Twenty added FBI agents and seven more federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents are being assigned to Chicago to help reduce violence, reports the Chicago Sun-Times. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder made the decision after meeting with Mayor Rahm Emanuel; B. Todd Jones, director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and Zachary Fardon, the U.S. attorney in Chicago. “They wanted to bring more resources to Chicago to combat some of the gun violence that's taking place here,” said ATF spokesman Tom Ahern. The additional agents would boost the total number in Chicago to 52.
Holder announced the move yesterday, two weeks after a bloody Fourth of July weekend in which 13 people were killed and 58 were wounded in Chicago. In a statement, Holder said: “The Department of Justice will continue to do everything in its power to help the city of Chicago combat gun violence. These new agents are a sign of the federal government's ongoing commitment to helping local leaders ensure Chicago's streets are safe.”