Good morning, Chicago.
Dr. Ayoub Sayeg’s ads have an appealing ring to budget-minded consumers: “Most Affordable Plastic Surgery Center in Chicago. Period.”
His social media, website and occasional billboards offer discount prices for those seeking “confident curves,” including perkier breasts, flatter tummies and plumper butts.
But a Tribune investigation has found eight of Sayeg’s patients — all of them women of color — died in a seven-year span shortly after their surgeries at 63 Laser & Skin Clinic, located in a predominantly Latino neighborhood on the city’s Southwest Side. Each surgery involved a tummy tuck and at least one other procedure, typically liposuction.
Six of the women died from complications of plastic surgery, according to medical examiner and coroner records, and two other patients overdosed on pain medication at home. The Tribune could identify only one other doctor in Cook County who, since 2015, had more than one patient die after performing plastic surgery. He had two patient deaths, medical examiner records show.
Read the full investigation from the Tribune’s Christy Gutowski and Gregory Royal Pratt.
Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day, including: why Illinois’ new cellphone ban is receiving praise and criticism, why some Illinois leaders are frustrated by the Bears’ stadium tactics over years of negotiations and Gene & Georgetti marks 85 years in Chicago.
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A shot to fix Chicago’s parking meter deal? Aldermen test chances amid sale.
Several council members are attempting to find ways to force Stonepeak Partners, a New York investment firm aiming to buy the much-loathed lease from Chicago Parking Meters LLC, to at least tweak the terms.
Illinois’ new cellphone ban receives praise and criticism from Chicago-area school communities
Many students reached for their backpacks as they spilled out of Bernhard Moos Elementary School earlier this week, pulling out smartphones and tablets as they walked away. Come fall 2027, that scene will be the norm, as the end of the school day will be the first chance most students will have to check their devices under the new Illinois cellphone ban.
Prohibiting cellphones in schools from “bell to bell” has long been a contested topic, but now that Illinois lawmakers have restricted their use in public and charters beginning with the 2027-28 academic year, parents and students have strong opinions on just how much device usage should be allowed — and when.
Illinois lawmakers lead US in spending campaign cash for childcare — and one dog
Five years after Illinois joined other states in allowing politicians to use campaign funds for childcare, a handful of state lawmakers from Chicago have become some of the nation’s biggest users of laws designed to encourage parents — particularly mothers of young children — to run for office, according to a nonprofit organization tracking the funds.
But which lawmakers have made the most use of the measure, and to what degree they’ve tapped into their campaign funds, has sparked concerns about whether the legislation is working as intended.
Chicago Bears’ stadium tactics over years of negotiations leave some Illinois leaders frustrated
Following a marathon week in which a legislative deal to incentivize a new Bears stadium in Arlington Heights collapsed and the team announced it is eyeing northwest Indiana instead, some Illinois political leaders blamed the Bears while still holding out hope for an eventual deal in Illinois.
The Bears’ announcement Friday came about four months after the Indiana legislature passed a bill to aid the team in its move to Hammond. While Friday’s statement from the Bears said the team’s intention is to “advance our stadium project in Hammond, Indiana,” it continues: “with the exact site to be selected.”
To key Illinois lawmakers, that left wiggle room.
- Bears say they will proceed with plans for a stadium in Hammond
- What to know about the Bears’ possible move from Soldier Field
NeoCon + Fulton Market Design Days = Chicago Design Week
Though Lollapalooza, the height of Chicago’s summer festival season, is still weeks away, visions of a different kind of creative collaboration are dancing through the minds of some Chicago innovators this week. This version, however, has nothing to do with music, and everything to do with interior and commercial design.
Both NeoCon, North America’s largest design show at Merchandise Mart, and Fulton Market Design Days, a parallel design show in Fulton Market, take place this week. There, multiple showrooms, activations and programming will be open to the public and members of the design community to view the latest products.
Edward Keegan: Barack Obama was the shadow architect of a Chicago-style treasure box museum
Forget Louis Sullivan’s definition of the tall building as “a proud and soaring thing” — there’s probably never been a building as tall as the Obama Presidential Center that seems so earthbound. The mostly solid 225-foot-tall tower’s forms are unusual. And they seem to have been driven by their very atypical client.
“(President Barack Obama) was one of the clients who walks in and says, ‘Well, if I hadn’t been a president, I would’ve been an architect,’” architect Billie Tsien recalls. “Anybody in practice, their stomach always slightly clinches, because you know, this person’s going to try to be the architect.”
Stacey King, the longtime Chicago Bulls broadcaster and former player, dies at 59
Bulls broadcaster Stacey King died yesterday at the age of 59, the team announced in a statement.
A three-time NBA champion during the first half of the 1990’s Bulls dynasty, King was a beloved member of the Bulls organization who provided color commentary for the team’s local broadcast affiliate — moving from CSN Chicago to NBC Sports Chicago and finally CHSN — for the last two decades.
Chicago Blues Festival: Living legends, longtime fans and a shout-out to Alligator Records
The blues can be heated music that thrills a sweat-soaked, booze-fueled crowd in a packed bar. It can also be the gentle sounds of acoustic guitars wafting from a nearby front porch.
The latter ambience largely prevailed in Millennium Park on Friday night during the Chicago Blues Festival, which began Thursday at the Ramova Theatre in Bridgeport before moving downtown. The festival continued through last night at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion and three side stages across Millennium Park.
Gene & Georgetti marks 85 years in Chicago
Billy Boyle’s Chop House opened in “Newspaper Alley” between Clark and Dearborn streets in 1878, the first of many steakhouses to open in Chicago. None of those steakhouses, however, can match Gene & Georgetti’s longevity. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average restaurant lasts around six years. Gene & Georgetti opened at 500 N. Franklin St. in 1941, 85 years ago.That staying power would be remarkable anywhere, but the restaurant’s old-time building under the “L” tracks makes the story even more fascinating.
2026 Tony Awards: Laurie Metcalf and ‘Schmigadoon!’ triumph on theater’s big night
“Schmigadoon!,” a loving if slight parody of classic Broadway musicals of the Golden Age that’s based on an Apple TV series, won the Tony Award last night for best musical. It beat out the vampire musical “The Lost Boys,” an epic spectacle based on the popular 1987 horror movie, and a show that impressed more with its bravura staging and design than its score or book.
