Post -Riot Blame Game/That Woman Is On Drugs

Hogan's office and aide Keiffer Mitchell said they tried to reach SRB on April 27 from 3:30 to 6 p.m. to get her permission to activate National Guard troops as the riots began at Mondawmin, but she didn't pick up the phone. From the WaPo:

At 2:30 p.m., Drew Vetter, director of legislative affairs for the Baltimore police, e-mailed members of the City Council and state legislators representing the city about a “credible gang threat against officers” and “possible violent activity” at Mondawmin Mall and downtown. ... After 3 p.m., Gregory E. Thornton, Baltimore’s schools chief, headed for the mall, only to be turned back by police who were blocking the streets. Thornton went to City Hall and told the mayor what he had see. ... 

By [3 p.m. Monday April 27], Mitchell had arrived at City Hall, having been ordered by Hogan to “be where the mayor is.” A former Baltimore City Council member who lives a mile from Mondawmin, Mitchell has known Rawlings-Blake since middle school. His uncle, as a state senator, had shown then-Gov. Spiro T. Agnew around Baltimore after the riots that followed the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in 1968. That was the last time the National Guard had been called in.  ...  

About 6:45 p.m., the mayor traveled from police headquarters to the Emergency Operations Center, where her cabinet was waiting, as were Mitchell and several City Council members. ... Even though the troops had been activated, the mayor waited an additional 75 minutes to inform the public.“She finally made that call, and we immediately took action,” he said. The mayor, when told of Hogan’s remarks, “was pissed off, because she viewed it as the governor politicizing this,” said Harris, her spokesman, adding that the two leaders had talked more than once that afternoon. “She thought it was a rookie move. And you can quote me on that.”

But the billion-dollar questions:

• who ordered police to assemble in full riot gear and lie in wait for kids to get out of school between 3-3:30 and close the subway stop and keep kids from getting on the bus? 
• was that a legal thing to do? don't kids have a right to assemble and not be detained without cause? 
• Wouldn't you freak the ef out and burn stuff if your kid was trapped behind lines of officers in riot gear? 

Witnesses say it took 4-30 minutes for kids to start throwing bricks and bottles at police.

And who/what were police supposed to be protecting on April 27? Not, apparently, Mondawmin mall, where looters were so brazen they loaded clothes and shoes into their trunks by the armful all afternoon and into dark. Or any of the businesses around Pennsylvania and North Avenue.

And who ordered/strongly suggested the shutdown of downtown businesses in the middle of the day, Batts? Did he consult with SRB at all? And why wasn't this suggestion issued directly from the Mayor to all downtown employees instead of what appears to have been communique directly to the biggest businesses? We didn't from the Mayor or Batts himself until late Monday night.

That Woman. Drugs.

Here's my theory of what started the riots: That Woman Is On Drugs. That Woman = Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, of course, and by Drugs I mean something or some combo that's sedating and also an appetite suppressant.  Vyvanse and Ambien? Strattera and espresso? Pot n Percocet? She seems spaced out to the gills every time she's on TV.

And with SRB MIA/apathetic or knowledgeably on board with what Batts felt was a pressing threat, wanting to prove to Hogan and whomever that Baltimore could handle its own business, faced with plunging morale within the department as the threat of body cameras and accountability seeming a real possibility for the first time, Batts dealt with the stress the only way he knew how, like a hammer looking for a nail. 

That's my theory.

Shit Hits Fan

First of all, the fire department would like to assure you that the massive fire from the senior center was not related to the rioting last night.

However, the burning and looting at the CVS and the rioters who cut the the fire department's hose certainly was.

And just because that guy is walking away from a police van does not mean he was the one who set it on fire.  Though those people at Mondawmin loading racks of clothes into their trunks are definitely guilty.

