As the nation applauds 14-year-old Zaila Avant-garde as the first Black American winner of the National Spelling Bee, a deep dive into the history of Black participation in it reveals the same ignominious treatment consistent with the racist thinking and attitudes that long prevailed, discouraging Black participation. Fortunately, racist impediments to Black competition are now behind us. May the best speller win.

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But celebrating her win has so far overlooked two implications deriving from it:

(1) That the past unfairness is part and parcel of the totality of American racial history that reactionaries, led by right-wing lawmakers, want it not to be taught in our schools, true though it is. They castigate it as “Critical Race Theory,” though it is common factual knowledge, not “theory.” The more the nation knows about such history, previously excluded from our schools, the sooner racial reconciliation can occur.

(2) The best spellers, competing or not, are those who were taught pure phonics, sounding out words, which was the universal standard until the mid-’50’s when our educational establishment inexplicably abandoned it in favor of the unproven, newfangled notion called “whole word recognition.” Correct spelling was de-emphasized as well. Emphasis was put on “context” and the vague hope that, uncorrected, kids would magically become good spellers over time. The result: Three generations of citizens have graduated from our high schools with substandard spelling ability and weaknesses in writing ability. By now, most teachers grounded in phonics have all retired.

We’ve all seen kids of East Indian descent winning spelling bees over the years without it dawning on us that in India, phonics remained the standard, so that adherence to it carried through among E. Indian families in the U.S. independent of what our schools taught.

Many parents of old who knew the value of phonics and could afford it bought “Hooked On Phonics,” a home-teaching aid to compensate for what the schools no longer taught. The sooner all schools return to a phonics-only teaching system, the sooner our population regains its ability to master spelling, the first step in learning English, which is inherently a tricky language to master. And the sooner all schools teach the part of our common history previously erased from the history books, including the unpalatable story of slavery, the sooner all Americans can eventually know how our nation became the nation it is.

Ted Z. Manuel, Hyde Park

Political theater

The article “Biden Calls ‘Remarkable’ Cuba Protests a ‘Call for Freedom'” (July 13) fails to point out that the “food shortages and high prices” that sparked the street protests are the direct result of the U.S. embargo on Cuba, which was just condemned for the 29^th year in a row by the U.N., this time by a vote of 182 to 2.

For some 60 years (with a brief and partial respite under President Barack Obama), the U.S. State Department and CIA have done everything in their power – including invasion, assassination attempts, germ warfare, sabotage and sanctions – to overthrow Castro and his successors. Even the pandemic has not softened our efforts at regime change, born of the fear that the Cuban model of governing on behalf of the nation’s own people rather than foreign corporations may spread.

For President Joe Biden to applaud these protests is like the director of a play loudly cheering his own show. This political theater will never fool the mass of Cubans, who know the real source of their suffering. Economic torture may cause pain and anger, but it does not induce the victims to love their torturer.

Hugh Iglarsh, Skokie

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Major-league baseball has reached the All-Star break with a .240 batting average. Comparisons to 1968 roll easy off the keyboard.

There are major differences, but to start with the similarities, MLB’s 1968 BA was a record-low .237. The 2021 BA is the lowest since and the fourth-lowest of all-time. You have to reach back to the 19th century (.239 in 1888) and the dead-ball era (.239 in 1908) to find the second- and third-lowest.

In 1968, Bob Gibson’s 1.12 ERA set a record low. In 2021, the Mets’ Jacob deGrom is challenging Gibson at 1.08.

The state of offense worried the lords of baseball in 1968, as it does now. In 1968, they responded by shrinking the strike zone and lowering the mound.

This year, we’ve seen a partial ban on sticky substances that help pitchers increase spin rates, and there’s discussion about lowering the mound again, moving the mound back and making the bases bigger.

But this is not a carbon copy of 1968.

Scoring

In the 1968 Year of the Pitcher, scoring plummeted to 3.42 runs per team per game. Only 1908 was lower at 3.38.

