WBAL reported that a 80-year-old woman was stabbed repeatedly in the parking lot of a KFC after she refused to give spare change to a pair of panhandlers.
A 14-year-old boy was shot multiple times with a pellet gun while getting off the bus on N. Howard Street.
Roxanne Umphery-Lucas claims that the former head of the PTA, Michael Franklin, stalked her, threatened to burn down her house, stole her mail and slashed her tires.
Speaking of the "troubled North Avenue corridor," that's just Elizabeth Carter was found after a neighbor recognized her from the TV.
"A Lutherville man facing a 13-year prison sentence for sexually abusing a child and harassing witnesses has been charged with soliciting the murder of a Baltimore County prosecutor."
"Youths at a private residential program for juvenile offenders are telling their lawyers about watching staff members sit on [17-year-old Isaiah Simmons] until he died."
Ann LoLordo Op-Ed:
"How many more murders will it take before Baltimoreans are fed up enough to do something about it?"
Cybrarian Op-Ed:
Dear Ann, if standing outside and hollering like a renegade Pawnee is what it would take to stop the violence, (or driving through the West Side shaking a finger, or writing irate letters to the editor) we'd be all over that shit. But we all know that 3,000 people could converge on city hall with flaming torches and not a thing would change. The police are understaffed-- that is not my fault. Judges who do have the opportunity to lock people up dole out half-assed "concurrent" sentences-- what am I supposed to do about that, other than not vote for that judge again next time? The city gets grants, and what becomes of them? They're pooped away on one-time worthless projects like cameras, database projects that never get finished and chit-chatting committees. As long as we're blaming "the citizens," the people who are in charge and actually do have the power to change things are off the hook. The violence Baltimoreans are subjected to is bad enough-- to suggest we deserve it because we aren't mad enough is downright offensive. Mkay?
15 comments:
Why you gotta drag the Pawnee into this? ;-)
okay, I just followed the blotter link. I think it is important to note that he was shot multiple times with a PELLET GUN and recieved no serious injuries. That's horrible and obnoxious, unfortunately happens all the time, but as a matter of crime reporting, 2 sentances is a little bit of overkill. Perhaps the Sun should write a piece about effed up little thug kids running around targeting strangers and shooting them multible times with pellet guns for kicks, as I hear about this sort of thing happening constantly, and how the instances are rarely reported by the victims, but it honestly shouldn't not be portrayed as something it is not.
i'm kind of surprised that pellet gun "shootings" are reported as often as they are. when i was a kid i grew up in a very low crime environment and kids were still constantly shooting each other with bb guns and pellet guns and nobody really cared.
I was shot by my idiot brother as a kid with a pellet rifle. Sure, I was pissed because it was bleeding, but I did know that it was just a moron with a pellet gun.
The kid on Howard street has no reason to not believe when some hoody boys draw on him that it's not a 9mm and he's not gonna meet his maker. Nor, really, does any unsuspecting pedestrian walking that street. It's serious in that context of uncertainty.
Now, elsewhere in the Northern Blotter, remember a disagreement I was having with an Anon who claims to live a block from 33rd & Greenmount and objects to it being called a Ghetto ?? Well, teenage hoods robbing other teens at gunpoint usually gives a pretty strong indication. 'Our Town' this is not. And no, those punks are not the exception. They are the rule in Greater Waverly. This place is swimming in handguns. I sometimes think they should convert the basketball courts to a shooting range just to minimize collateral damage. Ghetto. Ghetto. Ghetto
Fact is, it should probably be no one's town, like Chernobyl. Meanwhile Sheila Dixon aspires to be a garbage Mayor. Y'know, for the first time, I believe she'll deliver on that promise.
I can't believe this shit!
So I was in line for the car wash on Falls and Cold Spring, with about 20 other cars, everybody's patiently waiting their turn, and this woman jumps the line and pulls up next to me on the right side and tries to get in front of me.
I just ignored her-- I and everyone else behind me had been waiting for 20 minutes.
So what does she do? Rams my car with hers!
Then, she gets out and is screaming and cussing at me (and the car wash operator, like he cares) ... while my kid's in the car no less!
