Educator steps in to help orphaned teens

Good morning, Chicago. ✶

🔎 Below: How one school official stepped in to help a family separated by President Donald Trump’s deportation blitz.

🗞️ Plus: A man tied to Chicago’s power brokers is convicted in a violent extortion scheme, a mural honoring a slain Ukrainian refugee appears and more news you need to know.

📝 Keeping score: The Blackhawks fell to the Wild, 4-3.

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⏱️: A 9-minute read

TODAY’S WEATHER 🌤️

Mostly sunny with a high near 16 and wind chill values as low as -13.

TODAY’S TOP STORY 🔎

After Trump’s deportation blitz rips apart Chicago-area family, school official steps up

By Chip Mitchell

Diego and Rosa’s story: At first, Edith Rivera Courington expected her work with a pair of late enrollees would be routine. Rivera Courington supports students new to this country as assistant superintendent for English learners in a suburban school district that covers Westmont. She met Diego, 14, and Rosa, 13, when they arrived in 2023 after their parents died in Central Mexico — their mother lost her fight with lung cancer; their father was fatally shot. The pair joined their brother Federico, 18, who had been living with their aunt in the Chicago area.

ICE trauma: Federico got a job in a furniture factory and the three siblings moved to an apartment outside Rivera Courington’s school district, though they stayed in contact. Then in October, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained Federico on his way to work, sending him to a detention center in Missouri, where he remains. The aunt agreed to take in the other two.

Community aid: Rivera Courington jumped into action for her former students, reaching out to food pantries, providing toiletries, helping them get out of their lease, giving them rides, finding legal representation for Federico, and compelling her family and friends to raise $1,300 for the siblings at Christmastime. “This is what we should be doing for each other. If there’s someone in need, we should just help,” Rivera Courington told WBEZ.

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MORE IN IMMIGRATION ✶

• VA hospital memorial: Dozens of caregivers, veterans and union members gathered outside the Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Center to mourn Alex Pretti, a VA nurse shot to death by Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis. “I can’t help but see myself in Alex Pretti,” one nurse said.

• Mayor’s call to action: Mayor Brandon Johnson called Tuesday for a coordinated, sustained nationwide protest akin to the Civil Rights Movement in response to the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement actions.

• We’re tracking prosecutions: Federal prosecutors in Chicago have accused 32 known defendants of nonimmigration crimes tied to Operation Midway Blitz. But at least three were cleared after a grand jury refused to indict, and a fourth was cleared when a jury found him not guilty at trial. Eleven others saw their charges dropped for various other reasons.

THE WATCHDOGS ✶

Man who posed as Pablo Escobar’s son, mixed with Chicago power brokers is guilty of extortion

By Tim Novak and Frank Main

Fakroune convicted: A former top aide to the governor. A member of a state board that oversees stadiums. A top-notch Chicago restaurateur. They’re among the people with whom Jawad Fakroune, convicted Tuesday of a violent extortion scheme, managed to develop close relationships, according to court testimony.

Jury’s decision: On Tuesday, a jury convicted Fakroune — a past felon — on charges of using violence to try to collect $1.5 million from a Chicago restaurant owner. He’s to be sentenced June 30.

The trial: During the six-day trial, jurors learned Fakroune masqueraded as Angelino Escobar, a son of the late Colombian cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar — even though Fakroune doesn’t speak Spanish and is a Moroccan national. He was a well-known patron at Chicago’s top restaurants favored by wealthy diners, politically connected leaders and sports stars.

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CHILD CARE 👶

Report finds issues with state plan to unify early childhood programs

By Sarah Karp

Unified programs: Come July, a new state agency, the Illinois Department of Early Childhood, will be fully responsible for state programs that offer home visiting, early intervention, subsidized day care and preschool. It will also license and provide quality ratings for early learning programs.

Key context: Prior to the agency’s creation, these programs and services, as well as the grants that pay for them, were handled by three different state agencies. Parents often had to navigate a complex, fragmented system to get day care, preschool, or services for babies and toddlers with developmental delays. Gov. J.B. Pritzker created the new state agency in an attempt to untangle this mess, unifying the services under one umbrella.

