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ILLINOIS GUN OWNER LOBBY DAY Rally and March Wednesday, March 18, 2015 Let your voice be heard in Springfield! 10:30 a.m. Doors open - Prairie Capital Convention Center - sandwiches, drinks available at concessions 11:45 a.m. Registration/Rally, Prairie Capital Convention Center 1:00 p.m. March to the State Capitol to lobby legislators 3:00 p.m. Rally at the Rotunda! 4:00 p.m. Buses depart for home (north side of Capitol on Monroe Street) Thank you to those who signed up for a bus to IGOLD. All schedules are being turned in to the bus captains at this time. Let's make this a great...

... Bishop Talbert Swan II, pastor of the Spring of Hope Church Of God In Christ and president of the Greater Springfield chapter of the NAACP, said the report does not reveal anything new for the African American community. "The report reveals an atmosphere in the city that the majority of the African American community knew existed, but many outside the community were in denial of," Swan said. ... Swan said he wrote a letter to Mayor Domenic J. Sarno in the wake of the Ferguson incident last year requesting that a commission be formed to look at what elements...

Unemployment in the city of Springfield rose in January to 10.2 percent from a revised 9.4 percent in December 2014. The change was likely a reflection of seasonal hiring trends as stores and warehouses let Christmas season help go. But the city's unemployment rate for January was lower than the 12.7 percent jobless rate recorded in January 2014. And the Greater Springfield regional unemployment rate in January was 5.9 percent, down from 6.3 percent the month before and 7.7 percent a year ago. ... The city of Springfield's labor force was 63,799, down from 64,208 a month ago and down...

Critics said the M-14 was what happened when the U.S. government took many years and spent millions of dollars designing a rifle that was really just a glorified M-1 Garand from World War II. The M-14 was the U.S. military’s last battle rifle. It appeared in 1959—the contemporary of the Pentagon’s first jet fighters and ICBMs. With its heavy steel parts and walnut stock, the M-14 looked positively archaic. It was hardly a Space Age weapon. And it only endured as America’s battle rifle until 1970, when the M-16 completely superseded it—the shortest service record of any U.S. military rifle...

Two city men were arrested late Saturday night for robbing two people on Orange Street, just a few minutes after each was warned by police about not bothering people, police said. The two men, Tyrone Hill, 31, of 245 Morton St., and Rico Swinton, 21, of 50 Parkerview St. were each charged with two counts of unarmed robbery and resisting arrest. Police spokesman Sgt. John Delaney said Hill and Swinton knocked one victim off his bike and stolen another victim's cell phone. Officers Christopher Collins and David Robillard gave chase and quickly apprehended the pair, and recovered all the stolen...

Police arrested seven suspects Wednesday night after they allegedly went on a rolling spree, while armed with knives and boxcutters, and stole cell phones and other items from six different victims in three separate robberies. The robberies began at 5:35 p.m. when suspects, driving around in a green Chevrolet Suburban, robbed an 18-year-old man who was walking near Greenleaf Park at 1187 Parker St., Sgt. John Delaney said. The victim told police that seven suspects, wielding knives, took his iPad and cell phone. The second armed robbery occurred about 30 minutes later in the area of 62 Malden St. Delaney...

Video footage from Wednesday's attempted armed robbery at a Six Corners market shows the store owner fending off an assailant who allegedly stuck a fake gun in his face. "He put it in my mouth," said the owner of Walnut Convenience Store, who pulled out a real gun after fighting 20-year-old Fernell Pelzer. Pelzer pleaded with the shop owner not to hurt him, according to ABC40 News, which obtained store surveillance footage of the crime being committed. "I say, 'I'm not gonna shoot ya,' and I was holding him till the cops got here, and that's what I did," the...

A 20-year-old man was arrested Wednesday evening after an alleged armed robbery attempt with a fake gun was thwarted by a shop owner with a real one. According to Springfield Police Sgt. John Delaney, around 10:20 p.m., Fernell Pelzer allegedly entered the Walnut Convenience store on the border of the Six Corners and Old Hill neighborhoods. Delaney said Pelzer ran into the store and confronted the shop owner before attempting to pistol whip him with what turned out to be a fake gun. A struggle ensued, according to police, and in the process, Pelzer had the tables turned on him...

The chants cut through the warm, humid air like an approaching cold front, prompting drivers to crane their necks and pedestrians to stop in their tracks on the sidewalk outside the U.S. Post Office on Liberty Street. "No justice, no peace, no more people in the streets." "What do we do when banks attack? Stand up, fight back." The protesters' numbers were few – less than 20 – but the collective voice of Springfield No One Leaves was mighty as the group took aim at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the beleaguered government-sponsored mortgage enterprises bailed out by taxpayers, and...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)Springfield police are looking for a group of people who brutally beat a couple in downtown Springfield. Police have not made any arrests. They hope someone seeing the video will identify the attackers. One of the victims, Meredith Cole, says the attack started while her boyfriend, Alex, was working as a DJ at the Outland Ballroom. She said she was approached by a group of men outside the club, and they began to sexually assault her. Cole says she returned inside the club to alert her boyfriend, who then left the club to try to identify who her attackers are....

