Friday, September 27, 2013

Brawl in the hall

A man was shot and killed yesterday in the 3900 block of Penhurst Avenue

A stabbing in the 3300 block of Piedmont Avenue
Via Fox

At least two brawls at Patterson High on Monday (filmed by students, of course) led to students getting pepper-sprayed, arrested.

In Odenton a 19-month-old girl was hit with bullet fragments, her parents say it's because they called police on drug dealers, and some neighbors are saying the family is racist.

Wait, what? Ed Ericson Jr., City Paper reporter, testified yesterday in the Jose Morales case.*

Life +15 for Phillip Herrell, who killed a guy for wearing a red shirt in the blue shirt part of town.

"My heart is broken." Batts held an impromptu press conference about the Northern Parkway crash and some other stuff while some guy in a black shirt makes monkey faces.

Batts reaffirmed police use of stop-and-frisks* the practice of interloping and groping. Notable:
"The department's record-keeping has been questioned in the past. Police reported only 11 such stops in 12 months in 2005, as internal figures showed the number was in the thousands. One estimate indicated there had been as many as 130,000 over the course of nine months. In 2010, city police statistics show officers conducted 234 stop-and-frisk stops, 207 in 2011, and 249 in 2012 through August 2012."
For Liz: Cecil County teenage suspects. Their mothers must be ever so proud.

Gun rights advocates file federal lawsuit zzzzzz*

Thursday, September 26, 2013

Fact deficient

OoOo BURN! "The facts could not be clearer that more arrests do not lead to less crime. Everyone seems to be clear on that except the governor ... Honest minds can differ, but this honest mind is also fact-dependent.*" ~ SRB. And candidate/lieutenant gov Anthony Brown is distancing himself from his boss, in a vague and nosistic way. "We don't judge our safety record on the number of arrests but rather on the reduction in crime."

Speaking of facts, a Department of Justice survey of multiple studies has concluded that license plate readers have no appreciable impact on crime rates. Not only that, "the routes with the [license plate readers] had a slightly higher number of vehicle thefts compared to the routes with the manual plate checks or control group routes."

Two men were shot on Chinquapin Parkway last night.

Two women were robbed at gunpoint at the West Baltimore MARC station.

The woman in the Jeep killed in that crash early Tuesday morning was identified as Angel Chiwengo, 45.  Chiwengo immigrated from The Congo last year (formerly Zaire); her daughter gave birth to her first grandchild hours after the accident.

The Court of Appeals has restored the right of defendants to have representation at bail hearings.*

Norma Jean's Gentleman's Club back in the news: they're being sued by a dancer who claims managers cheated her out of tips.

Bank-robbery suspects creepy, awkward

A fatal home invasion in Cecil County, five skeevy suspects.


Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Floating solids

Ronn Williams, 52, was shot and killed last night* in the 1500 block of Upshire Road, near the intersection of Loch Raven Boulevard and The Alameda.


State police are unable to keep up with processing applications for 1,000 gun purchases a day, and so are now going to solve the problem by waiving the requirement for a handgun qualification license, people who applied before September 1 now won't have to show proficiency with the weapon.

The city has approved a $50,000 settlement for a girl molested by employee Charles Douglass Shelly* at Northeast Middle School.

Lakim Faust, who attempted murder here in Baltimore at age 14, was indicted in Greenville, North Carolina yesterday on 14 charges -- he allegedly went on shooting rampage with the intention of killing white people in a Walmart parking lot.

Renita Franklin-Thrower, former employee of the mayor's office who was hired in spite of having an open warrant, is now going to federal prison for 9 months on fraud charges.

Poop? Motor oil? Whatever it is, "reeking clumps of floating black solids" have bobbed up in the Inner Harbor next to the Marriott.

