The boy was shot in the chest inside a home in the 3500 block of South Rhodes Avenue, Chicago police said.

A 12-year-old boy was listed in critical condition after he was shot Thursday night on the South Side, officials say.

Shortly before 7 p.m., the boy was shot in a home in the 3500 block of South Rhodes Avenue, Chicago police said.

The boy suffered a gunshot wound to the chest and was transported to Comer Children’s Hospital, police said. He was listed in critical condition, according to Chicago fire officials.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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Gov. J.B. Pritzker said that barring another surge of infections, he’ll let the state fully reopen June 11.  It’s the clearest timeline Pritzker has set for most of the state to return to business as usual — and one that puts him in disagreement with Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who is sticking to a more conservative potential reopening date of July 4.

An ordeal that left many feeling like there was no end in sight might finally be coming to a close.

With coronavirus case numbers heading in the right direction, Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Thursday announced he’ll lift more COVID-19 business restrictions across Illinois next week — and barring another surge of infections, he’ll let the state fully reopen June 11.

Fourteen months into the pandemic, it’s the clearest timeline Pritzker has set for most of the state to return to business as usual — and one that puts him at odds yet again with Mayor Lori Lightfoot, who is sticking to a more conservative potential reopening date of July 4 for Chicago.

But even with the light at the end of the tunnel “getting brighter and brighter,” it’s still no sure bet, the governor cautioned during a Loop news conference.

“This good news comes with a caveat. We have all seen throughout this pandemic that this virus and its variants have proven to be unpredictable,” Pritzker said. “Metrics that look strong today are far from a guarantee of how things will look a week, two weeks, a month from now. We saw that last August and again last March.”

Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

That was the last time a spike in cases threw off the governor’s reopening plan. Illinois was on track to get to Pritzker’s intermediate “bridge phase” in late March until cases started trending back upward.

Now, with Illinois’ coronavirus testing positivity rate back down to 3% — its lowest point in six weeks — and more than 60% of the population at least partially vaccinated, the state is in line to get to the bridge May 14.

That means museums, amusement parks and zoos will be able to increase capacity from 25% to 60%, while festivals and other general admission outdoor events will be able to seat 30 people per 1,000 square feet. Additionally, meetings, conferences and conventions will see their capacity limit increase to either 1,000 people or 60% — whichever is less — with the same applying to theaters and performing arts venues.

After that, as long as residents follow basic COVID-19 precautions, keep signing up for vaccinations and help stave off another spike in infections, all of Pritzker’s business restrictions will be lifted June 11, he said.

“We want to keep moving forward,” Illinois Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said. “To do that, we need to get more and more individuals vaccinated, and we’re working to make the vaccines available in as many locations as possible.”

Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

Pritzker’s timeline would put the rest of the state about three weeks ahead of Chicago, where Lightfoot earlier this week said she’s aiming to fully open for business by July 4.

The mayor’s office said the city is “on course” to move to Pritzker’s bridge phase along with the rest of the state, but will stick to its own reopening timeline.

“While we have made significant progress and look forward to taking this step next week, we will only be able to fully reopen when we see continued improvement in COVID metrics and more widespread vaccine uptake,” a mayoral spokesperson said in an email. “We call on all Chicagoans to get vaccinated as soon as possible and to continue following the safety precautions so that we can experience all that Chicago has to offer this summer.”

Throughout the pandemic, Pritzker has given local governments leeway to impose COVID-19 restrictions that are tighter than his own, and Lightfoot often has done just that.

“I know that the mayor has said July 4 is what she’s aiming at,” Pritzker said. “I’m sure that she’s motivated to try to get there sooner, but this is where we can move to as a state.”

Graph not displaying properly? Click here.

Still, the governor stressed it might not happen if people don’t keep signing up for shots.

With the latest 99,599 COVID-19 shots that went into Illinois arms Wednesday, more than a third of the population is now fully vaccinated, but the state is now averaging just 70,063 shots given per day over the past week — a rate that has fallen almost in half since April 12.