Issues flagged: A new report from The Civic Federation points to several issues with which the new agency will have to contend. Quality licensed day care and preschool programs are not equally distributed across the state, according to the report. There’s also a high turnover of child care providers — and their staff are not well-paid, part of a larger issue of limited funds for these programs, the report says.

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MORE NEWS YOU NEED 🗞️

• Mural appears: A large mural has appeared, depicting Iryna Zarutska, a 23-year-old Ukrainian refugee who was fatally stabbed Aug. 22 in North Carolina. Little is known about the mural’s origin, other than Elon Musk pledged $1 million to get it painted.

• Ex-cop charged: Alain M. Dillon, a former Chicago police officer, is facing 18 felony counts after he allegedly lent out his police radio in exchange for payments, authorities said.
• Cook County judge removed: Weeks after two lawyer groups urged his removal over a conspiracy-filled blog post, the Illinois Supreme Court vacated retired Judge James R. Brown’s temporary assignment to the Cook County Circuit Court.
• Long COVID study: Researchers at Northwestern University used a smartphone app to follow patients with neurological symptoms stemming from long COVID-19. They found even those whose symptoms have improved suffer setbacks and an uneven recovery.
• Teatro ZinZanni to close: The dinner theater announced it will shutter its current show Saturday, citing a decline in ticket sales that stemmed from COVID-19 and federal immigration enforcement efforts.
• Festival season announced: The city announced its full summer festival schedule, including Taste of Chicago’s return to Grant Park in July.
• 2.5 stars for ‘Salome’: In this production of the 120-year-old opera, the focus is on fascist Italy of the 1930s, setting up weird geographical and chronological clashes — but Richard Strauss’ score is the real star, writes Kyle MacMillan in a review for the Sun-Times.

FROM THE PRESS BOX 🏈🏒🏀

• Bears’ offseason agenda: An edge rusher is high on the Bears’ list of upgrades, be it in the draft, in free agency or via trade.
• Embracing the future: Blackhawks veteran Jason Dickinson realizes there’s a good chance the Hawks trade him to make room for young talent graduating into the NHL. In the meantime, he loves those newcomers.
• Eyes on UCLA: Some teams are casting wider nets in college scouting since free agency and the expansion draft are delayed. UCLA offers an efficient solution for the Sky.
• Boys basketball: We’ve got Tuesday’s high school boys basketball scores, including St. Patrick’s 72-61 win over Marist.

CHICAGO MINI CROSSWORD 🌭

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BRIGHT ONE 🔆

Photojounralist captures stunning views of icy lake

By Vanessa Lopez

Most people retreat indoors when temperatures plummet below zero. Sun-Times photojournalist Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere heads toward the water. Whether on assignment or not, his passion for shooting outdoors compels him to chase conditions others avoid.

LaRiviere said these photographs — captured Jan. 22 and 23 — look more like abstract paintings to him, with the ice formations creating otherworldly shapes and patterns. But what draws LaRiviere back to the frozen lake is its rhythm as waves interact with pancake ice, the circular or pebble-shaped discs seen floating on the water.

“The lake looked like it was constantly rolling, like little humps coming into the shore. And as such, the ice almost looked like it was breathing. A rhythmic motion,” LaRiviere said.

To get the photos, LaRiviere wore four layers of tops including his coat, two layers of pants, two layers of socks, insulated boots, goggles, a face wrap and gloves.

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YOUR DAILY QUESTION ☕️

Some trend forecasters are predicting a “return to analog” this year, anticipating more people may break from screen-centered habits in favor of tactile hobbies. So we want to know:

What’s the best way to disconnect from your phone and reconnect with your passions?

Email your answer here. (please include your first and last name). We may run your answer in a future newsletter or story.

Thanks for reading the Sun-Times Morning Edition!

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Written and curated by: Matt Moore

Editor: Eydie Cubarrubia

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