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Too many Tavons

Three people are dead*-- a Jeep-driving unidentified woman and also Devell Cess Johns, 26, and Terrell Young, 28 (alias Tavon Brown) after a police pursuit that started near Harford Road and 25th Street and ended on York Road near Northern Parkway in a ball of fire at around 12:30 this morning. No word on why police were pursuing Johns and Young, but Johns-- if it is indeed the same 26-year-old-- has a prodigious criminal and civil record from the past eight years that includes charges for drugs, identity theft, illegal gun possession, driving without a license and failure to pay child support. Jayne Miller reports that Young's record was similarly impressive. Also impressive is the name "Tavon Brown"-- the JIS lists more than 30 offenders by that name, including seven who are 30.
Joey High

County police are ISO a guy named Joey High who shot someone in the thigh* in Randallstown in July. Call 911 if u see.

Sooo the governor has an Op-Ed in the Sun today entitled "less enforcement means more homicides."*
   For you teenagers, transplants and the Googletarded, Martin Joseph O'Malley was mayor of Baltimore from 1999-2007. The murder number never dipped below 250 during his tenure, and in 2005, 2006 and 2007 the city had 269, 274 and 291 murders, respectively. In 2005, police made 108,447 arrests* -- a rate of one arrest for every in 6 residents -- pretty much as mass-arresty as any arrests could massively amass.
    But things got better! O'Malley moved to Annapolis, team Dixon/Bealefeld took over, and in 2008 we had 234 homicides -- an unprecedented 20-something percent drop-- and only 83,439 arrests. In 2009 police made 77,595 arrests and there were 238 murders. Less O'Malley, less homicides. Hurray!
   So why is he stirring this turd? He could be goosing Rick Perry, or taking crab cakes to the latest mass shooting survivors, massaging bay oysters, posing in Under Armour on the pages of Men's Fitness.. why is he on this peculiar disinformation campaign, and who is giving him such crap political advice?

This is more pleasant to contemplate: $50,000 worth of men's shoes. Who the fuck would buy them? Some drug trafficker named Jerome Castle,* apparently, and some federal auction goer's husband is going to be a lucky lucky man.

Linger and finger

After O'Malley dropped by the CJCC to throw shade* on the city's current crime fighting strategies, Deputy Commissioner Jerry Rodridguez made the rather extraordinary choice to tell Justin Fenton that the BPD is still stopping and frisking but just not calling it that* (the new term is "investigative stop"). A stop-and-frisk (aka the "Terry stop") is constitutional if the police have reason to believe they are dealing with someone has been engaged in criminal activity or criminal activity is afoot; if the stop is based on racial profiling, "furtive movements" or bulges, not so much. So is Rodriguez trying to get the department sued, New York City style?

 

Monday, September 23, 2013

Open minded

Jose Morales, via the CP
Trial is scheduled to begin tomorrow for Jose Morales for the murder of Robert Long.* Morales is accused of hiring a Dead Man Inc. hit man to kill Long after allegedly finding out from his and Long's lawyer, Stanley Needleman, that Long planned to testify against him in a stolen-scaffolding case. Morales is currently serving a 262-month sentence in federal prison on charges that he tried to bring cocaine to Baltimore on a chartered jet. Demetrius Smith was previously charged for Long's murder, charges were dropped, but Smith is still in jail serving time for a different murder. Needleman is disbarred, serving a year for tax evasion and may testify against his former client.

The death of a five-month-old baby girl, Ilzaryah Morrison, in the 1600 block of N. Broadway September 2, was determined on Friday to have been a homicide.* No suspects, no details yet.

Willie Mayes, 59, charged with beating 52-year-old Donald Robinson,* said he pulverized Robinson after his daughter accused Robinson of rape. The daughter, Latiqwa Mayes, 19, is also charged, as are two of her teenaged friends. Mayes' story checks out: Robinson had been charged with a sex offense in 2003.

So apparently David's on Falls Road, formerly a crappy luncheon, is now a crappy sports bar, one where a gun was allegedly drawn on one employee by another.* One David Morgan, Jr., on Saturday night/Sunday morning.

Get used to armed a-holes-- Marylanders have reportedly been "flocking" to buy guns at the rate of 1,000 a day over the past two weeks.*

Ida Mae Snipe, bathroom pickpocket, identity thief and bank fraudster whose accomplice begged stall neighbors* to spare a square while she pinched their purses was sentenced to more than 21 years in prison.*

Professional football player Jacoby Jones was reportedly hit in the head with a $600 magnum bottle of Ace of Spades champagne by a professional escort named Sweet Pea, who has a "38 waste" and is "open minded," which apparently means pay up or I will open your mind and waste it with a 38-pound bottle. No charges were filed.