And despite the state’s progress in lowering case counts, the virus is still causing grief across the state. In addition to 1,778 new cases of the disease, officials reported 40 more COVID-19 deaths, including a man in his 30s from McLean County in central Illinois.

The state’s death toll is up to 22,136 among more than 1.3 million residents who have tested positive over since March 2020.

“This pandemic is not over. But if we’re going to truly end it, we have to make sure that we don’t see another surge in the virus, and the best way to do that is for everyone to get vaccinated,” Pritzker said.

Justin L. Fowler/The State Journal-Register via AP file

As part of that effort, Pritzker announced doses are now being allocated to more than a thousand private physicians’ offices.

The life saving vaccines remain free and readily available on a walk-up basis at government-run mass vaccination sites as well as many Walgreens, Walmart and CVS pharmacies.

For help finding an appointment in Chicago, visit zocdoc.com or call (312) 746-4835.

For suburban Cook County sites, visit vaccine.cookcountyil.gov or call (833) 308-1988.

To find providers elsewhere, visit coronavirus.illinois.gov or call (833) 621-1284.

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While Chicago opera plays on your phone, Symphony Center announces May opening.

We’ll have to wait until sometime this summer to get the video stream Lyric Opera’s promising of last weekend’s performance of the garage opera, Twilight: Gods. Like a picnic version of a gourmet meal, that event was more about the environment than the opera, so it’ll be interesting to see how well it works onscreen.  
In the meantime, Lyric’s lineup of free streaming music (at lyricopera.org) just got a boost from the addition of the 2021 production of the Ryan Opera Center’s “Rising Stars in Concert”—the annual showcase for the routinely terrific young singers at Lyric’s training center.…Read More

A 77-year-old man driving a 1979 Chevy Corvette rear-ended a Buick LaCrosse while traveling in the I-94 express lane near 35th Street, according to Illinois State Police.

Two men were hospitalized Thursday afternoon after a 1979 Chevy Corvette rear-ended a sedan and caught on fire on the Dan Ryan Expressway near 35th Street.

A 77-year-old man driving the Corvette rear-ended a Buick LaCrosse about 2:05 p.m. while traveling south in the I-94 express lane near 35th Street, according to Illinois State Police.

Following the crash, the 77-year-old pulled over onto the shoulder and exited his Corvette, which then caught on fire, state police said.

He and the driver of the Buick, a 27-year-old man, were taken to area hospitals both with injuries that were not considered life-threatening, state police said.

Three lanes of I-94 southbound were closed until about 3 p.m.

The cause of the crash remains under investigation.

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Police, paramedics and another county investigator initially believed 13-year-old Adam Toledo — a seventh grader who weighed 91 pounds and was 5 feet tall — was at least 20 years old when a Chicago police officer shot and killed him in March, according to city and county documents.

The Chicago Sun-Times reviewed the medical examiner’s autopsy report, a medical examiner’s investigator report from the scene of the shooting, a Chicago Fire Department report and a Chicago Police Department incident report.

A Chicago police officer fatally shot Adam in the early morning hours of Monday, March 29 after chasing him down an alley next to Farragut Career Academy in Little Village. A gun was found near where Adam was shot.

Police were in the area responding to a ShotSpotter gunshot detector alert. The fatal encounter was captured on police-worn body cameras and was released to the public in April which prompted mass protestst and national attention.

Latino leaders earlier this week called on a moratorium on police foot pursuits and last month also called for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the shooting of Adam.

The autopsy report concluded Adam was killed by a single bullet which entered the left side of his chest and exited the right side of his back. It made no note of any “soot deposition or gunpowder particles” on his clothing. Police also took samples of clothing to test for gunshot residue before the start of the autopsy, but no results have been provided to the Sun-Times.

Adam had a tattoo on his right wrist, according to the medical examiner, but no photos were included in autopsy documents provided to the Sun-Times.

