On Thursday afternoon, Mark Fitch, 44, tricked Oak Forest police into an hours long, one-sided standoff after leading them to believe that he was holed up inside his home, on the 5500 block of Babbette Court in Oak Forest, when he had really been at a bar the entire time talking to police on his cell phone. Fitch was eventually arrested outside a nearby Beggars Pizza. more ›

Robinson Taylor, 21, a student at Columbia College Chicago, took the role of the inside man in a recent home invasion, letting armed robbers into an Old Town apartment, where they beat his friends with brass knuckles and a handgun, according to Cook County prosecutors via the Chicago Tribune. Taylor was spotted on the security video on early Friday morning, opening the outer door to let the men inside. After beating the victims, the men stole computer and stereo equipment, before fleeing. Taylor allegedly climbed out a third-story window after the victims confronted. Police arrested him at 3:30 a.m. on Friday. He was held on Saturday in lieu of $450,000 bail on three felony counts of home invasion with a gun. more ›

Adam Hearn, 31, of the 900 block of South Main Street in Lombard, was charged with stabbing a security guard at Blackfinn American Saloon in Naperville after he and his girlfriend were caught smoking in the bathroom of the bar early Sunday morning. more ›

Deborah J. Cox, 58, of Naperville was arrested on Thursday and charged with aggravated criminal sexual abuse for allegedly having a sexual relationship with a student who graduated in June from Neuqua Valley High School, police said via the Chicago Sun-Times. Cox is a former teacher's aide at the school. The investigation initially began as a tip to the Naperville police last August. more ›

On Saturday around 5:30 p.m., police found two people dead with their throats slit and a third critically wounded in a North Side apartment in the 5800 block of North Winthrop Avenue, Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis said via the Chicago Sun-Times. Several suspects in the murders fled in a black or grey pickup truck and fired at a police squad car that was chasing it, injuring an officer. Police shot and killed the suspect, Weis said, and the other two men were taken into custody. The stabbing victims remain unidentified Sunday morning. more ›

Investigators have shut down an animal shelter in Tinley Park after a significant population of the animals within the shelter were found to be malnourished, sick, or dead. Authorities visited the shelter, Dazzle's Painted Pastures Animal Rescue and Sanctuary, this past Friday. What they found at the shelter was unpleasant and extremely disheartening:

Officers visited Dazzle's Painted Pastures on Friday with a search warrant. They found a dead miniature horse and a dead Himalayan cat. Officers seized 63 dogs, 31 cats and six rabbits. They also removed 30 horses, ponies, sheep, goats and llamas.

Candis Ricks, 29, a Streets and Sanitation department worker and mother of two, was killed on Saturday after an SUV and a car plowed into each other in Pilsen. Although there was an arrest following the crash, no charges have been filed as of Saturday night. The crash occurred in the 2100 block of South Damen around 1:30 a.m., as Ricks was traveling northbound on Damen in a Ford Escape SUV when her car was hit by a Ford Focus going west on 21st Street. The crash caused both vehicles to jump the curb and roll onto the sidewalk. more ›

On Thursday afternoon, a man walking his dog in Logan Square ended up preventing a 14-year-old girl from being sexually attacked, police said. As the girl got off the Diversey Avenue bus just after 5 p.m., she noticed a man--later identified as Larry E. Smith--following her. He allegedly ran up to her, threw her on the ground, and began to forcibly remove her clothing and his pants. She screamed and the man and his Great Dane ran over to her. "They came running over and the offender took off," Shakespeare District police Capt. Marc Buslik told the Chicago Sun-Times. "But the neighbor and the dog cornered him in the alley." The man and his dog kept Smith in the alley until police arrived. Smith, 28, was charged with attempted criminal sexual assault and already had a police record, including a 2009 conviction for public indecency. The 14-year-old was not seriously injured. more ›

Lazaro Montanez, 22, of the 3900 block of North Olcott Avenue, has been arrested in connection with a recent string of car thefts in the Belmont Heights neighborhood on the Northwest side. Montanez was charged with four counts of possession of a stolen vehicle and one count of possession of burglary tools, police said via Chicago Breaking News. more ›

Police arrested 18-year-old Bernard Williams yesterday in connection with the murder of Chicago police officer David Blake. Blae was found dead in his SUV on the 2900 block of West Seipp on the Souwhtwest side last month. more ›

Bo Hyun Nam, 46, was arrested and charged with four felony counts and one misdemeanor count of selling counterfeit merchandise after police seized more than $40,000 in counterfeit Casio watches, Nike shoes, and professional sports merchandise from his store on Thursday, police said via the Chicago Tribune. Nam was arrested on Saturday afternoon after police carried out a search warrant at his store, A-One Trading, located at 4536 N. Clark Street. more ›