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Tender moments

Robert Jackson, 34, was shot and killed last night* on Crismer Avenue in the NW.

A 44-year-old man is dead from multiple gunshot wounds in Rosedale.*

Fenton interviews Batts for he occasion of his one-year work anniversary, and here's a detail that doesn't bode well: "Department statistics show that the number of officers leaving the force since Batts took over is 33 percent higher than in the same period before his arrival....In 2013, an average of 22 officers have left per month.*"

Feud alert: the governor says SRB's crime strategy is "falling back into the pathology that led to Baltimore being the most violent and addicted city in America" because arrests have fallen. Under SRB the city arrests about half as many people as it did under O'Malley-- and the homicide rate is about 1/3 lower, too. So way to remind everyone what an epic fail your strategies were, guvnah!

Former city firefighter Jamar "Mar" Williams pleaded guilty to sex trafficking a minor, as did his partner in pimping Roosevelt "Nitty" Coit. You'll recall Williams was a firefighter based in the Roland Park station who moonlighted as a "madam" at a brothel on Madison Avenue, where hookering tips were written up on a chalkboard. The city had hired Williams as a firefighter even though he was on probation for similar sex-trafficking charges in the county.

In other pimping news, 36 years for Jeremy "Jerms Black" Naughton of Brooklyn, NY, who kidnapped women and forced them to engage in prostitution in New York, Maryland and other states. He also strangled a dog.

West African colon heroin is a thing.

LOL, Van Smith on wiretaps of Tavon White's BGF harem: "But tender moments were also captured, like when [Jennifer] Owens told White: 'You know what makes me stay with [you]? SEX! ... no one's going to give me sex like that.'"Say what you will about the guy, there's no doubt he must have had some crazy mad lady sexing skills.

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Tough times in the third grade


The victim, I presume
(Via Fox News
A nine-year-old was shot in the stomach around midnight in the course of a home invasion in Cherry Hill near Round and Bethune Roads. Police have some kind of a cracked-out flaming asshole in custody.

Four men-- Raheem Taylor, Randy Ennis, Gary Stokes and Nathaniel Booker-- pleaded guilty to charges related to them kidnapping an eight-year-old and demanding cash and heroin as ransom.

Katera "King's Mommy" Stevendon, former guard at the city jail, pleaded guilty to racketeering.*

There's some good news BOE has approved $10 million for Vacants to Value.

Meat, liquor and groceries: that's what they're stealing in Dundalk.

A 90-year-old man was scammed and robbed by a fake BGE employee in Canton. Also in the SE, a stolen Yorkie.

More on that craycray crash into Grand Central on Monday night-- arrested was one Donnell Tyrone Ray, age 18-- he had his headlights off and was driving the wrong way down Park Avenue, an MTA officer pursued him, he ran the light, and there you go.

City Paper BOBs are out, and crime-related winners include Justin Fenton (natch), Joce Sterman, who's turned the Deuce's crime coverage around to some of the best in town, the prison scandal (Best Scandal), Tavon White (Best Thorn in O'Malley's Side), Anthony Batts (Best BGF Promoter - "since his arrival last summer from California, Batts has mentioned BGF more than any other gang brand"), Best Boyz Bail Bonds (Best Use of the Law to Subvert Justice) and one major robbery: a BOB for Scott Calvert's work on the Speed Camera series, but no mention of Luke Broadwater. Considering those poor guys spent 6 months poring over 2 million citations, give the guy his BOB already, sheeze.

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

No romp, no stomp.

Two shootings last night in the Franklin Square and Cherry Hill neighborhoods, respectively.

Batts is planning to clean up Lexington Market so the normals and non-jaywalkers can enjoy it; also will no longer allow one to "romp and stomp" on the 4th of July. Instead, use that spare time on your hands to fill out the BPD's customer satisfaction survey.

