Good morning, Chicago.
Images of a slight Sonya Massey being fatally shot in the face by an imposing law enforcement officer inside her home in July 2024 shocked much of America.
The 36-year-old Black mother of two, who at the time was dealing with mental health challenges, had called police to her residence near Springfield because she said she was worried about a prowler. Mere minutes later, Sangamon County Deputy Sheriff Sean Grayson, who is white, killed her as he yelled for her to drop a pot of what he feared was boiling water.
Grayson’s first-degree murder trial begins today 15 months after that fatal night. But for Massey’s father, the trial is only a reminder of how much he’s lost.
“I miss our long conversations. We would have conversations that were sometimes at least a couple of hours long,” James Wilburn said in an interview earlier this month with the Tribune. “And we never, ever ended a conversation without her saying, ‘I love you, Daddy.’”
Read the full story from the Tribune’s Jeremy Gorner.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day, including: what happened at Saturday’s “No Kings” protest downtown, how the Bears got their first four-game winning streak since 2018 and a look at the Goodman Theatre as it turns 100.
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Vanessa Aguirre-Ávalos, owner of Luna y Cielo Play Café in Chicago’s Logan Square neighborhood, pictured on Oct. 16, 2025, provides whistles and information to customers for use to protect the community against ICE. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
Whistles take over Chicago as the small, inexpensive device becomes popular way to alert of ICE activity
From coffee shops to bars to adult stores, businesses and other volunteers have handed out thousands of whistles across the city in solidarity. Hundreds have also assembled whistle kits at “Whistlemania” events. The kits include “Know Your Rights” information, whistles and a zine with instructions on how to use them. They have been passed out to businesses, schools, Little Free Libraries and more.
Upset neighbors interrupt federal immigration manhunt in Mount Prospect
Federal immigration agents accuse women of battery, Bolingbrook police say
Archie Collins, 59, talks on Oct. 6, 2025, about the recent large-scale raid by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at the building where he lives at 7500 S. South Shore Drive in Chicago. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)
They were already living in one of Chicago’s worst apartment buildings. Then came the ICE raid.
Archie Collins went to sleep the night of the raid like he often does: on the floor and hungry. He was up on the fifth floor of the five-story brick building at 7500 S. South Shore Drive, in Apartment 502. He had no gas for his stove. No electricity, except for that provided by an extension cord from a neighboring unit. The U.S. Postal Service stopped delivering mail long ago.
He didn’t hear the approaching helicopters. He didn’t see their spotlights shining through the windows, or hear the snipers land atop the roof, ready to take aim. He didn’t feel the presence of the federal agents, from ICE and the FBI, until they were at his door. He awoke only when they kicked it down. When they were upon him.
President Donald Trump speaks in the Oval Office at the White House on Oct. 16, 2025, in Washington. (Alex Brandon/AP)
‘Devil’s ideology’: President Donald Trump’s darkening rhetoric escalates attacks and often targets Illinois
President Donald Trump has long wielded sharp rhetoric as a political weapon — who can forget “Crooked Hillary” Clinton or “Sleepy Joe” Biden? — but in his second term, the president’s language and that of his top aides has taken an even darker turn. And perhaps nowhere in the country has Trump focused his efforts to discredit his opponents more than on the Chicago area.
Demonstrators head north on Michigan Avenue for the “No Kings” march after a rally at Butler Field, Oct. 18, 2025, in Chicago. (John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune)
‘No Kings’ rally in downtown Chicago draws more than 100K protesters: ‘You fight for the people’
Looming over the tapestry of flags and homemade signs undulating across the Grant Park lawn Saturday were two that stood higher than the rest. Robert Ryan, 61, had meticulously fashioned both a “NO KINGS” flag — complete with an angry red X crossing out a crown — and the signature Chicago flag atop a 15-foot pole.
He was one of more than 100,000 rallygoers who flocked to Grant Park on Saturday morning to take part in the nationwide “No Kings” demonstrations that later proved to be Chicago’s largest protest in recent memory. The event was organized in response to President Donald Trump’s administration, which has lately made Chicago ground zero for his mass deportation campaign.
