$659,000 Worth of Quality Phones

Despite City comptroller Joan Pratt's pleas, Baltimore City Solicitor George Nilson has given the stamp of approval for the $659,000 worth of telephone equipment that Mayor Rawlings-Blake's office purchased. 

A Friday night shooting in the 1700 block of West Lexington St puts a 26-year-old man in the hospital.

The BPD have made an arrest in the 2007 homicide of Melvin Jordan, 32. Now 32-year-old Phillip Herrell was doing a bid in a Delaware correctional facility when he was charged with the five-year-old homicide.

A scooter accident in the 700 block of East Heath St. put a 43-year-old man in the hospital. 

Two arrests have been made in the June 12th Overlea murder of Miguiel Anthony Bailey. Linwood Tymais Smith , 21, and DeAngelo Devonne Johnson, 24, have been charged with first-degree murder in the drug robbery gone awry. The drug-rip-turned-murder left Baily dead and Smith and Johnson with gunshot wounds to the cheek and nose respectively. 

An intelligent young man threw rock into the window of a gas station, and instead of fleeing and returning home, decided the best course of action was to call police himself, and claim he was jumped by a group of men, in order to explain his injuries... or something. 

A former Dundalk resident already serving life in prison for one murder is facing another set of murder charges in Alleghany County after strangling his cell-mate to death at the North Branch Correctional Institution. Brian Cotter, 25, faces first degree murder charges for killing convicted rapist Lewis Thompson Jr., 57. 

In a County crime roundup, an Essex doctors' office burgled, "Nibbles" is dog-napped in Parkville, and remember Zachary Campbell, the glasses wearing perv who made college bathrooms worse than they already are? Well surprise, surprise, he's been charged yet again, this time for more Peeping Tom-ing committed back in April. It seems peepery, or perhaps anti-peeping vigilance is, for some weird reason, on the increase, as five different men have been charged with "Peeping Tom"- related crimes since May. They are (would be great to have pix -- Ed):

• Zachary Campbell, 20, of Baltimore, Charged May 3, and June 19
• Sean Shalev, 33, of Baltimore, Charged May 13
• Hector Pensalfini, 32, Homeless, Charged June 12
• Michael Nace, 58, of Parkville, Charged June 12
• Kevin Lange, 45, of Towson, Charged June 19

Free data should be free!

Fancy yourself a crime mapper/ information architect/ data analyst type? You might enjoy to read this article wherein SpotCrime.com discusses the design issues of relaying crime data to citizens, and the stickier wicket of getting timely public information from a public agency that's headed by people determined to contract with some friend-of-a-friend's-friend's for-profit company instead of releasing the information via free, public, no-barrier channels. 'Splains SpotCrime:

"We only see crime data delivered openly when a public agency - not commercial company - elects to use this method.  Private crime mapping companies have an incentive to balkanize the data they are contracted to publicize (typically funded by taxpayers) and limit entities from sharing this data (the same entities who are paying taxes). They may come across as open, however, they typically add a lengthy terms of service agreement to their maps and websites - ostensibly asking each citizen to agree to a contract before viewing public crime data.  These terms of service agreements have no public value.  They not only inhibit the press from republishing the data, but also serve to restrict public sharing of crime data."

Fox 45's Jeff Barnd linked to Vast Rat Wang Conspiracy

Remember those National Organization for Marriage-y robocalls a lot of Bmoreans got two Novembers ago? We knew the rat(s) would get smoked out eventually, and now they have (in the Sun's TV blog, no less. Which I think you can view without having it 'count' against yr firewall).

So if you thought you recognized that voice, you were right, 'twas no less voice than Fox 45's Jeff Barnd's, working for ccAdvertising of Centreville, VA, darkening your ringer with those do-you-believe-marriage-between-a-man-and-a-woman robocall push polls.

ccAdvertising has been linked to a company owned by a creationist in Centreville, VA, where coincidentally or not Mitt Romney's campaign has also been shooting political advertisements in the past week. Ooh, can't wait to see them. A source reports they involve B-roll of a very white Little League team.

And isn't it interesting that we have heard for years about Obama's supposed Muslim roots, but now we have a candidate who is part of a genuinely fringe religion, Mormonism, but liberals are too liberal mention how bizarre it is? ... well not me-- if you don't feel like reading Under the Banner of Heaven, enjoy this entertaining-yet-factual song from the Book of Mormon musical...




Anyway, re., Jeff Barnd, so much for the journalistic tradition of appearing objective and neutral. I wonder if the RNC paid Jeff Barnd in cash money (he's anti-gay for pay!), or if he was pressured into doing it by Fox honchos, or if he volunteered enthusiastically to record the push poll calls because he feels his hetero marriage (wait, does he even have one?) would be threatened by somebody's gay partner being eligible for health insurance. Wonder if he'd take an interview from Ed Ericson... considering how kind the CP has been to him previously...? Enquiring minds want to know...

