Free Republic

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who wrote a letter asking the Department of Justice (DOJ) to investigate Chicago Police policies in December, recently said the windy city’s law enforcement is “holding back.” In coverage of the 44 people killed or injured in last weekend’s shootings in Chicago, WGN-TV reports:U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin feels the spike in shootings could be related in part to low officer morale, as the Department of Justice investigates the police department. “I think they’re holding back now in fear of video cameras, DNA, and losing a job over a mistake they might make,” Durbin said.…

CHICAGO — Police officers are making drastically fewer investigative stops and confiscating fewer guns as murders and shootings have increased so far this year, DNAinfo Chicago has learned. So far this year, the number of so-called investigative stop reports — formerly known as “contact cards” — has decreased by about 80 percent compared to the same time period last year, police sources told DNAinfo.com. There also been a 37-percent decline in gun arrests and a 35-percent decrease in gun confiscations compared to last year, according to police data. Meanwhile, there have been 72 more shootings (a 218 percent increase) and...

Desperate to save his own head in the fallout over the recorded police killing of Laquan McDonald, Mayor Rahm Emanuel reached for another. Another head, that is. This one belonged to Garry McCarthy, Chicago's superintendent of police, who just the other day said he'd never, ever quit. "I never quit on anything in my life," McCarthy told reporters late last week, after protesters closed Michigan Avenue on Black Friday, after the mayor hid out, lying low, letting McCarthy and Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez take all the heat. "The mayor has made it very clear that he has my...

Protesters took to the streets in the wake of the release of dash cam footage showing police shooting a teen being shot by police, chanting "16 shots" for the number of times the officer allegedly shot him.The dash cam video, released by police today a day ahead of a court-ordered deadline, shows officers confronting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, who later died at a hospital, as he walked down the street on Oct. 20, 2014. snip Chicago police officials said they were responding to a report of a person walking down the street with a knife and that McDonald refused to drop...

James Triplett had his customers lined up around the corner in broad daylight, the feds say. Not for concert tickets. Not for iPhones. For heroin. Now 42 people are facing state or federal drug charges for their alleged roles in supplying and distributing heroin around West Grenshaw and Independence in the North Lawndale neighborhood on the West Side. Among them is the 33-year-old Triplett, also known as “Trell,” who authorities said controlled the drug market in the area. Investigators even included a photo in a federal criminal complaint spanning more than 200 pages. They said the photo depicts a line...

A gun pointed at his gut, the off-duty sheriff's sergeant digs through his pockets with his left hand, fumbling for money, as the three robbers surround him at the Far South Side gas station. The sergeant is surer with his right hand, quickly drawing his own gun and firing point-blank. The gunman, 16, drops at his feet as the two others scatter, according to surveillance video that captured the robbery Monday night at a Citgo station at 103rd Street and Cottage Grove Avenue, across the street from Gately Stadium. The sergeant swings around at the fleeing robbers, then points the...