In 2021, the average is 4.47, more than a run higher than 1968. It’s lower than the 4.65 last year and 4.83 in 2019, but about on par with the 4.45 in 2018. Of the 20 seasons from 2001 to 2020, 13 were higher-scoring than 2021, seven were lower-scoring.

Power

Scoring is being kept at normal levels largely because of home runs. In 1968, teams averaged .61 home runs per game. The 2021 average is nearly double that at 1.19.

MLB’s .403 slugging percentage is 63 points higher than that of 1968. By isolated power — the portion of slugging percentage that comes from extra bases — MLB is at .163 in 2021 vs. .103 in 1968.

Strikeouts and walks

Here’s a reason for worry in 2021: Strikeouts are at an all-time high of 8.86 per team per game, while they were at a mere 5.89 in 1968. Walks are at 3.33 per team per game vs. 2.82 in 1968.

In 1968, Sam McDowell led MLB with 9.5 strikeouts per nine innings. Gibson was at 7.9, Cubs leader Fergie Jenkins at 7.6 and White Sox leader Gary Peters at 6.1. This season, deGrom leads at 14.3, with Carlos Rodon at 13.0 to lead four Sox starters averaging double figures. The Cubs’ Adbert Alzolay is at 9.4.

Workload

In 1968, pitchers averaged 6.65 innings per start. In 2021, the average is 5.09. More innings are going to relievers, who are averaging 9.5 strikeouts per nine innings. In 1968, the average was 5.83 strikeouts per nine.

The 2021 baseball world has a steep increase in the number of hard-throwing pitchers, emphasis on spin rates no one knew about in 1968 and offenses built for power to counteract the difficulty of stringing hits against today’s pitching.

It’s a challenging time, but the challenges are different than in 1968, when scoring crashed along with batting averages.

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Hockey fans, the time has come. We’re less than ten days away from the 2021 NHL Draft. The NHL Draft normally takes place in June, but this year it was pushed back due to the late finish of the NHL season that was caused by the pandemic. And from July 23  to the 24th, the draft will take place virtually for the second year in a row.

The 2021 NHL Draft happens to be a special one given that there’s a new hockey franchise entering the league. The newest NHL team is named the Seattle Kraken. If you recall from last time the league expanded with the addition of the Las Vegas Golden Knights, the Kraken actually have their own draft where they get to select from other teams players. This draft is known as the, “Expansion Draft”, while the 2021 NHL Draft is technically known as the, “Entry Draft”. The Kraken do take part in the Entry Draft after their Expansion Draft on July 21, but they only start making picks in round two. Which, all things considered, seems pretty fair after you poach from everyone else.

Top Prospects In The 2021 NHL Draft

NHL Draft prospects are different from leagues like the NBA or NFL in that unless you’re a diehard fan of the sport, there’s a good chance you haven’t heard of the top guys until they’re picked. This is the case for us too because when it comes to the Chicago Blackhawks, we’re diehard fans. But, for the rest of the sport and especially outside of the NHL, we don’t really pay as much attention.

Luckily though, there’s experts who do. And those experts have certainly been busy compiling their consensus prospect rankings for the 2021 NHL Draft. 

At the top of their list is 18-year old, Owen Power, from the University of Michigan. Interestingly enough, at one point in his career Owen played for the Chicago Steel, a hockey team based out of Geneva with players aged from 16 – 20. Owen Power is by far and away everyone’s prediction to go first overall. That pick belongs to the Columbus Blue Jackets. The expert’s number two man is Matty Beniers, another fellow University of Michigan player. We might not know a lot about hockey outside of the Blackhawks, but even we aren’t surprised that two Wolverines lead the list. At number three is William Eklund, an international player from Sweden. Jumping all the way to the 11th prospect on the list is Chaz Lucius. Chaz will play for the Minnesota Golden Gophers next year, but expect him to be dominant at putting the puck in the net. If you’re wondering why we skipped to 11, well, that’s where the Chicago Blackhawks find themselves drafting in the 2021 NHL Draft.

What Can We Expect For The Chicago Blackhawks?

But wait, didn’t Chicago receive the 12th pick in the draft instead of the 11th? Yes, technically that’s true. However, thanks to some rule breaking by the Arizona Coyotes, the Blackhawks moved up to 11. Unfortunately for Arizona, they lost their first round pick this year.

