Man slain on way to dialysis treatment: police

Police at the scene of a fatal shooting early Saturday at Homicide at Eberhart and 95th Streets. (Peter Nickeas / Chicago Tribune / March 2, 2013)

By Peter Nickeas




Tribune reporter

7:54 a.m. CST, March 2, 2013

A 72-year-old man was shot and killed in his gangway on the Far South Side early Saturday morning as he left a home for dialysis treatment. 

The man's grandson was inside and heard the shots that killed his grandfather.

The man was shot about 3:30 a.m. and pronounced dead about 4 a.m., according to authorities.

The motive appears to be robbery, police said, but detectives are still investigating. 

Detectives remained at the scene, across from Chicago State University, into the morning.  

Police taped off the northeast corner of 95th Street and Eberhart Avenue, surrounding the two houses between which the man was killed. 

Check back for more information. 

pnickeas@tribune.com
Twitter: @peternickeas 

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Washington stares down start of sequester cuts

NEW YORK, March 1 (Reuters) - The U.S. government hurtled today toward making deep spending cuts that threaten to hinder the nation's economic recovery, after Republicans and Democrats failed to agree on an alternative deficit-reduction plan.

The $85 billion in across-the-board “sequestration” cuts were expected to cause airport delays, disrupt public services and result in lower pay or layoffs for millions of government workers.

Locked in during a bout of deficit-reduction fever in 2011, the time-released cuts can only be halted by agreement between Republican lawmakers and the White House.

That has proved elusive so far.

Both sides still hope the other will either be blamed by voters for the cuts or cave in before the worst effects - like air traffic chaos or furloughs for tens of thousands of federal employees - start to bite in the coming weeks.

Barring any breakthroughs in the next few hours, the cuts will begin to come into force at some time before midnight on Friday night. The full brunt of the belt tightening, known in Washington as “sequestration,” will take effect over seven months so it is not clear if there will be an immediate disruption to public services.

President Barack Obama meets top leaders of Congress at the White House at 10 a.m. EST (1500 GMT) to explore ways to avoid the unprecedented, across-the-board cuts totaling $85 billion.

But expectations were low for a deal when the Democratic president huddles with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, the top U.S. Republican, and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.

Democrats insist tax increases be part of a solution to ending the automatic cuts, an idea Republicans reject.

“We should work together to reduce our deficit in a balanced way - by making smart spending cuts and closing special interest tax loopholes,” Obama said on Thursday.

Congress can stop the cuts at any time after they start on Friday if the parties agree to that. In the absence of any deal at all, the Pentagon will be forced to slice 13 percent of its budget between now and Sept. 30. Most non-defense programs, from NASA space exploration to federally backed education and law enforcement, face a 9 percent reduction.

The International Monetary Fund warns that the cutbacks could knock at least 0.5 percentage point off U.S. economic growth this year and slow the global economy.

The prospect of weaker growth and a jump in unemployment caused by the cuts was being seen by some in the markets as making it more likely the U.S. Federal Reserve will need to maintain its ultra lose monetary policy for longer.

“The market is of the view that if there's a fiscal tightening which causes a significant negative impact on economic prospects and the labor market, then the Fed will have to respond,” said Ian Stannard, head of European FX strategy at Morgan Stanley.

Financial markets have also had a long time to assess the potential impact of the cuts on growth and believe it is not tantamount to a recession trigger.

“There is no immediate and visible impact to the economy so markets are not seeing it as a tail risk,” said Ayako Sera, a market economist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank in Tokyo.

DISEASE RESEARCH, WEAPONS HIT

If the cuts were to stay in place through September, the administration predicts significant air travel delays due to layoffs of airport security workers and air traffic controllers.

Some Pentagon weapons production could grind to a halt and the budget cuts would ripple through the sprawling defense contracting industry.

Meat inspections could get hung up, medical research projects on cancer and Alzheimer's disease canceled or curtailed and thousands of teachers laid off.

Instead of these indiscriminate cuts, Obama and Democrats in Congress urge a mix of targeted spending cuts and tax increases on the rich to help tame the growth of a $16.6 trillion national debt.

Republicans instead want to cut the cost of huge social safety nets, including Social Security and Medicare, that are becoming more expensive in a country with an aging population.

Meantime, Obama is edging closer to having to enforce the meat-axe approach.

By midnight, he is required to issue an order to federal agencies to reduce their budgets and the White House budget office must send a report to Congress detailing the spending cuts. In coming days, federal agencies are likely to issue 30-day notices to workers who will be laid off.

STILL TIME ON THE CLOCK

The question now appears to be how long the budget cuts will be allowed to happen. If budget cuts last only a few weeks, it is plausible they could have a marginal impact on growth and on employment. This is because some budget cuts won't translate into immediate spending cuts.

The Defense Department, for example, will probably not begin furloughing some 800,000 civilian workers until late April, after which these workers will work one day less per week. Budget cuts for capital spending could also be delayed.

The CBO estimates that only about half of the $85 billion in budget cuts planned from March through September would translate into lower spending during that period.

Once the furloughs and other spending cuts take hold, though, workers will feel the pinch, especially the 2.8 million people employed by the federal government.

Despite warnings that it had little flexibility on executing the cuts, White House budget office controller Danny Werfel outlined some steps that could come before major program cuts are instituted.

Federal travel, conferences and training classes could first be canceled, he said, as could worker bonuses and new hiring. Agencies have also been instructed to identify contracts and grants that could be canceled or delayed.

Even so, the process has already generated uncertainty among businesses that work with the federal government, as well as throughout the agencies that run Washington.

Referring to the partisan battles that have dominated budget fights for two years, Republican Representative Scott Rigell told Reuters: “This reminds me of a couple of crocodiles in a death grip underwater and they're running out of oxygen and we're all going down” with them.

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Low-key departure as Pope Benedict steps down

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict slips quietly from the world stage on Thursday after a private last goodbye to his cardinals and a short flight to a country palace to enter the final phase of his life "hidden from the world".

In keeping with his shy and modest ways, there will be no public ceremony to mark the first papal resignation in six centuries and no solemn declaration ending his nearly eight-year reign at the head of the world's largest church.

His last public appearance will be a short greeting to residents and well-wishers at Castel Gandolfo, the papal summer residence south of Rome, in the late afternoon after his 15-minute helicopter hop from the Vatican.

When the resignation becomes official at 8 p.m. Rome time (02.00 p.m. EST), Benedict will be relaxing inside the 17th century palace. Swiss Guards on duty at the main gate to indicate the pope's presence within will simply quit their posts and return to Rome to await their next pontiff.