Rene Ortega, 33, and Leonel Torres-Torres, 43, of the 100 block of North West Road, both face drug charges after a search of their home on Wednesday night uncovered 38 kilograms--about 84 pounds--of cocaine, officials said via the Chicago Tribune. Each man faces a charge of one count of unlawful possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, a sentence that usually carries between 15 and 60 years in prison, according to the DuPage County state's attorney's office. Both Ortega and Torres-Torres appeared before DuPage County Judge Liam Brennan on Friday morning, and both their bails were set at $1 million each. They will appear before Judge Daniel Guerin on January 10, 2011. more ›

Despite the Santa hat and fake fur coat that Adam Klimek, 35, was sporting on Friday, his mood was anything but jolly. Klimek was asked to leave the Brown Elephant store at 3651 N. Halsted in Lakeview because he was cursing at other customers and appeared to be intoxicated, police said via the Chicago Sun-Times. While he was escorted out of the store, Klimek allegedly pushed a store employee to the sidewalk before fleeing south on Halsted. Police caught up with him and told him he was under arrest, which caused Klimek to spit at and kick an officer in the shin, according to the police report. Klimek was charged with felony aggravated battery to police and misdemeanor counts of battery and criminal trespass. more ›

Cook County Commissioner Tony Peraica has scheduled a 1 p.m. press conference at Daley Plaza to address his weekend arrest in suburban McCook for allegedly tearing down campaign signs of his opponent in tomorrow's election, McCook Mayor Jeffrey Tobolski. more ›

A very un-Christian moment occurred during last week's musical tribute to Gospel music legend Albertina Walker when a nephew of the late "Queen of Gospel" and a family friend were charged with roughing up an ex-agent of Walker's. more ›

During a routine check on Friday afternoon, a revenue agent made a stop at H&Y Food Store at 3825 W. Chicago to make sure that cigarettes were being sold properly and not bootlegged. The agent spotted a large candy jar behind the counter in plain sight of the public, containing about 1,500 codeine pills, police said to the Chicago Sun-Times. Police discovered that the pills were being sold for $5 apiece and they also found a gun behind the counter. more ›

Marlow Sahron Land, Jr., 22, of the 17300 block of West Wausau Court in South Holland, was charged for riding his bike on an O'Hare Airport runway on Thursday night, and then attempting to go inside the terminal through a security entrance. Land received one count of criminal trespass, police said to the Chicago Sun-Times. He was detained after going through a secured area near the American Airlines terminal at O'Hare around 10:35 p.m. on Thursday. Land was held on $200,000 bond on Friday and has a preliminary hearing set for Oct. 14. more ›

Todd Stroger's (now-former) Deputy Chief of Staff spent the night in Cook County Jail after being arrested and charged with defrauding the county of $300,000 in a scandal involving multiple no-bid contracts awarded at a dollar threshold just low enough to avoid county board approval. Carla Oglesby was held on $250,000 bail after she was arrested Monday afternoon. State's Attorney Anita Alvarez served a warrant issued as part of an investigation by her financial crimes unit. more ›

Carla Oglesby, Todd Stroger's former deputy chief of staff, was arrested Monday afternoon by the Cook County State's Attorney's financial crimes unit on a warrant related to charges stemming from an ongoing corruption probe of Stroger's office. Oglesby was charged with theft of government property, money laundering and and official misconduct. more ›

Alvin Herbert, 50, of the 500 block of Des Plaines in Forest Park, was charged and cited with a dozen different counts after he allegedly tried to run over police officers around 12:40 a.m. early Saturday morning on the 100 block of East 95th Street. Police shot at the tire of Herbert's vehicle as he drove towards them, but no one was hit by gunfire or injured, police News Affairs Officer Hector Alfaro said to the Chicago Sun-Times. more ›

Law enforcement officials announced on Thursday that 55 people were arrested on state and federal charges after a series of successful investigations that targeted narcotics, gangs, and guns probes in Chicago. Members of six street gangs and several drug wholesalers were among those charged. more ›

People, we've gone over this before. Stay out of Buckingham Fountain. It is not a kiddie pool or a water park. Act like adults. Not that any of this stopped a trio - a 25-year-old man and two women, 20 and 19 - from jumping in. The trio were arrested last night around 6:20 p.m. after police saw them climbing and swimming in the fountain. Really? That was either one hell of a drug trip or they were huge fans of Married With Children. more ›