Via Instagram
Whut. According to Tweeter @Elkephant, a joy-riding kid in a stolen BMW hit a truck full of paint, then rammed the car into the side of the Grand Central bar on Charles and Eager Streets. The driver of the truck was taken to the hospital, no word if there were any other injuries.

Brew: citizens skeptical of alleged changes* at the Liquor Board and the governor's "secret working group" to reform it. Even the Mayor griped that "the liquor board’s principal positions are patronage positions controlled by the state senators.*"

And speaking of mayorial gripes, SRB wrote an op-ed re. the Grand Prix, lamented "it is bittersweet to see this event come to an end,*" calls race skeptics a bunch of pessimists. Because you should be thanking her for mismanaging the event millions of dollars into debt! Quit being such a Debbie Downer! Gah!

Good news, gun nuts: the state has cleared the employees of other agencies to help clear the background-check backlog,* in spite of some paranoiacs' privacy concerns.* Actually watching you: the NRA, which has a database of all gun owners and people who have taken gun-safety classes in the U.S.





Monday, September 16, 2013

An argosy of mug shots

Kauron Gross
An arrest in the Saturday murder on Bonview Avenue, police say alleged killer Kauron Malik Gross was the housemate of the victim, Anthony Pryor.*

A shooting last night in the 100 block of Willard Street

After talking about it since at least last June,* the City Council is now "poised" to ban cash-for-phone machines... even though there are no cash-for-phone machines in the city.* More on ecoATMs from the City Paper. The company does collect serial numbers and compares them to a list of stolen phones; they claim that only 5 in 10,000 phones they collect is stolen. Meanwhile a Hopkins student reports his/her phone was stolen from her hand while waiting for the shuttle on Charles Street in the middle of the day.










Down in HoCo someone set a speed camera on fire.*

Reminder, tonight the Walk of Hope meets at 6:30 at East Eager and Valley Streets.

Sunday, September 15, 2013

Get it together, people!

Three shot, one two dead this weekend, one fatality was in the 500 block of North Bradford, the other Friday night in the 3700 block of Bonview Avenue.

Nine indicted last Friday in a drug-conspiracy case centered around the Coppin Heights area.*

Inmate Jason T. Wallace, 29, was found dead in his cell in Cumberland on Friday, the ME determined it was a homicide by blunt-force trauma. And Duncan and Wells report on the four inmates mistakenly released this summer,* including Jeffrey Bryant, who used his freedom to stab someone in the lung.
Foster Dove III



Foster Dove III of Essex, wanted on child sex abuse/pornography charges, fled from police and is on the loose.*The suspect has a pierced right ear and a McNugget chin.

Tomorrow night's Walk of Hope will start at 6:30 at East Eager and Valley Streets.

Shocking to no one, after three years the wet beer fart of money-losing failure that was the Grand Prix is cancelled.* (Officially it's "on hold" for two years, but bitch, please.)

Friday, September 13, 2013

You're welcome for the porn, Israel

Pushback on the proposed lower curfew from the ACLU, with accusations of racism and class-ism and neighborhoodism abounding ("The sad reality is that if you go to Roland Park, you don't see kids out at 12 o'clock.")  will Batts back off?* That would be too bad, as 86% of Sun readers who take polls support a new curfew. Via @IDuncan, exceptions to the curfew include a minor who's out with a parent, emergencies, school and civic functions... and if said minor is married. Oh, Maryland!

Heated exchanges at a Hampden community meeting* about that methadone clinic. Notably co-owner Moshe Markowitz claimed that 80 percent of clinic patients live within two miles of the clinic. (Markowitz three years ago: "I'm sure in a year and a half we're going to see an article in the Messenger saying this was an asset to the community." So much for that!) Meanwhile an increase in property crime (including burglaries at Spro, Luigi's and Zissimo's) has business owners pushing for foot patrols, but the BPD says they can't afford them.*

Paula Shipley
Ugh, more horrible parents- Paula Jane Shipley of Hampsted, 46, was charged in the drug-related death of her four-year-old* in March; in HoCo Aron James Krampf, 26, allegedly shook his 6-week-old daughter to death.* Parents, if a baby just won't stop crying and it's driving you nuts, put the baby down somewhere safe like the crib, get away from the sound, take a breather, call 1-800-4ACHILD. You don't have to be a mouth-breathing redneck to shake a baby to death in a fit of pique (though apparently it helps).