Buildings are burning, schools are closed, and streets are lined with chaos: http://t.co/vQbV0zpoMK #BaltimoreRiots pic.twitter.com/hxtI1FHlJk
— KTAB News (@KTABTV) April 28, 2015

Baltimore looked like a war zone last night... http://t.co/E8O3OdB9Rg #BaltimoreRiots pic.twitter.com/zlJOsOWrVS
— The Independent (@Independent) April 28, 2015

One of many episodes. Phalanx comes to scene of fire. Battered bearcat vehicle. Burned out cars #BaltimoreRiots pic.twitter.com/LKoS13he7D
— Chris Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) April 28, 2015

15 buildings and nearly 144 vehicles set on fire last night. This was one. @BBCNewsUS #BaltimoreRiots #Baltimore pic.twitter.com/iDIlRuwpu6
— Rajini Vaidyanathan (@rajiniv) April 28, 2015

But heroes emerged, like the man who danced on top of a box truck to Michael Jackson, the (different?) v talented Michael Jackson impersonator who danced to "Beat It" and the mom who saw her son rioting on TV and ran out and beat him. Yes, even CNN concedes, "A few people tried to stop the unrest," including Vietnam vet Robert Valentine, who told young people to go away and told CNN,

"I've seen more than all this. This here is not relevant need to have their butts at home, viewing this with their families, studying and doing something with their life. They do not respect this young man's death. Their mom and daddy done lost a child. I am very pissed. .. I love my country, I love my charm city."

The riots ignited at the conclusion of Freddie Gray's funeral, a high and solemn-yet-firey event attended by Gray's family, including his mum, twin sister Fredricka, sister Carolina, stepfather; White House officials, Eric Garner's family; an all-star show of orators:

• Jesse Jackson - "all of our sons are at risk .. police wagon became a tomb ... he is more than a citizen, a martyr. ...go out and march, and march and call his name"
• Scruffy, tie-less Billy Murphy - "this is like a bad marriage, but we're not interested in divorce"
• Jamal Bryant - "he was a threat because he was man enough to look somebody in the eye .. they're used to black men with their head bowed down low, their spirit broken. .. but he stopped running"
• Elijah Cummings [tears]

And then at around 11:30 a.m. police claimed a "credible threat" of talks of gangs targeting police and "purge" on social media. As we were later to discover,  apparently a guy said on Facebook:

"We gonna unify, you got Bloods, Crips, Muslims, BGF, you got everybody out here, you ain't never see it like this before. Everybody together just to go against these pigs" 

So downtown schools and businesses then began to close starting at around 2 p.m., including UMAB, T. Rowe Price and Legg Mason. But at the end of the funeral, mourners rolled out, protestors converged, students from schools including Frederick Douglass near Mondawmin spilled into the streets. "outsiders" including press, national groups like the Crips, Bloods and Nation of Islam took to the streets, and on the East side Dunbar students near Hopkins Hospital hit the bricks.

And the mayor made good on her quip from last week about allowing civilians on the streets "space to destroy." Indeed, police held back, not just at Mondawmin and with Dunbar students but as North Avenue and the CVS were smashed and burned, until the men started cutting the fire hose. And at some point the police claimed someone shot at them, and boys and men definitely threw rocks and bricks. And 144 burnt cars.

Tuesday city schools were closed, and Tuesday morning the National Guard rolled in. City private schools were open, but sports were cancelled, and one school decided at 1:10 to close at 1:30 out of fears of .... no one is sure what, exactly.

But no fatalities that we know of yet.

when you realize this was 23 yrs ago... Right now Baltimore is just like L.A. in 1992... #BaltimoreRiots😔🙏🏾 pic.twitter.com/yDK1U41Epi
— Travis Dope Azz (@boyznthehood_) April 28, 2015

At the moment Baltimore is on the front page of the BBC News, and thousands of troopers have been deployed. Hogan is moving his office to take over from Stephanie, who is clearly overwhelmed (I miss Sheila Dixon, she got stuff done).

A warm, clear and sunny day, the cloying sweet smell of burnt lead-painted wood dominates the air, with pockets of burnt rubber, sulphur and plastics.