Saturday, March 19, 2011

33

A 21-year-old man, id'd as Angelo Fitzgerald, killed in the 300 block of McMechen Street during the course of a crazy night last night, with eight (or is it 11?) shooting victims in four separate incidents, including the officer shot in the neck and the alleged gunman, who is in "grim" condition

A case against a 48-year-old man charged with raping a 15-year-old is dropped, Bernstein's office apparently doesn't believe the public is owed an explanation, and Peter Hermann is justifiably puh-issed.

William Vincent Brown's only known surviving victim confronted him in court (I ♥ u IV, but Fenton's story is much more in-depth & readable)

In the county, Jeremy Richards pled guilty to first-degree murder and admitted to robbing his 61-year-old neighbor and setting her house on fire

Bel Air residents busted for supplying booze to minors (and what is going on in that picture?)

Friday, March 18, 2011

Officer shot

An officer is in stable condition after being shot in the neck near East 25th Street and Harford Road

Wha?? "The 27-year-old co-worker of the woman killed at a Bethesda yoga store, who originally was portrayed as a victim in the violent outburst, has been charged in the killing of [co-worker] Jayna T. Murray"

Serial killer now tied to PA case

William Vincent Brown's only known surviving victim gave dramatic testimony at his sentencing hearing today. Prosecutors also revealed he had a prior conviction for "terrorizing" and imprisoning a woman in Philly.

32

A man shot to death at the U.S. Fried Chicken on Pennsylvania Ave.

And in Frederick, a worker killed at the Burger King

Life with all but 50 years suspended for William Vincent Brown (so how much time will he actually serve?)

Senate says yes to medical marijuana, ignition-locking devices for drunks, bans on novelty lighters & smoking in a car that has kids in it, and a 180-day use-it-or-lose it parole deadline for the guv. .. and $60 million in new fees?! Effing effers!!

Page Croyder: "if the governor is simply removed from the parole process, prison and parole proceedings will be left shrouded in darkness and unavailable to the public."

WYPR’s Garland Thompson reports why three-year investigations of large drug-dealing conspiracies are worth it (audio link).

"Independent Examiner" Hassan Giordano reports that "The 49-year old former Baltimore City Council President, Lawrence Bell took the first step in exonerating the charges and clearing his name of allegations made against him. Shan Mabry, a longtime 'friend', who brought forth her second peace order claim against Bell in six months, while also filing a criminal complaint against the man she once shared her heart with." (includes a courthouse picture of the plaintiff, so totally not kosher!)
Fun fact: in 1999 Bell won a CP award for "Best Scandal"

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Denied!

Perhaps spurred by the House passing the "Use it or Lose it Bill," looks like O'Malley is planning to make like the Circle Jerks and deny everything, starting with these seven cons.

Trunky McGuilford-Robber, aka John Couplin, got 20 years and the label of "menace" from Judge Lawrence P. Fletcher-Hill, but Mary Pat Clark thinks it's a load of crap: "Twenty years becomes 10 years becomes a modified sentence." The conviction also means Couplin violated his probation for a 2008 knife attack, but the wack-azz judge in that case is letting him serve that time concurrently.

Here's a picture of that a-hole disturbed individual who set his mother on fire

Police are ISO a guy with a tattoo on his throat reading "REAL GOON"

Yeeks, a doctor at a clinic owned by Bon Secours Hospital is accused of performing unnecessary eye procedures, including surgery that blinded a woman.

Adorable local hipsters create an app to help you avoid tickets

Say what? MD senators want to help sluts slots parlors dodge local taxes.

Changing minds

Intriguing article in the New Yorker this week about how childhood trauma can lead to health problems in adults and predispose them to violence later on.

The Ink has last week's two murders and lots of case updates

An inmate in a federal heroin case managed to get a list of witnesses against him and "convinced many defendants to change their minds about pleading guilty"

Van Smith on Jean Therese Brown's "terrifying pot-smuggling saga"

Have you seen these two suspected armed carjackers?

A drug dealer may get off because DEA agent & convicted embezzler Mark Lunsford "admitted to the FBI that he concocted information in the case."

