Lawyers argued about whether Thompson must surrender his passport while awaiting trial. It’s a routine request, but his attorney called it “just punitive.” The judge gave Thompson a week to turn in his passport — and his FOID card.

Ald. Patrick Daley Thompson pleaded not guilty to federal criminal charges related to a failed Bridgeport bank during an unusually contentious arraignment Thursday.

Lawyers argued during the hearing — held by telephone before U.S. District Judge Franklin Valderrama — about whether Thompson should have to turn his passport over to the government while awaiting trial.

The condition is routine for defendants charged in federal court. But defense attorney Chris Gair called it “just punitive.”

Gair also asked the judge about a trial date after repeatedly saying he wants to clear Thompson’s name.

Meanwhile, Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Netols told the judge Thompson had declined to be interviewed by court personnel ahead of the hearing, telling the judge the alderman “doesn’t want to participate in the process” and “made your job more difficult.”

Gair retorted: “We’re the ones who want a trial, and want it now.”

Valderrama ruled Thompson must turn over his passport and firearm owner’s identification card by May 20. He also told the lawyers to be ready to discuss trial dates at the next status hearing, set for June 10.

Thompson was accused in a bombshell indictment late last month of lying to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and filing false income tax returns in which he lied about paying more than $170,000 in mortgage interest over five years.

The indictment made him the highest-profile figure to face criminal charges in connection with the clout-heavy Washington Federal Bank for Savings in Bridgeport, which was shut down in 2017 over what authorities say was a massive fraud scheme.

Prosecutors have said three people charged in connection with that alleged fraud are expected to testify against Thompson.

The grandson and nephew of Chicago’s two longest-serving mayors, Thompson is also the only member of the Daley family ever charged with a federal crime. Thompson denied the accusations after his indictment on April 29.

“My conscience is clear,” Thompson said in a statement. “I did not commit any crime, I am innocent, and I will prove it at trial.”

Thompson is charged with five counts of filing false tax returns and two counts of lying to the FDIC. The indictment alleges he received $219,000 from the bank between 2011 and 2014 — before he was elected to the Chicago City Council in 2015 — through a purported loan and other unsecured payments.

The indictment alleges Thompson made only one payment on a loan but failed to pay any interest. Then, after federal regulators shut down the bank in December 2017, the FDIC tried to collect the money from Thompson. The alderman allegedly said he only owed around $110,000 and that he’d used the money for home improvements.

But Thompson knew he received $219,000 and “$110,000 was paid to a law firm” as Thompson’s capital contribution, according to the indictment.

The indictment also alleged that Thompson claimed in federal tax returns for the years 2013 through 2017 to have paid more than $170,000 in mortgage interest. Washington Federal, founded back in 1913, allegedly sent IRS forms to Thompson that falsely accounted for the mortgage interest payments.

Copies of such forms are sent to the IRS, the indictment noted.

Federal regulators shut down Washington Federal less than two weeks after John F. Gembara — its president, chief executive officer and major shareholder — was found dead, seated in a chair, a rope around his neck, in the master bedroom of the $1 million Park Ridge home of his bank customer and friend, Marek Matczuk.

Matczuk had five outstanding loans from Washington Federal totaling about $1.8 million. An investigation of the bank so far has resulted in federal charges against 10 other individuals, including Matczuk.

In his statement, Thompson said he had been indicted over “inadvertent tax preparation errors and my incorrect memory about the amount of a personal bank loan.”

Contributing: Tim Novak

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The White Sox will increase capacity to approximately 24,300 fans beginning May 24. The Cubs will go to 60% on May 28.

The White Sox and Cubs announced they will increase fan capacity at their stadiums to 60% this month.

The White Sox will increase capacity to approximately 24,300 fans at Guaranteed Rate Field beginning May 24 against the St. Louis Cardinals. The stadium can normally accommodate 40,615 fans.

Approval from city and state leadership and public health officials provided the green light.

The Cubs will begin 60% capacity — or about 25,000 fans — at Wrigley Field on May 28 against the Cincinnati Reds. Wrigley’s normal capacity is over 41,000.

“We have been working toward this moment and have always looked forward to welcoming more fans back to Guaranteed Rate Field in a safe and responsible way,” Brooks Boyer, White Sox chief revenue and marketing officer said in a statement. “We have seen great success providing a safe and enjoyable gameday experience for guests in April, and as we see more people get vaccinated, we are thrilled to bring more fans into the ballpark to experience White Sox baseball in person and cheer on our first-place team on the field.”

