKED PIG

 

Note From Elie: Bill Barr’s Cringeworthy Text Messages

Become a member of CAFE Insider: cafe.com/insider

By Elie Honig

Dear Listener,

Regular readers of this column will know: I’m not the biggest fan of Bill Barr. I’ve had some harsh words for him in this space — “sycophant,” “liar,” “pretender,” and other colorful but well-deserved descriptors. Oh, and I also wrote a book about him titled Hatchet Man. Why mince words?

In that book, I examine Barr’s tenure as attorney general under Donald Trump from early 2019 to late 2020. As the book’s title suggests, I argue that Barr was a wickedly dishonest and thoroughly corrupt operator. 

Now we’ve gotten a glimpse into new materials that are uniquely revealing about Barr’s stint as attorney general: his texts. The Justice Department released a batch of his texts last week in response to a Freedom of Information Act and, boy oh boy, are they cringeworthy. The texts give us a firsthand glimpse at an attorney general who eagerly exploited DOJ to serve Trump’s electoral prospects, who wouldn’t make a key decision without first running it by the White House, and who was vain and insecure about his public perception. I skewer Barr in my book, no holds barred. After reading his own words in the texts, I feel even more justified.

I have a bit of sympathy for Barr here. (Just a bit.) It’s got to feel invasive to have the texts from your phone suddenly available to the world over the internet. (If my texts ever became public, readers would quickly tire of my kids and I going back and forth on what time they need to be picked up from soccer.) On the other hand, the guy created written records about official business while serving as attorney general. He should have been smart enough to know that his texts were public records, hence potentially disclosable. (Some of Barr’s texts are even mildly humanizing. Twice, he pleads guilty to “butt dialing” others; another time, he apparently tried to respond to an update with the word “good” but mis-typed it and got auto-corrected to “zoo.” Hey, we’ve all been there.) 

Relatable typos aside, the texts are downright pathetic and embarrassing, for Barr and for the Justice Department that he once led. They expose Barr’s mindset towards the AG job: his insecurity, his pettiness, his eagerness not just to please Trump but to use the Justice Department as an extension of the Trump 2020 political campaign.

Indeed, despite his efforts to cultivate an image as an old-fashioned public servant who didn’t give a whit about what people said about him, Barr in fact closely monitored his media exposure — and the extent to which his actions pleased the Trump campaign. For example, in one exchange in late May 2020, DOJ Press Secretary Kerri Kupec triumphantly informed Barr that his press statement about public protests against police violence had been retweeted by “Don Jr., Brad Parscale,” and “Kayleigh” — referring to the then-President’s son, campaign manager, and press secretary, respectively. 

Kupec also explained that she had been working with reporters to explain how Barr’s statement “squares with the POTUS tweet.” Barr responded, “Hoping for more retweets.” Yes, folks: the Attorney General of the United States made a public statement on a vital issue, eagerly watched to see whether Trump’s political minions approved of it, and then held his breath hoping for even more retweets by MAGA royalty. That’s just embarrassing. And keep this telling exchange in mind for all the times Barr has protested (and surely will continue to insist) that he never took politics into consideration as AG.

These texts are consistent with revelations in two outstanding new books about the Trump administration, Frankly, We Did Win This Election by Michael Bender and I Alone Can Fix It by Carol Leonnig and Philip Rucker. Both books detail how, on occasion, Barr spoke with Trump specifically to give him political advice about how best to campaign and appeal to voters, drawing on the lessons of prior Republican presidents. It’s a mid-level revelation in both books, given the scope of other Trump scandals, but it jumped off the page to me. Barr, as attorney general, served as a political and electoral consultant to the President. Again: so much for Barr’s political impartiality. 

It gets worse. At one point last summer, as the Trump administration strained to make political hay out of ongoing nationwide protests and to frighten the American public about the threat of Antifa, Barr played right along. He issued a public statement declaring, “In many places, it appears the violence is planned, organized, and driven by anarchistic and far left extremists, using Antifa-like tactics…” (Barr’s Justice Department would indict not a single alleged member of Antifa in protest-related violence, though it would eventually charge several members of right-wing extremist groups.)

At one point, as Trump and Barr carried out this performative two-man public waltz of nonsense, Trump formally declared (by tweet) that “[t]the United States of America will be designating Antifa as a Terrorist Organization” — a “designation” with zero legal backing or significance. Here’s where the texts are so revealing. Publicly, Barr played right along: he proclaimed in lockstep with Trump that that “violence instigated and carried out by Antifa and other similar groups in connection with the rioting is domestic terrorism and will be treated accordingly.” Yet, behind the scenes, Barr acknowledged that it was all bullshit: “There is no such thing as ‘designating’ a domestic group,” he noted to Kupec, correctly. 