Slave for a Day

An item on the park service's agenda is raising eyebrows: "Slave for a Day" aims to educate young whelps about Hampton Mansion's slavery history*, wherein servants were fed in troughs, among other activities. As a visitor you'll be able to whip your little sister in the hog pen, wipe the bottoms of other people's children and attempt to “carry buckets of water with a yoke on your shoulders!” ... actually I made some of those up. Next Sunday's event has been renamed the "African American Experience Tour," and if you want to go experience how the 3/5ths of a person people lived for 90 minutes in June, note that the map on the nps' site is wrong, the correct map is below. The tour is 2 - 3:30.
View Larger Map

The Big 100

Baltimore's homicide count for the year has reached the big 100, and the various news organizations sound almost excited about this unfortunate milestone. Baltimore's two most recent homicide victims are Tavon Whelchel, 18, and Lewis Womack IV, 36.*

Mayor Rawlings-Blake and City Comptroller Joan Pratt are in the midst of a very public tiff over a new phone system. Pratt is not-so-subtly saying that Rawlings-Blake is lining her own coattails, while Rawlings-Blake is demanding an apology for such an insinuation. 

Unsurprisingly, a not-guilty plea by alleged Phylicia Barnes killer Michael Johnson.

Police are asking for the public's help in figuring out who murdered 19-year-old Vernon Williams on the eighth of June.


Not the sort of list a college wants to get on... Morgan State has been named the 6th most "Crime-Rattled School" in America.

A woman robbed in yet another Craigslist scam is in trouble after repeatedly firing her gun into the air to ward off the aggressors.

It has not been a good few years for baseball icons. MLB Hall of Famer and former Oriole Eddie Murray is smack dab in the middle of a Federal insider trading probe.

North Baltimore Patch offers up a compilation of North Baltimore crimes from the last few days.

County citizens beware, there has been an influx of phone scams plaguing the area. Some have even slithered into extortion territory.

Genius. 42-year-old Dundalk resident Michael Blottenberger was not-so-subtly biking home with a television and various other ill-gotten gains from a recent burglary when two cops attempted to apprehend him. After a pursuit, Blottenberger managed to steal a cop car, and, to cut a long story short, is now facing a $1 million bail.

An Owings Mills accidental shooting puts a babysitter the hospital.

Three men are facing charges related to the robbery of a Lansdowne Wendy's. Hatratico Smith, 46, Rico Bias, 34, and Moncell Lee, 19, have been charged with the June 11 heist.

In other parts of Maryland, a 15-year-old in Ellicott City was shot in the head in an execution-style attempted murder, while Carroll County experienced its first homicide of the year on the same day mb and I visited an area gun range. Coincidence? Probably.  -- obvs we brought the devil up from the big city ... I love the Fox farm-team reporter with the busy hands in the clip, the last 5 seconds in particular. Paul Guessler? Gansler? Shelton Dutes he is not - mb

The latest Baltimore Guide crime blotter focuses on the city's Southeast, and includes fake police, assaults with wrenches and keys, and a mean ex-girlfriend.

Famed former Baltimore crime reported David Simon has put up a blog post chastising everything from the BPD, to the State's Attorney, to Justin Fenton, to (indirectly) yours truly. While I don't much appreciate what he had to say about Fenton, I do appreciate his general new bravado of being a cranky old fuss-pot, annoyed at all this newfangled technology and how no one does anything^the right way anymore.

Fun w/Guns

Illos from the cover of this

Shot an AR-15 in .223, a 9 mm, a .22 and some other kind of old-school rifle at the Hap Baker Range in Carroll County this morning with co-blogger TAB and some other guys. This just in: rifles are loud and shotguns are louder. If you've got some firearms and you're itchin to shoot em, it's byo guns,  ammo and ear protection, you can buy targets and soda there, and while their web site shows the address in an office building, it is actually on the 140 W in the landfill, which, remarkably, does not smell any stranger than anything else in Carroll County.

Croyder on Bernstein

Is the new State's Attorney tough, transparent or neither?

"here's what I found most interesting: that a State's Attorney who campaigned on the promise of transparency and the willingness to take on tough cases has apparently retreated on both fronts.  

According to Simon, Bernstein is using his unilateral power to charge cases to cherry pick the best cases, a tactic that should keep his conviction rate high for political purposes.  Bernstein directly criticized his predecessor for dropping tough cases, but at least she took the hit in her statistics.  She just blamed the police for lousy work.  But, says Simon, Bernstein can make his conviction statistics look great by not charging cases to begin with."

Cannibalism a Sign of Mental Instability? No...

The world famous Maryland cannibal Alexander Kinyua has been indicted for his crimes, and then  promptly moved to a mental facility for a complete mental evaluation.*
 
Police are hoping the public can identify three men who took part in a brazen armed robbery of the McDonalds at 5100 York Road.

The latest in a series of federal infiltrations of robbery crews ended in gunfire, but the feds had all the reason to be jumpy since said robbery crew had planned on killing the federal agent who was posing a member of the group.

The cases just keep piling on. Another person got jacked after responding to a bogus Craigslist ad. Although unlike past cases, this one was for a non-existent car.

North Baltimore was ripe with violence these last few days. A fella got shot in the arm for seemingly no reason in the 600 block of East 36^th Street, while another guy got cut up over in the 1000 block of West 36th St.

The one-time chief of the Baltimore State's Attorney's office's gun unit got busted carrying his own illegal gun. Apparently he was going to meet a client and do what I can only assume is some intense lobbying.*

A fire on Eastbourne Ave. claimed the life of a man, his pet dog, and ten cats.

Sweet neck-tat having Joseph Viars (Pictured Right), escaped from a work detail yesterday. Police are currently ISO Viars, but if you ask me, the first place I would check is Crystals house...

