Food stamp trafficking often begins with an innocuous question.

“Can I talk to you?”

Sami Deffala, who’s managed a corner store in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood for 13 years, said he hears that every day from customers vying for a private moment in hopes of using their Link cards to exchange SNAP benefits, the modern-day version of food stamps, for cash — an illegal practice called trafficking by federal regulators. And every day, Deffala said, he hears them out but refuses to take part in the scheme.

“I have people young and old doing this, from an 18 year-old-woman to a 67-year-old man,” said Deffala, manager of Morgan Mini Mart. “It’s a big problem.”

That is exactly what Lisa Creason did.

Twenty years ago, she was a 19-year-old single mom, broke, with an infant daughter to feed. She tried to steal cash from a Subway cash register and was quickly caught, convicted and sent to prison, where she served one year of a three-year sentence.

Over the years, Creason has had her share of challenges, including losing a fiancé to gun violence.

But she stayed out of legal trouble. She even founded a non-profit organization that has helped other ex-convicts address some of the issues they face on re-entering the world outside prison.

Months after reopening an investigation into the 2012 death of Philip Coleman while in policy custody, the city’s police oversight agency has called for suspensions for six officers.

Coleman, a 38-year-old University of Chicago graduate with no criminal record, died at Roseland Hospital after struggling with police officers and a detention aide in a cell at the Calumet Police District lockup and at the hospital.

Rockford may no longer be the screw capital of the world, but it still ranks as the 10th largest U.S. metropolitan area for fastener production, and Rock Valley College is forging plans to help the region maintain its standing.

College trustees meet Tuesday to consider approval of a lease with the city for an empty Buckbee Street factory where Rock Valley intends to establish a cold forging manufacturing training center before the end of the year.

The college was donated a Nakashimada cold header but has no place to put it. Much of Rock Valley’s career and technical training is housed at its Samuelson Road Center, but the floors there cannot support the weight of the 10-ton machine. The city, however, owns a vacant building at 424 Buckbee St. that can house the machine and quickly be repurposed as a manufacturing training center.

Sweet Beginnings uses a bee farm to create jobs and careers for former convicts, NBC 5’s LeeAnn Trotter reports.