Avoiding any special ceremony, Benedict used his weekly general audience on Wednesday to bid an emotional farewell to more than 150,000 people who packed St Peter's Square to cheer for him and wave signs of support.

With a slight smile, his often stern-looking face seemed content and relaxed as he acknowledged the loud applause from the crowd.

"Thank you, I am very moved," he said in Italian. His unusually personal remarks included an admission that "there were moments ... when the seas were rough and the wind blew against us and it seemed that the Lord was sleeping".

CARDINALS PREPARE THE FUTURE

Once the chair of St Peter is vacant, cardinals who have assembled from around the world for Benedict's farewell will begin planning the closed-door conclave that will elect his successor.

One of the first questions facing these "princes of the Church" is when the 115 cardinal electors should enter the Sistine Chapel for the voting. They will hold a first meeting on Friday but a decision may not come until next week.

The Vatican seems to be aiming for an election by mid-March so the new pope can be installed in office before Palm Sunday on March 24 and lead the Holy Week services that culminate in Easter on the following Sunday.

In the meantime, the cardinals will hold daily consultations at the Vatican at which they discuss issues facing the Church, get to know each other better and size up potential candidates for the 2,000-year-old post of pope.

There are no official candidates, no open campaigning and no clear front runner for the job. Cardinals tipped as favorites by Vatican watchers include Brazil's Odilo Scherer, Canadian Marc Ouellet, Ghanaian Peter Turkson, Italy's Angelo Scola and Timothy Dolan of the United States.

BENEDICT'S PLANS

Benedict, a bookish man who did not seek the papacy and did not enjoy the global glare it brought, proved to be an energetic teacher of Catholic doctrine but a poor manager of the Curia, the Vatican bureaucracy that became mired in scandal during his reign.

He leaves his successor a top secret report on rivalries and scandals within the Curia, prompted by leaks of internal files last year that documented the problems hidden behind the Vatican's thick walls and the Church's traditional secrecy.

After about two months at Castel Gandolfo, Benedict plans to move into a refurbished convent in the Vatican Gardens, where he will live out his life in prayer and study, "hidden to the world", as he put it.

Having both a retired and a serving pope at the same time proved such a novelty that the Vatican took nearly two weeks to decide his title and form of clerical dress.

He will be known as the "pope emeritus," wear a simple white cassock rather than his white papal clothes and retire his famous red "shoes of the fisherman," a symbol of the blood of the early Christian martyrs, for more pedestrian brown ones.

(Reporting By Tom Heneghan; editing by Philip Pullella and Giles Elgood)

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Kelly says win in Congressional primary a 'message' to the NRA

Former state Rep. Robin Kelly easily won the special Democratic primary Tuesday night in the race to replace the disgraced Jesse Jackson Jr. in Congress, helped by millions of dollars in pro-gun control ads from New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's political fund.

A snowstorm and lack of voter interest kept turnout low as Kelly had 52 percent to 25 percent for former U.S. Rep. Debbie Halvorson and 11 percent for Chicago 9th Ward Ald. Anthony Beale with 99 percent of precincts counted.

Kelly will formally take on the winner of the Republican primary in an April 9 special general election in the heavily Democratic district. In the GOP contest, less than 25 votes separated convicted felon Paul McKinley and businessman Eric Wallace.

Kelly framed her win as a victory for gun control forces.

"You sent a message that was heard around our state and across the nation," Kelly told supporters in a Matteson hotel ballroom. "A message that tells the NRA that their days of holding our country hostage are coming to an end.

"To every leader in the fight for gun control ready to work with President (Barack) Obama and Mayor (Rahm) Emanuel to stop this senseless violence, thank you for your leadership and thank you for your courage," she said.

Halvorson told supporters to rally around Kelly as the Democratic nominee. But Halvorson also made it clear she believed her biggest opponent was the mayor of New York, whose anti-gun super political action committee spent more than $2.2 million attacking her previous support from the National Rifle Association while backing Kelly.

"We all know how rough it was for me to have to run an election against someone who spent ($2.2) million against me," Halvorson said at Homewood restaurant. "Every 7½ minutes there was a commercial."

Bloomberg's Independence USA PAC was the largest campaign interest in the race and dominated the Chicago broadcast TV airwaves compared to a marginal buy by one minor candidate.

Beale also called Bloomberg's influence "the biggest disservice in this race."

"If this is the future of the Democratic Party, then we are all in big trouble," Beale said.

Bloomberg, an Emanuel ally in the fight for tougher gun restrictions, called Kelly's win "an important victory for common sense leadership on gun violence" as well as sign that voters "are demanding change" in a Congress that has refused to enact tougher gun restrictions, fearing the influence of the NRA.

But as much as Bloomberg sought to portray the Kelly win as a victory over the influential NRA, the national organization stayed out of the contest completely while the state rifle association sent out one late mailer for Halvorson.

Be it the TV ads or a late consolidation toward Kelly in the campaign, the former Matteson lawmaker made an impressive showing with Democratic voters in suburban Cook County, where the bulk of the district's vote was located, as well as on the South Side.

Despite the size of the field, Kelly got more than half of the votes cast in the two most populated areas of the district. Halvorson won by large percentages over Kelly in Kankakee County and the district's portion of Will County, but those two areas have very few votes.

The special primary election, by its nature, already had been expected to be a low-turnout affair — an expedited contest with little time for contenders to raise money or mount a traditional campaign.

Adding to the lack of interest was the fact that there were no other contests on the ballot in Chicago and most of the suburban Cook County portion of the district. Few contests were being held in Kankakee County and the portion of Will County within the 2nd District.

Turnout was reported to be around 15 percent in the city and suburban Cook. More than 98 percent of the primary votes cast in Chicago were Democratic, as were 97 percent of those cast in suburban Cook.

On the Republican side, the unofficial vote leader was McKinley, 54, who was arrested 11 times from 2003 to 2007, mostly for protesting, with almost all of the charges dropped. In the 1970s and '80s, McKinley was convicted of six felony counts, serving nearly 20 years in prison for burglaries, armed robberies and aggravated battery. He previously declined to discuss the circumstances of those crimes but has dubbed himself the "ex-offender preventing the next offender" in his campaign.

Records show McKinley also owes $14,147 in federal taxes, which might explain his answer at a forum when asked if he would cut any federal programs. "Certainly," he said. "The IRS."