Perry Hall resident Rodney Hailey is facing a long stretch in the federal clink after selling over $9 million worth of sham energy credits.

I'm nearly tearing up... soon to be former commish Bealefeld went on his final citizens on patrol walk.

Officials are cracking down on speakeasy-esq taverns throughout the city. All told 128 different businesses face the wrath of city health officials.

Friends of 17-year-old Christopher Brown, who was asphyxiated by an off duty county police officer in the aftermath of a bout of teenage tomfoolery, are adamant that Brown didn't actually throw the rock that caused officer James D. Laboard to go ballistic.*

What's family for... Not so wee-nephew Seamus Coyle got life in prison for orchestrating the meet between Karla Porter and hit-man Walter Bishop Jr., a meet that culminated in the planning and eventual murder of Porter's husband William Porter.

A traveling crime duo, a modern Clyde and Clyde if you will, were busted for committing a string of burglaries and robberies. 18-year-old Davon Alexander Jones and 34-year-old Sylvester Joseph Johnson face a multitude of charges in both Baltimore and Howard County.

Gotta pay those taxes. Chung K. Choi, 47, the owner of Frankford Garden Liquors got 18 months in the federal pen after sneaking away some $745,000 without letting the IRS know.

Let's pray he's not the father... Racist slimebag Christopher Michael Gelston, 30, threatened and pointed a gun at a woman in a dispute over a paterity test. Gelston faces a bevy of charges related to the baby mama drama.

Yahh... that's not suspicious. Gary Giordano, the man whose gal pal mysteriously disappeared in Aruba, is now trying to cash in on the $3.5 million insurance policy he took out on her before the trip.

Thanks to DNA, Texas jail inmate David Martinez, 30, has been charged with a 2003 Silver Spring rape.

Finally, two men were charge with robbing and assaulting a Towson busker. A beef over stolen street corners led to Tony Lyde, 43 (Pictured Right), and Reginald Johnny Bonaparte Jr., 32, robbing a guitar playing busker.
This story hits a little close to home because I'm very familiar with Tony Lyde, (Not so affectionately nicknamed Turtle) He's a fairly prominent local vagrant, due in part to his large size and booming voice. I had the "pleasure" of interviewing Mr. Lyde once. I learned a multitude of things, including that (and these are his words) his "father murdered a man once, but got away with it and moved to New York, where he happily lives with his new family." Of course the last time I saw him, he and his entourage had been getting a bit more aggressive with their panhandling techniques, so it was only a matter of time before something like this occurred.

16 Busted By the Feds, Local Five-O

State and Federal police took down a drug ring recently. Eight people were charged federally, and eight were charged in City court. Only those charged locally have been identified. The defendants are:

Thomas Darrell Washington, 43, has two prior arrests for attempted murder, once in '93, and again in '01. Washington has convictions for gun possession, resisting arrest, and drug dealing.

Fabian Moore Jr., 24, has prior arrests for armed robbery and assault with a deadly weapon, and weapons possession by a felon, and prior drug dealing convictions.

Wendell Griffin, 50, was arrested twice for robbery in the early 90's, and is a twice convicted drug dealer, having been released from prison within the last year or two.

Anthony Perry, 49,

Devance Brown, 39, has prior arrests for assault, handgun possession, robbery, and sex offenses. Brown is also a convicted felon, having been convicted three times of drug dealing.

Roland Fleming Jr., 35, is a convicted drug dealer, and has two prior gun possession convictions as well.

Melvin Spencer, 26, (Pictured Right), is a convicted sex offender with prior convictions for drug dealing, sex offenses, and failure to register as a sex offender.

Donteze Thomas, 24, has prior arrests for gun possession and drug dealing. Thomas was arrested for drug dealing earlier this month in the county.

Shake it, don't break it...

Sharmell "Flash" Thomas, 22, left, has been charged with the murder of his girlfriend's 14-month-old daughter, Desmare Braxton. (Note to WJZ, technically, at 14 months, Desmare isn't a "shaken baby," rather, an "abused-to-death toddler.") According to his Facebook and MySpace pages, Thomas is a strapping football player ("YES I Am A HEADHURTER..lol") who was studying business administration at Baltimore City Community College and working at a local catering company, having previously been employed at The Shake Shack in New York. MySpace page quote: ""OUR DEEPEST FEAR IS THAT WE ARE POWERFUL BEYOND MEASURE""

The actor who played Bodie on "The Wire," J.D. Williams, says he's often stopped and frisked by the NYPD who mistake him for an actual drug dealer as he's on his way to auditions. There was a mega-protest in NY yesterday against the NYPD's copious stopping-and- frisking, a highly inefficient and lawsuit-inducing crime-fighting technique that Baltimore employed under the O'Malley administration but has since abandoned. NY hasn't, apparently, taken a lesson from our city's experience, in NY the "increase in street stops has been steady and vast: 600 percent from 2002 to 2011."

Other side of the bars

Five years for Larry Morris, and jail time for other corrections officers convicted of beating a woman in their custody at Central Booking and Intake. All very Stanford Prison Experiment.

