State officials last week approved a request from Sangamon County coroner Jim Allmon, deciding that a Springfield man who died after a 2010 altercation with Sangamon County sheriff’s deputies succumbed to homicide. More than a decade ago, an inquest jury could not determine the manner of Patrick Burns’ death. Former coroner Susan Boone decided that […]
Bruce Rushton
Bruce Rushton is a freelance journalist.
Posted inNews
SJ-R gets new editor
The State Journal-Register last week got a new editor. Leon Tucker will run the paper’s news operation from Lakeland, Florida, where he is executive editor of the Lakeland Ledger owned by Gannett, which also operates the SJ-R. With more than 220 newspapers across the nation, including USA Today, Gannett has the largest circulation of any […]
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A new normal
The Springfield City Council in recent months has issued permits for three marijuana dispensaries, including one for Maribis, which is moving its Grandview dispensary to a former phone store at 2451 Denver Drive, near North Dirksen Parkway. “It’s a more high-traffic location than what you’ve got now, with what I’d say is better accessibility for […]
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Strange bedfellows
A political action committee headed by a longtime Republican is backing both Colleen Redpath Feger and Lisa Badger in the Springfield treasurer’s race. Citizens For New Leadership, a PAC set up by Leland Grove resident Frank Vala, sent out mailers this week urging voters to support Badger. The mailer, which includes a photo of Badger […]
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Money and experience
Three candidates for Springfield city treasurer tout experience in a campaign that has become a big-money endeavor for one candidate. Colleen Redpath Feger, deputy city treasurer and daughter of Ward 1 Ald. Chuck Redpath, has raised nearly $127,000 – that’s more than all candidates for treasurer received in the elections of 2015 and 2019 combined. […]
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Who’s paying? Who knows?
Under state law, the public is supposed to know who pays for political ads. But a political action committee run by Frank Vala, a Leland Grove resident long active in local politics, is paying for attack ads against William McCarty in the city treasurer’s race with virtually no way of the public knowing who’s paying […]
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Who, me?
Life can be tough for a reformed con artist. Chase Brown knows. Not long after release from federal prison for scams running into the six figures, Brown recently drew attention from Springfield police. Anyone recognize this guy?, cops asked on the department’s Facebook page in a post that featured a still from a Menard’s security […]
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No badge, no problem
The chair of the Illinois Police Training and Standards Board has a permit to carry a concealed firearm by virtue of being a retired police officer, even though he never was a sworn officer with arrest powers. In his 2019 application for a permit to carry a concealed firearm via a program for retired law […]
Posted inSpecial Issues
MARK KESSLER Nov. 16, 1947-April 24, 2022
If Adams Street had a mayor, Mark Kessler qualified. Genial? Could be, depending on circumstance. Genuine? Always. Shrewd? In spades, and bridge. As co-owner of Recycled Records, Kessler could, gently, tell a hopeful customer that her late grandfather’s trove of Terry Baxter LP’s might be best off at Goodwill. He was sharp with the sketchy, […]
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PATRICK COBURN March 3, 1941-May 18, 2022
Pat Coburn loved chardonnay, art, travel and Springfield. He hung Christmas decorations early. Among veterans at the State Journal-Register, where he rose from cops reporter to publisher during a journalism career spanning from 1966 to 2006, he is remembered for microwave popcorn. Jack Clarke, Coburn’s predecessor in the publisher’s office, had an MBA from Harvard […]
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SUNDERINE TEMPLE Oct. 29, 1936-March 4, 2022
Sunderine Temple’s life was not ordinary. Her mother died when she was two or three, according to her husband, Wayne “Doc” Temple. She ran away from an orphanage when she was nine or so, he says, and fell in with a carnival, which helps explain her fascination with the merry-go-round at White Oaks Mall. Long […]
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Deputy in trouble again
A Sangamon County sheriff’s deputy who has cost taxpayers a six-figure settlement is back in court. This time, Deputy Travis Koester and the county are being sued by Billie W. Greer, a retired Illinois Department of Corrections administrator whom Koester detained and handcuffed last February. According to her lawsuit and an internal affairs investigation, Koester […]