The Sox will have two vaccinated-only sections for four games this weekend. Beginning with Game 1 of the doubleheader against Kansas City on Friday at 2:10 p.m., fans who purchase tickets in the designated vaccinated-only sections located in Sections 108-109 will present their vaccination cards or other proof that they have been fully vaccinated along with a photo ID upon entering the ballpark.

Fans holding tickets in these sections will be seated without physical distancing.

Fans who receive a vaccination before a game will receive a $25 White Sox gift card for use inside the ballpark. The team will have two vaccination sites at the stadium beginning May 24.

Tickets for the vaccinated-only sections go on sale Thursday on the White Sox website at 3 p.m.

Cubs single-game tickets for the May 28-June 2 games will go on sale Tuesday at 10 a.m. at the team website. Tickets are available on a first-come, first-served basis in seating pods of up to six people and will have a minimum of one open seat between pods within the same row.

Like the Sox, the Cubs will have a designated area specifically for fully vaccinated fans at Wrigley Field for the four-game series against the Washington Nationals May 17-20 only. The upper section of the center field Budweiser Bleachers will be designated for fully vaccinated fans and will be at full capacity with no physical distancing. Single-game tickets for that area go on sale May 13, at 3 p.m. Proof of vaccination and a photo ID will be required.

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The new guidance still calls for wearing masks in crowded indoor settings like buses, planes, hospitals, prisons and homeless shelters, but will help clear the way for reopening workplaces, schools, and other venues.

WASHINGTON — In a striking move to send the country back toward pre-pandemic life, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday eased indoor mask-wearing guidance for fully vaccinated people, allowing them to safely stop wearing masks inside in most places.

The new guidance still calls for wearing masks in crowded indoor settings like buses, planes, hospitals, prisons and homeless shelters, but will help clear the way for reopening workplaces, schools, and other venues — even removing the need for masks or social distancing for those who are fully vaccinated.

The CDC will also no longer recommend that fully vaccinated people wear masks outdoors in crowds. The announcement comes as the CDC and the Biden administration have faced pressure to ease restrictions on fully vaccinated people — people who are two weeks past their last required COVID-19 vaccine dose — in part to highlight the benefits of getting the shot.

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the CDC, announced the new guidance on Thursday afternoon at a White House briefing, saying the long-awaited change is thanks to millions of people getting vaccinated — and based on the latest science about how well those shots are working.

“Anyone who is fully vaccinated can participate in indoor and outdoor activities – large or small — without wearing a mask or physically distancing,” Walensky said. “If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic.”

The new guidance comes as the aggressive U.S. vaccination campaign begins to pay off. U.S. virus cases are at their lowest rate since September, deaths are at their lowest point since last April and the test positivity rate is at the lowest point since the pandemic began.

To date about 154 million Americans, more than 46% of the population, have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccines and more than 117 million are fully vaccinated. The rate of new vaccinations has slowed in recent weeks, but with the authorization Wednesday of the Pfizer vaccine for children aged 12-15, a new burst of doses is expected in the coming days.

Just two weeks ago, the CDC recommended that fully vaccinated people continue to wear masks indoors in all settings and outdoors in large crowds.

During a virtual meeting Tuesday on vaccinations with a bipartisan group of governors, President Joe Biden appeared to acknowledge that his administration had to do more to model the benefits of vaccination.

“I would like to say that we have fully vaccinated people; we should start acting like it,” Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, told Biden. “And that’s a big motivation get the unvaccinated to want to to get vaccinated.”

“Good point,” Biden responded. He added, “we’re going to be moving on that in the next little bit.”

The easing guidance could open the door to confusion, as there is no surefire way for businesses or others to distinguish between those fully vaccinated and those who are not.

Walensky said the evidence from the U.S. and Israel shows the vaccines are as strongly protective in real-world use as they were in earlier studies, and that so far they continue to work even though some worrying mutated versions of the virus are spreading.

The more people continue to get vaccinated, the faster infections will drop — and the harder it will be for the virus to mutate enough to escape vaccines, she stressed, urging everyone 12 and older who’s not yet vaccinated to sign up.

