December 9

"The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' Violent Crime Impact Team, working with the Baltimore Police Department, dismantled a 'very violent' drug organization in the Edmondson Village area ..."

From the DR [subscription required]:

An 82-year-old Baltimore woman is suing Baltimore City, the Baltimore City Police Department and one of its officers, claiming she was handcuffed, pushed and screamed at when police responded to a call at her home in March. Juanita Cantrell filed suit Friday in Baltimore City Circuit Court, alleging assault and battery, false arrest and imprisonment, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. She is seeking $1 million in compensatory and punitive damages. Cantrell also claims the officer threatened to charge her with assault if she reported the behavior, which she in fact did. Police arrived at Cantrell’s home on March 30, 2006, in response to an alleged dispute between the Cantrells and their neighbors.

Dirty Old Men:
Father Jerome F. "Jeff" Toohey Jr., 60, former chaplain of Calvert Hall College High School in Towson, got 8 months shaved off of his sentence by Baltimore County Circuit Judge John G. Turnbull II.
Victims (including CNN's Thomas Roberts) are furious.
The E on Timothy Gouranis: "When an accused sexual offender can switch school districts without so much as a heads up to his future employer, heads should roll."

One of the largest steroid stashes ever was found by customs investigators in AAC.

All sorts of robbery and stolen stuff in the blotter.

Baltimore City Solicitor Ralph Tyler will become chief legal counsel for the new O'Malley administration. From TDR {<- TDR sub. required}:

The 59-year-old Tyler ... spent 14 years in the Office of the Attorney General after moving to Maryland in 1982 [from Illinois]. As chief of litigation, he won the landmark case of Baltimore City Department of Social Services v. Bouknight before the U.S. Supreme Court. In that case, the state’s highest court held that a mother's confinement for civil contempt for failing to produce her previously abused son violated the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. The Supreme Court, however, held that the mother could not invoke that amendment to resist the court order to produce the child. In 1996, Tyler made a move to private practice at Hogan & Hartson LLP, where, among other things, he represented Maryland in an attorney'$ fee di$pute with Peter G. Angelo$ stemming from toba¢¢o litigation. In 2004, he replaced Thurman Zollicoffer Jr. as city solicitor. Tyler is a graduate of the University of Illinois, Case Western Reserve University School of Law and Harvard Law School.

Also From TDR: what's up with the Court of Appeals for next week.

PGC lawyer MeLinda Porcher Hodgson of Windsor Mill was disbarred after failing to tell her client that said client's divorce case had been dismissed because Hodgson didn't file a financial form. {<- - sub. required}