Former Ald. Ed Burke is in the custody of the Federal Bureau of Prisons at Federal Correctional Institution Thomson in Thomson, Illinois, nearly 150 miles west of his beloved hometown. He will begin his two-year prison sentence.

The Chicago City Council voted 44-3 to approve what supporters dubbed the Northwest Side Housing Preservation Ordinance, which expands two pilot programs that began in 2021 and makes them a permanent part of the city code.

Calling the measure illegal, Mayor Brandon Johnson said he would veto it.

The revised governmental ethics ordinance prevents what Board of Ethics Chair Steve Berlin called the “erasure of 13 years of reform.”

During the past eight years, city officials have paid at least $11.2 million to hire private attorneys to defend former Sgt. Ronald Watts and the officers he supervised, despite his criminal conviction and the hundreds of people he helped convict who have been exonerated.

The showdown set for Wednesday is the latest inflection point in the monthslong debate over whether ShotSpotter is an irreplaceable tool in the fight against gun violence or a waste of taxpayer funds.

During the first six months of 2024, Chicago taxpayers paid $40.5 million to resolve lawsuits alleging police officers committed misconduct, records show.

In an interview with WTTW News, Kennedy Bartley, 29, the managing deputy for external relations, said she feels deep regret about what she said in the wake of the August 2019 killing of Elijah McClain, of Aurora, Colorado. She declined to express regret for posting “From the river to the sea. Palestine will be free. Amen!”

In all, Chicago taxpayers spent $197.8 million to resolve 42 lawsuits brought by more than three dozen people wrongfully convicted based on evidence gathered by the Chicago Police Department between Jan. 1, 2019, and April 30, 2024, according to an analysis of city data by WTTW News.

U.S. District Court Judge John F. Kness ordered former Ald. Carrie Austin, 75, to undergo a physical examination by an expert doctor to determine whether she is too ill to stand trial, as her lawyers insist.

The city's inspector general said it was “troubling” that the city did not hold the firm that leases the city's parking meters accountable for seven years.

The move was announced Monday by Annette Guzman, the city’s budget director, and comes as city leaders stare down a $222.9 million deficit this year and a projected $982 million shortfall in the 2025 fiscal year.

Charles Cui, 53, of Lake Forest, was convicted in December alongside Ed Burke of one count of federal program bribery, three counts of using interstate commerce to facilitate an unlawful activity and one count of making a false statement to the FBI. 

Charles Cui, 53, of Lake Forest, was convicted in December alongside Ed Burke of one count of federal program bribery, three counts of using interstate commerce to facilitate an unlawful activity and one count of making a false statement to the FBI. 

The lawsuit filed by John Velez, who spent 17 years in prison before his conviction in the murder of 26-year-old Anthony Hueneca in Little Village was overturned, is set for trial for July 2025, U.S. District Court Judge Edmond Chang ruled Tuesday.

Ald. Daniel La Spata (1st Ward) is proposing to reduce Chicago’s citywide speed limit from 30 mph to 25. Advocates of the ordinance say the small change could significantly curb the amount of traffic injuries and fatalities, and improve public safety.