Here Come the Swarming Drones

Perhaps you weren't freaked out about reports awhile back of drones crisscrossing Baltimore and trailing citizens' cars. And maybe you were unruffled when you found out drones have been cleared for use for commercial purposes (muses one flying-camera operator, "Maybe the F.A.A. should give a driver’s license for this ... Do a background check to make sure I’m not a terrorist.”) But how do you feel about Harvard engineering hummingbird-sized drones that can swarm you with cameras, poison darts or God-knows-what? Anyone else see the military-industrial complex's planes showing off over the city yesterday and heave a sigh of relief that they weren't bombing *us*...

Your Tax $$ at work...

The mayor's got more than half a million buck$ to throw at video-conferencing phones, in the meantime the Baltimore Police's public-information crime-mapping site has been down since at least April (if you can get it to load, let us know...)

.. Ahso, they have moved it to this link.  No more mapping, though, right? You have to search by street name, and there is no way to search by zip code...

Comptroller versus Mayor...

Comptroller Joan Pratt says the mayor broke the law when she bought 600K worth of video conferencing phones for the city

98

The man shot Monday night in the 2600 block of W. Patapsco Ave. has become Baltimore's 98th murder victim. He has been identified as 28-year-old Ronald Dawson, who (somewhat) infamously recieved just one year in jail for killing an 18-year-old in AAC back in 2006. It was believed that Dawson may have been the victim of an attempted robbery before killing Taveon "TJ" Watson. Dawson was awaiting trial on motor theft charges, and had a violation of probation on his Manslaughter conviction scheduled for October. **

'Ol Pat McDonough can sleep easy now, because the city has opened up a brand-spanking-new curfew center!

I'm posting the most recent North Baltimore crime report simply because the headline "Man Picks Fight, Gets Beat Up" makes me chuckle.

Owings Mills resident Miguiel Anthony Bailey (alternately spelled Miguel), age 22, was found shot dead inside a car near an apartment complex on Mopec Circle.

A long time in the pen for a County couple convicted of imprisoning and starving a a 22-year-old woman in order to collect her disability checks. Germaine Smith-Bey, 31 (Pictured Right) got 50 years while his gal pal Kimberly King, 39 (Pictured Further Right) received 40.

Finally a whopping 60 days in the can for robo-call "brains" Julius Henson. The political consultent was found guilty at trial on one count and acquitted on three others. Henson didn't much care for the case against him (shocking) calling it a "witch hunt."

'Your dumb ass just fell over a table ’cause you can’t walk straight'

Frank Klein: iced by a drunkard with a pink pimp chalice.

Honfest's First Annual Drag Queen Pageant was cancelled due to lack of interest from said drag queens, but thanks to City Paper photographer Frank Klein a fat, sweaty ice-heaving drunkard is getting his 15 minutes of fame. Police issued an 'APB' and I hope the CP will let us know if he turns up!

City's Getting Relatively Safer, Says FBI...

Crack open the champagne! The most recent FBI statistics show that Baltimore's murder rate is no longer among the top five cities in the US. Hooray!*

A 22-year-old woman was attacked and raped after leaving a Federal Hill bar. The woman, who had no recollection of the incident, woke up on someone's lawn several miles away.

County Police are scratching their heads after the body of 33-year-old Janell Earlita Balogun was found in the woods along Frederick Rd. Balogun wasn't quite a civilian, having prior drug dealing convictions, an assault conviction from a few weeks ago, and active warrants for motor theft and forgery.

Several recent shootings, including a guy who got capped in his Bridgehampton Drive apartment, a triple shooting in the 2200 block of Annapolis Ave that put two teen girls in the hospital*, and a Sunday drive by in the 5400 block of Crismer Ave.

A massive fire engulfed a vacant warehouse in the 500 block of South Broadway St.

During a foot-chase of a drug suspect in the 5100 block of Stafford Street an officer shot and killed a pitbull. 

19 years in the slammer for police impersonator Joshua Hatch, 29. Hatch would put on a fake badge and rob people with pseudonym of "Officer Henson." A co-defendant received two years for partaking in one of the impersonation robberies.

A 17-year-old girl was falsely accused of attempted murder, leading her to spend four days in jail and miss her high school graduation.

The hell? A couple of AACO teens threw a bottle bomb at a six-year-old girl playing on a school playground.

Over in Pikesville, a woman kidnapped her biological child in during a visit. The mother, 20-year-old Kendra Nicole Gough, 20, faces kidnapping and weapons charges.

In the county, the Towson Trader Joes was robbed at knife-point, and Essex criminal Thomas Edward Maroney, 19, escaped custody and enjoyed a few sweet, sweet hours of freedom.

Probably not going to make for a good reference... A disgruntled former employee of the Tark’s Grill, identified as 43-year-old Oscar Mendez, attempted to set fire to the kitchen just an hour after getting canned. No one was injured.

The wife of Carl Johnson, a man who died after being tasered by police, has filed a multimillion dollar lawsuit against the county and state police departments. 

Multitasking heroin dealer Kenya Salik Montgomery, 40, got 10 years in the federal pen for being a part of two different drug organizations.
 

Apparently a Mob Mentality Works Out Pretty Well....

Pat McDonough must be seething... Gregg Bernstein announced his office will not be taking action against the youths who participated in a flash mob turned beatdown at the 7-11 on Light Street.* 

The participants in the fatal police-involved shooting from last week have been identified. The deceased is 44-year-old Stuart Fitzgerald. The officer has been identified as Karen Crisafulli. Fitzgerald was killed while attempting a daytime burglary in the 400 block of South Chester St.

