September 11, 2024

Crime, Guns & Solutions: What Are We Doing to Stop the Flow of Illegal Guns in Illinois?
Moderated by WTTW’s Chicago Tonight Host Brandis Friedman
Christopher Amon – Special Agent in Charge, ATF Chicago Field Division, Brendan Kelly – Director, Illinois State Police, Kim Smith – Director of Programs UChicago Crime Lab and Education Lab

City Club event description:

The Joyce Foundation is hosting a three-part series, Ending Gun Violence in Chicago: Connecting Policy, Practice and Community, in partnership with the City Club of Chicago and in collaboration with WTTW’s Firsthand Initiative & WTTW News, join us at the second program.

Today, in Chicago there is a strong correlation between the flood of illegal guns — almost more than anywhere in the nation — and the volume of gun violence in our communities.

While the Chicago Police Department have made progress in getting guns off the streets — in 2023 CPD recovered more than 12,000 guns for the third consecutive year — that is a drop in the bucket and the flow of illegal guns continues.

Please join Christopher Amon, Special Agent in Charge (SAC) for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Chicago Field Division, Brendan Kelly, Director of the Illinois State Police, and Kim Smith, Director of Programs for the University of Chicago Crime Lab and Education Lab to discuss the source of illegal guns coming into our region, and what can be done to eliminate them from our communities. This panel will be moderated by WTTW’s Chicago Tonight Host Brandis Friedman.

At the conclusion of these three forums, a white paper of the key takeaways and recommendations from the discussions will be developed and shared with policy makers and civic leaders in the region.

Speakers

Special Agent in Charge Christopher Amon
Christopher Amon was appointed as the Special Agent in Charge for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Chicago Field Division in March of 2023. As the Special Agent in Charge, Mr. Amon has responsibility over ATF operations in the Northern and Central Districts of Illinois, The Eastern District of Wisconsin, and the Northern District of Indiana.

Before arriving in Chicago, SAC Amon served as the Assistant Special Agent in Charge in the Washington Field Division since August 2020. In this role, Special Agent Amon supervised all ATF criminal enforcement operations in Washington, D.C.

Prior to this assignment, SAC Amon served as Chief of the Firearms Operation Division at ATF Headquarters, managing the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN), the NIBIN National Correlation and Training Center (NNCTC), and ATF’s Crime Gun Intelligence Programs. He was also the Chairman of the National Crime Gun Intelligence Governing Board consisting of Chiefs of Police, United States Attorneys, District Attorneys, and Laboratory Directors from major cities nationwide.

SAC Amon began his career as a Special Agent in the Denver Field Division in 2005. He investigated violent crime and firearms trafficking organizations and was a crisis negotiator of ATF’s Los Angeles Special Response Team. Prior to joining ATF, SAC Amon worked for a member of Congress in the U.S. House of Representatives.

A Brooklyn native, SAC Amon holds a bachelor’s degree from Fordham University in the Bronx, New York, and a master’s degree in professional studies from George Washington University in Washington, D.C. He is married with four children.

City Club video

Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly
Brendan F. Kelly was appointed by Governor JB Pritzker and confirmed unanimously by the Illinois Senate to serve as the eighth Director of the Illinois State Police in 2019. As Director, Kelly leads a public safety agency of nearly 3,000 employees and seven unique divisions, including the Divisions of Criminal Investigation, Patrol, Forensic Services, Justice Services, Academy and Training, Statewide 911, and Internal Investigation.

Director Kelly oversees the operations of statewide criminal investigations of violent crime, drug, gun and human trafficking; public corruption; and child exploitation; as well as special operations including SWAT, air operations, federal task force officers, and Illinois’ criminal intelligence fusion center. Additionally, Director Kelly oversees criminal interdiction and traffic patrol functions, statewide crime scene investigations and forensic laboratories, and 22 trafficking enforcement task forces, among other areas. Director Kelly serves on the Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board, the board of Chicago High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), the Illinois Drug Enforcement Officers Association, and the Illinois Homeland Security Advisory Council. Director Kelly chaired the Firearms Restraining Order Task Force.

Director Kelly has sworn in more than 500 new troopers, initiated long needed changes to the firearms background check process and enforcement of firearms safety laws, and slashed forensic testing backlogs. Working with federal, state, and local law enforcement, and homeland security partners, Director Kelly has led the statewide law enforcement response to COVID-19, 2020 civil unrest, and preparations for the DNC. Director Kelly is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame and Saint Louis University School of Law, FBI National Executive Institute Class #44, and the Illinois State Police New Agent School, and has a certificate in International Law from Saint Louis University and Cybersecurity from Harvard University.

Kelly was a prosecutor and an elected State’s Attorney for 12 years, prosecuting every level of crime from gun and drug trafficking to crimes against children and heinous murders. Kelly is a veteran of the United State Navy. He has been married to an oncology nurse for 20 years and they have two sons.

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