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Porch collapses on 2 firefighters battling extra-alarm blaze

Two firefighters were hurt in an extra-alarm fire on the South Side early this morning

By Adam Sege




Tribune reporter

7:35 a.m. CST, February 26, 2013

Two firefighters were hurt when a porch collapsed at an extra-alarm fire in Gresham on the South Side this morning, sending them through the floor into the basement, officials said.

The collapse trapped both firefighters and officials called a mayday as firefighters scrambled to free them. They were finally able to reach the two by breaking through a side window, and the injured firefighters were taken to Little Company of Mary Hospital.

The firefighters, both veterans of the department, suffered relatively minor injuries but the situation "could have been a lot worse," said Deputy Fire Commissioner John McNicholas.

"Had we had fire in that basement, things could have been a different story here," he said.

The 2-11 alarm fire broke out about 3:40 a.m. in vacant home in the 8800 block of South Parnell Avenue, spreading to a house next door.   A family of five was living in the second home but escaped uninjured.

The cause of the fire was under investigation.

Tribune photographer John J. Kim contributed.

asege@tribune.com

Twitter: @AdamSege

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Storm watch issued as system bears down on Chicago

For the second time in less than a week, the Chicago area is in line for a snowstorm that promises a mixture of freezing rain, sleet and snow with enough accumulation to bring out the snow shovels.

Early predictions from the National Weather Service pegged the potential snowfall at about 3-6 inches, about what the storm left the end of last week. But the weather service says it's still unclear which areas will be hit with what: If the temperature is above freezing, there will be less snow, and if it's below, there will be more.

The weather service has issued a winter storm watch from Tuesday morning through the evening.

The weather service said the snow will start sometime after midnight Tuesday morning, with freezing rain turning to sleet to wet snow by early afternoon. With winds gusting about 35 mph, some of that snow will drift and made Tuesday a bad day on the roads.

The track of the storm is over the Texas panhandle northeast and through Missouri and southern Illinois and central Indiana, the Lake Erie area early Wednesday. North of the low pressure path, winter storm watches are in effect from late Monday through Tuesday from Missouri through northern Illinois, the southeastern corner of Wisconsin, extreme northern Indiana and much of Lower Michigan.

In the Chicago area, there could be heavy snow of 6 inches or more Tuesday generally north of Interstate 80, with northeast winds at 25 to 35 mph whipping and blowing the snow, according to the Chicago Weather Center.

Rain, a period of freezing rain and sleet will spread north out of central Illinois early Tuesday, changing over to a heavy wet snow in the Chicago metro area and across the far west through north suburbs into southern Wisconsin.

A combination of freezing rain, sleet and snow will cause hazardous driving across northern Indiana Tuesday. The precipitation will be all snow across Illinois later Tuesday.

According to the Chicago Weather Center, February has been an unusually snowy month during a winter that has been unusually snowless. Through Saturday, there has been 10.1 inches of snow, about 136 percent of normal, while the winter's total has been 13.6 inches, way below normal.

Midwest roundup

A wind-driven snowstorm blanketed eastern Colorado on Sunday, creating blizzard conditions on the High Plains and prompting the cancellation of 200 flights in and out of Denver International Airport, authorities said.

Gov. John Hickenlooper ordered all non-essential state workers to report to work two hours later than scheduled on Monday to give Denver snow plow drivers more time to clear city streets.

By early evening, 10 inches of snow had accumulated in the Denver metropolitan area, as snowfall tapered off. Blizzard conditions will remain through the night on the eastern Colorado plains, weather forecasters said.

"It's still snowing out there and there's been a lot of blowing and drifting that's made the roads tough," National Weather Service meteorologist Brad Gimmestad said.

The Denver International Airport remained open but travelers could expect delays of up to two hours as crews de-iced departing aircraft and plowed the runways, said spokeswoman Laura Coale. The airport typically handles about 1,500 flights on a Sunday.

A deep, low-pressure system near the Four Corners borders of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah had stalled, dumping heavy snow in eastern Colorado, the weather service's Jim Kalina said.

"That setup makes it a snow event mostly for areas east of the Continental Divide," Kalina said.

Reuters contributed

chicagobreaking@tribune.com

Twitter: @ChicagoBreaking

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28 fans hurt in fiery Daytona pile-up

A pile-up at the Daytona speedway on Saturday injured at least 28 fans after a 10-car crash sent car debris, including a tire, flying into the crowd in the final lap of the Nationwide NASCAR race.

Race officials said 14 fans were sent to nearby hospitals and another 14 were treated at the Florida track, which will host the prestigious Daytona 500 race on Sunday.

"Stuff was flying everywhere," spectator Terry Huckaby, whose brother was sent to the hospital with a leg injury, told the ESPN sports network. "Tires were flying by and smoke and everything else."

Among the injured were a 14-year-old boy in critical but stable condition, and a man who was in surgery for a life-threatening head injury, according to ESPN.com.

Joie Chitwood, president of the Daytona International Speedway, said Sunday's main race would go ahead despite the incident as crews were repairing the track and the grandstand.

"First and foremost, our thoughts and prayers are with our race fans," Chitwood said. "Following the incident, we responded appropriately according to our safety protocols and had emergency medical personnel at the incident immediately."

Tony Stewart won the race at Saturday's event, which is the curtain-raiser for American stock car racing's biggest event on Sunday which will feature Danica Patrick as the first woman to start on pole position.

CAR SENT AIRBORNE

Saturday's wreck happened after driver Regan Smith, who was leading the race, attempted to block another driver as they were nearing the checkered flag and hit the other car, a report on NASCAR.com said.

"My fault," Smith, who finished 14th, told NASCAR.com. "I threw a block. I'll take the blame for it. But when you see the checkered flag at Daytona, you're going to block, and you're going to do everything you can to be the first car back to the stripe. It just didn't work out today. Just hoping everything is okay, everyone who was in the wreck and all the fans."

The crash sent driver Kyle Larson's car airborne and ripped out its engine, although he climbed out of the wreckage afterward unhurt.

"I was getting pushed from behind, it felt like," Larson told ESPN after the crash.

"By the time my spotter said, 'Lift,' or to go low, I believe, it was too late and I was in the wreck. Then I felt like it was slowing down, and it looked like I could see the ground, and had some flames in the cockpit. Luckily, I was all right and could get out of the car quick," he added.

The injured were carried away on stretchers from the chaotic scene in the stands. They were taken to Halifax Health Medical Center and Florida Hospital Memorial Medical Center in Daytona Beach.

NASCAR's vice president of race operations, Steve O'Donnell, said that the fencing, which was ripped through by the flying debris, was being replaced and the incident would be reviewed.