Barr’s texts with White House Counsel Pat Cipillone are particularly bizarre and inappropriate. Barr texted Cipillone seven times from May 2019 to June 2020. Each of Barr’s texts is one line long, and five of the seven are identical: “Can I call you later?” Cipillone never responded in writing to any of the texts. At a minimum, this shows the AG and White House counsel coordinating in some way that they did not feel comfortable reducing to writing. 

Worse though, on January 30, 2020, Barr texted to Cipillone simply, “You are a STAR.” (All-caps Barr’s.)

What was going on that day? The (first) impeachment trial of Donald J. Trump. In fact, that very day, it became clear that enough Republican Senators would vote against calling witnesses to effectively end the trial and ensure Trump’s acquittal. Barr — who should have had no role or stake whatsoever in the impeachment, and who conspicuously refused even to open an investigation into the Ukraine scandal — was downright ebullient. A few days later, Barr would attend Trump’s bizarre post-acquittal rally in the White House. Again: I can rail all day long about Barr being a political hack, but nothing speaks as loudly as Barr’s own words and actions.

None of this is the worst of Barr. No text message could measure up to his lying to the American public repeatedly, twisting facts and law to save Trump from the Mueller investigation, interfering in criminal cases to help Trump’s lackeys, or spreading Trump’s lie about the risk of election fraud. But they flesh out and confirm the worst of Barr’s instincts and abuses. 

We’ve long known that Barr abused his position as attorney general for crassly political purposes. Now his own texts confirm it. 

Stay Informed,

Elie

 

No Way to Run a City

 

This is no way to run a city

Published by pvbella on August 30, 2021

Image: PV Bella

“We are saddened and extremely frustrated by this situation, and we express our sincerest apologies to the impacted families for the inconvenience this has caused — especially with such short notice,” CPS said in a statement.” (Chicago Tribune)  

A school bus shortage will leave approximately 2100 students in Chicago without rides to their schools. According to the Chicago Tribune, 90 bus drivers resigned last week. Parents are scrambling to figure out how to get their children to school. CPS is offering a $1000 stipend for the first two weeks and $500 a month until the issue is resolved. Oh, and they are saddened?  How nice.

How did CPS not see this coming? CPS is another train wreck in this city. They spent time arguing with the teacher’s union over opening schools, ignoring other important issues, like bus drivers. One could wonder who is in charge at CPS? Someone needs to get fired over the lack of bus drivers. This is a national issue and was reported in national news media. How did no one see this as a potential problem and plan for it?

There is a sexual misconduct scandal at the Chicago Park District and a second scandal over the firing of the investigator. It appears no one really cares about it except the victims and some in the news media. #MeToo, anyone?

COVID cases are rising again. Mayor Lori Lightfoot wants to make vaccinations a condition of employment but will not state the consequences for those who refuse to get them. The employee unions are frustrated and confused. Oh, and some of her staff is not vaccinated. Rank has its privileges.

People are getting bills for the 6mph speed cameras, and there is only a short window to pay before the fine doubles or triples. No one believes this is about traffic safety. It is a cash grab, more like highway robbery, just like the parking boxes.

Crime is out of control all over the city. Every plan is failing. Even the so-called “quiet” neighborhoods are plagued by violence. Nowhere is safe. People are getting fed up. Superintendent David Brown was supposed to hold a press conference this morning. Crickets.

The City Council is a fractured warring group of mobs, politely called caucuses, who are better at fighting each other and the mayor than doing their six-figure part-time jobs. They are getting worse than the warring do-nothing United States Congress.

Some in the business community are fed up too. There are daylight street robberies in the Loop along with other crimes. Michigan Avenue is experiencing a spate of major thefts in broad daylight. River North is up for grabs. Businesses will suffer if people do not feel safe coming downtown or other nearby areas, especially at night.

Big business is also looking at these conditions. Some are returning people to the workplace. They are questioning if the city can keep their employees safe. It is a double whammy, COVID, and physical safety.

The problems keep adding up and no one has solutions. We get no answers from the people in charge. It appears the people responsible are either inept or do not care. Citizens are questioning who is in charge of Chicago.

Lightfoot lost the Police Department, many if not most of the teachers, and other city employees who provide services. She has few people to turn to and whatever advice she is getting is bad. She is marching down the road of righteousness. She is right and everyone else is wrong.

The past year and a half have been one thing after another. When the mayor gets called out, she plays the race card or some other card and walks away. Many in the news media no longer trust her or her spokespeople. Why would they?

This is no way to run a city. Lightfoot’s popularity is plunging. People are fed up. As bad as some of the past mayors were, they had a handle on things. Very little got past them. When serious issues or scandals arose, heads rolled. There were no sacred cows.

Lightfoot is short on goodwill and long on flimsy excuses. It can’t last. Chicago is being run into the ground. Many of the alderpersons do not care, just look at the conditions in their wards.

The 150^th Anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire is around the corner. Chicago has another historic smoldering fire, and its epicenter is the fifth floor of City Hall.

NEVER FORGET THIS SHAMELESS ASSHOLE