Three murders and four arrests. The BPD is slowly but surely inching the clearance rate back to an acceptable number:

• Arrested for the stabbing death of Ettice Jones was 46-year-old Kevin Whittington, a man with a multitude of prior convictions including several for drug dealing.
• Charged with shooting 19-year-old Lacy Lamb through a basement window was 19-year-old Sean Randall.
• Finally, the brother and sister duo responsible for the death of Antoneo Mattison have been id'd as Emanuel Fowlke, age 35, and Temeka Clark, age 26.

Have you seen this fella? He's wanted for a string of pharmacy robberies and the police are eager to snatch him up. 

A whopping 105 years in the clink for 21-year-old carjacker Terrell Scott. Scott, along with 20-year-old Abram Hall, jacked a civilian, beat him ferociously, stripped him, and then shot him in the chest. Luckily the victim (who for some reason was identified in the press release) managed to survive.

Several shootings earlier this week put three in the hospital. The first occurred late Monday, where a man was popped in the 1900 block of East Lafayette Ave. An early morning Tuesday shooting in the 200 block of Carey St left a man and a woman with gunshot wounds.

While guns are going off in the city, it seems everyone is getting knifed in the county. Three 16-year-olds were stabbed in separate incidents. The first stabbing was that of a Milford Mill Academy student playing hooky, stabbed in an apparent robbery. The second incident occurred Monday night, where a kid got cut up near a Middle River 7-11. Finally, a girl in Halethorpe got stabbed by her own brother while walking to a store. The brother, id'd as Austin Taylor Davis, faces first degree assault charges.

Speaking of County stabbings, the guy who stabbed his so-called girlfriend in the middle of the street before getting into a head on collision whilst fleeing the scene has been identified as Reginald Lee Fields, 29. Fields faces attempted murder charges whenever he's released from the hospital.

Life in prison for Susan Datta, convicted of providing the gun used in the murder-for-hire killing of Towson Hess station owner William R. Porter back in 2010.

A Towson attorney and his two sons were killed in a car accident while vacationing in England.

So apparently the city can effectively tell you to "suck it" when they owe you money, even if it's their mediocre infrastructure that broke your stuff... interesting.

So much for being lucky... the 7-11 famous for selling the winning Mega Millions ticket earlier this year has been stuck up again.

Two interesting stories I've come across: a fairly run-of-the-mill video from Fox regarding the Bath Salts craze that has people scared to no end, the other is a older Patch article regarding the various forms of burglary.

Some Recent Case Updates:

Remember Omar Little? No, I don't mean one of the single greatest fictional characters of all time, I'm talking about Omar Little Jr. (Pictured Right) He got busted on gun charges at the beginning of the year. It seems Bernstein is getting cases through the court system pretty quickly, because Little pleaded guilty and got five years, all but six months suspended.

This hasn't been posted on any news sites from what I can tell, but Vincent Forney, who was arrested after stabbing a man to death while visiting a lady friend back in August of 2011, has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.

This is a bit random, but I find it interesting. Very nearly 20 years ago there was a very violent neighborhood rivalry between The Old York Road boys and the McCabe Avenue crew. Despite being just a few streets from one another they spent most of their time trying to kill one another. When asked about the groups, a detective from back in the day said "They're like the Hatfields and the McCoys. It's never taken much to precipitate a shooting."
It's amazing how the style of crime has barely changed in 20 years, it's still just crews shooting it out with crews. I bring this up because a former member of one of the crews, Ronald Brady, now 38, was just sent to prison for the next 12 years for gun possession. A classic example of the "Bad Guys With Guns" mantra. Brady was one of several young men scooped up on murder charges related to the feud, and according to online court records, he served nearly all of his 20-year prison term for murder.

I took a moment to look up some of the other men arrested 20 years ago for their roles in the York Boys-McCabe Crew beef.  Marvin Day Rivers beat his murder charge, and eventually left the game by the year 2000. Now 43-year-old Eric Brown's current status is unknown, but he also beat his murder charge. Now 40-year-old Reginald King is still serving out a Life sentence in Jessup for crimes committed during the rivalry. Finally, now 36-year-old Gilbert C. McCory beat his murder charge as well, but didn't stay out of trouble for long, having been stabbed in a pancake house in 2000, and having finished a federal prison term three years ago**

Tribune slithering out of bankruptcy

The RealDeal

GERALD SCARFE

NYker

A mere 3 1/2 years, $1.3 billion in claims and $410 million in lawyer's fees later, short-fingered vulgarian Sam Zell is preparing to steer his crotch rocket away from a Delaware court with a bankruptcy plan... only to likely be forced to return in the future should right-to-sue claims against Morgan Stanley & Co. from disgruntled bondholders stand up.

No speeding

Baltimore widow Linda Johnson is suing the State and County police for "allegedly killing her husband"-- one thing is not in dispute, Carl Johnson was alive before he was Tased by police, but afterwards was not...

Guillermo L. Lopez-Molina, 41, is no Snoop, but he nailed a man he was having a dispute with while framing a house on Sweet Leaf Lane in Edgewater with three-inch framing nails..

