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Police and a bird-monitoring group are investigating how two dozen Canada geese sustained lead poisoning in Lombard, Addison and Villa Park.
Two geese were found dead Nov. 14 on the shore of Lombard Lagoon Park. A Chicago Bird Collision Monitors volunteer investigating found dozens of other dazed and sick geese there.
The volunteer managed to catch one and bring it to the DuPage Wildlife Conservation Center in Glen Ellyn. X-rays determined the goose had eaten lead pellets.
From Nov. 15 to Dec. 7, volunteers captured sick geese nearby. Some were found in retention ditches in Lombard, at North Terrace Pond in Villa Park, and some at an industrial park retention pond in Addison.
Symptoms of lead poisoning in geese include a high-pitched squeak, inability to walk straight and a swollen face.
Some of the geese were found dead, and others stood near the waters’ edges, dazed.
Authorities don’t know the source of the lead.
Anyone with information is asked to call Lombard police at (630) 873-4400 or Chicago Bird Collision Monitors at (773) 988-1867.
Illinois Conservation Police are investigating.
Read more at dailyherald.com.
A 41-year-old bicyclist was killed in a crash Tuesday night in suburban Rolling Meadows.
Patrick J. Houlihan was riding his bike about 9:30 p.m. at the intersection of Rohlwing Road and Campbell Street when he collided with a vehicle, Rolling Meadows police said.
Houlihan, of Rolling Meadows, was still conscious and was taken to an area hospital where he later died, police said.
The vehicle involved in the crash possibly left the scene but returned a short time later, officials said. The driver was cooperating with authorities.
No charges have been filed and no further information was immediately available.
A man was shot and wounded by a home invader Wednesday morning in Austin on the West Side.
Around 5:45 a.m., the man, 37, was inside a home in the 5500 block of West Jackson Boulevard when someone he knew broke in and opened fire, Chicago police said.
The man was taken to the Loyola University Medical Center with a gunshot wound to his left shoulder, police said. He was reported in good condition.
The shooter fled and was not in custody.
Area 4 detectives are investigating.
A bicyclist has dead after colliding with a vehicle in Rolling Meadows late Tuesday night.
Police said the crash happened just before 9:30 p.m. near the intersection of Rohlwing Road and Campbell Street.
Witnesses initially reported the vehicle that struck the bicyclist had left the scene, but the vehicle returned and the driver was cooperating with police.
The bicyclist was conscious at the scene and taken to a hospital for treatment, but died a short time later, police said.
The bicyclist’s identity was being withheld until family is notified. The Cook County medical examiner’s office was expected to conduct an exam Wednesday.
The crash remains under investigation.
Read more at dailyherald.com.
Chicago is losing the quarterback of its response to the migrant crisis at a time when the incoming Trump administration has threatened to make Chicago ground zero for mass deportations.
Brandie Knazze is stepping down as commissioner of the city’s Department of Family and Support Services, effective Dec. 31. After four years in the pressure cooker job, she is moving to the lower-stress non-profit world, although she refused to say which one.
Knazze stressed that the decision to leave is hers alone. Although the timing for Chicago and embattled Mayor Brandon Johnson is not great, Knazze stressed that she is not leaving because of any policy disagreement with the mayor.
“I have covered every major crisis the city has had since 2017…I have helped so many people. I helped with the recovery plan from COVID. I have helped with the migrant crisis. I did the [city’s response to] civil unrest. I’ve done great work. I’m proud of the work that I did for Mayor Emanuel, Mayor Lightfoot and Mayor Johnson,” Knazze said.
“I’m on call 24/7. There’s always something going on. I have to think about my own health, my personal life. My family. You can’t give to others [forever]. You have to think about what’s next for myself and my own career journey.”
Knazze said there is “never a good time when good employees leave.” But she flatly denied that her departure just weeks before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20 leaves Chicago in the lurch.
“I have gotten them through the migrant crisis. We are merging the one [shelter] system. We have expanded a significant part of our COVID dollars. We have launched new programs. I have shown new programs can be successful,” Knazze said.
“It’s not bad timing for Chicago. This is a good time because now, the team can go on to their next journey. And they are well-positioned to do so. I built an amazing team…When you build a good team, it doesn’t matter who’s at the top.”
New York Times Critic’s Pick! At this bustling Harlem hotspot, West African braiders work their magic on the locals’ locks.
See Jaja’s African Hair Braiding at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater from January 14-February 2, 2025.
Learn more and get tickets at www.chicagoshakes.com/jaja.