O'Malley appoints a panel to ensure marijuana remains expensive, inaccessible. And some good news for O'Malley: he got slammed by governor Rick Perry. Not as good as a shout-out from Rush Limbaugh or David Duke but I'm sure he'll take it. M to the O to the M also showed up at the CJCC bearing slides, talking points, barbs for the Sun and City Paper for not sufficiently touting in his achievements.

And to do my part to keep this story from dropping off the radar, here's the NSA revelations of the day:

Thursday, September 12, 2013

50/50

A man and a boy were injured in an early-morning shooting* in the 2600 block of Monument Street.

What the?! Two assistant city prosecutors, Angela Gallaher and Erin Valenti, are facing charges after a drunken brawl following the Jay-Z/Justin Timberlake concert downtown, where they may have been the aggressors or been defending themselves, depending on whom you believe.

A suspected bomb in a trash can in front of the courthouse on Calvert Street approached by a police robot turned out to be nothing,* no explanation as to why a loud explosion was heard.

Hampden methadone clinic vows to change,* quit stealing your shit and hocking it letting clients gather out front to the consternation of local merchants.

Harbor Point developers to drill about 1,000 pylons through the protective cap encasing the poisonous hexavalent chromium.


Wednesday, September 11, 2013

aquam fellis

Another Edmondson Avenue shooting, this one in the 3300 block. And a shooting on South Pulaski and Christian Streets.*

Via Justin George, a woman stabbed in front of the Metro Gallery on Charles Street, under the watchful eye of Mr. Boh.

Fell's Point residents are concerned about the dangerous chemicals soon to be seeping from the Harbor Point site.

Unshocking news: more robberies in Canton

City Liquor Board chair claims that the liquor board is going to start doing actual work now.* Uh huh.

Geeze, CVS has to pay a $250,000 fine after admitting to selling expired medication and playing it fast and loose with customer's personal information.

Wow, JZ, you really need to moderate the comments on your web site.
UPDATE: the article's comments appear to be shut down for now, but if you're really dying to know what they said someone on Reddit collected some of the klassier selections. The story was linked to the front page of the Drudge Report.

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Can't kill everybody

Homicide #163 happened yesterday afternoon* at around 4:30 in the 6500 block of Brighton Avenue, that's 11 more than at this time last year, says Justin George. Three more victims have been identified publicly: Shandin R. Cunningham, 33 (Woodland Avenue), Nathaniel McCoy, 30 (Chesterfield Avenue), and Terrell Mitchell, 26 (North Avenue).

City police announced a new pubic enemy #1, Jamal Williams, arrested him an hour later.


 ham pants.
Of course the city council had no problem officially pledging millions of your taxpayer dollars last night to old ham-pants Michael Beatty, and Harbor Point construction is set to begin October 15,* hexavalent chromium be damned.

Batts is proposing a new, lower youth curfew that would require all kids under the age of 14 to be indoors after 9 p.m.*

WBAL follows the story of "Tracy," a former local prostitute who escaped "The Game" with the help of a group called TurnAround. The group says that the average age of women forced into "The Life" is 12-14.

John Anderson
One Deborah Claridy is suing Sheriff John Anderson for retaliating against her for running against him. Claridy was a lieutenant in charge of day-to-day operations, after the election, she alleges, she was demoted to a job that involved her to check the operation of courthouse telephones and hand-santizier stations. Comments on the article are a good read, eg. "(Anderson) may very well be shocked to hear about these allegations himself because he doesnt come to work until 2pm on a daily basis."
In Hampstead a man committed suicide during a barricade situation.

SRB dropped by the WYPR studios. Tweeted Justin G., "Asked about 9% increase in homicides, 20% incr in non-fatal shootings, mayor says she remembers when city had more than 300 homicides/yr"

Man who called in the bomb threat to Camden Yards said he did it because he was "tired of Baltimore" and wanted to stop people from doing bad things. Sassed back the 911 operator, "Well, you not gonna kill everybody"

Punishment modified for Towson U cheerleading team, the squad was given "social probation" for just the fall semester.