From the Brew: Thomas Threatt, whose April arrest by Baltimore police was caught on videotape (see the :40 mark) appeared in Baltimore City District Court today, where a judge granted his request for a jury trial. ...he was given a June 26 trial date in Baltimore City Circuit Court ... A YouTube video of the Mar. 29 demonstration near Johns Hopkins Hospital in East Baltimore shows Threatt prone on the street, with officers kneeling on his back and neck and other officers repeatedly spraying Mace, point-blank, in his face. 

Voo jah day, county Senator Jim Brochin wants state police posted to the Harbor. He says he wants his constituents to go down to the city (better there than to his district's malls and streets, right?)

Mt Washington Starbucks employees were locked in the can during a closing-time robbery Monday May 28.

If you learn nothing else from this blog, learn that if you park in the Charles Village/Waverly/Guilford/Tuscany area enough times, you will get a broken car window. Sometimes even if your car is as clean as a rental and unlocked. But if you have a GPS, purse or phone in your car, pretty much expect it. Most stations have glass vacuums, there are also mobile glass repair services like Safelite that come out and fix the window at your job or house. Call your insurance co right away, find out if it's covered by your deductible, blah blah... make sure you get a report number form the police for your insurance company...

Traffic of pain pills to Wheeling, West Virginia got bottlenecked when 29 conspirators git federally indicted. 

Speed cameras: on one hand they've slowed down average traffic speeds in school zones, and we enjoy the schadenfreudeliciousness of seeing a-hole drivers get a flash in the plate. But Word on The Street is the city only gets $8 of every $32 ticket, and if that's true, that's an effing load, man. Revenue from the tickets was written into the city budget before the camera contract was even approved. In MoCo the county gets $16.25. If the city gets less than half they are sucka-asses.

Aw old-person Bmore culture moment.. when I was 27, pregnant and working at MICA I got to drive David Byrne around the city in my filthy Honda (that got broken into 13 times  in Charles Village). Nice to hear he is still interested in issues of urban living, promoting biking, etc.

how u doin

Remember the sad story of Johma Blackwell, an 18-year-old Coppin State student and young mom stabbed to death (32 times!) in Remington? One Syron Abdullah has pleaded guilty to her murder. He apparently started up chats with young women on a certain social media site with a "how u doin." Reports the Patch, "He would then attempt get their personal information, such as address and phone number, so he could rob them." A kid left with no mother for some video games.. fckawful. Who is raising this little girl?

And an Owings Millsian, Joseph Anthony Kallash, age 31,  was sentenced to 15 years for producing pornography with a 15-year-old girl he met on Facebook (whilst Kallash was pretending to be a teenager). The pervy scumbucket was busted after he expressed interest in the victim's younger sister, prompting her to report him. ... for Chrissakes, don't 'friend' or chat with anyone you haven't met in person, people! (Unless you've guest-blogged on their web site...)


"Career criminal" John Thomas (yes, John Thomas) got 15 years in the Federal pokey for gun possession.

A "strong odor" coming from a room at the Holiday Inn Express led to the busts of two Oklahomans, a North Carolinian, a Michigander and a Pennsylvanian in HoCo-- geniuses were (allegedly) cooking up meth.  Said a police spokesperson, "Apparently meth is their drug of choice and when they couldn't find it here in Howard County, they decided to make some themselves in their hotel room."  Hilariously, one of the suspects-- the one with the mega-overbite-- talked to a WBAL reporter. Students of body language will enjoy all of his classic liar's pantomimes-- covering his mouth, shifty eyes and postures ("I only know what I seen on movies..." "apparently it was a foul odor...")-- as compared to his demeanor when he's telling the truth ("I seen some cop cars drive by...")

In HarfCo, an 11-year-old was accidentally shot to death by his brother with a gun the boys found in a neighbor's shed. Man, the therapy that 8-year-old is gonna need...!

Wangs and thangs: Pasadenian CEO of "Wings to Go" indicted for embezzling $885k to pay for phone sex and hookers. At least it was for a good cause...

Tsk tsk, Baltimore lawyer Kenneth Ford is charged with defrauding clients in WVa.

Ignominious milestone

Seven people have been murdered in the city since Friday.

Tweeted Fenton, "it should be noted that [Michael J.] Sullivan, the 92nd murder victim,is the first white male."

Sullivan, 55, was the owner of Sully's Seafood & Subs on Belair road. He was found shot to death at work, but police say that robbery may not have been the motive-- items of value were left behind.*

Stop whatever you are doing right now and watch

... the Wire, the musical!
C'mon Bubs, stop doin drugs!

Dragon's Den Busted

By the DEA for selling "bath salts" labeled as “Speedy Gonzalez,” “Incredible Hulk,” “Taz,” and “Bugs Bunny.” Also found, "more than 100 containers—jars, packets, boxes, and the like—labeled with names such as “Dragon’s Breath,” “Bayou Blaster,” “Get Twisted,” “Zombie Matter,” and “Super Villain.”
WTH are bath salts, anyway? Explains the C to the P:

"popularly they are known as MDPV, 4-MEC, and MDMC (also called methylone). (For the hard-core chemists out there, who probably already know this, they are related to cathinones, alkaloids found in the khat plant.)... One of them, methylone, was patented in 1996 as an antidepressant."

89, 90, 91

This year's 91st killing is that of 64-year-old Edmond Dabney, shot in the head during a robbery gone awry in the 4600 block of Pimlico Ave. Dabney was walking with a female friend at 4am when he was murdered by an unknown assailant.

