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From: Rhino <no_offline_contact@example.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: Chicago Wins Again! - Literal Highway Robbery
Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2025 18:57:15 -0400
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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