Monday, September 9, 2013

A good listener


View Larger MapThe City is expected to give final approval for the sale of $107 million in bonds tonight, upon which the city will pay $174 million in interest. Of that $107 million, $35 million will be lent to the city by the developer himself, Michael Beatty, who will earn an additional $20 million in interest on the loan. All told the project is expected to cost city taxpayers about $600 million. The project, BTW, will sit atop a shit-ton of plastic-and-concrete entombed* hexavalent chromium, a carcinogen made famous by Erin Brockovich that is known to cause lung and intestinal cancers and damage DNA. Beatty has said that developers will re-cap the devil's brew of toxic chemicals after construction is finished ... in about a decade.
Fun facts: the developer's name is pronounced "Beety," at least one of his sons goes to Gilman and he has been known to wear khaki skinny jeans.* (WTF?) He claims to be impervious to critics, "I was never a good listener."

A 2012 Honda Civic Hybrid was stolen Saturday night in Evergreen in North Baltimore, Maryland tag #28373CA, silver 4-door. Call 911 if you see the car.

September 12 at 6:30 p.m. the Metro Gallery will be hosting "The Grateful Zeb Show," a benefit for Zeb Drinkwater, who was shot at 40th St and Roland Avenues.

And tonight at 7 p.m. is the "Walk of Hope," a neighborhood walk starting at 22nd and Barclay.

Tomorrow morning there's some kind of anti-corrupt-judge flash mob at the federal courthouse at 101 W. Lombard.

Sunday, September 8, 2013

Through a glass, darkly

Five six shot, one dead last night making it a three-homicide nine-shot weekend with two hours to go. Last night's homicide was at 1000 Valley Street, two were shot in the 4400 block of Marble Hall Road, one at Woodland & Delaware, one in the 3600 block of Edmondson, and an adult and juvenile shot in an unknown location. yesterday was 5000 Edmondson,* a homicide at 6800 McClean, homicide 3900 Chesterfield,* shooting at Queensbury and Spaulding Aves., shooting at 1500 E. Pratt.



A body was found in the parking lot of the Corinithian Bar in Windsor Mill. ...Did you know? Corinth is considered the birthplace of the Dionysian mysteries, secret clubs that would get insanely drunk together, listen to loud music and eat raw meat. One of the most famous Corinithians was Diogenes, one of the first Cynics. When he wasn't dispensing lectures about how much everybody sucked but him, which he concluded by pooping on stage, he lived in a storage jar in the marketplace off of a diet of onions, where he masturbated, peed on people and gave them the finger.

Anyway, also in the county last night a double drive-by shooting in Pikesville on Blanche Road.

Farther northwest at Antietam the KKK held a rally.* Guess what, they don't like Obama.

In the city, a considerably larger group held a rally to support stricter background checks for gun buyers.*

Saturday, September 7, 2013

So far this weekend

Two homicides in the past 24 hours- 6800 McClean Avenue and 3900 Chesterfield, and (at least) two shootings in the 5800 block of Edmonson Ave.* and at Queensbury and Spaulding Avenues (West side).

Rodricks feels a tickle of glee* at the come-uppance of former city police officer Meredith Cross, who married one Carlito Cabana (... seriously his name?). Cabana is a convicted murderer/robber/drug dealer/accused rapist cum alleged "Supreme Commander" of Dead Man Inc. Mrs. Cross-Cabana used a fake ID to visit him at North Branch, then lost her police job, then sued the city to get it back (with the police union's money, no doubt), lost that case, lost her appeal and is now unemployed and on the hook for court costs.* Good!
Cabana was sentenced to 30 years in 1998 for murder, yet is apparently no longer in custody in the state of MD or of the feds. Bad!
  ... FWIW, Dan Rodricks, it's not exactly correct to call DMI a BGF "subsidiary." BGF has a Black Panther/race separatist thing going on so melanin-deficient people can't be members. Dead Man Inc. is surely a jailhouse partner of the Black Guerrilla Family but DMI has always had its own code/leadership/symbols, etc.
    Bonus fun fact: in 2008 the Black Guerrilla Family kept an office in the city jail with desks, chairs and computers.

