Monday, July 2, 2007

July 2

Charles Brockington, the man charged with second-degree murder for shooting rim-stealer Joseph Milton Johnson, will be held without bail. His preliminary hearing is scheduled for 8:30AM July 26, 2007 in Wabash District Court, room six.

Three more murders between Saturday night and Sunday night, bringing our official tally to 157.

A man was killed in the parking lot of the Windsor Inn bar and restaurant in Woodlawn (Balto. County) just after closing time on Sunday morning.

A decomposing body was found in a garbage bag behind a rowhouse in the 1500 block of Bond St. The death is suspicious but has not been ruled a homicide. Also at the same link, a man was shot during a robbery at a house in Severna Park.

The hit-and-run driver who killed 10-year-old Kianna Johnson with a green station wagon on June 21 remains free and unidentified.

Hey Sheila, your voters are almost ready to pack up and leave. Maybe you should do something more meaningful than holding another f--king meeting.

16 comments:

ppatin said...

You know, for a while I thought we might have actually had a murder free weekend. Then I took a look at the local news section in the Sun. "Three men shot, killed in 24 hours." Silly me, that's what I get for being an optimist.

Dopple said...

In the piece about the murder in Remington being "out of the ordinary" I think everyone forgot to mention the tripple murder at the halfway house at 500 W. 27th Street. About two blocks south of the 29th street murder. I live in Remington...during the day it's nice, but at night it's scary.

John Galt said...

It seems that residents of Charles Village, Ednor Gardens, Remington , and other parts of North Central Baltimore which during the housing boom were touted as 'the next hot neighborhood' are far, far hotter than anyone knew. The new crop of residents is learning why their parents' generation fled: it's all one big, bad Baltimore.

It makes no sense to take comfort in the fact that there are scads of shootings.... but not on my block. Because the criminals are mobile. And it just takes a single, statistically-unlikely bullet to change your life forever.

That's why people left here years ago, and it's why they're leaving now.

You can only cook the crime stats so long before people start figuring out that it doesn't seem as safe as the Commissioner of Police keeps saying.

Hey, when not one but both of the prior Police Commissioners call for an audit of the crime stats, you know you're being lied to.

The boom in Baltimore has been about form over substance. The substance of Baltimore City remains largely unchanged over the past 15 years: second-worst city in the nation.

Crime is our primary industry and largest private employer. That will never change until you get serious about policing. Not social work. Or redundant recreation centers. You've been understaffed for decades. Way below authorized manpower for years: Lenny Hamm's entire term, in fact.

Get a serious Comissioner (which probably means from outside Baltimore) and start policing again.

And do it before all these functional people flee this time.

ppatin said...

I suspect the court system is a bigger problem than the police force in Baltimore. If you look at most of the major crimes that are reported the vast majority of perps already have pretty serious criminal records. They just get away with ridiculously light sentences. What would really kick-ass would be if the legislature passed an even tougher state version of federal law that prohibits felons from owning guns. I'd suggest a minimum of eight years, no parole for any felon caught with a firearm, and at least twenty years if that previous conviction was a violent one.

ppatin said...

"What would really kick-ass would be if the legislature passed an even tougher state version of federal law that prohibits felons from owning guns."

That was a poorly worded sentence. What I meant was that the legislature should pass a state law that's even tougher than the federal one.

Anonymous said...

Do you know anything about a shooting that occurred in Mount Vernon on Mulberry street (@ Park Ave?) on Saturday evening? (the 30th) I live just around the corner and saw and heard the aftermath, but have been unable to find anything in the media.

taotechuck said...

I haven't heard anything about that one, km; Galt might've heard something, but that's a bit outside his normal territory. Check the police blotter in the Sun in the coming days; for "minor" occurrences like shootings, Irwin provides the most consistent coverage. Most likely, though, it won't get any coverage, anywhere.

Have any of you media folks out there heard about this one?

ppatin said...

As of today former felons can vote in Maryland as soon as they complete their sentences. Fan-friggin-tastic. Apparently our current voter pool wasn't dumb enough.

John Galt said...

Another fatal shooting in lower Charles Village/Barclay.

It just keeps getting worse, doesn't it ?

John Galt said...

Y'know, I've been thinking about Lenny Hamm's story that "we couldn't prevent the murders even if we had many more police...".

When that situation obtains, doesn't a municipality generally declare a state of emergency and evacuate residents from the uncontrollable circumstance ???

So, either evacuate Guilford Avenue or fire Lenny Hamm.

John Galt said...

More details on the above and homicide victims named.

Meanwhile, the Examiner considers the war on the homefront in Baltimore City.

John Galt said...

And the property crime continues in Northern, but don't tell Lenny Hamm. His stats say something different. 'Course, his stats are manufactured.

Speaking of police and truthfulness (in the same breath), check out what happened in tony Roland Park: it discovered that it's in Baltimore City too.

Anonymous said...

galt - actually that intersection is the eastern edge of Tuscany-Canterbury, which is evidently where most of the people involved live - still, same difference. I think I recall seeing that accident aftermath and wondering why there were more than the usual number of cop cars and ambulances there and why it took so very long for them to clear the accident. Could have been a different accident, though - that's an intersection that hosts a lot of them ....

ppatin said...

David Lee Miller has become the first person to be charged under Maryland's fetal homicide law.

Anonymous said...

Crime is our primary industry and largest private employer. That will never change until you get serious about policing. Not social work.

Bravo! I wish more people felt this way, particularly in my neighborhood where the community groups focus on crap like needle exchanges and ineffective youth "mentoring" done by adults who are halfway illiterate themselves. Enough with the social work programs that don't work -- start locking up the bad guys and the rest will fix itself.

Anonymous said...

And I'd like to add:

To the people fleeing the city -- good riddance. Many of them came here because they saw dollar signs and cheap real estate, not because they were committed to doing anything positive in the city. Go back to DC and stop investing/destroying our real estate so we have room for people who actually WANT to make a difference here. It's not like you didn't know what you were coming to...cheap real estate came with a high price after all.