"We're very confident that we'll be ready for tomorrow's event with the 55th running of the Daytona, but as with any of these incidents, we'll conduct a thorough review, we'll work closely with the tracks as we do for all our events, learn what we can and see what we can apply in the future," he said.

It is rare that spectators get hurt in American racing, but it has happened before. In 2009, Carl Edwards's car slammed into the catch fencing at Talladega and injured nine fans. Three were killed in Charlotte, North Carolina, a decade earlier in the IndyCar Series, and three others were killed in 1998 in Michigan during CART's U.S. 500.

Driver Michael Annett of the Richard Petty Motorsports team was treated at the Halifax Health Medical Center in Daytona Beach for bruises to his chest and sternum received in a crash on the 116th lap of the 120-lap race. He was given a CT scan and was being kept in for observation, the team said in a statement.

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Charges filed in slaying of Clemente High School student

Authorities filed charges against a 34-year-old man in connection with the shooting death of an 18-year-old Clemente High School student killed on the West Side last week.

Larry Luellen Jr., 34, was charged with first degree murder in the death of Frances Colon. Luellen is due in court today.

Luellen lives in the 3900 block of West Division Street in West Humboldt Park, around the corner from where Colon was shot. Police don't believe she was the target.

Colon is the third student at Roberto Clemente to be killed this school year, according to the school's principal Marcey Sorensen.

Rey Dorantes, 14, of the 2400 block of West Augusta Boulevard, was shot and killed on Jan. 11. His death came about a month after another Clemente student, 16-year-old Jeffrey Stewart, of the 5200 block of West Race Avenue, was shot and killed on Dec. 9.

Colon was a senior who was preparing to attend college. Hours before the shooting, she had watched President Barack Obama speak at Hyde Park Academy on the South Side about gun violence, according to her father.

Check back for more information.

pnickeas@tribune.com
Twitter: @peternickeas

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Storm loses punch, but still socks morning commute

A winter storm that buried the Great Plains in more than a foot of snow lost some of its punch as it blew through Chicago overnight, but it still managed to slow the morning commute with slick roads and dozens of spinouts on expressways.

Snow began tapering off around 5:30 a.m., but the National Weather Service was warning of freezing drizzle through the morning and light snow in the afternoon. A winter weather advisory remains in effect until 6 p.m.

At 6 a.m., 2.7 inches had fallen at O'Hare International Airport, tying the highest total recorded there this winter, according to the National Weather Service. Accumulation ranged from 2 to 5 inches throughout the area, according to the Chicago Weather Center.

At the height of the storm shortly after midnight, state police described road conditions as "horrible." But conditions had improved by the time the morning rush hour began. Still, state police said they had responded to 22 accidents as of 7 a.m. but there were many other spinouts that didn't require their assistance.

The city of Chicago sent 284 plows to work clearing main thoroughfares, according to the Streets and Sanitation Department.

Dozens of schools closed because of the storm, or delayed start times.

The storm, which is moving toward the Northeast, has forced the cancellation of nearly 400 flights at O'Hare and delays for 80 more.

Flurries could linger into the weekend, with a chance for light snow on Saturday.  High temperatures both days should be around 30, with lows in the low 20s and high teens both mornings.

Kansas bore the brunt of the storm, with up to 15 inches of snow in some parts of the state, according to the National Weather Service. A 200-mile stretch of Interstate 70 in central Kansas was closed and strewn with cars stuck in snow.

National Guard troops riding in Humvees were dispatched to look for stranded motorists along the interstate and other highways, said Sharon Watson, a spokeswoman for Kansas emergency management services.

The fierce storm triggered severe thunderstorms from eastern Texas to Georgia. Thunder accompanied snow in Kansas City, hit by 2 to 3 inches of snow per hour on Thursday morning.

"When there is thunder and lightning, it's a pretty screaming clue that you are going to have massive snowfall," said Andy Bailey, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Pleasant Hill, Missouri.

Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon and Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback declared states of emergency because of hazardous travel and possible power outages. Brownback ordered state offices closed because of the storm.

Kansas City International Airport was closed on Thursday while crews cleared runways. It was unclear when the airport would reopen, spokesman Joe McBride said.

At the Denver International Airport, some 55 commuter flights were canceled overnight, spokeswoman Laura Coale said. More than 320 flights in and out of Lambert-St. Louis International Airport were scrapped and nearly 50 flights in and out of Omaha's Eppley Airfield were listed as canceled by midday.

In Nebraska, a 19-year-old woman was killed in a two-car accident on Wednesday on Interstate 80 near Giltner. The Nebraska State Patrol said weather was a factor.

An 18-year-old man died in Oklahoma when his vehicle slid into a semi-truck on a slushy state highway, the state's highway patrol said.

The storm is expected to reach the East Coast this weekend, delivering heavy snow to parts of New England for a third straight weekend, from northern Connecticut to southern Maine.

Reuters contributed

chicagobreaking@tribune.com

Twitter: @ChicagoBreaking

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Judge poised to rule in Drew Peterson case

Drew Peterson could be sentenced to up to 60 years in prison today if a judge rejects defense team arguments that his former lead attorney's inept trial performance violated his constitutional rights to a fair trial.

Judge Edward Burmila is expected to rule Thursday whether the former Bolingbrook police sergeant will get a new trial, a rarely granted motion.

If not, Burmila will begin a sentencing hearing at which prosecutors have said they plan to argue Peterson also killed his fourth wife, Stacy, who went missing in 2007, in asking for the maximum sentence.

Peterson, 59, was convicted by a jury last fall of first-degree murder in the 2004 bathtub drowning of his third wife, Kathleen Savio.

Among the oddities Wednesday, during the unusual hearing on post-trial motions that has stretched across two days, was former Peterson lead attorney Joel Brodsky chatting in a courthouse hallway with Stacy's sister Cassandra Cales.

Both declined to detail their conversation. “We were just discussing how to make sure that her sister Stacy isn't forgotten after Drew goes away,” Brodsky said.

Much of Wednesday's hearing focused on Brodsky's trial decision to call Wheaton divorce attorney Harry Smith, who represented Savio in her bitter divorce fight with Peterson and also fielded a call from Stacy about her divorce options shortly before she vanished.

Smith testified at trial that Stacy had asked him if the fact that Peterson killed his third wife could be used as leverage in a divorce.

Several jurors said after trial that the testimony convinced them of Peterson's guilt. There was no physical evidence tying Peterson to Savio's death, which was initially treated as an accident.