A killer brother-and-sister duo are behind bars. A fight between the unidentified female and 42-year-old Antonio Mattison led to the unidentified brother stabbing Mr. Mattison to death inside a boarding house in the 1200 block of Lafayette Ave. Mattison, the 90th victim of the year, has one prior arrest for armed robbery, a charge he beat earlier this year.

The man in drag shot dead after an argument at the Exxon on the corner of E. Fayette and N. Caroline St. has been identified as 18-year-old Desean Bowman.*

Seems a day doesn't go by lately without a police officer sent to the clink. This time it's 37-year-old Edgewood resident Samuel Ocasio. Ocasio received an 18-month Federal bid after copping to his role in the vast "Majestic Towing" scandal. 

Two men were shot in separate incidents overnight*. In the first shooting, which occurred in the 1800 block of W. Lexington St., a 33-year-old got a slug in his dome, as well as his upper back. In the second incident, a 41-year-old got shot at around 4 am in the 2100 block of N. Monroe St.

Five years for Sharee Thomas, the head of the "Diamond Divas" prostitution ring operating in Baltimore. The 35-year-old now-registered sex offender used underage prostitutes and advertised her pimping business online.

Daddy issues at their finest... Michael Darnell Palmer, 22, is accused of stabbing his pops after an argument over taking out the trash went a bit to far.

Impressively un-intimidating looking 18-year-old Bruno Pozzo (Pictured Right), is accused of robbing a a Pikesville pizza man with a pellet gun. Also arrested were 18-year-old Brandon Hudson Rohrback, 16-year-old Billy Antonio Evans, and an unidentified minor.

Somebody robbed the Parkville BK located in the 8300 block of Harford Rd. The lack of an arrest has certain residents "flame-broiling mad." (HAHA, just... awful)

Lennell Ellis, 32, accused of murdering another man and setting his body ablaze in a love triangle gone bad has turned himself into authorities.
(Do love triangles ever end... well?)

Male in gender-nonconforming clothing shot

Justin Fenton

Police tweeted a shooting of a woman last night at Fayette/Caroline; now say a man in women's clothing was killed in argument at gas station

 Victim was pumping gas when female friend went to pay the cashier, & suspect began arguing w her. ictim directed friend back to car,was shot

· · @justin_fenton on Twitter · 3 minutes ago via Twitter ·

Police-Involved Shooting in Upper Fells Point

Police appear to have interrupted two burglars near Cristo Rey Jesuit High School, and one of them ended up with a bullet in the chest.* 

87, 88, Cannibalism, and Gangs of Young Folk

The shooting on the 1100 Block of Myrtle Ave. has apparently turned into a this year's 87th homicide. Quintin Butler (Alternately Spelled Quinton), age 30, was shot and killed Tuesday. Butler had past convictions for Attempted Murder and drug dealing.

The 88th Homicide of the year is a so-far-unidentified man stabbed to death* in the 3000 block of E. Preston St. Thursday night.

The Sun has more and more information on* Alexander Kinyua, the man whose human-eating exploits have caused my Facebook homepage to blow up with people making zombie apocalypse jokes. Shockingly enough Kinyua seems to be a bit unstable, posting strange Facebook posts and having just been released from jail after blinding a fellow student in an unprovoked assault with a bat. Apparently Justin Fenton just figured out the guys internet handle, so expect more on this story tomorrow.

Apparently local groups of angry youngins are still going kind of nuts, beating on a Federal office worker* earlier today, while walloping another person Wednesday.

On the subject of youth mobs, a few have been identified from the 7-11 flash mob/possible robbery from a few days back.

Life times two for Larry L. Joseph, 23. Joseph was convicted of killing two men outside a Dollar Store in the 3400 block of Belair Rd. back in 2007. According to the State's Attorney, Joseph pumped a total of 15 rounds into the two men.

The death of  Daryl Augustus II, 21, found in a burning car in Essex Tuesday, was ruled a homicide. Police quickly ID'd a suspect; 32-year-old Lennell Earl Ellis. Ellis turned himself in Thursday and faces first degree murder charges for killing Augustus in an apparent jealous rage. 

What a creep. David Knight, 26 (Pictured Right Sporting a Fittingly Crusty Neck Beard) has been busted for taking a cell phone video of a teenage girl while she was using bathroom at the Inner Harbor. Not surprisingly Knight has a criminal record including convictions for theft, destruction of property, car theft, possession of not-marijuana, and gun possession. He also, shockingly, has a prior arrest for a smiler Peeping Tom incident.

And the scuzzbags just keep coming... Arrested by state police was 28-year-old Brian Williams, a Pennsylvania creeper charged with taking photographs of children at various rest stop bathrooms. 

An actual punishment for witness intimidation... nice. 21-year-old Lionel Lynch got two years for verbally threatening a witness in the Clarence M. Mitchell Jr. Courthouse in November of 2011. 

The eleventh in a seemingly never-ending array of corrupt police officers has been sent to the Federal clink. 32-year-old Rodney Cintron got more than three years for his role in the massive Majestic Towing scandal.

A guy with a starter's pistol scared the living hell out of folks at the UMBC campus today. An as of yet unidentified man sent the campus into a panic after being seen waving around a realistic looking fake gun, although police say he didn't actually threaten anyone at any point.

 One person is in the hospital after a suspect fleeing the BPD crashed head on with another car earlier today. 