Jaja’s African Hair Braiding
Chicago Shakespeare Theater
Jan. 14 – Feb. 2
The Chicago Transit Authority plans to increase bus service to pre-pandemic levels starting Sunday.
The CTA’s winter schedule adds more weekday buses on 19 lines and additional weekend buses on six lines, the agency announced Wednesday.
The CTA has been increasing the frequency of its trains and buses since the COVID-19 pandemic sent ridership tumbling. The agency has struggled to hire and retain operators but has doubled its hiring efforts in the last year.
CTA President Dorval R. Carter Jr. said the new schedule fulfills his goal of returning to pre-pandemic service levels by the end of 2024.
“Our ability to provide pre-pandemic service marks not a finish line but a milestone in providing the exceptional bus service our riders deserve,” Carter said in a news release.
The CTA said the new winter schedule includes “strategic adjustments” to “better meet changing ridership patterns.” Carter has previously said fewer people travel during the rush periods and more people travel at off-peak hours, as well as on weekends.
The CTA said it returned train service to pre-pandemic levels in November.
Ridership on the CTA is still low compared with five years ago. Average weekday ridership on the CTA this summer was about 67% of what it was in 2019, according to an agency report on ridership in July.
The CTA said these bus routes will see more weekday service:
The Nos. 6, 80, 84, 151 and 201 will also receive Saturday service increases. The No. 151 Addison will also receive a Sunday service increase.
Firefighters rescued one person while another — a child — was taken to a hospital in good condition following an Auburn Gresham apartment fire Wednesday morning on the South Side.
Around 7:25 a.m., firefighters responded to the 7900 block of South Racine Avenue for the fire, which started on the third floor of the apartment building, Chicago Fire Department officials said.
At least six ambulances were sent to the building and one child, whose age and gender wasn’t immediately known, was taken to Comer Children’s Hospital where they were in good condition.
Additionally, one person who was trapped was rescued from a window of the building, fire officials said. Firefighters searched the building but no other victims were found.
Chicago police also responded to the fire, but haven’t yet released any official details.
The cause of the fire wasn’t immediately known.
Federal prosecutors rested their case Wednesday against former Illinois House Speaker Michael J. Madigan, the once-powerful Southwest Side Democrat whose reign in Springfield shattered records but ended amid a wide-ranging corruption investigation.
Now, six years after that investigation first surfaced publicly — and almost three years after Madigan’s indictment — federal authorities have made their case against one of the most significant politicians in Illinois history.
It’s a crucial moment that shifts Madigan’s trial into a new phase. Defense attorneys for the former speaker and his longtime confidant, Michael McClain, will get a chance to summon their own witnesses to testify before the jury. Attorneys signaled Tuesday that McClain’s defense team will go first.
It also means closing arguments and deliberations may not be far off — but neither is expected until after the holidays.
Madigan and McClain are on trial for a racketeering conspiracy, outlined in a sweeping 117-page indictment alleging five separate schemes. At its core, the indictment accuses Madigan of leading the criminal “Madigan Enterprise,” designed to enhance his political power and reward his allies and associates. McClain is accused of acting as Madigan’s agent.
A jury of eight women and four men heard from about 50 witnesses since late October. Secret FBI recordings have taken them back as many as 10 years, deep into City Hall and inside Madigan’s private law offices. They listened to more than 20 hours of testimony from ex-Ald. Danny Solis, one of the most significant undercover moles recruited by the FBI in decades.
They heard about Solis’ excessive dirty laundry, including tales involving him and Viagra, massages that turned sexual, alleged tax fraud and a suitcase full of $10,000 in “Chinese money.”
They also heard testimony and evidence about an “old-fashioned patronage system” and Madigan’s “good soldiers,” and how McClain tried to keep allies in the “fox hole” with Madigan while trying to keep the speaker’s “fingerprints” off political maneuvering.
The schemes allegedly took place between 2011 and 2019, when Illinois and Chicago were led by politicians of the past including former Gov. Bruce Rauner and ex-Mayor Rahm Emanuel. While neither man is accused of wrongdoing, jurors heard the names of several others who have graced federal courtrooms in Chicago.
They included former Ald. Edward M. Burke, the late state Sen. Martin Sandoval, and former state Rep. Luis Arroyo.
Revelations in the Madigan case ranged from news of an unfruitful wiretap on the phone of Solis’ sister — Hillary Clinton 2008 campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle — to the appearance on a secret FBI video of a punching bag with Rauner’s face on it inside Madigan’s office.
In short, the jury got an upfront and uncensored look at behind-the-scenes politics in Illinois.