("Mommy, why's that lady pointing at us?")
I didn't get out of the car, let her go ahead of me to wash her freakin' Malibu... checked the damage after she was safely gone ... my wheel well, bumper are all scraped up, and some piece of molding under the door's all hanging off.
Got her tag, called the police and filed a report, and here's the kicker: the bitch was born in 1934!
Guess there's no such thing as old enough to know better!
I stand by my original hypothesis from before I even started this blog: why is there so much crime in Baltimore? because BALTIMOREANS ARE FUCKING CRAZY!
...present company excluded.
You can't hold them responsible for their behavior. They don't get adequate parenting, because they're not born, they're hatched.
Call the owner of the carwash, tell him you're not suing him, and ask if he has a security camera of the scene. At that intersect, there might also be a redlight camera somewhere.
FYI, a guy was shot dead on the 3900 block, W. Rogers Ave. in NW.
So what happens next with the crazy car wash lady? Do the cops call her or just her insurance company or does she even get a call? Probably smart you were to stay in the car but you almost want to ram back into these a-holes, it sounds like the typical situation when someone tries to but in front of you at the toll-booth. I tell you, Baltimore will be a nicer place when they ban cellphone talking in cars and ban smoking in restaurants.
galt, you asked me for a shooting total for last year. well i think i'm done. for 2006 (minus the first week or so for most of the western half of the city, because i didn't get that data before it was removed to make way for more recent data), the number of agg. assault w/ gun incidents (plus number of fatal shootings, by my own count), seems to be 1,119. number of victims is 1,337. please keep in mind that this is very approximate and may not reflect reality at all, not just because of mistakes or omissions on the police's part, but also because i could have screwed some stuff up too (this is a rather large amount of data to work with).
maybe sometime soon i'll try to break it all down by district/neighborhood, but that's gonna take a long time.
This is why no one ever does anything about all the murders in Balto. B.
As long as activists call for solutions which deny personal responsibility on the part of perps and instead embed fault in 'things', such as drugs, structural unemployment, lousy schools, etc., no politician has any need to make a move.
They say 'We cannot police a solution into existence.' and objectify the problem into something impersonal and everyone in Balto. B gets to feel good about themselves, while only Balto. A gets any criminal justice results.
So, in which do you think functional people want to live? And so, by exclusion, where do you think the violence will continue ?
Dummies.
Well, the officer said she was going to go to her house to ticket her (she said, "I could give her as many as eight tickets, but I'm only going to give her one." ?!), the insurance company said I could go through her company or them (I chose my company-- she probably has Gebco or something), have to take the car in on Tuesday for an estimate and get a rental for however long it takes (and I know from experience, body work is shockingly expensive and takes five times as long as it seems like it ought to).
And then I hope I never have to see her again!
In making the insurance claim she gets to know my home address, which makes me quite uncomfortable (though less uncomfortable than paying for the damage myself).
I'd like to raise an objection in theory.
This notion that an officer of the court perceives multiple offenses, each of which seems to be justifiable, yet chooses to extinguish several of them.
This is the problem we have with the Assistant State's Attorneys and the Ladies & Gentlemen of the Bench.
It is not theirs to pardon offenses, in their Imperial discretion. They are not legislators. Legislators determine what the law is and what rules will govern its application.
The executive and judicial branches are concerned with applying it, as written, as best they understand its intent.
This idea that individuals wish to express their personal magnanimity while executing the duties of the office is a serious problem. If they feel so strongly about a matter of advocacy, the appropriate thing to do is to recuse themselves and pass on official duties to an uncompromised alternate.
Basically, it is not for them to be kind at society's expense. I think that in Baltimore, they don't get what it means to be a public employee. They think it means getting a check without having a real boss.
I'm with you, man. I wish I'd said something about that to the officer, or at least asked her why.
Please also remember that, not only are the police understafeed and the courtrooms overcrowded, a JURY OF PEERS must determine guilt. As long as the venue in Baltimore is as it is, with people either too scared or too blinded by the "us against them" mindset, there will continue to be unbridled crime. As it is with raising children, we must show them we mean business when we say criminal activity is intolerable.
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