(WTTW News)

State Rep. Bob Morgan said banning guns at polling places is necessary given rising security concerns surrounding elections. Gun rights advocates said the proposal is an answer in search of a problem.

A memorial is on display at the funeral of Chicago police Officer Ella French on Aug. 19, 2021. (WTTW News)

Officer Ella French was shot and killed during a traffic stop on Aug. 7, 2021. Emonte Morgan, 23, is charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder.

Robert Crimo Jr., left, pleaded guilty to seven counts of misdemeanor reckless conduct. (E. Jason Wambsgans / Pool / Chicago Tribune / AP via CNN Newsource)

Prosecutors over the past few years have been slowly, but steadily, expanding the notion of who can be held accountable for a mass shooting.

A memorial is on display at the funeral of Chicago police Officer Ella French on Aug. 19, 2021. (WTTW News)

Ex-Chicago police Officer Carlos Yanez Jr., who was critically wounded in the shooting that left his partner Ella French dead, said he has no recollection of the altercation itself, which left him severely injured.

Chicago police Officer Ella French (@TomAhernCPD / Twitter)

A sea of Chicago police officers and officials filled Judge Ursula Walowski’s fifth-floor courtroom as opening statements got underway at the Leighton Criminal Court Building Tuesday, more than two and a half years after Officer Ella French was killed.

Chicago police Officer Ella French (@TomAhernCPD / Twitter)

Jury selection in the trial of Emonte Morgan is set to begin Monday at the Leighton Criminal Court Building — more than two and a half years after he allegedly shot and killed the 29-year-old police officer.

A woman is taken to an ambulance after an incident following the Kansas City Chiefs NFL football Super Bowl celebration in Kansas City, Mo., Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024. (Reed Hoffmann / AP Photo)

It is the latest sports celebration in the U.S. marred by gun violence, following a shooting last year in downtown Denver after the Nuggets’ winning an NBA championship that injured several people, and gunfire last year at a parking lot near the Texas Rangers’ World Series championship parade.

(WTTW News)

Illinois’ assault weapons ban passed after a July 4, 2022, mass shooting in suburban Highland Park. The law banned the sale of AR-15s and scores of other guns beginning in January 2023. People who previously owned guns subject to the law are allowed to keep them, but the weapons must be registered.

People visit a memorial at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School to honor those killed on the 5th anniversary of the mass shooting on Feb. 14, 2023, in Parkland, Florida. (Saul Martinez / Getty Images / File)

From 2008 to 2017, about $12 million in federal research awards were granted to study pediatric firearm mortality each year – about $600 per life lost, according to a study published in Health Affairs. Motor vehicle crashes, the leading cause of death among children at the time, received about $26,000 of research funding per death.

State Rep. Dan Caulkins is pictured at an Illinois State Capitol news conference last year. He was again rejected by the Illinois Supreme Court this week in a case against the state’s assault weapons ban. (Capitol News Illinois file photo)

Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed the ban on the sale, possession and manufacture of a long list of firearms, high-capacity magazines and certain accessories in January 2023. State Rep. Dan Caulkins, R-Decatur, quickly challenged it. 

State Sen. Celina Villanueva speaks at a news conference about “Karina’s Bill” on Jan. 24, 2024. (Amanda Vinicky / WTTW News)

“Without this law, Illinois is putting targets on the backs of domestic violence survivors,” said Yolanda Androzzo, the director of the gun control advocacy group One Aim Illinois.

State Rep. Ryan Spain, R-Peoria, is pictured at the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules hearing Jan. 16, 2023, in Springfield. (Peter Hancock / Capitol News Illinois)

The law, named the Protecting Illinois Communities Act (PICA), has banned the sale of hundreds of specific guns and types of guns since Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed it in early 2023.

A gun store display is pictured in a file photo. (WTTW News)

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday denied to take up a petition filed by state Rep. Dan Caulkins, R-Decatur, that sought to overturn a ruling on a related case he’d brought before the Illinois Supreme Court.

Homicides in the US declined in 2023 compared to the year prior, including in cities like New York. (Theodore Parisienne / For NY Daily News / Getty Images)

National data from the FBI covering January to September 2023 showed an 8.2% drop in all violent crime, including a 15.6% drop in murders, compared to the same period in 2022. These declines were seen in cities over 1 million people and those under 10,000, and across all four regional quadrants of the US.

Top left: Mayor Brandon Johnson takes “Chicago Tonight” co-host Brandis Friedman around the Austin community on April 13, 2023. (Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News) Top right: The state Capitol. (WTTW News) Bottom left: Field Museum staff collected 1,000 dead birds Oct. 5, 2023, from the grounds of McCormick Place. (Courtesy of Taylor Hains) Bottom right: File photo of guns. (WTTW News)
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Chicago elected a new mayor, Illinois banned so-called assault weapons and the Boss played at Wrigley Field. Here’s what people were reading in 2023.

(WTTW News)

The law prohibits the possession, manufacture or sale of semiautomatic rifles and high-capacity magazines. It takes effect Jan. 1.