The 11th pick gives us a good chance to find a solid youngster from the 2021 NHL Draft. We can’t definitively guess who they end up with that late in the round, whether it be Chaz Lucius or someone else. We do have the knowledge to say where all of Chicago’s picks are going to be in the draft. After the first round, they’ll pick 43rd overall and 61st overall in the second round. Their next selections are a pair of picks in the fourth , one in the sixth, and two more in the seventh. Will they find a superstar early on, or will a diamond in the rough appear out of the later rounds? That, Chicago Blackhawks fans, remains to be seen.

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A 17-year-old boy was critically hurt in a shooting Wednesday night in South Chicago.

Just after 7 p.m., the boy was standing in front of a home in the 8500 block of South Marquette Avenue when a vehicle approached and someone inside fired shots, Chicago police said.

He was struck in the side of the body and the arm and transported to the University of Chicago Medical Center in critical condition, police said.

No one is in custody as area detectives investigate.

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Three men were wounded in a shooting Wednesday evening in the South Shore neighborhood.

Just after 6:30 p.m., the men, 32, 53, and 64, were walking on the sidewalk in the 2100 block of West 71st Street when an unknown vehicle approached and someone inside fired shots, Chicago police said.

All three men suffered gunshot wounds to the leg and the 53-year-old was also struck in the arm, police said.

They were all transported to the University of Chicago Medical Center in good condition, according to police.

No one is in custody.

This is a developing story. Check back for details.

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Two teens were wounded, one critically, in a shooting Thursday night in Calumet Heights on the South Side.

A 17-year-old girl and a 19-year-old man were in an alley about 6:45 p.m. near the 9200 block of South Yates Boulevard when two people approached them and fired shots, Chicago police said.

The man was struck in the back and listed in critical condition. The girl suffered a gunshot wound to the thigh and was listed in good condition, police said.

Both teens self-transported to Trinity Hospital, according to police.

No one is in custody, police said.

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A new mural was unveiled under a viaduct at the 606’s Bloomingdale Trail on Humboldt Boulevard that honors the life of a young Chicago baseball prospect that was fatally shot nearly four years ago.

The ribbon-cutting Wednesday of the “Tunnel of Blessings: Neftali Reyes Jr. Memorial Mural” brought over 50 people to the underpass with many staring at the mural with both grieving eyes and proud smiles. It was a bittersweet moment for the family of the young man whose life was cut short but whose image, frozen in time, will be seen for years to come.

Annette Flores and Neftali Reyes Sr. fought back the tears as they remembered their son’s life. They told of how he was able to catch a baseball before he could walk, his college days and the legacy he left behind.

Flores said the mural “reflects unity and community, relentless perseverance and unconditional love.

“Today, as a mother of a gun violence victim, who was forced to live this devastating journey, I share my love, my pain and my continued roar for change,” Flores said. “Our youth deserve it; our children need us.”

The mural features a vibrant Reyes Jr. in his Roberto Clemente High School baseball jersey with his gloved raised. The names of 13 other young shooting victims from the area were are memorialized in the mural that was painted by artists Andy Bellomo, Sandra Antongiorgi and Rae Wilson.

Bellomo said the artwork includes letters and notes from families who lost loved ones to gun violence which were first written on the wall of the concrete underpass before the mural was painted on top. She hopes their words breathe life into the space and can be a blessing for those walking by or taking a minute to remember Reyes Jr. and the other victims.

Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times

Reyes Jr. graduated with honors at Clemente and was enjoying a full ride to play baseball at Claflin University in South Carolina. The aspiring major league pitcher had to return to Chicago to recover from an injury that was keeping him off the field.

Then in the early morning of Dec. 29, 2017, Reyes Jr. was driving in the 2300 block of West Grand Avenue in West Town when his car was rammed several times by another car with two men and a woman inside, forcing him to lose control of his car.

The group pulled up beside him and someone fired shots that would kill the then 19-year-old.