Retired Cook County Judge Daniel Locallo, called as a witness by Peterson's attorneys, blasted Brodsky for calling Smith, saying the testimony for the first time at trial connected Peterson to Savio's death.

The retired judge said that, in his opinion, Brodsky's decisions constituted ineffective assistance of counsel, which can be grounds for a new trial.

“It was an awful decision,” defense attorney Steve Greenberg later argued in court. “It ruined the case -- we brought out the worst possible evidence, and the best evidence for the state.”

The defense team also attempted to call to the stand Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow to explain his comment in a courthouse hallway during the trial that Smith's testimony was “a gift from God.”

Greenberg wanted to use the statement to contradict prosecutors' argument that Smith's testimony was part of well-thought-out defense strategy.

Burmila first called Glasgow to be sworn in, but stopped the process after prosecutors said Peterson had failed to meet the legal standards necessary to call him.

Assistant State's Attorney Marie Czech argued that Brodsky's decision to call Smith was a calculated risk to discredit Stacy by attempting to show she was out for money, and not grounds for a new trial.

“There was a strategic decision,” she argued. “It was well-conceived.”

Greenberg argued that the upside was so small and the risks so monumental that there was no way Brodsky's decision could have been part of a reasonable trial strategy.

“Whatever kernel of impeachment Mr. Brodsky thought he was going to get out of it paled in comparison to the mountain of damage that it brought out,” Greenberg said. “It was awful strategy, and that strategy alone means Mr. Peterson should get a new trial from this court.”

Brodsky, who could be heard sighing loudly as he listened to Wednesday's arguments in an overflow room, continued to assert that he was not alone in the decision to call Smith, saying Greenberg supported the decision.

“A number of lies and misrepresentations were made about me today, but you know, I've got tough skin,” Brodsky said. “I can handle that.”

Stacy's older sister Cales said she was “very excited” that Peterson could be sentenced Thursday.

“Even if he gets the minimum of 20 years, technically that's life for him because he's an old man,” she said.

Cales said that she still holds out hope that someone will come forward with information about her sister's disappearance. Prosecutors have said they are reviewing the case again with an eye to possibly bringing charges.

“Maybe that person out there will have a conscience and come forward because Drew will be away at prison and will be unable to hurt them,” Cales said.

mwalberg@tribune.com
sschmadeke@tribune.com

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Police shoot robbery suspect in Bucktown intersection

Chicago police chased a robbery suspect from River North into Bucktown and shot him after he tried to run over an officer, according to authorities.

Police said the man wanted in more than a dozen robberies of North Side convenience stores and restaurants. He was wounded after robbing a Subway shop on State Street just north of Chicago Avenue, police said.

Officers working a robbery mission team pursued an SUV that matched the description of one fleeing the scene to the intersection of North, Milwaukee and Damen avenues. The man tried to run over an officer after backing into a squad car, police said in a statement.

The man did not respond to commands and made suspicious movements inside the vehicle before he was shot, and police said they recovered a weapon at the scene.

The man, whose age was not available, was taken to Stroger Hospital.

Police from a number of nearby districts responded to the scene after officers called a "10-1," a term used to signal an officer, firefighter or paramedic in distress. Detectives from two of the three city detective areas also responded.

Detectives approached people at the bars that line the intersection, asking if anyone saw anything.  Police blocked access to the area and the CTA rerouted its bus traffic around the intersection.

Hours after the shooting, as the bars wrapped up for the night, people stood outside smoking and exchanging stories of the cop cars they saw speeding toward the scene.

The other robberies linked to the suspect usually occurred between 11:30 p.m. and 2:15 a.m. They included hold-ups within two hours of each other at 2200 N. Lincoln Avenue and 300 W. Chicago Avenue early in the morning of Feb. 6.

pnickeas@tribune.com
Twitter: @peternickeas

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Prosecution details 'horrific' murder case against Pistorius

PRETORIA -- "Blade Runner" Oscar Pistorius put on his artificial legs and walked across his bedroom before firing four handgun rounds into the locked bathroom door, killing his cowering girlfriend in cold blood, prosecutors said on Tuesday.

Reeva Steenkamp, a law graduate and model, died after being hit by three rounds, prosecutor Gerrie Nel said.

Pistorius wept uncontrollably in court as Nel outlined details of a shooting that has gripped South Africa and the millions around the world who saw the double amputee's track glory as the ultimate tale of triumph over adversity.

Scores of mourners gathered in the coastal city of Port Elizabeth for Steenkamp's funeral, where the mood was one of grief tinged with anger at the loss of "an angel".

In Pretoria central magistrate's court, defense lawyer Barry Roux disputed the murder charge, saying the facts surrounding the shooting in the early hours of Thursday were unclear.

"All we really know is she locked herself behind the toilet door and she was shot," he told the packed courtroom.

However, the prosecution painted a picture of premeditated killing - a crime that carries a life sentence in South Africa.

"If I arm myself, walk a distance and murder a person, that is premeditated," he said. "The door is closed. There is no doubt. I walk seven meters and I kill."

"The motive is 'I want to kill'. That's it," he added. "This deceased was in a 1.4 by 1.14 meter little room. She could go nowhere. It must have been horrific."

The arrest of Pistorius, 26, stunned the millions who had watched in awe last year as the Olympic and Paralympic sprinter reached the semi-final of the 400 meters in the London Olympics, running on high-technology carbon fiber 'blades'.

Initial reports suggested he might have mistaken Steenkamp for an intruder - a possibility in crime-ridden South Africa and a version Pistorius told his sister immediately after the shooting, Nel said.

The prosecution countered this theory by saying Steenkamp's overnight bag had been found in the bedroom of the plush two-storey home in a gated compound north of Pretoria.

Later, in an affidavit read out by defense lawyer Barry Roux, Pistorius said he had been "deeply in love" with Steenkamp and had no intention of killing her.

'ROT IN JAIL'

Dressed in a dark suit, Pistorius arrived at the court in a police car shortly before 7 a.m. (0500 GMT). Proceedings were delayed as more than 100 journalists from around the world jostled to get into the dimly lit, brick-face courtroom.

The case has drawn further attention to endemic violence against women in South Africa after the gang-rape, mutilation and murder of a 17-year-old near Cape Town this month.

Members of the Women's League of the ruling African National Congress protested outside the building, waving placards saying: "No Bail for Pistorius" and "Rot in jail".

At Steenkamp's cremation in the windswept Victoria Park Crematorium in Port Elizabeth, sorrow mingled with outrage.

"She was an angel. She was so soft, so innocent. Such a lovely person. It's just sad that this could happen to somebody so good," said Gavin Venter, an ex-jockey who worked for Steenkamp's father.

