Tuesday, April 11, 2006

April 11

News from afar: a prison radio station.

Jayne Miller: Though Baltimore's medical examiner ruled the death of 58-year-old James Royster a homicide and said his death caused by his aorta rupturing during an assault, and though a suspect had been indicted, the police department took the death out of the "homicide" category and changed the record to indicate that Royster instead died of "natural causes."

The Baltimore City Grand Jury indicted Dana White, 51 of the 400 block of East 25th Street, for first-degree murder. On March 21 White got into an altercation with a neighbor, Lee Artis Tatum, 73, and stabbed him to death in the Brentwood Apartments building where they both lived.

The Baltimore City Grand Jury indicted Corey McLeaurin, 29 of the 3400 block of Gwynns Falls Parkway, for armed robbery, use of a handgun in the commission of a crime of violence and other related charges. Court documents allege that on March 17, McLeaurin and another man robbed a man of $5,900 cash in the parking lot of the Village of Cross Keys shopping center. The victim shot and injured McLeaurin during the robbery. Another suspect was shot and killed, and the State's Attorney's Office is reviewing that fatal shooting. There has been no finding in that incident and the matter is considered still under investigation.

The murder trial of Mohammad Biglari (who is accused of killing his neighbor in Charles Village) which was scheduled April 6 and continued until April 10 for lack of courtroom availability, was continued again Monday. The defendant was not transported to court from the Detention Center; an interpreter was not available; and no courtroom was available. The State was ready to proceed to trial both days. The new trial date is 10:30 a.m. April 17 before Judge Kaye Allison, 451 Mitchell Courthouse.

Four years after the murder of Taharka McCoy, will Tyrone "Moochie" Beane face trial?

Shakia Watkins, 19, got four years for making fake calls to 911 to clog up the police system before the firebombing of Edna McAbier's house.

A body was found yesterday in Crownsville.

Police identified Saturday's murder victims as as Shelton Turner, 21, Noble Johnson, 26, and Andre Brantley, 21.. also a girl was abducted and raped on North Curley street.

Though both parties said in January that tougher penalties for sex offenders were a priority, the legislature couldn't agree on a bill.

Oprah: "We're standing in a city where the dropout rate is atrocious for young black males ... 76 percent. That should make you gasp." She was in town and raised $1.4 million for the Beth Tfiloh Dahan Community school. She also paid a visit to Richard Sher, her former "People Are Talking" co-host and a friend of the school's dean.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Seems to be a lotta violence from Charles Village in today's post. Nah, that couldn't be right; they say they have no crime!

Wonder who's lyin'.

Anonymous said...

see Greg Kane's latest take on the misconduct at Baltimore City Police Department:

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/bal-md.kane12apr12,0,3936680.column?coll=bal-home-columnists

Maurice Bradbury said...

Wow, that's amazing. Gregory Kane actually reporting something that doesn't involve himself!

Tsk, drug dealers getting off because a cop hit a woman in the head with a bottle, there's a serious problem. I have a dealer living next to me that the police won't investigate or take a report of ("people going in and out of the house is not probable cause"), so I can imagine how rare it is that a dealer actually gets indicted.

Prevas is so totally my favorite judge.

Emptyman said...

I get a kick out of Prevas; he's a smart guy but more than a little eccentric. As when he starts reading from the bench.

While I know nothing about the Royster case, I do know the Baltimore City medical examiner's office, and if they told me the sky was blue I would stick my head out the window and double-check anything those halfwits said. I am somewhat reassured by the fact that the police and state's attorney's office takes the uncredentialed incomptents at the MEs office with a grain of salt.

Anonymous said...

Investigation in Bo-dy-more is generally about as extensive as "He's dead, Jim." If you want to see rigorous work, find a real city. As for Lenny Hamm, what can I say; ol' Useless strikes again.

Can Hamm!

Anonymous said...

Speaking of municipal services, of the 50 major cities in the U.S., Baltimore was the 5th most highly-taxed, behind New York, Philly, and Providence. The difference between us and those places is that they actually get services.


http://money.cnn.com/2006/04/10/pf/taxes/taxfriendly_cities_2006/index.htm

Anonymous said...

BTW, murder is up 8% over this time last year.

Congratulations, Mayor McCheese.


Cyb, did you attend CJCC? I understand that Petunia Jessamy was in rare form.

Not only should the State take over the schools - but also this thoroughly inadequate police department.

Anonymous said...

hey john galt, while you often bring up interesting points, i wish you would stop speaking in soundbites. are you running for office or something?

Anonymous said...

Office? Heck, no, I'm not nearly good enough at lying to run for that.

I'm just pissed at worthless political hacks who make this city a third-world country.

Commr. Hamm is not doing a civilized job of policing. He should be fired. A municipal government has a first, primal responsibility: to ensure that its citizens have a reasonable expectation of the safety of person & property. In the absence of that, all programs are subject to suspension until job # 1 is under control.

Baltimore City should be placed on austerity and have its discretionary powers suspended, pending the restoration of law & order and functional public schools.