Ald. Roberto Maldonado (26th) said the mural was only possible because of Flores’ relentless fight in getting the city to approve the use of the 26th Ward menu funds for the project. He said it took several years of fighting with the city’s legal department to bankroll the project and was nearly brought to tears during the ceremony.

Maldonado said the viaduct is along a route he takes on his daily walks and shared his own grief after his wife died of cancer — an anniversary that falls on the same exact day although it happened two years earlier.

“I know what it is to carry a grief forever for losing a love one, the anger and the disbelief as well,” Maldonado said. ” … It feels like it was yesterday.”

Maldonado also said he empathizes with Reyes Jr. since his son is a baseball player for Lane Tech High School with aspirations of turning pro.

“This could’ve been my son,” Maldonado said. “I relate to Annette’s family like if it were mine.”

Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times

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Autry Phillips runs a community outreach center on a block in Gresham where people like to gather on the street and catch up with each other.

“It’s a good thing to do,” Phillips said. “We want people hanging out on our block.”

And that’s what people were doing Wednesday, standing and talking near a food mart at 79th and Justine streets when a silver car pulled out from an alley and three gunman opened fire shortly after noon.

Five people were hit, four men and a woman. Three of the victims were listed in critical condition as they were taken to hospitals. They ranged in age from 27 to 50.

It was the second mass shooting in Chicago in a day.

Hours earlier, four women and a man were shot in West Garfield Park on the West Side. As in Gresham, they were gathered on a sidewalk in the 4600 block of West Monroe Street when someone approached with a gun and shot them shortly after midnight, police said.

Authorities released no other details, other than the victims were between 18 and 34 and were all in good condition.

There have been at least 31 shootings across Chicago this year involving four or more victims, according to a Sun-Times analysis of city data. The city is on pace to surpass the total from all of last year, 48.

Wednesday was the fifth time this year where there have been two mass shootings in a single day. On June 27, a pair of mass shootings on the South Side within two hours of each other left two people dead and 15 more wounded.

Wednesday’s shootings happened in the Gresham and Harrison police districts, by far the deadliest this year. The Harrison district, which includes West Garfield Park, has recorded three other mass shootings this year, while the Gresham district has been hit with two others.

Over the last five years, Chicago has recorded the most mass shootings in the nation by far, according to data compiled by the Gun Violence Archive.

“Mass shootings are becoming the norm,” said the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a longtime crusader against gun violence whose church, St. Sabina, is just a half-mile from the Gresham attack.

Pfleger said he doesn’t believe the victims of the shooting were the intended targets, noting they’re fixtures of that area who often hang out there playing cards. An infant was sitting in a stroller nearby but wasn’t struck, he said.

“It’s an area that’s known by a particular gang and I think whoever it was, they’re sending a message to that area,” he said. “And these people just happened to be sitting there and there was nobody else out there.”

The shooting happened across the street from Phillips’ Target DevCorp Auburn Gresham Community Outreach Center, an anti-violence organization that immediately began working to stop any retaliation.

“What we try to do first is to try to make sure the families are okay,” Phillips said as he watched police work behind crime tape near the food mart.

Phillips said it was troubling that the shooting happened so close to his organization, but added that these attacks can happen anywhere in the city.

“At any time at any place, anyone in Chicago can get hit” he said. “We have shootings that’s next to the Chicago Police Department, we have shootings that’s next to schools.”

The people wounded Wednesday are not gang members and were not hurting anyone, he added. “Unfortunately, someone made the decision to pull the trigger.”

Pfleger said Chicago doesn’t appear to have a comprehensive plan to address the violence plaguing the South and West sides. Meanwhile, the toll continues to grow.

“We’re burying dreams every week,” he said. “And we’re less of a city because of who we’ve lost in this city. And I don’t see anything changing.”

Read more on crime, and track the city’s homicides.

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There’s been a lot of changeover in top leadership at Chicago theaters over the past 18 months, with more to come; we’re still waiting to hear who will be replacing Anna Shapiro as Steppenwolf’s artistic director when she leaves at the end of her six-year contract in August. (Will the company honor past tradition and draw from within the ensemble, or will they look outside the walls of the growing Steppenwolf campus on Halsted?)