Soon, they will be asked if they see a crime.
Before that happens, jurors will hear again from the Madigan defense team that includes Tom Breen. He told jurors in opening statements that prosecutors have it all wrong. Madigan, he said, was “completely ignorant of what people are saying behind his back.”
That seemed to be a reference to McClain, who was viewed as Madigan’s emissary in Springfield.
“They don’t have the authority to speak that way for Michael Madigan,” Breen said. “He doesn’t talk that way. He doesn’t act that way. He’s never made a demand on anyone.”
Madigan seems to have paid close attention to testimony throughout the trial, watching and taking notes from his seat at a defense table. Members of his family, including former Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, have often appeared in the courtroom gallery in a show of support.
Two of the five schemes outlined in Madigan’s indictment allege that he accepted bribes from ComEd and AT&T Illinois in the form of jobs, contracts and money for his allies while legislation crucial to the utilities moved through Springfield. McClain has already been convicted for his role in the ComEd allegations.
Prosecutors say that five Madigan allies were paid $1.3 million by ComEd over eight years. The money was paid through intermediaries, but the recipients allegedly did little or no work for ComEd. They were former Alds. Frank Olivo and Michael R. Zalewski, former Cook County Recorder of Deeds Edward Moody, longtime Madigan campaign worker Raymond Nice and former state Rep. Edward “Eddie” Acevedo.
AT&T Illinois also paid Acevedo an additional $22,500 through an intermediary.
The other three alleged schemes involved Solis, who by 2017 had represented Chicago’s 25th Ward on the City Council for more than two decades and had risen to become the powerful head of its Zoning Committee. However, the FBI confronted him with evidence of his own alleged wrongdoing in June 2016, and he agreed to wear a secret wire.
The Chicago Sun-Times unmasked Solis in January 2019.
Prosecutors say Madigan took advantage of Solis’ position to steer private business to his law firm, Madigan & Getzendanner, in schemes that involved an apartment project at Sangamon Street and Washington Boulevard, a Chinatown parking lot at Cermak Road and Wentworth Avenue, and the Old Post Office that sits over the Eisenhower Expressway.
The apartment developers agreed to hire Madigan’s firm, and jurors saw a check for $3,331 the group paid to Madigan & Getzendanner. The Old Post Office developers also agreed to hire the firm, but the scheme fell apart amid the Sun-Times’ reporting on Solis. The Chinatown effort collapsed on its own, amid political infighting in Springfield.
However, at least two other individuals also benefited from Madigan’s alleged criminal enterprise. One is Kevin Quinn, a onetime Madigan aide who lost his job early in 2018 while being accused of sexual harassment by political consultant Alaina Hampton.
Jurors heard a secret FBI recording of McClain telling former Madigan staffer Will Cousineau he hoped to convince people “to kick in a grand each … for six months” to help Kevin Quinn get by while he looked for work. Kevin Quinn is the brother of Ald. Marty Quinn (13th).
Cousineau testified that Kevin Quinn wound up working for Cousineau’s lobbying firm, Cornerstone Government Affairs, and he was paid. Another former Madigan staffer, Tom Cullen, acknowledged that he also made $6,000 in payments to Kevin Quinn at McClain’s request.
Another who benefited from Madigan’s alleged enterprise is the former speaker’s son: Andrew Madigan. Prosecutors tied $43,000 that Andrew Madigan made through his job at Alliant Insurance between 2019 and 2021 to an August 2018 conversation between Michael Madigan and Solis.
Solis sought help from Michael Madigan in June 2018 landing a paid seat on a government board as part of an FBI ruse. During a follow-up conversation about the board seat on Aug. 2, 2018, Solis promised the speaker, “I’m gonna help you.” Michael Madigan replied, “don’t worry about it.”
But moments later, Michael Madigan told him, “there’s one thing you can do.”
The speaker then convinced Solis to help Andrew Madigan get a meeting with officials at The Resurrection Project, a Pilsen not-for-profit. The agency ultimately hired Andrew Madigan’s firm, leading to the $43,000 in payments.
Neither Andrew Madigan nor Kevin Quinn have been accused of wrongdoing regarding their receipt of the money.
Michael Madigan spent a record 36 years leading the Illinois House of Representatives, where he controlled legislation that shaped every facet of life across the state. He resigned in 2021, shortly after charges were filed against McClain and three others with ties to ComEd.
The investigation, which dates back to 2014, led to charges against roughly 20 people. Nine were sentenced to prison, including Burke. and Acevedo.
Contributing: Dave McKinney and Matthew Hendrickson