P.G. County police confirm that a body found in a trunk was that of a missing man, but they're not treating the case as a homicide(?)

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Confessions of a Baltimore serial killer

William Brown pleaded guilty two killing two women and maiming another between 2003 and 2004

Half psychotic, sick hypnotic...

A rare "not criminally responsible" finding for D'Lana Simmons, who beat her aunt Cecelia Mitchell to death.

The last two TTP Bloods defendants were sentenced yesterday to 100+ months each

A MoCo police officer is accused of helping to run a cocaine ring

Fox reports that "A Baltimore County man is accused of setting his mother on fire. It happened just before 11a.m. this morning inside a home in the 7900-block of Baltimore Street in Eastview."

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Thoroughly, deeply, completely depressing

Not only was 19-year-old murder victim Tanise Ervin an "innocent bystander," according to police, she just came off of a 10-hour shift at McDonald's, then went back to have her last meal there. She left, was shot in the back, and when her mom arrived at the scene, she says "police wouldn’t let me touch her." Apparently the gunperson(s) were shooting at Ervin's companion; the male "friend" was shot also but is not co-operating with investigators.
Mourners gathered tonight in Better Waverly.

Monday, March 14, 2011

Truth in advertising

Hot topic of the week: forcing the guv to use or lose the option of parole for lifers. County SA Scott Shellenberger: "I view the need for the governor to sign off on the parole of a 'lifer' not as putting politics in the parole system but as a way of making sure that the person who makes the weighty decision of when a lifer is released is a person directly accountable to the citizens of this state."

And the General Assembly is set to begin debating the death penalty this week; yesterday Archbishop Edwin O’Brien hosted a prayer service aiming to increase support for abolishing it (wonder what religion he would be if the Roman Empire had had life without parole?).

Freaky story of a 7-year-old Amanda Mitchell, attacked by dogs: said her aunt, "They both were yanking. One was on the left, one was on this right side of the cheek."

Hey prospective divorcees, the Senate has approved a one-year separation requirement. In other marital news, "Bigamy costs Baltimore Co. man $500K"

Re. this MADD story, the trouble with drunk driving laws is that DUI is the only offense someone can commit and not know they're committing it. If we wanted to actually solve the problem, we'd put breathalyzers at the exit doors of bars or put interlock on every car-- 80 percent of DUIs are first-time offenders.

Under Armour sues the company Purple Armour for ripping off its logo & cybersquatting

The real crime

When you drive around Baltimore and see dozens of rotting homes, you might want to thank these guys for in part making it happen. Of course they're not going to jail, they live in Howard County, they just sucked money out of the city and got away with it because they were smart.

Sunday, March 13, 2011

31

Nineteen-year-old Tanise Ervin was shot to death in Better Waverly

A 15-year-old boy shot on Friday, plus three other shootings and a man stabbed in the thigh
gardener
What is going on with all these missing teenage girls?! Police are now asking the public's help in finding Andrea Gardener, 15, right, if you see her call 911.

.. and eeeeeew, 10,000 gallons of sewage overflowed in the 400 block of East Eager Street. Survive the violence, die from the cholera & e. coli!

Huh? Judge tells Felicia Pearson she got no bail because "You are a good actress."

In Bethesda, MoCo, a worker murdered and another sexually assaulted at Lululemon Athletica

Serial bank robber strikes again, have you seen this guy?

Linskey & Bykowicz's gay marriage post-game recap, and Steve Lash's, and one from the WaPo; so much for personal appeals making a difference. Or maybe certain Democratic senators found $1 million mighty personally appealing.

Friday, March 11, 2011

.. in other news

No bail for Snoop. Sixty-four people arrested in old Latrobe in a case that took three years to develop. (Why so tense, Bernstein?)

Police are asking for help to find Stephanie Jones, 21, and her infant son.

As part of a class-action suit, a debt collector will drop more than 10,000 cases

Media blabber: in a rare move, the NYT's public editor agrees with outraged readers that a "Gang Rape Story Lacked Balance"

And just like that..