But two longtime Equity companies have just announced new artistic directors, and they’ve chosen women with deep roots in town to lead them in the (hopefully) post-pandemic era.

Marti Lyons, a freelance director whose resume includes shows at Victory Gardens, Chicago Shakespeare, Court, Writers Theatre, Gift, and Sideshow, as well as work around the country at theaters such as Wooly Mammoth and Studio Theatre in Washington, D.C., and the Geffen Playhouse in LA, has been named as the new artistic director for Remy Bumppo.

And Teatro Vista has named two women–Lorena Diaz and Wendy Mateo–as co-artistic directors. Diaz and Mateo also have long resumes as performers and directors onstage and onscreen (they’ve both been seen on Dick Wolf’s Chicago PD and Chicago Med), and have been creative partners for many years. Sketch fans know them as “Lolo and Wendy” of the comedy duo Dominizuelan. (The name is a portmanteau of their Latina heritage–Diaz is Venezuelan and Mateo is Dominican.) They also run their own digital content creation company, Chicago4Real. (They produced a web series, The Dominizuelan Consulate, with Fred Armisen.)

In talking to all three women (the first female artistic directors in the history of their respective companies), it’s clear that they see their mission is to work collaboratively within the existing ensembles of Remy Bumppo and Teatro Vista, while expanding the idea of what the work created by those ensembles can be, onstage and off.

Remy Bumppo was founded 25 years ago by James Bohnen (the name came from his pets), and the company’s emphasis has been on language-driven works and classics–they adopted “Think Theatre” as the shorthand version of their mission some time ago. After Bohnen departed in 2011, Remy Bumppo brought in Timothy Douglas as his replacement. But that arrangement only lasted six months, as an apparent lack of artistic rapport with the ensemble led to Douglas resigning in early 2012. (He told the Reader‘s Tony Adler at the time, “The approach to the work that I have differs so markedly from what has gone before that it just felt the compromise was too great.”) Douglas was replaced by ensemble member Nick Sandys.

Sandys announced his intention to leave the artistic director’s post back in mid-December of 2020 (he remains a member of the ensemble), and the company hired ALJP Consulting to help find his replacement. Lyons, who hasn’t directed at Remy Bumppo in the past, found that the “brilliantly structured process” leading to her hiring meant that everyone’s voices were heard.

“I interviewed with every part of the organization. It was very thorough. I got the sense that the board, the staff, and the ensemble all had a say, and that they all had to turn their keys in order to make this hire,” says Lyons, adding, “I had a working session with the ensemble where we collaborated together, and that also then became an interview with the ensemble.”

Lyons notes that she’s joining Remy Bumppo during a time when the company has already been developing a new strategic plan “for shifting some practices and making actionable change on all levels of the organization. And that was something that is very interesting to me in my work as an individual. And I’m speaking here specifically of anti-racist and anti-exploitative practices.”

In practical terms for Lyons, that means “Representation is on the forefront of my mind. Both in terms of who’s on our stages and who’s behind the scenes for our season. Additionally, who is on our ensemble, on our board, and on our staff.” She adds, “I think the anti-racist work that is being done in the theater community really betters the working conditions for everyone. And so here’s where we’re also talking about pay equity, looking at how to pay staffers but also freelancers as fairly as possible, given the size of our organization. Pay equity is also something that is on the forefront of our minds.”

Lyons also notes, “We See You White American Theater, the conversation around that brilliant document is something that has been happening at Remy Bumppo for over a year now. And it’s something that is taken very seriously and considered very thoroughly on all levels of the organization.”

Though the company hasn’t announced its next season yet, Lyons acknowledges that Remy Bumppo has been best known for “Eurocentric classics” (albeit with a modern bent–they’ve produced seven Tom Stoppard plays over their history, for example). Lyons says, “We as an organization are very excited to continue to expand beyond those works and those writers, although they are great works and brilliant writers, to invite new lenses and new frameworks and new writers into our midst. Again, to expand what language-centric work can mean.

