Police Step Up Patrols After Lakefront, Downtown Mob Attacks (Mark: crime, tax)

[Chicagodan]

What in God’s name is going on here? According to Channel 2’s website today, “in the past three weeks, there have been more than 35 arrests for wilding and flash mob attacks” downtown and at North Avenue Beach. Two people riding their bikes on the path at North Avenue Beach were surrounded by about 100 teens, then knocked off and thrown into the lake. I live and work downtown and have never seen anything like this, but I do recall seeing similar stories on the news last year. This is insane and clearly needs to be dealt with. Has anyone ever seen anything like this?

[Alacran]

lol.That's some british type stuff

[Chicago60614]

Interesting that when the news station contacted the businesses and navy pier they all said it didn't happen??? I'm assuming they don't want to ruin their name or drive people away.

[Attrill]

The reporting on this is pretty thin - not much is verified. Hell, they use video from St. Paul in the story. There may be something there, but they certainly haven't shown it in that crappy report.

[ofcjim40]

These incidents have been reported all over Police blog sites and for weeks now. These incidents are very real and very dangerous. Remember the media is controlled by Daley and other top politicos. This looks very bad for tourism, etc. The politicians will always sacrifice the public's safety for appearances and tax dollars. The Daley machine has always been a wonderful spin machine for public perception. Just like any beat cop will tell you it's laughable that crime is down for it's 24th straight month or whatever other propaganda is being spewed.

[Attrill]

Originally Posted by ofcjim40

Remember the media is controlled by Daley and other top politicos. This looks very bad for tourism, etc...The Daley machine has always been a wonderful spin machine for public perception. Just like any beat cop will tell you it's laughable that crime is down for it's 24th straight month or whatever other propaganda is being spewed.

Ummm...no. The media loves sensational stories and will run with whatever will get them ratings, politicians be damned. This whole "Daley rules EVERYTHING" paranoia is insane. Especially in an age when everyone has cellphone cameras and posts any little thing to Facebook or Twitter. I can certainly imagine stores not releasing security videos and denying something happened, but I have a hard time imagining that scores of teenagers who must have been working at these stores didn't witness any of these things and post them online immediately.

Ultimately the report that was linked to was completely half-assed. There may be a story there, but they don't have it yet. If Daley controlled everything there would be no story running, it looks like something is happening, but it probably isn't as dramatic as they make it out to be.

[gullit]

Didn't the same thing happen last year at the exact same time?

[ERS-One]

Originally Posted by gullit

Didn't the same thing happen last year at the exact same time?

Yes. I witnessed something like this from afar last May - around Castaways. About a dozen squad cars showed up.

[Chi-town Native]

Originally Posted by Attrill

Ummm...no. The media loves sensational stories and will run with whatever will get them ratings, politicians be damned. This whole "Daley rules EVERYTHING" paranoia is insane. Especially in an age when everyone has cellphone cameras and posts any little thing to Facebook or Twitter. I can certainly imagine stores not releasing security videos and denying something happened, but I have a hard time imagining that scores of teenagers who must have been working at these stores didn't witness any of these things and post them online immediately.

Ultimately the report that was linked to was completely half-assed. There may be a story there, but they don't have it yet. If Daley controlled everything there would be no story running, it looks like something is happening, but it probably isn't as dramatic as they make it out to be.

yep... I'm reminded of the old quote "the problem with most conspiracy theories is they wildly overestimate the sophistication of the supposed conspirators."

[emathias]

Originally Posted by ofcjim40

These incidents have been reported all over Police blog sites and for weeks now. These incidents are very real and very dangerous. Remember the media is controlled by Daley and other top politicos. ...
Just like any beat cop will tell you it's laughable that crime is down for it's 24th straight month or whatever other propaganda is being spewed.

I have no problem with the police, but I wouldn't put much stock in anything "the average beat cop" told me about any subject if for no other reason than that in my experience officers on the street are extremely susceptible to "group think." I don't say this as a slur - any group that has a shared experience virtually unknown by the larger population is going to experience some degree of group think, especially when it's a hard, at times dangerous, experience.

While I think the political powers in any region have some degree of influence on the main stream media, to say that Daley's Machine "controls" the media is laughable. In this day and age, there would be well-documented blogger reports or youtube reports. Even if Daley controlled the Trib and/or the Sun-Times, he doesn't control YouTube and Facebook.

All that said, I have noticed a MARKED increase in police presence along Michigan Avenue, although the largest increase I saw coincided with Obama's Oprah trip, so I just chalked it up to that.