CRIME: Chicago

After seven murders in seven days, the Chicago police, unpaid since Jan. 1, commenced last week what their chief called “a sledgehammer campaign” against the city’s underworldlings. Detectives and patrolmen scooped up night prowlers, street-corner hoodlums, speakeasy patrons, cabaret “artisteés,” “guests” at red-light hotels, many a citizen who could not quickly explain his evening’s stroll. Within twelve hours 917 assorted characters were arrested, of whom 271 were found to have police records. Revolvers were taken from a score. Soon the police sieve began to leak. More than half of those arrested were released for lack of evidence. Bondsmen and police court lawyers buzzed busily to free the others. No. 1 gangsters captured: none.

While the police raids were going on, two white boys in an automobile were shot dead by a carload of Negroes after a traffic dispute, four burglars were caught breaking into a fashionable hotel, a detective was shot by robbers and two men almost succeeded in kidnapping a patrolman. Other crimes during intense police activity: holdups, 60; burglaries, 20.