“Remy Bumppo and I have this really neat aesthetic alignment in that we both have a history of doing extant works, and also new works, and adaptations.” Lyons adds, “I think there is a lot of freedom in being a language-based company because we can do works that are historical. We can also do new works or second and third productions. We have a lot of flexibility and we have an opportunity to do work that is language-driven. But that can mean so many things. Certainly it has in my career. And it also has with Remy Bumppo.”

New vistas–on stage and screen

Founded in 1990 by Edward Torres and Henry Godinez, Teatro Vista’s motto is “theatre with a view”–and more specifically, a view that encompasses the broad range of work by contemporary Latinx artists. Torres took over as sole artistic director in 1995 when Godinez (who has been a longtime resident artistic associate for the Goodman) left. In 2013, Ricardo Gutierrez moved into the role.

Diaz has performed with Teatro Vista mainstage productions, while Mateo has not. But they have both been in the company’s larger circle of friends for many years. Mateo says, “We’d perform at their fundraisers and would perform as Dominizuelan in various forms. There was a program they did called Late Night TV a couple of years ago that we participated in pretty regularly.”

With the duo’s strong background in digital content, it’s not surprising that that’s one of the areas where Diaz and Mateo believe they can expand the artistic and audience reach of the company. Mateo says, “We’ve always been creating content, whether it be onstage or it be on digital platforms. And we felt that that skill set, paired with what the ensemble is already doing, would be a recipe for finally bringing theater to folks, as well as into the theater. We always look at it as an opportunity for ‘How do we step theater out of these four walls and give it accessibility to the communities who want to see our stories, who need to see themselves represented, and need to see our stories?’ So it was a convergence of all of those things and the ensemble is so energizing to lead that way.”

Diaz adds, “The audience during the pandemic, they learned, ‘Oh, I don’t have to be in the theater to have a theatrical experience.’ And so just like we learned that we can skip over commercials with TIVO, we’re like, ‘Oh, this is new and awesome.'”

Mateo and Diaz also went through a lengthy interview process, facilitated by BLVE Consults. Diaz says that the Teatro Vista board “were hesitant about a co-artistic director partnership at first. But once you talk to Wendy and I together, you get it. The ensemble was really on board; we knew that they would be because we’re so used to collaboration and what it looks like to bring that to leadership.” The two also credit Teatro Vista’s managing director Sylvia Lopez (“who is a boss,” says Diaz) and board president Adela Cepeda for their advocacy of the arrangement.

Building bridges between communities is also something that Mateo and Diaz feel they can do well, based on their own career experiences.

“Wendy and I have always been looking for ways to create bridges from one to the other,” notes Diaz. “So earlier on in our career, we were like, ‘How do we bridge comedy and theater?’ Because it was so separate. When we arrived in Chicago 15 years ago it was like, ‘The comedy community over here, the theater community over here.’ And so we set out to create a theatrical sketch show that was more of a theatrical experience, as opposed to a straight-up, lights-up, lights-down [show]. And now that bridge that we’re looking to craft is between theater and film and that digital experience.”

But of course the company will maintain its focus on live performance. Though the next season is still a work in progress, the new artistic directors did mention one show that will be happening: Somewhere Over the Border, written by Brian Quijada, whose 2016 autobiographical solo show, Where Did We Sit on the Bus?, was a hit for Teatro Vista. Diaz describes it as, “Think The Wizard of Oz meets Willy Wonka. He’s amazing. An incredible talent, an incredible musician, performer, writer, and this story is epic.” “EPIC,” echoes Mateo. Teatro Vista will produce a workshop of Quijada’s show this fall, with a full production slated for spring of 2022.

Like Lyons, Diaz and Mateo also think that the year of shutdown and demonstrations against racial injustice has potentially seeded the ground for something greater in the theater community. They also credit other women in theater with whom they’ve worked–specifically Heidi Stillman, artistic director for Lookingglass Theatre, and Miranda Gonzalez, artistic director of UrbanTheater Company, for the support they’ve given.