"I'm disgusted with what he did. He must be dealt with harshly," he added. "Without a doubt he's a danger to the public. He'll be a danger to witnesses. He must stay in jail."

After the hour-long private ceremony in the cream-colored hill-top church, Steenkamp's brother Adam and uncle Mike, fighting back tears, spoke briefly to reporters.

"There's a space missing inside all the people that she knew that can't be filled again," Adam Steenkamp said. "We are going to keep all the positive things that we remember and know about my sister. We will miss her."

The case has gripped sports-mad South Africa, where Pistorius was seen as a rare hero who had transcended the racial divides that persist 19 years after the end of apartheid.

Pistorius' endorsements and sponsorships, which include sportswear giant Nike, British telecoms firm BT, sunglasses maker Oakley and French designer Thierry Mugler, are thought to be worth as much as $2 million a year.

Nike said on Monday it had dropped Pistorius from any future advertising campaigns. Other sponsors have said they will make no decisions until the legal process has run its course.

Pistorius has cancelled scheduled track appearances in Australia, Brazil and Britain in the coming months to focus on his attempt to clear his name.

Born without a fibula in either leg, Pistorius had his lower legs amputated as an 11-month-old baby but became the highest-profile athlete in the history of the Paralympic Games.

In last year's Paralympics he suffered his first loss over 200 meters in nine years. After the race he questioned the legitimacy of Brazilian winner Alan Oliveira's prosthetic blades, but was quick to express regret for the comments.

Reuters

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2 questioned in fatal shooting of Chicago teen

Janay McFarlane, 18, was shot on the way to a store, the same day Obama spoke on gun violence.

Two people are being questioned in connection with the fatal shooting of an 18-year-old Chicago woman who was killed Friday, the same day her sister attended President Barack Obama's speech on gun violence, officials said Sunday.

An 18-year-old man and a 20-year-old man are considered persons of interest in the homicide investigation and are being questioned by North Chicago police and officials from the Lake County State's Attorney's Office in connection with the death of Janay McFarlane, according to a statement released Sunday afternoon by North Chicago police.

The men were arrested after McFarlane was shot at about 11:30 p.m. Friday on the  1300 block of Jackson Avenue in the northern suburb.

Angela Blakely, McFarlane’s mother, said she knew few details about the investigation but was encouraged by the news of the arrests.

“I’m just hoping that they do find out who did this to my baby, so they can pay for the crime they committed,” she said.

Blakely urged anyone with information about the killing to talk with police.

McFarlane, 18, of the 8900 block of South Lowe Avenue, was in North Chicago visiting family and friends and was walking with friends when she was shot, according Blakely. McFarlane was walking with friends, one of whom may have been the intended target, Blakely said.

When police responded to a call of shots being fired in the area they found McFarlane fatally shot, police said. They canvassed the area and were tipped off to the men who were taken in for questioning, according to police.

McFarlane was killed just hours after her sister, Destini Warren, 14, had attended President Barack Obama's speech against gun violence Friday.

Blakely, the mother of both girls, said that the family had been anticipating the President's visit to the school where Destini is a freshman.

Leading up to the visit, McFarlane frequently mentioned the recent death of Hadiya Pendleton, 15, whose own shooting death a mile from the Obama's home spurred the President's visit.

"It's terrible, it's terrible the only thing I can remember is my daughter telling me, 'Mommy, it's so sad about Hadiya. That makes no sense,' " Blakely said. "She always asked me a lot of questions about death."

The speech resonated even more when her family got the call from McFarlane's father in North Chicago, who told Destini that her sister was dead, she said.

"It was like real painful," said Destini, her voice choking back tears.

North Chicago officials said McFarlane's killing is the first in the northern suburb since October. The October slaying was the only homicide for the town last year.

chicagobreaking@tribune.com

Twitter: @ChicagoBreaking

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Woman shot, killed hours after sibling attends Obama speech

Hours after Destini Warren, 14, attended President Barack Obama’s speech against gun violence Friday, her family learned of a terrible irony.

Destini’s sister, Janay McFarlane, 18, was the victim of the very thing that the President was condemning at Hyde Park Academy in Chicago.

McFarlane, of the 8900 block of South Lowe Avenue, was visiting friends and family in North Chicago when she was shot on her way to a store in the northern suburb, her family said.

She was pronounced dead at 11:30 p.m., shortly after sustaining a single gunshot wound to her head, according to the Lake County Coroner’s office.

North Chicago Police officials did not return calls for comment Saturday.

Angela Blakely, the mother of both girls, said that the family had been anticipating the President's visit to the school where Destini is a freshman.

Leading up to the visit, McFarlane frequently mentioned the recent death of Hadiya Pendleton, 15, whose own shooting death a mile from the Obama's home spurred the President's visit.

“It's terrible, it's terrible the only thing I can remember is my daughter telling me, 'Mommy, it's so sad about Hadiya. That makes no sense,'“ Blakely said. “She always asked me a lot of questions about death.”

Blakely said that McFarlane was still trying to make sense of the violence that claimed Pendleton’s life. She kept questioning why someone so innocent could die from violence.

McFarlane, who attended Hyde Park Academy before she became pregnant with her son Jayden — 3-months-old — and dropped out, was excited that her younger sister was able to attend Obama’s speech.

Destini said that during the days before the President arrived to Chicago, her sister would come by and talk to her about the visit. Destini said she last spoke to her sister on Thursday night before the younger girl went to sleep.

“She was like 'Just tell me how it's going to be.' She was excited for me,” said Destini. “ (The violence) was really wracking her because she was talking to my momma about Hadiya.”

Destini said she was sitting on a bench about two rows behind the President on stage listening as he spoke about gun violence.

“I could relate to it because that's been happening to a lot of people,” said Destini.

The speech resonated even more when her family got the call from McFarlane's father in North Chicago, who told Destini that her sister was dead, she said.

“It was like real painful,” said Destini, her voice choking back tears.

Since President Obama's speech on Friday, two people have been killed and six injured by guns in Chicago.

csadovi@tribune.com

Freelance reporter Ruth Fuller contributed

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More than 1,000 injured when meteor explodes over Russia

CHELYABINSK, Russia—

Thousands of Russian emergency workers went out on Saturday to clear up the damage from a meteor that exploded over the Ural mountains, damaging buildings, shattering windows and showering people with broken glass.

Divers searched a lake near the city of Chelyabinsk, where a hole several feet wide had opened in the ice, but had so far failed to find any large fragments, officials said.