And while some people still get COVID-19 despite vaccination, Walensky said that’s rare and cited evidence that those infections tend to be milder, shorter and harder to spread to others. If someone who’s vaccinated does develop COVID-19 symptoms, they should immediately re-mask and get tested, she said.

There are some caveats. Walensky encouraged people who have weak immune systems, such as from organ transplants or cancer treatment, to talk with their doctors before shedding their masks. That’s because of continued uncertainty about whether the vaccines can rev up a weakened immune system as well as they do normal, healthy ones.

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When quarterback Justin Fields walks onto the practice field Friday at Halas Hall, he’ll be taking the first step toward what the Bears hope is a transcendent NFL career. His coaches, though, will be watching the basics all three days of the Bears’ rookie minicamp. 

When quarterback Justin Fields walks onto the practice field Friday at Halas Hall, he’ll be taking the first step toward what the Bears hope is a transcendent NFL career.

His coaches, though, will be watching the basics during all three days of the Bears’ rookie minicamp.

“Show the other 10 guys in that huddle that you have some command and you’ve been working your butt off on the plays,” quarterbacks coach John DeFilippo said. “Knowing the cadence, knowing where to go with the football.

“It’s not going to be a very in-depth installation in terms of the amount of plays, amount of formations, shifts and motions and that sort of thing. But I want to see him. Those building blocks of becoming a starting quarterback in the league — and you start at the lowest of lows.”

So much of Fields’ evaluation — at least this early in his career — will be about what he does before the ball is even snapped.

“You start with the cadence, you start with the huddle,” DeFilippo said. “You start with knowing your first wide vision, which is everything that you have before you get the ball in your hand. Play clock. Are we lined up correctly? What’s the cadence? Is there a kill with the play?”

Offensive coordinator Bill Lazor will look for what he calls basic quarterback intangibles: leadership, communication, a sense of urgency — and, yes, his personality in the huddle.

“Then it just kind of starts — ‘OK, that’s where he is in all these areas,’” Lazor said. “Now we address them and help him get better. And then you also have kind of your list — ‘I’ve seen this guy really throw the ball down the field, let’s see what it looks like in-person.’ You have your list of things that are kind of more personal curiosities.”

One of the best to ever do it struggled with those building blocks. Texas Tech’s Patrick Mahomes had never huddled regularly until he showed up for the Chiefs’ 2017 rookie minicamp.

“He started screaming the plays, and the defense could hear him on the other side because he had never called a play call in a huddle before,” Bears coach Matt Nagy, who was the Chiefs’ offensive coordinator at the time, said earlier this month. “Those are the little things we all think we can get up and do that these kids haven’t done — getting a snap from under center, doing different things there. So those small little processes take time. Once we get that, you can play faster and faster.”

The Bears will pattern Fields’ immersion after that of Mahomes, who didn’t make his first NFL start until the Chiefs’ regular season finale in 2017. They were so confident in Mahomes’ development they agreed to trade starter Alex Smith — who had just led the league with a 104.7 passer rating — a month into the offseason.

Fields — who huddled more than Mahomes did in college — will need time to connect with his new teammates, though. While splitting training-camp reps with both Dalton and Nick Foles could slow that progress, the Bears will have a plan to give the rookie plenty of work.

By then, the Bears hope Fields will have mastered the building blocks.

“It’s not our first time doing it, so we don’t freak out about the really good or the really bad,” Lazor said. “If you see ‘really good’ you might want to react to it. You try to hold that back and just let it play out. …

“Day 1 can look certain ways, but we know what the end is. We know what we’re aiming for. And we know there are a lot of ways to get there. And it’s our job to find the best way to get each guy there. We really won’t treat Justin any differently.”

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“I’ve always written more than people can keep up with. I write a lot of plays and I write a lot of lyrics. I just write all the time.”

Beau O’Reilly, 68, has been a fixture on Chicago’s fringe theater and music scenes for decades, most notably with the Curious Theatre Branch (coproducers of the annual Rhino Fest), Maestro Subgum & the Whole, and the Crooked Mouth.…Read More

This week Draft Dr. Phil and Shayne “The Smartest Man” Marsaw are joined by David Kaplan and former Bears DT Chris Zorich to talk about the 2021 schedule release and expectations for the 2021 season! PLUS, the guys discuss the golden rule of fall – not scheduling ANYTHING that takes away from Sunday football…that goes double for kids birthday parties.