Ксения Teplicova
Look, gun-toting Belarussians! -- she looks considerably better on her Facebook page

Indycar driver Scott Dixon was fined $30,000 after making "disparaging" comments at the Grand Prix. In other GPrix news, the noise from the race itself was found to have violated the city' health department's own safety codes.*

One Michelle Varick has filed a lawsuit in Baltimore against the makers of the DaVinci robot for her really, really botched hysterectomy. Warning: contains mental images that may haunt your trips to the toilet.

Friday, September 6, 2013

Dentata

A fatal shooting in the 1200 block of W. North Avenue-- Nick Mosby's district has been a hotbed of nefarious activity* lately, on Monday a 52-year-old man was beaten to death in the 800 block of Lennox Street a mile to the west of last night's shooting. There was also a shooting in the 1500 block of West Pratt.

The Sun's got a shiteous story of thrice-acquitted accused rapist Nelson Bernard Clifford* on a Friday. Each time prosecutors brought juries DNA evidence, and each time juries chose to believe Clifford's story that the knifepoint sex was consentual. "At some points, jurors giggled as he went point-by-point describing his version of courtship and intercourse." And Clifford is not the only one, a Tyrone Miller, 45, also had three different accusers claiming he raped them in alleys but prosecutors dropped charges after losing a motion to have the cases tried together. Marilyn Mosby, I get your rage, but when you blame Bernstein for the work of fucktified juries and judges it kind of sounds like you don't understand how the system works. ... In other news, three years after it was given away in South Africa for the World Cup, the Rape-aXe dentata condom, right, is apparently still not available in the U.S.

The Brew covers the local/national epidemic of phone thefts. Probably needless to say, don't walk around talking or playing on a phone, keep it in your pocket and be alert instead. Also, ef ecoATMs and their BS excuses with an effing chainsaw, why are they still operating in our state?

But there's some good news, consumers!: Doug Gansler has sued a grifting Pasadena appliance repairman.

Crimercize

A group in town called The Transition Team is organizing "Walks of Hope" through different city neighborhoods every Monday night at 7, visiting crime scenes and churches in the area. Last Monday's started at Lafayette and Harford Road, left, next Monday 9/9 the group will start at 22nd and Barclay, right.
From the description: 
"Churches, community organizations and police continue to work together because 'Presence Brings Reduction' - join in by being present - it makes a difference!
Join us as we walk, pray, sing, engage the residents and inspire hope that will bring the change we are all believing for"
The Barclay neighborhood as actually been (seemingly) pretty quiet lately, with no shootings in the past month, and "only" five thefts and one assault. Still, it can't hurt anything to get out, socialize and get some exercise with your fellow citizens, right?
Prayer is mentioned but organizers assure me that atheists and people of all faiths are welcome.
Maps courtesy of SpotCrime.

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Hand on the Pump, Per Say

Donte Bennett
Police fatally shot a man (who witnesses called a "kid" and Fenton says is 25near Douglass Homes and N. Caroline Street last night. Police say the man was armed, witnesses say he was only holding a cell phone. ("I didn't see no gun per say.") This is the 5th fatal police-involved shooting this year.
UPDATE: the man was ID'D as Donte A. Bennett, 5/1988, alias Donta Frye. He had an open warrant for assault and a long record, in February he was charged with spitting in public.

What is up with these domestics?! Police arrested a 68-year-old man for shooting a guy who I guess was either his boyfriend or his girlfriend's boyfriend.*

And what is up with the constant flow of people being mistakenly released from the city jail?! Today's butterfingers was the grandmother who allegedly killed her one-year-old grandson with methadone.* This time apparently it was the fault of a prosecutor who "mistakenly dropped charges." About six weeks ago the DA of PA publicly called MD corrections officials "utterly incompetent," "inept and completely uncooperative,""completely frickin irresponsible" and "sloppy" after they mistakenly released one Dale Wakefield, 21, who was being held after he allegedly stabbed a PA homeless man 70 times. There are so many mistaken-release stories I've given them their own tag, "butterfingers!"