Reports Fox, "The Maryland House of Delegates has sent the same sex marriage bill back to committee, effectively killing its chances of being passed in the House. There were not enough votes to pass the measure, so Del. Joe Vallario entered a motion to return the measure to committee."
More from the WaPo and Sun
Gawker: "last-minute pressure from church groups and the National Organization for Marriage apparently scared a few new, sensitive delegates"

Elsewhere, hundreds of people denuded the Rhode Island state house, where same-sex marriage hearings are being held, and on Wednesday, a U.S. House panel "voted 3-2 along party lines to direct the House counsel to come up with a legal defense" of DOMA

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Gayest. Legislature. Ever.

One Charles County closet just got a little cleaner-- Delegate Peter Murphy is here, queer, and says his constituents are already used to it. This Å“uvre makes the MD legislature the nation's gayest, says the Washington Blade.
.. and I hadn't heard of Maggie Gallagher before yesterday, but I get the feeling we're all going to become very familiar with her tuberrific form, given the $1 million bounty her group has posted for the defeat of pro-equality legislators.

In other big gay news, WBAL has a clip of Snoop's perp walk posted and filed under "entertainment." Say what you will, she always has a flawless complexion. Here's David Simon's statement, and his notorious "jury nullification" essay from Time.

Oh, Snoop!

Felicia "Snoop" Pearson (& 29+ others) arrested for running a drug ring

Huh? "The city's no. 2 top prosecutor — appointed late last year by Baltimore State's Attorney Gregg L. Bernstein — isn't licensed to practice law in Maryland."

FBI suspects home-invasion robbers got some help from the MVA

Documentary exposes sex abuse in Baltimore’s Orthodox Jewish community. (Oh, CP. "'I didn’t know that I was going to become the molestation writer of Jewish Baltimore,' [Phil Jacobs] said. It was more or less thrust upon him ...")

This will Illinois you Pp -- the state just chucked their death penalty

Same-sex marriage bill goes forth with an official vote scheduled for tomorrow (or so says TDR, the WaPo only calls it "likely"). Thanks Cham for the "House Republicans & DOMA" video... that Brian Moulton just needs to meet the right girl. Love the people having smoke breaks in the background.

Web finds: the blog of Ehrlich's former "Prince of Darkness" Joe Steffan, who apparently enjoys puns, making up nicknames and white-on-black type (two out of three things I like in a blog). Shame he hasn't updated in a while.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

30

Charles Hopsan, 22, stabbed in 2010 in the 1100 block of Cooks Lane and recently deceased, was posthumously awarded the title of the city's 30th homicide victim.

One Terrance Sims, 30, was arrested for the murder of 17-year-old Olympic hopeful Ronald Gibbs.

Tiffany Bolner, 21, pled guilty in federal court to sexually abusing a minor to produce child pornography; surely one of the most barfulent stories in BCrime history.

And a guy named Derwin declared himself guilty of pimping

Ten years for Rosedale home-invasion robber Antowan Bell, 25

Crack and guns confiscated on the East side

"Bathroom Bandits" nabbed, and Hermann has pictures of one of the alleged perps and her nappy-azz fur coats

Pawn star gets 46 months for money laundering

Lawyers for Policarpio Espinoza Perez and Adan Espinoza Canela have asked the Court of Appeals to grant them a third trial. In 2006, the childrens' parents told an AP reporter that they don't believe police arrested the right guys, though DNA allegedly linked Canela to the killings. Here is the Sun's guide to the epic mystery and related stories on the case.

Fertilizer control: All kinds of issues being rassled over down in A-town this week, including, of course, the melee that is the same-sex marriage debate. Oh Brooke Murdock, why did you have to wuss out and stay your opinion? .. and here's an article on what all those National Organization for Marriage polls were about.

Dixon's doughy swain is out, but the State Center project goes on.

More suspensions in tow case?

Police say there may be more cops suspended as the result of the feds investigation, but won't give a number.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Well that's odd..

I just got a letter in the mail from Talmadge Branch thanking me for my e-mail regarding "House Bill's #175 & #55, "Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act". Which is odd because I haven't sent anyone an e-mail -- I'm not even in the 45th district.
Could supporters or opponents be sending fraudulent letters? Anyone else get a letter like this?