The post Keepin It 100: A Chicago Bears Podcast – Bears Schedule Mayhem first appeared on CHI CITY SPORTS l Chicago Sports Blog – News – Forum – Fans – Rumors.Read More

Bears head coach Matt Nagy won’t coach the team’s rookie minicamp in person this weekend after being ruled a high-risk close contact for a family member who tested positive for the coronavirus, sources confirmed.

Bears head coach Matt Nagy won’t coach the team’s rookie minicamp in person this weekend after being ruled a high-risk close contact for a family member who tested positive for the coronavirus, sources confirmed.

Nagy was in the process of becoming fully vaccinated.

Nagy is expected to participate in the practice via virtual technology. He’ll run meetings remotely, too, as all classroom work this offseason is being conducted via Zoom.

The Bears will begin their rookie minicamp Friday, with quarterback Justin Fields and second-round tackle Teven Jenkins making their debut on the practice fields of Halas Hall. The team will hold practices on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, with voluntary organized team activities and mandatory minicamps to begin later this offseason.

Nagy appeared on NFL Network on Wednesday night as part of the league’s schedule release programming.

NFL teams continue to test players, coaches and staff members as a condition of their admission into their facilities.

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The Chicago Bears‘ 2021 schedule was officially released on Wednesday night and many were quick to debate on when Bears’ first-round draft selection Justin Fields will make his debut as the starting quarterback for the team. Dating back to when the Bears signed veteran quarterback Andy Dalton to a one-year deal in March, the plan […]

Chicago Bears Schedule Release: When will Justin Fields start? – Da Windy City – Da Windy City – A Chicago Sports Site – Bears, Bulls, Cubs, White Sox, Blackhawks, Fighting Illini & More

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Burns had a 55-46 record, including 3-3 in the playoffs, before retiring after the 1991 season. Many Vikings coaches and players over the years lauded Burns for his creativity on the field and for his sense of humor off the field.

MINNEAPOLIS — Jerry Burns, the colorful character who took over as the Minnesota Vikings’ head coach in a time of turmoil and led the team to three playoff berths in six seasons, has died. He was 94.

The team announced Burns’ death. Vikings spokesman Bob Hagan said Burns’ son-in-law informed him of Burns’ death Wednesday morning.

Burns helped the Green Bay Packers win the first two Super Bowls as the defensive backs coach for Vince Lombardi. Then he joined the staff of another future Hall of Fame coach when Bud Grant hired him as Minnesota’s offensive coordinator in 1968. Burns held the position until 1985 and became head coach in 1986, following Les Steckel’s 3-13 season in 1984 and Grant’s 7-9 campaign in 1985 when he was coaxed out of retirement.

“I met Burnsie at Iowa when he picked me up from the airport when I was visiting down there, and from that point on, we started talking football and never stopped,” Grant said in a statement released by the team. “We were on the same page a lot. When I went to Winnipeg, I’d have him come up as a guest coach. Our friendship grew over the years, and we became very close friends and so did our families.”

The 93-year-old Grant said Burns was a “very astute football mind” who “could see things on the field immediately.”

A Detroit native, Burns played quarterback at the University of Michigan from 1947 to 1950. He caught on as an assistant coach at Iowa in 1954 and took over as head coach in 1961, going 16-27-2 over five years before departing for the NFL.

Burns had a 55-46 record, including 3-3 in the playoffs, before retiring after the 1991 season. His 1987 team came on strong at the finish before losing to Washington for the NFC championship. He led the Vikings to regular-season records of 11-5 and 10-6 the next two years, both ending in postseason losses to San Francisco.

Many Vikings coaches and players over the years lauded Burns for his creativity on the field and for his sense of humor off the field.

“So many good memories with this man,” former Vikings quarterback Tommy Kramer tweeted. “He was the funniest, kindest guy you will ever meet, and an amazing coach. He invented the West Coast Offense. RIP Burnsie, you were the best.”

Another former Vikings quarterback, Fran Tarkenton, said through the team that his Hall of Fame career would not have unfolded so successfully without Burns.

“He made everybody smile,” Tarkenton said. “He was one of the most unique characters we’ve ever known, but it didn’t hide his brilliance. I spent the last seven years of my career with Burnsie, and he saved my life,”

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