Rodney Miller, 25 and charged with trespassing, was arrested for attempting to microwave a metal bike pump in the Circuit Courthouse on Calvert St.

Maj. Kimberly Burris placates the crime-victim residents of Lake Walker with flattery: " [burglars] come from outside your neighborhood. Your neighborhood is beautiful.*"

In Essex a man stabbed Balwinder Sandhu, the owner of 444 Liquors and Sports Bar on Eastern Boulevard.

Judge Emory Plitt refused to revoke bond for surf n turf menace Don Dwyer, noting that Dwyer hasn't been convicted on any charges related to his August DUI (yet).

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Dumbbells

Blaes & Jones
A man was shot in the chest* in the 600 block of Mount Holly Street in Edmondson Villageafter midnight, was sent to the hospital and treated and released. I'm thinking he did not have health insurance. No suspects, no motive, of course.

Marquis Queen, shot by an officer on August 13 who had just come back from leave after shooting a suspect in January, was revealed to be a carjacker. All's well that ends well.
 
Remember John Andrew Blaes, who pleaded guilty to producing BDSM pornography involving a 15-year-old North Carolina girl he lured into his van from the Internet? In February Blaes got 27 years, and now his accomplice, Margaret Ellen Jones, 38, has been sentenced to 15 years.

In other news of evil men, one Ryan Shallue shot his ex-girlfriend Kristin Loetz and her friend Charles Abbott then himself in a house near Salisbury Steak University. Loetz is alive, Abbott and Shallue are not. Oh, and an evil woman-- Helen Newsome, 26, is alleged to have broken into her (married) ex-boyfriend's house in PGC, waited in a closet for 12 hours-- and then attacked his 8-year-old son with a dumbbell. WTF?

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

DEA Has Acess to 26 years of Phone Records

Well, you knew more shoes would drop, and to the world of crime this is the big one: they call it the "Hemisphere Project."
    AT&T and the DEA, in a joint program (heh!) collected every phone record that passed through an AT&T switch -- so basically every cell phone call in North America and some land lines, too. The DEA paid for it, and AT&T has been quietly giving them what they ask for via High Intensity Drug Trafficking-designated employees, with no pesky judge in the way.
   Interestingly, this revelation is not from the Snowden files but from anti-war activist Drew Hendricks in Port Hadlock, WA, who obtained it as a series of PowerPoint slides after filing a public information request from an unnamed West Coast law-enforcement agency. 
“'All requestors are instructed to never refer to Hemisphere in any official document,' one slide says. A search of the Nexis database found no reference to the program in news reports or Congressional hearings."

Bloody home, party home, slummy home

Four men shot in separate incidents last night.*

The Spectator has more about the Whitelock shooting and photos, including one of the purported victim, Brandon Davis, left. He also notes that two brothers were stabbed on N. Streeper.

Here's an index to the Summer of the Gun series

The City Paper has more about Wall Hunters, in case you haven't heard enough already. But the national attention/shaming has apparently worked-- the city plans to spend $22 million to demolish vacants over the next 2 1/2 years,* in contrast to the $2.5 million a year it was reportedly spending previously.

A bust bust after ScapeScape at 2800 Sisson Street, the property owner was charged with disorderly conduct and keeping a disorderly house. The address is bordered by the 83 exit ramp, an abandoned office building and the city dump, so it's unlikely it was bothering the neighbors...







R.I.P. North Baltimore Patch- employees were laid off via a mass conference call.

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Quicksand

"I love my city but it's quicksand." Justin & Justin eulogize a violent summer in the city* by interviewing the souls left behind. Jack Young says it's drugs, Cornelius Owens says the shootings are all about "respect."

Don McCraw
Keep an eye out for Don McCraw, 13, missing since Friday.  Update: he has been found.

Heh. A homeowner in Edgewood trapped a burglar in his garage.

Think you know this town? ... see how many Baltimore neighborhoods you can find. (via Fenton)