A Lebanese citizen was arrested over the weekend and charged with plotting a bombing attack outside of a night club in Wrigleyville. Sami Samir Hassoun, of the 4700 block of North Kedzie Ave., was arrested after having gone through with an attempted bombing on Saturday night. Two problems: his accomplice was an undercover FBI agents and what Hassoun thought were explosives in the backpack given to him but the undercover agent were actually fake. The incident happened just south of Wrigley Field, near Eddy & Clark. According to the Tribune, while Hassoun will be charged with just this incident, he's also talked about "a biological attack on the city, poisoning Lake Michigan, attacking police officers, bombing the Willis Tower and assassinating Mayor Richard Daley." more ›

• Bad news from the Field Museum where they'll be trimming 50 jobs from the staff.
• McHenry County State’s Attorney Louis Bianchi was indicted today on felony conspiracy charges.
• A suspect is being held in this week's shooting of a Bowen High School student.

We'd never thought there'd be something about Jay Mariotti we couldn't joke about but now there is one, when he allegedly took things a few steps too far in a suspected domestic abuse incident with his girlfriend in Los Angeles last weekend. And now the punishments are rolling in. Mariotti, a regular guest on ESPN's "Around The Horn," hasn't appeared on the World Wide Leader all week and it seems there are no plans to include him this week, either. Perhaps more importantly, Mariotti was suspended from his job as writer/blogger/blowhard over at AOL Fanhouse. 's Richard Deitsch also tweeted out the following statement from AOL: "We are continuing to gather all the facts. In the meantime, we have suspended Jay Mariotti and are not featuring any new work from him." In related news, Deadspin talked to the guy who reported the incident to police and have his account of what happened. more ›

If you can't take a bunch of knives into the Daley Center, it should go without saying that you can't take a gun in, either. But one man still tried this morning on the way to a hearing on the foreclosure of his home. Thomas Pridgeon, 48, showed up for his court hearing with a .45-caliber handgun tucked away in his briefcase with one bullet in the chamber and seven more in a clip. Pridgeon's defense when he was arrested and charged with unlawful use of a weapon: he forgot it was there. Tighter security has been in place at the Daley Center since the October 1983 Hutchie Moore shootings, when Moore, a wheelchair-bound police officer in the midst of a divorce trial, smuggled a gun into a courtroom where he opened fire, killing the presiding judge and an attorney. more ›

Jermaine Brazill, 19, from Dolton, was arrested in Danville and charged with the May 24 murder of Destin Hernandez, a 15-year-old honor student from Thornridge High School. Dolton police tracked Brazill to Danville and he was arrested on Aug. 13 by U.S. marshals and Dolton and Danville police. Brazill was charged with first-degree murder and is currently being held in Cook County Jail on $1 million bond, according to Dolton police detective Darryl Hope via the Chicago Sun-Times. "I got a lead that he was in the area, I coordinated with Danville police and got the marshals involved, we did surveillance, and once he was spotted we made the arrest," Hope said. more ›

Paul H. Schniedermeir, 26, of the 2100 block of North Milwaukee, has been charged with possession and manufacture of fraudulent driver's licenses, as well as drug charges, after police discovered evidence that he made at least 35 fake licenses in the past two weeks and sold them for $100 each. Police suspect that Schniedermeir may have sold hundreds of licenses to Chicago and suburban teens for the purpose of buying alcohol. At least 30 people have come forward and turned in their fake licenses, which were purchased at a Northwest Side storefront, Wilmette police revealed to the Chicago Sun-Times on Friday. Police have urged others with fake IDs to turn them in as well and noted that anyone who did so would not face charges. more ›

Although the Chicago Crime Commission only released their new list of the 10 Most Wanted criminals earlier this week, they've already made their first big capture. Sherry Halligan--who was accused of murdering a man in her LaGrange home in 2003--was caught 10 miles away from LaGrange in Palos Hills on Friday, ending a six year nationwide manhunt. Halligan was turned in by someone that recognized her from the list. more ›

On Thursday night, 20 people were arrested in a prostitution sting in Joliet, after the "numerous" complaints that police had received about prostitutes working near Joliet Central High School, according to Cmdr. Al Roechner. "We were concerned about this activity and have spent the last few weeks making arrests and shooing away suspected prostitutes," he said to the Chicago Sun-Times. Between 8:30 p.m. and 1 a.m., undercover police posed as prostitutes and arrested 20 people who stopped to solicit sex. "Stopping this kind of activity is a quality of life issue," Roechner said to the Sun-Times. A list of the arrested individuals can be found here. more ›