Re: Chicago Wins Again! - Literal Highway Robbery

On 2025-04-09 6:00 PM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

BTR1701 <atropos@mac.com> wrote:
 

In Chicago, men of a certain unsurprising demographic dressed as parking
attendants are surrounding cars before they even exit the freeway and
demanding money to park at Comiskey Park.

 

In a (not-so) shocking twist, if you don’t give them the $40 they’re
demanding, they become violent.

 

https://video.twimg.com/amplify_video/1908162578641027072/vid/avc1/650x480/wAy_4va6RimmcLHu.mp4?tag=16

 

Well done, Chicago. Even in L.A. you don't get held up on the freeway by
masked bandits like it's an 1820s stagecoach robbery or something.

 Absolutely outrageous. I hadn't heard about that.
 An alderman is working on an ordinamce that would allow vehicle owners
to sue unlicensed predatory towing companies, that just show up at
accidents and try to get cash from motorists. I have no idea where they
take vehicles.

Probably somewhere that they charge hundreds of dollars a day to "store" the vehicle but that is out of the way and/or hard to find so that the owner takes a while to locate them....
Shady tow operators are common up here too. But it's gotten to a point where they will exchange gunfire with their competitors to get a tow at an accident scene. That's obviously REALLY bad but I don't know of anything that the police are actually doing about that beyond their standard declarations that this is unacceptable.
Given how much stricter gun control is here than there, you'd think the police would have plenty of leverage over anyone discharging - or even displaying - a firearm. Then again, with just about everyone getting bail for every offence, even if they are already out on bail, they may not think it's worth the risk of confronting the tow truck operators.
--
Rhino