Photos: ‘No Kings’ protest in downtown Chicago
Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates exits after addressing the Chicago Public Schools Board of Education at its meeting Aug. 28, 2025. (John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune)
CTU’s Stacy Davis Gates elected head of Illinois teachers union
Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates will lead the Illinois Federation of Teachers, the IFT announced Saturday after its election, positioning the progressive power player to have an even greater role in negotiations over state education funding.
Ignatian Corps. volunteer Derrick Blakely, center, a former reporter for the Chicago Tribune, WBBM-Ch. 2 and WMAQ-Ch. 5, speaks to Road to Success job readiness training program graduate Marcus King, left, and another graduate, on Sept. 19, 2025, at St. Leonard’s Ministries in Chicago. (Dominic Di Palermo/Chicago Tribune)
Ignatian Volunteer Corps connects 50-year-old-plus set with a chance to help those in need
What does retirement look like for you?
For a West Lawn resident with an electrical engineering degree, retirement entails spending a part of his week fixing electric appliances donated to Habitat for Humanity’s South Side ReStore.
For a former WBBM-Ch. 2 reporter and anchor/reporter at WMAQ-Ch. 5, retirement includes assisting people at St. Leonard’s Ministries who have been affected by the carceral system.
Tom Beardsley, of Downers Grove, and his daughter Joan, 4, encounter a Fresh Del Monte Servi roving robot offering bananas on Sept. 25, 2025, at a Jewel in Westmont. (Dominic Di Palermo/Chicago Tribune)
Banana-selling robots pitch customers in test run at three suburban Jewel stores
From bananas to burgers, store aisles to sidewalks, an army of robots has descended upon Chicagoland with the singular mission to bring us food.
Robotic serving carts, once the stuff of foodie science fiction, are rolling among us in increasing numbers to deliver meals on wheels to customers — whether they are ready or not.
A basket lift used by thieves is seen at the Louvre Museum in Paris on Oct. 19, 2025. (Alexander Turnbull/AP)
Thieves steal Napoleonic crown jewels in 4 minutes from Louvre Museum
In a minutes-long strike yesterday inside the world’s most-visited museum, thieves rode a basket lift to the Louvre, forced a window into the Galerie d’Apollon — while tourists pressed shoulder-to-shoulder in the corridors — smashed display cases and fled with priceless Napoleonic jewels, officials said.
Bears defensive tackle Gervon Dexter Sr. (99) celebrates with his teammates after recovering a fumble in the first quarter against the Saints on Oct. 19, 2025, at Soldier Field. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
Chicago Bears have their 1st 4-game winning streak since 2018: Brad Biggs’ 10 thoughts on the Week 7 win
The Bears (4-2) have their first four-game winning streak since the end of the 2018 season, which is the last year they finished with a winning record or won the division.
10 thoughts from the Week 7 win over the New Orleans Saints, which featured four takeaways, an explosive running game and an off-day for QB Caleb Williams.
Week 7 recap: Bears run win streak to 4, getting 4 more takeaways to beat New Orleans Saints 26-14
Bears defense’s flurry of takeaways is ‘the foundation’ of team’s 4-game winning streak
The Goodman Theatre at 170 N. Dearborn St. on Oct. 15, 2025. The theater is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
The road to 100: The Goodman Theatre grows with Chicago theater
An undistinguished playwright named Kenneth Sawyer Goodman, who had some success in Chicago’s Little Theatre movement, had written a letter to the Art Institute of Chicago suggesting that it get into the theater business and, when Goodman died of the flu in 1918, his parents came up with the money to realize their lost son’s dream. Thus a theater and drama school was built at the back of the Art Institute with a classically influenced design by Howard Van Doren Shaw, replete with the portentous motto “To Restore the Old Visions and Win the New.” Just that.
Named for Goodman, the theater opened in the fall of 1925, which turned out to be poor timing given the imminence of the Great Depression.
Timeline: A Chicago century at the Goodman Theatre
Just a few days remain to vote in the Tribune’s 2025 Holiday Cookie Contest
Just a few days remain to get your votes in and help decide which reader recipes will advance to the final round of the Tribune’s 39th annual Holiday Cookie Contest.
Readers can vote once a day until 11:59 p.m. Friday.