Black youths beat a young couple walking in Springfield, Missouri on August 22,2014. The mob ran up behind the couple as they left a bar in the city. The woman was also hit and knocked down in the assault.

Saying that the civil unrest that has followed the recent fatal shooting of an unarmed black teen by a white police officer, in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, Mo., "could happen" in Springfield as well as Holyoke, the Rev. Talbert W. Swan II, president of the Greater Springfield NAACP, has requested that the mayors of these two cities establish a commission in each city to address issues that could prove "a powder keg." "Holyoke and Springfield are two urban centers that have a large population of persons of color," Swan said. "They are also two cities with a sordid...

While some city residents were enjoying a weekend highlighted by a bright Supermoon and the successful Springfield Jazz and Roots Festival, others found themselves involved in spats of violence that kept first responders and doctors at the Bay State Medical Center busy. The city's 9th homicide of the year took place Saturday around 5 p.m. when police arrived at William DeBerry Elementary School on Union Street in the city's Old Hill neighborhood to investigate after a Shotspotter activation and 911 calls. The victim, 26-year-old city resident Lamar P. Kelly, was found with a single gunshot wound and was, according to...

Police are investigating the city's seventh homicide of the year after a man was shot in the chest Saturday night in the Forest Park neighborhood. Police have yet to publicly identify the 27-year-old victim, a city resident who was shot around 9:15 p.m. near the corner of White and Orange streets. The suspect was described as a Hispanic or light-skinned black man armed with a silver handgun. Witnesses told police the gunman had a full beard and "nappy hair" in the back, and he was wearing a white T-shirt and light-colored shorts. Sgt. John Delaney, a spokesman for the Springfield...

Police were busy from Tuesday night through Wednesday morning, investigating multiple gun calls, shootings, robberies and at least one stabbing. ... The most serious incident involved a man who was shot on Orchard Street in the Brightwood section of the North End around 7:50 p.m. Tuesday. That was followed about 40 minutes later by a shooting near the intersection of Johnson and Ranney streets in Forest Park, where shell casings were recovered but no victims were found. Police also responded to a 9:11 p.m. ShotSpotter activation indicating four rounds of gunfire in the vicinity of 39 Wendell Place in the...

His Excellency Most Reverend Thomas John Paprocki; Ars celebrandi et adorandiOn the Art of Celebrating the Eucharistic Liturgy The art of celebrating the liturgy properly and adoring the Lord in the Eucharist devoutly (ars celebrandi et adorandi) is the key to fostering the active participation of the People of God in divine worship. (Part 1 of series)The Reservation and Adoration of the Holy Eucharist 18. While the Holy Eucharist is reserved in the tabernacle of every parish church in our diocese, the faithful in some places do not frequently come to pray before the tabernacle to be in the presence...

A Massachusetts mayor is calling for an end to refugee resettlement in his city, saying Somali families are putting pressure on already strained services in Springfield, a onetime industrial center where nearly a third of the population lives below the poverty line. Mayor Domenic Sarno is the latest mayor to decry refugee resettlement, joining counterparts in New Hampshire in Maine in largely rare tensions with the State Department, which helps resettle refugees in communities across America. The mayor is drawing criticism from those who say this country has a moral obligation to help the outcast and refugees who say they’re...

Blame for the recent violence that's swept through Springfield lies in the hands of the young men committing the crimes – and those who tacitly abet them – not the law enforcement officials and religious leaders trying to keep the peace, according to the Rev. Talbert W. Swan II, president of the Greater Springfield NAACP and pastor of Spring of Hope Church. "Don't blame the police, you know, when Pookie gets shot and you knew the kind of life Pookie was living, and you knew the path that Pookie was on and you never addressed it with Pookie," Swan said...

SPRINGFIELD—A onetime top aide to former state public health chief Dr. Eric Whitaker plans to plead guilty to bribery, theft and obstruction of justice in federal court this week in a $400,000 state grant kickback scam she is accused of trying to cover up, according to court documents the Tribune obtained. Quinshaunta Golden, 45, of Homewood, is scheduled to change her plea to guilty Thursday and has agreed to cooperate with authorities. Federal prosecutors have agreed to request a sentence of no more than 10 years and a month in prison, a copy of Golden's plea agreement shows. Whitaker, a...

Seeking advice and comment on the best reload spec for a Springfield XDS 3.3 compact 45.