No Chicagoans Shot or Murdered Monday, But Watch Your Upper Left Thigh

Anyone notice how they didn't die or get shot on Monday? Everyone answer together now: "Yes." That's because no one in Chicago was murdered or shot on Monday! That's the first time since 1999 that we've had such a day. Go us.

Violent crime is down overall, which is one of the reasons for the zero-zero" day. Other reasons include luck. Police Superintendent Phil Cline told the Sun-Times that "We're down 112 homicides now, compared to last year… and we're down almost 1,000 shootings. The gangs are getting the message."

Too bad shoplifters aren't. A woman in a Schaumburg mall yesterday slashed two people after they tried to stop her from stealing a fur coat. The woman was tinkering with a fur coat that was secured to its display rack in Marshall Field's. An employee confronted the woman, the two scuffled, and the attacker slashed the employee on the upper left thigh and ran away (sans coat). When a customer tried to stop the attacker from fleeing, she too got slashed on the upper left thigh. The attacker made her escape by running into Sears, perhaps an attempt to see its softer, unslashing side. Both women were taken to the hospital, where the employee underwent surgery and the customer got 27 stitches and was released. Yikes.

The slasher, a black woman between 40 and 50 with a "wine or champagne glass tattoo on the left side of her neck" (hotttness?), fits the description of the woman wanted in two attempted fur thefts at other Marshall Field's locations. Jesus, lady.