Beverly residents want to see more police on the street
In light of a recent increase in neighborhood theft, Beverly residents are wondering where the police are. A number of residents have expressed concern about what they see as a lack of presence of Chicago police in the neighborhood. The Chicago Police Department reported a decrease in overall crime, but both the police and residents [...]
Between Friends protects victims of domestic violence
Court Advocacy Coordinator Megan Rose spends three days a week at court. She faces criminals on a regular basis, protecting her clients in court in ways they are not able to. Her clients are generally women and children, her job is to protect those affected by domestic violence. Standing alongside them every step of the way, she [...]
CAPS wrap: Kenwood residents learn ways to fight crime
Residents in the Kenwood area learned more details at a recent CAPS meeting about the fatal shooting of Hadiya Pendleton, a 15-year-old girl whose accidental death has drawn worldwide attention to gun violence in Chicago. Chicago police officer Denise Gathings told residents in attendance that the driver of the car from which shots were fired [...]
Editorial: Do we need a federal gun control law?
After the Jonylah Watkins funeral last month, and the recent death of 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, debate over the proposed assault weapons ban in Illinois has legislators outside Chicago and those representing inner-city districts staunchly divided over this time-sensitive issue. While visiting Chicago area churches Saturday and Sunday, Gov. Quinn said, “We’ve got to show in [...]
Chicago group rallies for stricter gun control laws
Dozens of people rallied in front of the Thompson Center in downtown Chicago last month to ask the Illinois Attorney General to fight a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning the state’s concealed gun ban. The rally was sponsored by the Stop Concealed Carry Coalition, a group fighting for stricter gun laws. Lee Goodman, a [...]
CAPS wrap: Police warn of robberies in Ashburn neighborhood
Police warned Ashburn residents of criminals targeting the elderly at a CAPS meeting last month in the neighborhood on the city’s Southwest side. Held at Bogan High School, the CAPS meeting covered crime in Chicago Police District 8, beat 834, between Kedzie Avenue, Pulaski Road and Cicero Avenue, and the areas between 79th and 87th [...]
New play confronts violence in Chicago
Three months into 2013, Chicago has endured over 60 murders. Chicago citizens have voiced their anger over the city’s violence with campaigns, and President Barack Obama visited the city’s South Side to speak to civilians about gun control. A Chicago theater group is taking a different approach to speak out about the violence that is [...]
CAPS wrap: Police warn Douglas residents about criminals who target elderly, increase in cell phone snatches
Chicago police officers warned elderly residents in the Douglas neighborhood on the South Side not to buzz strangers into their homes at a Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy meeting last month. “Criminals target senior buildings because they know the residents are vulnerable,” Chicago police officer Angela Winburn-Wright said at the CAPS meeting for police beat 131. “It’s not [...]
Englewood residents deal with perception, reality of neighborhood
Carvell Robinson says he has lived with his parents in Englewood for a year and has grown accustomed to the negative attention the neighborhood receives. “Oh, it’s as bad as they say it is,” said Robinson, 20. “I’m not allowed to go out after dark. My mom thinks of any excuse to keep me inside.” [...]
Gun control activist: Second Amendment doesn’t trump right to life
“There’s no such thing as a law abiding gun owner,” Elliot Fineman told a class at the University of Illinois of Chicago on February 19. “They’re legal, but not law abiding.” Fineman was referring to what he sees as a myth that is prevalent among political leaders and throughout America, that law abiding gun owners have a [...]
Gun control advocate speaks on concealed carry
A gun control activist said the National Rifle Association’s agenda is full of “bumper sticker” rhetoric and called firearms unsafe at a talk at Columbia College Chicago last week. Lee Goodman, an organizer for the Stop Concealed Carry Coalition, spoke to a Columbia College Chicago journalism class about gun control laws in Illinois and across [...]
Legislation seeks to end “no snitch” culture
Christopher Roundtree’s murderer may get away because people won’t speak up. The shooter gunned down the 29-year-old earlier this month in Chicago’s South Side Englewood neighborhood. In another murder, two years ago, 17-year-old Robert Tate refused reveal the name of his shooter to police, taking that secret to the grave. Both cases are the result of Chicago’s street [...]
Users reflect on benefits, harm of illegal drugs
“To feel something different.” That is how four illegal drug users described their aim when using illicit drugs in interviews with Chicago Talks. Medical and drug research has yielded thousands of drugs that help people. Antibiotics and vaccines have revolutionized the treatment of infections. Medicines can cure, slow, or prevent disease, helping us to lead [...]
Firearms Working Group to help craft concealed carry law in Illinois
Illinois Lt. Gov. Sheila Simon announced the members of her new bipartisan Firearms Working Group on Tuesday, in response to a recent federal appeals court decision that struck down the state’s ban on concealed weapons. The group is comprised of about a dozen members of the General Assembly from across the state, most of them Democrats, [...]
Beware of Cell Phone Snatches in South Loop
The 1st District Police have issues an alert about a rash of cellphone snatches in the South Loop area this week, on Thursday. The alert says there has been an increase in robbery related incidents during the month of January. In these incidents, lone female victims have been approached on the street during the daytime hours and had [...]
Chicago suffers deadliest January in more than a decade
This month has been the deadliest January in Chicago since 2002, a year that ended with 647 homicides in the city. There have been 44 murders in Chicago since the new year began, according to the Red Eye homicide tracker. That is four more than last January, a year in which the city gained national [...]
Sexual Assaults in South Loop
A 56-year-old woman was sexually assaulted and held up at gunpoint outside her South Loop home Wednesday night, the Chicago Police Department (CPD) reported. The assailant apparently approached the victim as she was seated in her car at 14th and Clark streets, in her garage. According to a police report, he pointed a handgun at the [...]