The scarcity of evidence on the ground fuelled scores of conspiracy theories over what caused the fireball and its huge shockwave on Friday in the area which plays host to many defense industry plants.

Nationalist leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky told reporters in Moscow it could have been "war-mongers" in the United States. "It's not meteors falling. It's a new weapon being tested by the Americans," he said.

A priest from near the explosion site called it an act of God. Social media sites were flooded with speculation about what might have caused the explosion, if not a meteorite.

"Honestly, I would be more inclined to believe that this was some military thing," said Oksana Trufanova, a local human rights activist.

Asked about the speculation, an official at the local branch of Russia's Emergencies Ministry simply replied: "Rubbish".

Residents of Chelyabinsk, an industrial city 1,500 km (950 miles) east of Moscow, heard an explosion, saw a bright light and then felt a shockwave that blew out windows and damaged the wall and roof of a zinc plant.

A fireball traveling at a speed of 30 km (19 miles) per second according to Russian space agency Roscosmos, blazed across the horizon, leaving a long white trail visible as far as 200 km (125 miles) away.

NASA estimated the meteor was 55 feet across before entering Earth's atmosphere and weighed about 10,000 tons.

It exploded miles above Earth, releasing nearly 500 kilotons of energy - about 30 times the size of the nuclear bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima in World War Two, NASA added.

"We would expect an event of this magnitude to occur once every 100 years on average," said Paul Chodas of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

"When you have a fireball of this size we would expect a large number of meteorites to reach the surface and in this case there were probably some large ones."

DIVERS SEARCH LAKE

Search teams said they had found small objects up to about 1 cm (half-an-inch) wide that might be fragments of a meteorite, but no larger pieces.

The Chelyabinsk regional governor said the strike caused about 1 billion roubles ($33 million) worth of damage.

Life in the city had largely returned to normal by Saturday although 50 people were still in hospital. Officials said more than 1,200 people were injured, mostly by flying glass.

Repair work had to be done quickly because of the freezing temperatures, which sank close to -20 degrees Celsius (-4 Fahrenheit) at night.

Emergencies Minister Vladimir Puchkov inspected the damage after President Vladimir Putin sent him to the region.

His ministry is under pressure to clean up fast following criticism over the failure to issue warnings in time before fatal flooding in southern Russia last summer and over its handling of forest fires in 2010.

Putin will also want to avoid a repeat of the criticism that he faced over his slow reaction to incidents early in his first term as president, such as the sinking of the Kursk submarine in 2000 which killed all 118 people on board.

($1 = 30.1365 Russian roubles)

Additional reporting by Katya Golubkova, Writing by Timothy Heritage; Editing by Andrew Heavens

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500 hurt when 10-ton meteorite explodes over Russia

CHELYABINSK, Russia -- More than 500 people were injured when a meteorite shot across the sky and exploded over central Russia on Friday, sending fireballs crashing to Earth, shattering windows and damaging buildings.

Russia's Academy of Sciences estimates size of Urals meteor at 10 tons, according to the Associated Press.

People heading to work in Chelyabinsk heard what sounded like an explosion, saw a bright light and then felt a shockwave according to a Reuters correspondent in the industrial city 950 mileseast of Moscow.

A fireball blazed across the horizon, leaving a long white trail in its wake which could be seen as far as 125 miles away in Yekaterinburg. Car alarms went off, windows shattered and mobile phone networks were interrupted.

"I was driving to work, it was quite dark, but it suddenly became as bright as if it was day," said Viktor Prokofiev, 36, a resident of Yekaterinburg in the Urals Mountains.

"I felt like I was blinded by headlights," he said.

No fatalities were reported but President Vladimir Putin, who was due to host Finance Ministry officials from the Group of 20 nations in Moscow, and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev were informed.

A local ministry official said such incidents were extremely rare and Friday's events might have been linked to an asteroid the size of an Olympic swimming pool due to pass Earth at a distance of 17,100 miles but this was not confirmed.

Russia's space agency Roscosmos said the meteorite was travelling at a speed of 19 miles per second and that such events were hard to predict. The Interior Ministry said the meteorite explosion had caused a sonic boom.

Russia's Emergencies Ministry said 514 people had sought medical help, mainly for light injuries caused by flying glass, and that 112 of those were kept in hospital. Search groups were set up to look for the remains of the meteorite.

"There have never been any cases of meteorites breaking up at such a low level over Russia before," said Yuri Burenko, head of the Chelyabinsk branch of the Emergencies Ministry.

WINDOWS BREAK, FRAMES BUCKLE

Windows were shattered on Chelyabinsk's central Lenin Street and some of the frames of shop fronts buckled.

A loud noise, resembling an explosion, rang out at around 11:20 p.m. Thursday CST. The shockwave could be felt in apartment buildings in the industrial city's center.

"I was standing at a bus stop, seeing off my girlfriend," said Andrei, a local resident who did not give his second name. "Then there was a flash and I saw a trail of smoke across the sky and felt a shockwave that smashed windows."

A wall was damaged at the Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant but a spokeswoman said there was no environmental threat.

Although such events are rare, a meteorite is thought to have devastated an area of more than 1,250 miles in Siberia in 1908, smashing windows as far as 125 miles from the point of impact.

The Emergencies Ministry described Friday's events as a "meteor shower in the form of fireballs" and said background radiation levels were normal. It urged residents not to panic.

Chelyabinsk city authorities urged people to stay indoors unless they needed to pick up their children from schools and kindergartens. They said what sounded like a blast had been heard at an altitude of 32,800 feet.

The U.S. space agency NASA has said an asteroid known as 2012 DA14, about 46 meters in diameter, would have an encounter with Earth closer than any asteroid since scientists began routinely monitoring them about 15 years ago.

Television, weather and communications satellites fly about 500 miles higher. The moon is 14 times farther away.

Reuters

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Anxiety grows as officials consider closing 129 Chicago schools

After trimming the number of schools that could be closed to 129, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's school administration has entered the latest and what is likely to be the most intense phase so far in trying to determine which schools should be shut.

Chicago Public Schools chief Barbara Byrd-Bennett is expected to pare the preliminary list, released Wednesday, before unveiling a final one at the end of March. She said administrators will determine which schools are saved in the coming weeks amid a final round of community meetings to hear arguments from parents, teachers and community groups about why their schools should stay open.

If a hearing Wednesday night in North Lawndale was any indication, CPS still has a long way to go to gain the public's trust.