Adam was shot on March 29 at 2:38 a.m. and pronounced dead on arrival at 2:46 a.m. by the CFD paramedics, according to the reports.

Chicago police reported Adam’s death to the medical examiner’s office at 4:09 a.m. — 83 minutes after CFD had pronounced him dead — according to a medical examiner investigation case report.

A police spokesman declined to comment on why it took officers that long to notify the medical examiner’s office of the shooting, but noted death scenes develop differently.

For example, when someone dies due to natural causes, officers typically are able to report the death to the medical examiner much more quickly than if it is a shooting death that requires more investigation.

Still, a county ordinance requires police to notify the medical examiner of deaths “immediately” and “within one hour of their becoming aware of the death.”

The medical examiner investigation report also leaves some questions about how long its investigator was on site. The investigator failed to document what time they arrived on the scene or what time they left.

A spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office said Thursday the investigator had enough time to take photos of the scene and obtain collect other information but couldn’t say when they arrived.

The investigator did document that Adam was fatally shot by police after officers were responding to “a call of shots fired.” At the time of the report, the identity of Adam was “Unknown” — Adam was carrying no ID. The investigator also listed Adam as between 21 and 30 years old.

That estimate of Adam’s age would not change until he was eventually identified two days later, on March 31.

Ruben Roman, a 21-year-old man who was in the alley that night, was arrested not long before Adam was shot. He gave a fake name for Adam and also denied knowing him, a Cook County prosecutor said. That hampered efforts to identify Adam, CPD Supt. David Brown has said.

According to the original CPD incident report, the investigator from the medical examiner’s office gave approval for Adam’s body to be transported from the scene. He was picked up at 5:02 a.m. and, 19 minutes later, arrived at the morgue.

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A man is facing charges after allegedly shooting two women in December on the West Side.

Joshua Jones, 26, is charged with felony aggravated battery and aggravated discharge of a firearm, Chicago police said.

He was allegedly identified as the gunman in the incident, which happened Dec. 23, 2020, in the 4800 block of West Harrison Street, police said. Two women, 22 and 24 years old, were traveling in a vehicle that day when Jones allegedly opened fire, striking them both.

Jones was arrested by U.S. Marshals and the Chicago Fugitive Apprehension Unit Tuesday at Stateville Correctional Center, where he is serving an 8 year sentence for a felony gun conviction, according to Illinois Department of Corrections records and police.

He is due in bond court Friday.

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During one of the many, many, armored-car heist sequences in “Wrath of Man,” the assailants splatter the windows with black paint, leaving the driver of the vehicle and his partner in the dark, unable to tell what the hell is going on and why.

Great. Now they know how we feel.

Guy Ritchie’s latest effort — a remake of the 2004 French film “Le Convoyeur” aka “Cash Truck” — plays like a half-hearted cover version of Ritchie’s best kinetic actioners, so why do we need this when we already have “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,” “Snatch” and even last year’s fantastically cockeyed “The Gentlemen”?

Spoiler alert: We don’t.

Tired, uninspired and meandering, “Wrath of Man” is a step backward for Ritchie, a step sideways for the stoic-for-life Jason Statham (reteaming with Ritchie for the first time in 16 years) and a misstep for anyone who invests their time and money on 118 minutes of such convoluted and forgettable nonsense. This is the kind of movie where even the poster isn’t consistent with the film itself; the advertising artwork depicts a bruised Statham in a beautifully tailored suit, indicating he might be playing some sort of high-end bodyguard or elite jewel thief or millionaire mercenary, when in fact his character shambles about in Dad Khakis, black zip-up sweaters and security guard uniforms.

Much more disconcerting is a storyline that serpentines this way and that, hopping all over the timeline — a favorite hallmark of Ritchie’s, but rarely employed to such underwhelming effect. A whiplash-inducing change in P.O.V. leaves Statham on the sidelines for a good chunk of time and makes us feel as if we’ve been plunged into an entirely different movie, for no great reason. If we’re gonna have a Jason Statham movie, let’s have Jason Statham around nearly all of the time — and oh yeah, let’s not disguise him in body armor and a reflective helmet in the penultimate action scene, making it virtually impossible to distinguish him from a half-dozen other gun-wielding men.