Four people are injured in a car accident while another two are stabbed in somehow-related incidents on Owings Mills Blvd.

The most recent Crime Blotter, this time from the Southeast, has a good old-fashioned purse snatching, someone sleeping on the job got jacked, and a fella gets his weed and shotgun stolen, which apparently you can report to the police.

A rash of robberies in Essex result in the arrest of two people for separate crimes. Danyelle Smialkowski, 22, was arrested after robbing a woman fleeing a purportedly unrelated robbery, while 24-year-old Joseph Drummond was charged with robbing a 50-year-old man with a metal pipe. 

Finally, 10 years for yet another conspirator in the Latrobe Homes drug organization. Armond Dowdell, age 39, got the dime after pleading to selling kilo's of weed while being an armed felon.

Big Gay News

The First Circuit Court of Appeals has torn out the heart of DOMA, lubing, inching, and now surging the turgid equal-protection case ever closer to the Supreme Court's sanctum sanctorum.

"One virtue of federalism is that it permits this diversity of governance based on local choice, but this applies as well to the states that have chosen to legalize same-sex marriage," Judge Michael Boudin wrote for the court. "Under current Supreme Court authority, Congress' denial of federal benefits to same-sex couples lawfully married in Massachusetts has not been adequately supported by any permissible federal interest."

BURN!

What the FARARRAKK?

Victim was eaten: Morgan State student charged in Joppa killing told police he ingested man's organs http://t.co/tOUtn6Mh

 Bath salts?!

Heroin homicide

Has this ever happened before?
Baltimore medical examiner Dr. David Fowler ruled the heroin overdose of 24-year-old Amber Brown a homicide-- but so far no one has been charged with anything. (Sun story)
Dr. Fowler has taken heat in the past (from me and Stephen Janis, anyway) for the crazy amount of undetermined deaths on the city's rolls-- at one point more than 340 in a single year, waay more . Fowler's comeback was that deeming overdoses' 'cause of death: undetermined' instead of 'accidental' was more intellectually honest in cases where a person might have been administered the fatal dose of a drug by someone else, which would technically be a homicide.
So it's kind of amazing after thousands of people determined 'undetermined' during Fowler's tenture this is the first time I have ever heard of an overdose actually classified as a homicide. Is there some evidence of a homicidal intention somewhere in the drug-supply chain?

Non-Targeted Shooting of a Child

A quadruple shooting in the 2300 block of East Hoffman St. Monday night put four in the hospital, including a 10-year-old boy. As if it needed mentioning, the 10-year-old was not the target of the shooting.

A fella took a slug to the chest in the 1100 block of Myrtle Ave, while a man and a woman were both stabbed Monday near North Paca and West Saratoga St. 

A man who struck a police car sending Officer Teresa Rigby over the JFX has been convicted and sentenced. 23-year-old Robert Vanderford received 3 points on his license, a fine, and community service.


A drive-by on Loch Raven Blvd. in Towson has left a man in critical condition. Two men shot the unidentified male outside the Welcome Inn apartments. Violence isn't new to these apartments, as this was the same location that witness Alicia Lee Avery and her 4-year-old daughter were murdered by disgruntled ex-boyfriend Brian Lamont Eggleston Jr., a little less then a year ago. Eggleston's trial has been postponed twice so far, and no trial date is scheduled.  

Judge Sylvester Cox has taken a metaphorical hacksaw to the damages awarded to the family of Philip Parker Jr., a man strangled to death by fellow inmate Kevin Johns whilst on a prison bus. The settlement has been knocked from $18.5 Million to $600,000.

An argument led to a police standoff which led to a suicide. 28-year-old Ansley Turner is dead after taking his own life while in the midst of a standoff with police in the 5700 block of Fenwick Ave. Sunday afternoon. 

A series of robberies on York Rd. are just some of the many crimes mentioned by the North Baltimore Patch. 

So called "Drano bombs" are becoming the hot new toy of Dundalk hoodlums, as three have gone off in the last four days. In the reported instances, two arrests have been made. One was of a juvenile, and the other was of 18-year-old Marco DeJuan Jones, charged with detonating one during the Dundalk High senior picnic.

A one million dollar fine has been levied upon the man held responsible for the 2010 Ehrlich campaign robo-calls. Beyond being out a cool million, Julius Henson also faces sentencing for the crimes next month. 

Local criminals are breaking out in droves. Maybe breaking out isn't the correct term, maybe more like "walking swiftly away" in droves. A total of five different area criminals have suddenly gone on the lamb, with convicted murderer Jermaine Jeter, 30, being the first to go AWOL. Jeter went missing after not showing up for his job at Checkers... can't really hold that one against him.

Another three men, Antwan Fraiser, Joseph Ryles and Emanuel Rich simultaneously left a half-way home Sunday, before all apparently simultaneously turning themselves in on Tuesday. I'm not even going to bother to figure out the motivation for that sort of weirdly synchronized action.

Finally, 24-year-old Eliyahu Goode (Pictured Right), escaped from the Spring Grove Hospital Center, a psychiatric facility. Goode was in the psychiatric facility after being found to be incompetent to stand trial for Robbery. 

Finally, 10 years in the federal clink for heroin kingpin Kevin Hently, 53. Hently was sentenced for his leadership role in an organization that imported the drug from New York by the kilo.