Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Sept 20 Evening

A new Baltimorean Blogger named Hoodlum challenges conventional wisdom with footnotes in the entry "American Police: Overpaid for Easy Work."

In Howard County, a woman who survived an encounter with serial killer Charles Burns spoke to WJZ. Two more women's bodies have been found near Aberdeen.

WJZ repeats the husband-as-suspect story in the death of Roxanne Amick. County Police want to hear from anyone who may have noticed her green minivan at the Perry Hall shopping center between 2 and 3 p.m. last Wednesday.

The whole Vernon Evans thing is just gross and sad. Why don't we have a firing squad?

Former Baltimore County officer James Blankenship Jr. got 18 months for sexual abuse of a minor.

grandpaSchaefer's not shutting up in his final days: he blames Ehrlich for voting debacle: "responsibility is with the head, and not somebody else, saying you didn't do this and you didn't do that. Plenty of time, plenty of money, it just wasn't done." Meanwhile, the city's top election official Gene Raynor has declared himself a "deficient" and walked off the job.

International editon:
Ha! Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez called Bush "the devil," claims he left stink-cloud of evil at the UN.

Hungarians: Economics are a Riot!

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

hi guys. i have, in my email inbox, a fun letter from the mayor addressed to "community leaders" containing a memo written by dr. josh sharfstein (health commissioner) rebutting that wbal story about crime statistics and sinai hospital and such. i'm just not sure how to post it (it has charts!) since the last time i tried to email ms. cybrarian, my letter got bounced back as "undeliverable."

Maurice Bradbury said...

It works, Just click on the line under grandpa.

Felix Medina said...

For me it will mean so much if instead of just looking at the bad stuuf like crime i could see just peace and harmony or just fun stuff in a blog, its enough with reality. take care. greetings from Mexico.

Hoodlum said...

Wow, thanks for the plug on my article. It's most appreciated.

Anonymous said...

Hoodlum's article is rather misleading, from a statistical perspective. The tenth most-deadly occupation with a rate per 100,000 of 24.4 is taxidrivers.

Taxidrivers are a largely urban occupation. If we start thinking about policing carefully, notice that the occupation encompasses a half million personnel, most of whom don't work in the big city. They face a reasonably safe environment. Looking at officers in the nations largest cities, 3.3 officers per 100 are injured by assault, whereas only 57 officers were feloniously mudered over a base of 500,000 officers nationwide.

Conclusion: Rural police face a low risk of death. Urban police face a high risk of injury or death.

Anonymous said...

Hey! I just realized something. The city keeps setting forth the argument that the majority of Baltimore's violent crime is committed by someone connected to the victim by a drug-dealing relationship, which implies that law-abiding residents face no crime. Beilenson apparently started that crap.

Waitaminute! If only 1/3 of murders in this town are cleared, how could you even try to say that?

Anonymous said...

One thing that the "murder ink" column the citypaper used to do was to indicate whether or not a victim had a substantial criminal record. In the majority of cases, they did.

This practice was discontinued because relatives did not want their loved ones to be remembered by the mistakes that they had made in life.

It is true, however, that murder victims in this town are typically involved in a lifestyle that does not promote healthy living.

There are exceptions, of course, and we hear about those loud and clear.

Perhaps Baltimorecrime should blog the criminal history of each murder victim in addition to the headcount??

Anonymous said...

More sloppy reporting by the Sun.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/crime/bal-md.coma21sep21,0,3053869.story?coll=bal-local-headlines

According to the article the woman is brain-dead, which she clearly isn't. Someone needs to teach this idiot reporter the difference between brain damage and brain death.

Betsy said...

that's what I was told when I moved here a year and a half ago-"if you're not buying or selling drugs, you'll be ok."

of course, no one mentioned the muggings or home invasions that happen daily so that people can get money to buy drugs. nothing bad has happened to me yet, but I recently befriended a group of young women who are doing an americorp type program through a local church and are living in a house in a not great part of town. one of them was mugged on her doorstep last week. the officer who took the incident told her that she shouldn't be outside after dark.

Maurice Bradbury said...

Dear 'non-- (can't you 'nons use nicknames? It gets very confusing),

Anyone can look up a case, just enter someone's name in the Judiciary Case Search.

Publishing a victim's police record somehow implies that someone had it coming. Even if someone has a record that does not mean that they deserved to die.

John Galt said...

Actually, the police record in some other jurisdiction might give you some inference a to why they died.

In Baltimore City, however, it tells you NOTHING. Why? Because arrests and cases bear no relationship to what actually happens here.

I just got finished with a false arrest for a charge carrying a max sentence of 25 years incarceration. I spent three days in jail and when the case was finally tried, the State's Attorney null prossed it because upon interview of the officer... I had committed no crime whatsoever. F#@kin' idiot Baltimore cop. I TOLD him he didn't understand the law. I told him it would be dismisssed immediately. These f#@king idiots are just loose cannons. You should have seen the look on my face when the Commissioner told me what the hell I was charged with!

They tell me there is a procedure for making sure you don't have a 'history' from this. Yeah, you move to a real city, one with real police.