Statham plays Patrick Hill, a security specialist who has just been hired as an armed guard at a private, Los Angeles-based cash truck firm known as Fortico Securities. On Hill’s first day on the job, the veteran and likable Bullet (Holt McCallany from “Mindhunter”), the de facto clubhouse leader of the organization, dubs him H, “like the bomb or Jesus H,” ha ha ha. Our man H barely passed the firearm accuracy and driving tests to qualify for the job, and his new partner, the cocky Boy Sweat Dave (Josh Hartnett), mocks H and tells him to stay out of his way — but when the bleep hits the fan and armed gunmen try to take down the truck, Boy Sweat Dave is more like Flop Sweat Dave, and H coolly and efficiently mows down every last henchman. Something doesn’t add up about this guy, says Eddie Marsan’s Terry, the exec who runs the company — a sentiment echoed by a number of others who see H in action and realize he’s not some journeyman security guard.

Gee. Ya think?

Turns out H runs his own elite squad of lethal killers, and though it’s not entirely clearly what these guys specialize in, they spring into action and start hunting down, torturing and executing suspects after H’s son Dougie (Eli Brown) is in the wrong place at the wrong time and is gunned down. (We learn the full story in flashback.) Meanwhile, as H thwarts yet ANOTHER attempted robbery of a Fortico armored car, we shift gears and find ourselves in a movie about a group of disgruntled, restless and bored American combat veterans who start pulling off heists because they’re, well, disgruntled, restless and bored.

Top-tier actors such as Jeffrey Donovan, who plays the leader of the squad, a family man with a loving wife and two adoring children, and Scott Eastwood, portraying the obligatory scar-faced, crazy-eyed, bloodthirsty killer who’s in it more for the action than the money, are wasted in paper-thin roles. But at least we know who these guys are and what they’re all about, as opposed to Andy Garcia’s Agent King, who is apparently the king of all agents at … some agency, and either used to be or still is H’s boss and exists primarily to look the other way while H presides over the murders of a number of notorious scumbags who might have been tied to his son’s murder.

After an overlong heist sequence that only serves to remind us how difficult it is to match up to films such as “Heat,” there’s an epilogue that’s entirely unsurprising and not the least bit satisfying, in large part because the main villain was never fleshed out and just seems like the last in a long, long line of killers and thieves who find themselves on the wrong end of H’s gun.

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As Republicans march ahead with their campaign to tighten voting laws in political battlegrounds, some in their party are worried the restrictions will backfire by making it harder for GOP voters to cast ballots.

The restrictions backed by Republicans in Georgia, Florida, Iowa, Texas and Arizona often take aim at mail voting, a method embraced by voters from both parties but particularly popular with older voters. The new rules, concerned Republicans note, may be billed as adding security or trust in elections but ultimately could add hurdles for key parts of the GOP coalition.

“The suppression tactics included in this bill would hurt the Republican Party as much or more than its opposition,” Texas state Rep. Lyle Larson, a Republican, said in an opinion column this week. “One can only wonder — are the bill authors trying to make it harder for Republican voters to vote?”

On Thursday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a wide-ranging voting bill, making his state the latest to tighten its election rules, while lawmakers in GOP-controlled Texas were debating new limits on voting. The push for new restrictions comes even though former President Donald Trump won both states last year and Republican officials touted their elections as fair and efficient. Critics charge the effort is meant to make it harder for Democrats to vote.

But some of the impact is likely to be bipartisan. The Texas proposals add new restrictions on early voting and prohibit county officials from sending ballot request forms to all registered voters. Until last year, it was Republicans who were more likely to cast mail ballots than Democrats were. In 2016, 40% of mail ballots were cast by people who had voted in a GOP primary, compared to 27% cast by Democratic primary voters.

