Hear Sean Crawford s interview with Charlie Wheeler here.
How well have the efforts of Samuel Witwer and his 117 fellow delegates met the tests he laid out in the convention’s closing moments in the half century that’s passed since the convention’s final adjournment?
The question is especially timely now, as the citizens he cited ratified the delegates’ work 50 years ago this month, on December 15, 1970.
While hardly an unbiased observer covering Con-Con was this writer’s first major assignment as a fledgling reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times I believe the document has fared well, albeit with a handful of needed tweaks and a couple still pending.
HAMMOND â A Hammond man who nearly killed a store clerk in 2015 as he carried out a string of violent armed robberies could serve 28 years in prison and pay $723,445 in victim restitution if federal prosecutors get their way at sentencing.
Gregory J. Smith, 28, pleaded guilty in December 2019 before U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge Andrew Rodovich to nine felony counts that could carry a maximum penalty of decades in prison.
Smithâs girlfriends, Jessica Tate, of Hammond, and Heather Wright, of Gary, also were charged in the case. They allegedly committed the armed robberies using Tateâs car.
Smith, Tate and Wright carried out the robberies at Nate s Tobacco, 1403 173rd St., and Gallops Marathon, 6502 Kennedy Ave., both on Nov. 13; Witham s gas station, 2847 165th St., on Nov. 14; Boost Mobile, 3506 165th St., on Nov. 16; Hammond Liquors, 7448 Columbia Ave., Manny s Chicago Style Dawgs House, 6217 Kennedy Ave., and Briar East Liquors, 3217 169th St. â all
HAMMOND â Minutes after Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot stepped out of the Joliet City Council chambers Thursday night, the mayor from Hammond walked in, quickly addressing the elephant in the room.
âItâs tough to follow the great mayor of city of Chicago,â Thomas McDermott Jr. said as he took out his notes at the podium that laid out all the reasons he thinks the Joliet council should pick Hammond, not Chicago, to supply its drinking water for the next 100 years.
McDermott and Lightfoot and each respective teams pitched their final presentations to Joliet city officials Thursday night during a special council meeting, as Joliet approaches the end of its two-year alternative water source study.Â
GARY â After months of delay, federal prosecutors on Thursday filed an indictment against an ex-Gary city employee and close confidant of former Mayor Karen Freeman-Wilson for wire fraud.Â
Mary Cossey, a serial filer in bankruptcy court from Munster, was charged Aug. 4 by way of information in U.S. District Court, but for months, the U.S. Attorney s Office had agreed to hold off formally indicting Cossey in the fraud case.Â
Cossey is scheduled to be arraigned Friday on three counts of wire fraud.Â
It has not been disclosed why the federal government delayed Cossey s formal indictment by six months, but her attorney, Scott King, has suggested to The Times it was a pressure tactic and they may have been relying on Cossey for information in a broader investigation into someone else.
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