Extra, Extra

• Thanks for your help, Rod. Blagojevich wants to get rid of the "gift card grinch." It's a loophole that lets your gift card lose its value over time.


• Police on the Northwest Side have issued a community alert for a suspect in two attempted sexual assaults -- One on a 16-year-old girl, in the 3100 block of north Sawyer about 11 p.m. Sunday; the other a 23-year-old woman near the 3000 block of north Elbridge Avenue. Both victms were able to run away.


• The fight against police misconduct in Chicago continues. City Council could vote for a new agency to investigate allegations of brutality.


• Attorneys for a man who says he was beaten by a Chicago Fire Department paramedic two years ago released a videotape Monday that shows the man cowering as he takes blows to his face. However, his attacker has since died.


• Lawyers for convicted Brown's Chicken killer Juan Luna asked for a new trial Monday, saying errors by Judge Vincent Gaughan slanted the proceedings against their client. They said there weren't enough women allowed on the jury, although the one vote that spared him his life was made by a woman juror.


• Federal authorities say they have broken up a ring that allegedly used sham marriages to obtain green cards for foreign nationals by linking them to U.S. citizens in exchange for cash payments -- the ringleader Jeremy Stames is from Chicago.


• The turtle soup is back. After a 12-year hiatus -- not counting two appearances a few years back -- the dish made famous by the South Loop restaurant Binyon's will once again rear its head at Taste of Chicago. It will be served up by BB's, owned by Jack Binyon.


• Deep dish, the blues, and gambling? For the fifth straight year, casinos in the Chicago market rank No. 3 in the United States behind Las Vegas and Atlantic City in terms of gambling revenues.

"Summer In The Windy City" by kookybites