In Arizona, thousands of GOP voters could find themselves no longer automatically receiving ballots in the mail under a proposal that would remove infrequent voters from a permanent voting list.

Florida’s new law requires voters to request their mail ballots every two years, rather than every four. Critics of the idea argue that could lower voter turnout in off-year elections, when already far fewer voters cast ballots.

Any changes to mail voting in Florida is certain to affect older voters.

“Anything that makes it harder for people to cast their vote will have an oversized impact on seniors,” said Florida state Sen. Jeff Brandes, a Republican who voted against the bill.

He noted that many older adults live in his Pinellas County district: “I don’t think many of them understand the broader implications of this legislation yet. I don’t think many legislators understood it as it was going through the process.”

Republicans in other states are pressing ahead. In Ohio, another Republican-dominated state, a bill introduced Thursday would restrict placement of drop boxes, eliminate a day of early voting and tighten voter ID requirements.

In general, Republican supporters argue the changes will have minimal impact on voters and are aimed at boosting public confidence.

“It’s going to remain really easy to vote after this legislation is signed into law,” Iowa state Rep. Bobby Kauffman told colleagues in urging them to support his proposal that was signed into law in March. “This bill protects Iowans’ right to vote, and it adds certainty and security to it.”

Republican lawmakers have zeroed in on mail voting rules this year after a notable shift in voting patterns in the November election resulted in more Democrats casting mail ballots in a few key states.

That followed a year in which Republican voters heard repeatedly from Trump that mail voting was insecure and rife with fraud despite any evidence. The pandemic also drove core Democratic constituencies to mail voting to avoid crowded polling places.

It remains to be seen whether this trend will hold as pandemic restrictions ease and people return to pre-pandemic voting behaviors. In the past, especially in places like Florida, that’s meant more Republicans voting by mail.

“When you restrict access by reducing opportunities for voters, you are suppressing the vote for all voters,” said Adrian Fontes, a Democratic former chief elections official in Maricopa County, Arizona. “Many of the restrictions being proposed by Republicans are effectively a product of their ignorance of the voting habits of their own constituents.”

In Iowa, 76% of eligible voters cast ballots last November, among the highest rates in the nation, as Republicans swept races up and down the ballot. Trump easily won the state in what had been expected to be a close race, Republican Joni Ernst won reelection to the U.S. Senate, and Republicans flipped two U.S. House seats with no major problems or fraud reported.

And yet state lawmakers approved several changes to election laws, including a new statewide deadline for mail ballots that could mean an increase in the number of ballots rejected for arriving late. Previously, mail ballots were counted in Iowa as long as they were postmarked the day before the election and received by noon the following Monday.

If the new Election Day deadline had been in effect last November, it would have meant more ballots from registered Republicans tossed out: at least 689 compared to 649 Democratic ballots and 616 unaffiliated ones, according to a review of state data.

That combined with a new shortened period of just 20 days for when clerks can send out ballots means rural residents who prefer to vote by mail will have a narrow window to receive their ballots, fill them out and send them back. In 2020, this period spanned 29 days — a reduction from 40 days in 2016.

All this will undoubtedly affect rural parts of the state, where mail service is typically slower.

“Smaller rural counties have a large elderly population who typically choose to vote absentee because of weather or health concerns. Why are we making it harder for them to vote?” Rebecca Bissell, a Republican and the county elections commissioner in Adams County, asked lawmakers in February.

In Florida, Republicans have long held an advantage in mail voting. In 2016, about 940,000 more Republicans voted by mail. But last November, Florida Democrats outvoted Republicans by about 680,000 mail ballots amid a record 4.8 million total mail ballots cast. Trump still ended up carrying the state by about 3 percentage points.

DeSantis, in signing the bill during a live broadcast of “Fox & Friends,” praised it as “the strongest election integrity measures in the country” and said tighter restrictions were needed on drop boxes to protect the security of the votes.

