Chicago Gun Violence Down Over Labor Day Weekend, Police Say

Deputy Police Superintendent Kevin NavarroDeputy Police Superintendent Kevin Navarro

The Chicago Police Department says it’s not a victory, but it is progress: Homicides were down 46 percent over the holiday weekend compared with last year, and there was a 30-percent reduction in shootings. Seven people were killed, however, and there were 28 shooting incidents.

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Deputy Police Superintendent Kevin Navarro credits a multi-pronged strategy calling for more cops on patrol and using data to predict “hot spots” for crime.

“This year we stepped up our enforcement and recovered more guns this holiday weekend than last, with 110 illegal guns seized from city streets,” Navarro said. “That’s more than the department’s average of one illegal gun every hour.”

Navarro says police recovered what he described as assault weapons, including an “Uzi-style machine gun.”

In other news in Chicago tonight

The Chicago Tribune’s parent company Tronc is going bicoastal. It just bought the New York Daily News.

Tronc already owns the LA Times.

In a sign of the times, published reports say it cost Tronc only a dollar, plus absorbing the tabloid’s liabilities.

The purchase expands Tronc’s national reach, but some dedicated readers are bemoaning what they fear will be the loss of a 100-year-old institution’s distinctive voice and cutting front-page headlines.

You may have seen ads promoting the controversial tax on sweetened drinks as a way to keep kids from becoming obese.

Now, the beverage industry is out with ads of its own.

The ads aim to pressure Cook County commissioners to repeal the soda tax that took effect a month ago. 

Follow Amanda Vinicky on Twitter: @AmandaVinicky


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