Promising an offensive against gun-toting gang members, U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald announced Monday his office will review every local criminal case involving firearms to see whether tougher federal laws could be used to prosecute the suspects.
The program, which could shift hundreds of gun cases into the federal system each year, is meant to target the most violent and repetitive offenders with hefty prison terms. Fitzgerald is determined about getting the word out on the street that federal authorities are serious about gun crimes.
“It means fear,” Fitzgerald said. “The gangbangers who are afraid not to have a gun ought to be scared to death of us. They ought to know we’re out there; they’re going to go to federal court. . . . They’re going to go to jail for 15 years without parole.”
The initiative is part of a national effort modeled after a program in Richmond, Va. It is the most substantial foray by federal authorities here into the business of prosecuting gun cases, authorities said.
In the past 2 1/2 years, the U.S. attorney’s office has gone after five suburban gun shops for selling illegal weapons. Federal prosecutors have teamed up with an advertising agency to warn gang members and drug dealers about the hefty price they could pay for using firearms.
“Now it’s time for the federal government to do more,” Fitzgerald said at a news conference Monday attended by Mayor Richard Daley, Police Supt. Terry Hillard, prosecutors, and federal and local police.
Daley, who has said the federal government needs to be more involved in the fight against gangs and guns, called Monday’s announcement “a dream come true.”
Hillard called the program “a long time coming.”
The program will start in Cook County and be expanded to the collar counties and elsewhere in northern Illinois under Fitzgerald’s jurisdiction. Federal prosecutors, he said, will meet with representatives from Cook County State’s Atty. Richard Devine’s office to hash over the details of every state criminal case involving a firearm.
The effort will focus on the Harrison and Austin Districts on the West Side. Harrison led the city in slayings last year with 72 and recorded 615 aggravated batteries with a firearm. Austin had 38 slayings and 394 aggravated batteries with a firearm.
If prosecutors agree a case could bring stiffer penalties under federal law, the U.S. attorney’s office will take over.
“We have some decent [state] laws,” said Devine. “But when you look across the board at the resources, it is quite clear that in certain situations the federal penalties are significantly higher.”
For instance, if a person with three prior convictions for violent offenses is arrested with a gun, under state law he could face 3 to 14 years in prison–but would likely only have to serve half the sentence. In federal court, that person could face a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison and be required to serve most of that time.
The plan is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods announced by the Bush administration last year. The two-year, $533 million program will help pay for 113 assistant U.S. attorneys and about 600 state and local prosecutors.
It’s modeled after Project Exile in Richmond, where every gun case is now sent through federal court. The effort has been recognized nationally, as the city’s crime rate plunged–slayings were cut in half–even though some critics said the law unfairly targeted blacks for tougher sentences.
Chicago had 666 slayings last year, the most of any city in the nation. Guns were used in about 75 percent of the slayings, police said.
Monday’s announcement follows the indictment last week of 21 people on federal gun offenses, including a suburban firefighter and police officer.
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The charges bring the year-to-date total to 52 cases and 75 defendants charged with federal gun crimes. In 2001, there were 65 federal gun cases involving 134 defendants. A year earlier, it was 55 cases and 125 defendants.