Voting rights groups say Republicans are counting on the motivation and privilege of their own voters to overcome any hurdles they may face, leaving poor and minority voters to bear the brunt of these restrictions.

Mac Stipanovich, a longtime Republican operative who has since left the party, said there’s a risk that new elections rules in Florida could end up having other, unintended consequences.

“There’s also the possibility that by appearing to intentionally try to keep poor people of color from voting, you will incense them, and you’ll get exactly the reaction you didn’t want,” Stipanovich said.

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Associated Press writer Bobby Caina Calvan in Tallahassee, Fla., contributed to this report.

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BOISE, Idaho — A sixth-grade girl brought a gun to her Idaho middle school, shot and wounded two students and a custodian and then was disarmed by a teacher Thursday, authorities said.

The three were shot in their extremities and were expected to survive, officials said at a news conference. Jefferson County Sheriff Steve Anderson says the girl pulled a handgun from her backpack and fired multiple rounds inside and outside Rigby Middle School in the small city of Rigby, about 95 miles southwest of Yellowstone National Park.

A female teacher disarmed the girl and held her until law enforcement arrived and took her into custody, authorities said, without giving other details. Authorities say they’re investigating the motive for the attack and where the girl got the gun.

She is from the nearby city of Idaho Falls, Anderson said. He didn’t release her name.

Dr. Michael Lemon, trauma medical director at Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, said the injured adult was treated and released for a bullet wound in an extremity. The bullet went cleanly through the limb, he said.

Both of the students who were shot were being held at the hospital overnight, and one of them might need surgery, Lemon said. Still, both students were in fair condition. One of the students had wounds in two limbs and might have been shot twice, he said.

Police were called to the school around 9:15 a.m. after students and staffers heard gunfire. Multiple law enforcement agencies responded, and students were evacuated to a nearby high school to be reunited with their parents.

“Me and my classmate were just in class with our teacher — we were doing work — and then all of a sudden, here was a loud noise and then there were two more loud noises. Then there was screaming,” 12-year-old Yandel Rodriguez said. “Our teacher went to check it out, and he found blood.”

Yandel’s mom, Adela Rodriguez, said they were OK but “still a little shaky” from the shooting as they left the campus.

“Today we had the worst nightmare a school district could encounter,” Jefferson School District Superintendent Chad Martin said.

Martin said schools would be closed districtwide to give students time to be with families, but that counselors would be available starting Friday morning.

Rigby Middle School has about 1,500 students in sixth through eighth grades, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

“I am praying for the lives and safety of those involved in today’s tragic events,” Gov. Brad Little said in a prepared statement. “Thank you to our law enforcement agencies and school leaders for their efforts in responding to the incident.”

Police tape surrounded the middle school, and small evidence markers were placed next to spots of blood on the ground. Investigators interviewed faculty and staffers individually.

Lucy Long, a sixth-grader at Rigby Middle School, told the Post Register newspaper in Idaho Falls that her classroom went into lockdown after they heard gunshots, with lights and computers turned off and students lined up against the wall.

Lucy comforted her friends and began recording on her phone, so police would know what happened if the shooter came in. The audio contained mostly whispers, with one sentence audible: “It’s real,” one student said.

Lucy said she saw blood on the hallway floor when police escorted them out of the classroom.

The attack appears to be Idaho’s second school shooting. In 1999, a student at a high school in Notus fired a shotgun several times. No one was struck by the gunfire, but one student was injured by ricocheting debris from the first shell.

In 1989, a student at Rigby Junior High pulled a gun, threatened a teacher and students, and took a 14-year-old girl hostage, according to a Deseret News report. Police safely rescued the hostage from a nearby church about an hour later and took the teen into custody. No one was shot in that incident.

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Associated Press writers Keith Ridler in Boise and Emily Wilder in Phoenix contributed. Photographer Natalie Behring contributed from Rigby.

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This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Yandel Rodriguez’s first name and his pronouns.

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