Chiraq: 10 dead and at least 29 others wounded over MLK weekend

MLK Legacy Apartments, on the site
where King lived

Violence never takes time off in Chicago and the three day Martin Luther King holiday weekend of course was no exception. Over the long weekend ten people were murdered and at least 29 others were wounded.

Of the deadly shootings, seven of them occurred on the West Side. It's almost forgotten now, but in 1966 King and his family moved to the West Side and they briefly lived in the North Lawndale neighborhood, where one of this weekend's gun fatalities took place.

This was the first weekend since the Department of Justice issued a report where it castigated the Chicago Police Department for excessive brutality, poor judgment, inadequate training, and ineffective oversight. However, John Kass, the Chicago Tribune's respected political columnist, correctly places the blame upon the city's longtime corrupt political culture, long dominated by the Democratic machine.