Gordon of Gotham Steps Down

Gotham City - A policeman's life is never easy. However, if any cop has seen and survived it all, it's Jim Gordon, who served as police commissioner of Gotham City for the last ten years.

No longer.

Gordon announced his retirement from the Gotham City police force yesterday. This announcement follows his recovery from a shooting a few weeks ago. He will be succeeded by Michael Akins, a veteran of the force who will become Gotham City's first ever African-American police commissioner.

He has stated that the shooting is not the sole cause of his retirement. Instead, he focused on the memory of his late wife, fellow police officer Sarah Essen, who was killed by the Joker at the end of Gotham's "No-Man's Land" period. "I am no longer able to face the ghost of my wife, which hangs heavily in the air whenever I engage in police work," he has said. "The shooting was merely the catalyst, not the cause."

The Joker is foremost amongst the costumed villains who bear malice toward Gordon, as he is responsible not only for his wife's death, but also for the crippling of his niece, Barbara. However, he does not appear to be responsible for the Gordon shooting. Neither does Catwoman, the master burglar whose Capture Gordon made a priority shortly after the restoration of order that followed No-Man's Land.

However, it is ironically believed that none of these are responsible for Gordon's shooting. Instead, investigations have focused on Jordan Rich, a one-time criminal who Gordon had once collared and who, after serving his time, became a policeman by using an assumed name.

Rich was held for questioning, but the Gotham police have issued a statement that there is insufficient evidence to link him to the shooting. He has, however, been relieved of his position with the police department, which he had acquired when Gotham was rapidly, and apparently sloppily, rebuilding its ranks following No-Man's Land.

Gordon's immediate plans, in his own words, are "rest and relaxation." It is expected that at some time in the near future, he will very likely run for mayor of Gotham City. His accomplishments and his unwillingness to ever give up on Gotham City, even during No-Man's Land, make him the surest political bet since the mob-corrupt Gotham party bosses were deposed…by Gordon himself, in one of his earliest police actions.

Gordon's most notable innovation in police work was his close association with the legendary Batman, and his use of Batman as a figure to induce fear into the hearts of Gotham's criminal element. While super-heroes have acted in concert with local police since their advent in the late 1930's, Gordon was the first commissioner to offically make exploitation of this resource part of his crime-fighting strategy.

"Jim Gordon showed me what being a cop really means," said Captain Margaret Sawyer, head of the Metropolis Police Department's Special Crimes Unit. "Our unit's strategies and strong integration with Superman's abilities is strongly based on his work in Gotham."

"Jim Gordon's work with Batman pretty much created my position…superhuman liaison…which led to my appointment as commissioner," said Clarence O'Dare, police commissioner in Opal City and close personal friend of Starman.

JLA Thwarts
Alien Takeover

San Francisco, CA - The Justice League of America, with help from about two dozen other heroes, have reportedly thwarted an alien takeover of Earth.

In an incident that is not widely understood, several groups claiming to be the Justice League, each containing actual members of the JLA, coalesced to battle several otherworldly threats. What emerged from all those threats was a plan by a wheeling-and-dealing being known only as "Advance Man" to allow an alien race to take over suitable human bodies so that they could make use of Earth's resources. Apparently, these aliens have problems with resource management and deplete planetary resources after several generations, rendering them nomadic.

Earth was saved from this fate when these various JLA groups worked together to battle the alien queen, who had already arrived on Earth and was about to discharge the life-forces of the rest of her race into suitable human vessels. The destruction of odd power stations that had been recently erected along the Pacific coast disabled her connection to the humans in question, and she was forced to discharge those life-forces into the Advance Man himself, who was then force dto abandon Earth.

Still not fully understood is the role that Hector Hammond, a foe of the JLA and specifically of Green Lantern, whose mental state has been unstable since the beginning of this incident. There are suggestions that the Advance Man had been incontact with him, but it is unclear whether Hammond cooperated with the alien or whether he fought him and led to Earth's salvation.

The other super-heroes involved in these JLA teams were mostly former members of the Justice League in some previous incarnation, and remain on reserve status with the current team.

Louis Sendak,
a.k.a. Scarab, Dies

The world today mourns the loss of Louis Sendak, once known as the super-hero Scarab. The mystical hero, who operated during World War II, was reported by the Justice Society of America to have been killed by the super-villain Johnny Sorrow during the incident which led to an insect invasion of New York City.