Chicago

DuPage County prosecutors charged four Chicago men after a pre-dawn break-in at Maria's Gaming Café in Addison, Illinois. Authorities say a group of five, four of them armed, used stolen vehicles, sledgehammers and a crowbar to smash into the business and steal $13,847 from gaming machines in about two minutes. The getaway led police on a chase exceeding 100 mph before occupants fled on foot near Bellwood, dropping three guns, including a handgun modified to fire automatically. Keonte Adams, Dajuan Johnson, Kyronte McCondichie and Daryl Nesbit face charges including armed violence, burglary and unlawful possession of a machine gun. A judge denied pretrial release; all four return to court November 23.

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Division is sending roughly 1,000 federal monitors nationwide for Election Day, including to Pennsylvania counties where state law bars them from entering polling places. DOJ has said ICE and FBI personnel won't serve as monitors, though staff from agencies like the DEA, ATF and Federal Bureau of Prisons may participate without firearms or enforcement authority. Chicago has coordinated security with police, the FBI and emergency officials amid concerns over immigration enforcement near polling sites, while a coalition of civil rights groups is deploying lawyers and poll monitors. California is separately sending attorneys and observers to battleground districts, and DOJ continues legal challenges over noncitizen voter rolls.

Project 50, a political group founded by Illinois abortion-rights veterans including former state Sen. Heather Steans and ex-HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, is working to replicate Illinois' decades-old shift toward abortion access by targeting state legislative races in conservative states with bans or heavy restrictions. After early setbacks in Arizona, the group refocused on culturally conservative states in 2023, winning three races in its first three years and four more in 2025, including in Virginia. It has raised over $3.7 million from donors such as Michael Bloomberg and Gov. JB Pritzker. Organizers say the strategy targets voters uneasy with total abortion bans, not broad support for unrestricted access. Abortion-rights opponents call its electoral impact limited so far.

Chicago Police Department leaders faced sharp questioning from City Council members during a budget hearing over Mayor Brandon Johnson's newly announced gunshot detection pilot program. Interim Superintendent Fred Waller and other CPD officials said they had few details, telling alderpersons the city's Department of Procurement and Public Safety is leading the rollout, with CPD's role limited to helping select six pilot districts. Alderpersons including Matt O'Shea and Jason Ervin criticized the lack of transparency and unclear deployment timeline. The program follows the 2022 cancellation of ShotSpotter and a recent bid process for a replacement system. City officials expect to share implementation details in early November, with the six-month pilot planned for districts 2, 5, 7, 9, 10 and 11.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson is facing pushback from City Council members over how to allocate $75 million from the city's parking meter deal sale. Council approved the sale last month with funds earmarked for pensions, but Johnson's budget treats the $75 million as part of a supplemental pension payment rather than additional to it, as some alderpersons say was intended. Critics, including members of the Budget Accountability Coalition, are calling for a special Council meeting to resolve the issue, a change that would open a $75 million gap in Johnson's budget. The dispute adds fiscal pressure as Johnson seeks reelection in February against a growing field of challengers.

Parth Nayi, 29, of Woodridge, Illinois, has been sentenced to two years in federal prison for orchestrating hundreds of staged armed robberies between 2022 and 2024 at businesses across Chicago, its suburbs, and other states. Participants paid Nayi between $5,000 and $30,000 to be "robbed," then sought law enforcement certification as crime victims to apply for U visas, which offer legal status to victims who cooperate with investigators. Nayi paid business owners and recruited people to act as robbers.

One staged robbery turned real when a purported robber accidentally shot a liquor store clerk in Bucktown, critically injuring him. The case highlights vulnerabilities in the U visa program, which was designed to encourage crime victims to assist police.