Rumor Central

From the comments:

• from the rumor dept.: a) supposedly district bosses have to send a report to Dugan this week re: the reduction in tickets, and what they plan to do about it; b) according to sources, if the "numbers" (homicides, agg batt's) don't improve by April or May, another round of boss housecleaning will take place (all to impress the Olympic folks); c) speaking of Olympics, hearing that there will be a "de-emphasis" on the reporting of violent crime by the local media types (unless, of course, the "numbers" improve); big time pressure from the 5th floor....

Well we can see why they'd want to "de-emphasize" reporting violent crime (item c). Did anyone get a look at the past five days?

• Marcell Castle, a 19-year-old reputed gang member was killed Saturday night after being shot inside a van in the South Side's Park Manor neighborhood.
• A 16-year-old was killed in a shooting in the Pilsen neighborhood late Saturday.
• A 22-year-old man was found fatally shot on a West Side porch late Saturday.
  
• Antonio Cole, 28, of North Keystone Ave., and 34-year-old Lenneht Suggs, of North Laramie Ave., were each fatally shot at 5219 W. Lake St., the Cook County Medical Examiner said. Cole was pronounced dead on the scene at 9:55 p.m. and Suggs was pronounced dead at Mount Sinai Hospital at 9 p.m.
• Police are looking for the people responsible for wounding three people in three separate shootings in less than an hour Saturday afternoon on the West Side.
• A 16-year-old boy fatally shot Thursday afternoon near his Southwest Side home was the the first Chicago Public Schools student to be slain this year, and the 17th this school year.

If we were on record as claiming homicides were down almost 30% in January and it had everything to do with our brilliant decision making and not the coldest January in almost a decade, we'd want the media to stop reporting violent crime, too. People might think we were a moron. We might have to have an exempt member get caught with a dead hooker in the trunk of a car they owned and absolve them of any responsibility for knowing what was in the car just to distract everyone.

As to the ticket numbers being down (item a), since we're down 1,200 or more officers and we're running from call to call all shift generating paper, we don't really seem to have time to be writing tickets. We heard from half-a-dozen people that downtown is freaking out at how bad tickets numbers are. We're talking major hair pulling. Watch for some softball to start an "unwritten" quota system in the immediate future. Someone always comes up with this bad idea and it always bites them in the ass.

We can only hope for the regular shake-ups in the exempt ranks (item b).