Says Mateo, “When the summer rebellion happened and We See You White American Theater came out with their demands, I thought to myself even at that time, ‘What would be the possibility of a BIPOC-led and -founded theater to create equitable practices for their artists? What would it look like for us to not have to demand that of the white theaters, but lead that?’ And so we have this opportunity to be that.” v

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The Iowa auto mechanic arrested in a downtown Chicago hotel room with a rifle, scope and pistol was in town to propose to his girlfriend over the Fourth of July weekend, not to launch a mass attack as the mayor and top cop have suggested, his lawyer insisted Wednesday.

“This baseless accusation against Mr. (Keegan) Casteel spurred sensational media coverage, despite the dearth of evidence that our client had any ill intent,” said Loop attorney Jonathan M. Brayman.

“Mr. Casteel did have a plan for the Fourth of July – to travel to the city of Chicago to propose to his girlfriend on the Ferris wheel at Navy Pier that evening,” he added.

This is the first public comment from Casteel since he was arrested July 4, when a housekeeper at Hotel W led police to room 1208, where officers found a loaded semi-automatic rifle with a laser scope, five ammunition clips and a loaded .45-caliber handgun.

Both Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Police Supt. David Brown have said Casteel may have intended to fire on Navy Pier crowds from his hotel window, though prosecutors have yet to offer any proof of such plans.

Brayman said his client is licensed to have the guns and was merely possessing his Second Amendment rights. They suggested the weapons made Casteel feel safer in a crime-ridden city.

“The fact that good people feel the need to arm themselves when traveling to Chicago is the real problem that our public officials need to address,” he said. “In Mr. Casteel’s case, there was nothing nefarious afoot.”

Brayman suggested that both the mayor and the superintendent purposely sensationalized the arrest to draw attention from the city’s rising violence.

Brown announced the arrest two days after it was made, during a news conference where he was questioned about one of the most violent Fourth of July weekends in years, with over 100 people shot, including 13 children.

“While the superintendent and other public officials have made Mr. Casteel a scapegoat in the face of widespread violence and actual shootings in the city of Chicago, he is nothing more than a law-abiding person exercising his Second Amendment Rights,” Brayman said.

Casteel, 32, has so far been charged with two felony counts of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon, though prosecutors said Wednesday a grand jury will review the case.

In the meantime, he has been released on a relatively low $10,000 bond after a judge reminded him that gun laws in Chicago are different than in Iowa.

After leaving Cook County Jail on July 7 , Casteel walked up to an SUV and knelt in front of his girlfriend who had just gotten out of the driver’s seat. He held a ring and proposed, and they drove off.

The judge allowed Casteel to return to his home near Des Moines, where he has run an auto garage since the fall of 2019.

Since his arrest, Casteel’s mugshot has been carried by media around the world along with the accusations from the mayor and the police superintendent.

Brown, during his news conference, noted that Casteel’s hotel room overlooked a portion of the Ohio Street Beach along Lake Michigan and Navy Pier.

Brown said the housekeeper who tipped off police “likely prevented a tragedy from happening,” adding, “Thank God for that hotel worker who saw something, and said something, and I believe averted disaster.”

Brown, and later the mayor, noted that Casteel was interviewed by the “joint terrorism task force” in Chicago.

Though no terrorism-related charges were filed, Lightfoot described the guns found in the room as “weapons of war.”

“Because he was charged with mere possession and legally, here in our city, the charges weren’t of the type that he could have been held,” she complained hours after Brown’s news conference. “But luckily, he was questioned by the joint terrorism task force. He is now under radar screening of the FBI.”

As described in the police report, officers found a PTR 91 semi-automatic rifle with a .308-caliber round in the chamber. It was fitted with a “laser and high-powered” scope.

There were also five ammunition clips with an “unknown amount” of ammunition, and an HK USP Tactical pistol with an “unknown amount of .45-caliber rounds.”

The housekeeper spotted the guns near a window “in a very suspicious position,” Brown told reporters, without elaborating.

But as the police report also notes, there is nothing suspicious in Casteel’s background: No outstanding arrest warrants, no investigative alerts, no threats on social media. He was neither on parole nor on probation.

Contributing: Stefano Esposito

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