CHICAGO’S TOP COP GIVES SESSIONS AN EARFUL
Chicago Police Supt. Eddie Johnson, who met with U. S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions in Washington, D. C., Thursday, wants in.
Translation: Johnson — who was personally requested by Sessions to be part of a contingent of Major Cities Chiefs Association members to discuss the nation’s gun violence — asked Sessions to include the association in President Donald Trump’s new Task Force on Policing.
Explanation: “Johnson wants Chicago, which has the secondlargest police department in the country, at the table,” said a top police source. “At present, Trump’s task force on policing is only comprised of federal agency heads.”
With regard to the meeting in general, “The superintendent was very appreciative and thankful he was invited before Sessions gave his final decision on suggested sweeping police reforms President Obama’s attorney general, Loretta Lynch, recommended” for Chicago, the source said.
Sessions signaled last month he’s not on board with those reforms. But Mayor Rahm Emanuel has vowed to implement them anyway — something that might be difficult unless the Trump administration pushes to have a federal court monitor oversee them.
Sneed is also told Johnson talked about criminal- justice system failures by citing the three children shot and killed in Chicago in fewer than three days in February.
“He emphasized that all were innocent bystanders who had to pay the price for our criminal- justice system because all the suspects arrested had prior criminal histories,” said the source. “And the justice system did not take them off the streets.”
Among Johnson’s requests to Sessions:
1) More assistant U. S. attorneys detailed to Chicago to focus on prosecution of felons who commit violent crimes.
2) More federal agents to the city’s FBI, ATF and DEA task forces.
3) The development of a large- scale NIBIN lab ( National Integrated Ballistic Information Network) in Chicago that would more closely integrate ATF agents and Chicago Police officers when it comes to analyzing ballistics and tracing guns.
Other chiefs in the group included those from Washington, D. C., Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Virginia Beach and Montgomery County in Maryland.
Ivana tell ya . . .
Yikes! President Donald Trump’s first ex- wife, Ivana Trump, is no dumb bunny. She has figured out a way to raise big bucks by capitalizing on the Trump name by writing a memoir titled “Raising Trump,” which focused on motherhood and how she raised Donald Jr., Eric and Ivanka.
Since the couple’s tumultuous divorce after the Donald’s infidelity with Marla Maples, Ivana married twice more to husbands with a lot of consonants in their names, kept her mouth shut, and spends most of her life as far away from Trump as she can get.
Sneedlings . . .
I spy: Hey! Hey! March Madness: Retired NCAA basketball coach Bobby Knight, the secondwinningest NCAA basketball coach of all time — who won three NCAA basketball championships as head coach of Indiana — dining at Harry Caray’s Italian Steakhouse on Kinzie and talking about the night he had dinner with Harry Caray. . . . Auction maven Leslie Hindman and ace newspaper veteran Dorothy Collin spotted at Winnetka’s jewel of a French restaurant “Michael” last Saturday night. . . . Musician Billy “Smashing Pumpkins” Corgan celebrating his 50th birthday at Harry Caray’s on Monday afternoon. . . . Bulls’ Jimmy Butler at the Chicago Sports Museum on Tuesday night. . . . Actress Phylicia Rashad spotted dining at Gibsons recently. . . . Today’s birthdays: Rob Kardashian, 30; Rob Lowe, 53; Hozier, 27; and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, priceless.