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2 weeks ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
Lavette Mayes had already spent 425 days locked up in the Cook County jail when she found herself in front of a judge in 2016. The Chicago Community Bond Fund had just helped her buy her freedom, and the judge was prepared to let her go home through a program known as home confinement. Mayes didn’t fully understand what it entailed, but it sounded far better than jail.
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2 weeks ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
On April 4, State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke announced she was expanding a pilot program that allows Chicago cops to file gun possession charges without review from a prosecutor. The pilot launched on January 1 in the Seventh Police District, which covers Englewood and surrounding south-side neighborhoods. Last week, O’Neill Burke expanded the program to the Fifth District, which includes Roseland, Pullman, and Washington Heights.
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3 weeks ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
About 1,000 people packed into Federal Plaza on Sunday, March 30, to stand against growing attacks on transgender rights. The rally and march to Trump Tower was organized by the groups Trans Upfront Illinois and Indivisible Chicago.
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4 weeks ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
Illinois is facing a public defense crisis. That was the message from lawyers, lawmakers, policy advocates, and organizers who converged at the Northwestern Pritzker Law’s downtown campus on March 24 for a daylong summit on the future of public defense. The event, hosted by Northwestern’s Children and Family Justice Center and the Illinois Justice Project, was organized ostensibly to support a bill moving through the General Assembly that would create a statewide public defender agency.
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1 month ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
Donald Trump and his cronies are continuing their fascist assault on higher education. In recent weeks, the federal government has announced multiple probes into Chicago-area universities intended to stifle dissent and expel immigrants and other marginalized students.
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1 month ago | 
thetriibe.com | Shawn Mulcahy
This article was produced by Bolts, a nonprofit publication that covers criminal justice and voting rights in local governments, and is reprinted with permission. Sign up for their newsletter here. In the early evening on Feb. 19, two Chicago police officers arrested a 40-year-old man in the Englewood neighborhood.
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1 month ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
The City of Chicago has quietly authorized a six-figure payment for an expansive “law enforcement search engine and information platform” from SoundThinking, maker of the gunshot detection system ShotSpotter, according to public records. The payment caps off a six-month pilot for the software, called CrimeTracer, that ran in 2024, though the program’s future is not immediately clear.
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1 month ago | 
boltsmag.org | Daniel Nichanian |Shawn Mulcahy
In the early evening on Feb. 19, two Chicago police officers arrested a 40-year-old man in the Englewood neighborhood. According to their report, the officers cited an odor of “raw cannabis emitting from within the vehicle” to search the car. They didn’t turn up any drugs, but they did find a nine millimeter handgun under the driver’s seat. He owned the gun legally but he didn’t have a concealed carry permit, so the officers arrested him and took him to the lockup at the Seventh District station.
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1 month ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
These days, there’s simply too much news. (Seriously, can someone make it stop?) As a small but freaky weekly newspaper, we’ve struggled to keep up with the fire hose of information drowning media organizations ten times our size. That inspired a short-lived online news column that ran from late 2023 to last June. In the months since, things have only gotten worse. So, we figured we’d give it another shot—this time online and in print. Welcome (back) to Make It Make Sense.
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1 month ago | 
chicagoreader.com | Shawn Mulcahy
In a city like Chicago, where style meets sustainability, and high-end meets down-to-earth, Seres provides the right answer to footwear. Founded by Vanessa Arroyo, 35, almost two years ago, Seres combines Arroyo’s rich Chicana heritage with her experience designing shoes for the luxury brand Rag & Bone—all while remaining committed to creating ethically made footwear that lasts a lifetime. The name “Seres,” meaning “beings” in Spanish, reflects Arroyo’s dedication to the people and the planet.