"Our schools don't need to close," Dwayne Truss, vice chairman of CPS' Austin Community Action Council, said in front of hundreds of people packed inside a church auditorium in the West Side neighborhood. "CPS is perpetrating a myth that there's a budget crisis."

CPS initially said 330 of its schools are underenrolled, the chief criterion for closing. Members of a commission assembled to gather public input on the issue told CPS officials earlier this year that closing a large number of schools would create too much upheaval. The Tribune, citing sources, said the commission indicated a far smaller number should be closed than initially feared, possibly as few as 15.

CPS then started holding its own hearings and on Wednesday, while following many of the formal recommendations made by the Commission on School Utilization, said 129 schools still fit the criteria for closing.

The new number and the latest round of hearings sets the stage for the administration to counter questions about the district's abilities to close a large number of schools and the need to do so.

For many who have already turned up to school closing meetings, this final round of hearings will be even more critical. School supporters must show how they plan to turn around academic performance and build enrollment, and also make the case for any security problems that would be created by closing their school.

"We are prepared now to move to the next level of conversation with our community and discuss a list of approximately 129 schools that still require further vetting and further conversation," Bryd-Bennett said. "We are going to take these 129 and continue to sift through these schools."

In the past, political clout has played a role in the district's final decisions. Already this year, several aldermen have spoken out on behalf of schools in their wards.

On the Near Northwest Side, for instance, the initial list of 330 underused schools included about six in the 1st Ward. Ald. Proco "Joe" Moreno helped organize local school council members, school administrators and parents to fight any closing. He also took that fight to leaders in City Hall and within CPS' bureaucracy. Nearly all of the schools in the ward were excluded from the list of 129.

"It is effort and it's organizing and not just showing up at meetings and yelling. Anybody can do that," Moreno said. "Those schools that proactively work before those meetings and explain what they are doing, what they need and that they are willing to accept new students, that's when politics works.

"My responsibility in this juncture was to focus on these schools," he said. "I had to work on the inside, with CPS and with City Hall, and with my schools on the outside."

Most of the schools on the list of 129 are on the West, South and Southwest sides, many in impoverished neighborhoods that saw significant population loss over the last decade. Largely spared were the North and Northwest sides.

In all, more than 43,000 students attend those 129 schools on the preliminary list, according to CPS records.

The area with the most schools on the list is a CPS network (the district groups its schools in 14 networks) that runs roughly from Madison Street south to 71st Street and from the lake to State Street. The preliminary list includes 24 schools in that area.

The Englewood-Gresham network has the second-largest number, 19, while the Austin-North Lawndale network where Wednesday night's meeting was held still has 16 schools on the list.

CPS critics said the preliminary list is still too large to be meaningful and that the district's promise to trim it before March 31 is only a tactic to make the final number seem reasonable.

"They started out with such a far-fetched, exaggerated list of schools, many of which are nowhere near underutilized," said Wendy Katten, co-founder of the parent group Raise Your Hand. "They might appear to be looking like they're listening, but they're not. They have not done a thorough and substantive assessment of these schools."

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Remains found in burned cabin after standoff with rogue cop

After what LAPD Chief Charlie Beck called "a bittersweet night," investigators Wednesday were in the process of identifying the human remains found in the charred cabin where fugitive ex-cop Christopher Dorner was believed to have been holed up after trading gunfire with officers, authorities said.

If the body is identified as Dorner’s, the standoff would end a weeklong manhunt for the ex-LAPD officer and Navy Reserve lieutenant suspected in a string of shootings following his firing by the Los Angeles Police Department several years ago. Four people have died in the case, allegedly at Dorner’s hands.

Beck said he would not consider the manhunt over until the body was identified as Dorner. Police remained on tactical alert and were conducting themselves as if nothing had changed in the case, officials said.

The latest burst of gunfire came Tuesday after the suspect, attempting to flee law enforcement officials, fatally shot a San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputy and seriously injured another, officials said. He then barricaded himself in a wooden cabin outside Big Bear, not far from ski resorts in the snow-capped San Bernardino Mountains east of Los Angeles, according to police.

"This could have ended much better, it could have ended worse," said Beck as he drove to the hospital where the injured deputy was located. "I feel for the family of the deputy who lost his life."

The injured deputy is expected to survive but it is anticipated he will need several surgeries. The names of the two deputies have not been released.

TIMELINE: Manhunt for ex-LAPD officer

Just before 5 p.m., authorities smashed the cabin's windows, pumped in tear gas and called for the suspect to surrender, officials said. They got no response. Then, using a demolition vehicle, they tore down the cabin's walls one by one. When they reached the last wall, they heard a gunshot. Then the cabin burst into flames, officials said.

Last week, authorities said they had tracked Dorner to a wooded area near Big Bear Lake. They found his torched gray Nissan Titan with several weapons inside, the said, and the only trace of Dorner was a short trail of footprints in newly fallen snow.

According to a manifesto that officials say Dorner posted on Facebook, he felt the LAPD unjustly fired him several years ago, when a disciplinary panel determined that he lied in accusing his training officer of kicking a mentally ill man during an arrest. Beck has promised to review the case.

DOCUMENT: Read the manifesto

The manifesto vows "unconventional and asymmetrical warfare" against law enforcement officers and their families. "Self-preservation is no longer important to me. I do not fear death as I died long ago," it said.

On Tuesday morning, two maids entered a cabin in the 1200 block of Club View Drive and ran into a man who they said resembled the fugitive, a law enforcement official said. The cabin was not far from where Dorner's singed truck had been found and where police had been holding news conferences about the manhunt.

FULL COVERAGE: Sweeping manhunt for ex-cop

The man tied up the maids, and he took off in a purple Nissan parked near the cabin, the official said. About 12:20 p.m., one of the maids broke free and called police.

Nearly half an hour later, officers with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife spotted the stolen vehicle and called for backup, authorities said. The suspect turned down a side road in an attempt to elude the officers but crashed the vehicle, police said.

A short time later, authorities said, the suspect carjacked a light-colored pickup truck. Allan Laframboise said the truck belonged to his friend Rick Heltebrake, who works at a nearby Boy Scout camp.

Heltebrake was driving on Glass Road with his Dalmatian, Suni, when a hulking African American man stepped into the road, Laframboise said. Heltebrake stopped. The man told him to get out of the truck.

"Can I take my dog?" Heltebrake asked, according to his friend.

"You can leave and you can take your dog," the man reportedly said. He then sped off in the Dodge extended-cab pickup -- and quickly encountered two Department of Fish and Wildlife trucks.

INTERACTIVE MAP: Searching for suspected shooter

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