Profits and Losses

No charges for officer John A. Ward, who helped Monae Turnages's teenage killers try to cover up her accidental shooting by putting the weapon in his personal vehicle. One of the teen's mom's DNA was found on Turnage's body*, probably from the trash bags the teens appropriated to use to try to conceal her body. The Sun has a photo gallery of Turnage's neighbors and memorial service.*

Dimitri Staten

Randy Owens

Anna Ditkoff, back in full effect after a mere two weeks of maternity leave, recounts last week's four murders of Sean Melton Sr., Dimitri Staten Sr., Randy Owens, and an "adult female," Ahjee Harrod, 16, and notes Kentrell Brown, 18, was arrested for the murder of Queren Thomas. The City Paper also has Audit Failures by The Numbers.

Speaking of $ fails, SRB and co is reportedly considering bids from two other speed camera companies* to operate and profit from speed camera ticketing duties on behalf of the state when Xerox's contract is up: camera manufacturer Redflex Traffic Systems of Melbourne, Australia, (perhaps best known in the U.S. for Chicago's cameras and getting kicked out of Los Angles and a slew of other CA cities following citizen outrage with $175 tickets and "kangaroo courts"), Brekford Corporation of Hanover, MD (which currently "upfits" not-to-be-named government law enforcement vehicles with laptops and cameras and such). All three companies are publicly traded (XRX on NASDAQ, RDF on the Aussie Securities Exchange,  BFDI on the U.S.). The mayor claims the city won't add any more cameras and expects revenues to go down: "$11.4 million from speed cameras next year, $7.5 million in 2014 and $6.9 million in 2015." which doesn't sound like it would incentivize these companies to give the city the best possible deal, but whatever.

A guilty plea for misconduct from PGC's  Tiffany Alson, the delegate perhaps best previously known for stalling same-sex marriage in the House. Alston copped to using campaign funds to help pay for her opposite-gender traditional wedding

Twitters:

Paul Smith ‏@paulsmith

@justin_fenton Foxtrot over Federal Hill, loudspeaker saying something like, “if you know whereabouts of Anthony Brooks, please dial 911”

Kevin Rector ‏@RectorSun

@BaltimorePolice chase stolen car through Canton:http://bsun.md/QRq8cQ *

The Baltimore Sun ‏@baltimoresun

After two years of no online reports, new director pledges a more transparent CitiStat. http://bsun.md/PlQIw1 *

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

UPDATE w clarity on "missing" situation: Principal [of Baltimore Community High School] says Ahjee was "dealing with things that were overpowering her" http://bsun.md/QaLY9w *

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18hJustin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

One of those stories that develops throughout the day: Ahjee Harrod's principal said she was NOT missing and had been attending school

Klaus Philipsen takes on West side redevelopment in the Brew

How the debate was

   Anyone bemoaning the state of rhetoric or young people's civic involvement in this country would not have been encouraged by the debates on Questions 4 and 6 last night at Morgan. The light brigade was out front with a sign (right), but attendance in the hall was sparse-- Mark Steiner and his A/V squad of two, Rob Lang of WBAL, about 7 League of Women Voters ladies and about 15 audience members for the first debate and 60 or so for the second.

    The first, anti-aliens v dreamers, was with Regina O'Neil of CASA, who teaches Spanish at Poly and is married with five kids, and a guy Charles Lollar, an executive at the uniform company Cintas, who ran against Steny Hoyer in 2010 and is married with four kids. After everyone's fecundity was established, Charles the executive hit his "we can't afford it" points on down the line: MD's broke, can't afford to give a $17,000 tuition break, "I may like the way your hair looks, Regina, but if I was your husband I might have to tell you you can't afford to go to the salon any more, and MD needs to do the same thing."
     Lollar opined that illegal immigrant/aliens can work hard and pay full tuition just like someone from New Jersey might could to go to school here, he himself had worked his way through Emory as a janitor (wonder if he cleaned up after Keiffer Mitchell?), and furthermore they're illegal immigrant aliens and so it's illegal to hire their illegal alien selves after college anyway, and if you don't like it, "I saw Keiffer Mitchell's walking around the hall out there, go talk to him about fixing our broken immigration system."
     Regina O'Neill's retorts seemed woefully underprepared-- no numbers, no evidence. She did manage to work her points in here and there, but not in a methodical way: these kids have been here their whole lives, we shouldn't punish kids for parents' sins, they're not eligible for federal loan programs, their parents have been working and paying taxes, etc.
     They dickered around in circles a bit, then Lollar's line items of points turned finger-pointy and mad dad with a side of sexism-- there was a low booing groan when Lollar talked about the injustice of aliens taking away jobs when there's 20% of black men in Baltimore unemployed. (Too bad his audience was about 80% female).
      Eventually audience questions were taken, one regarding the cost of the act. O'Neill offered that there's an estimated 435 "dreamers" who are expected to take advantage in 2013 if the law passes. Lollar did some kind of quick math, and I forget what his math was, but $17,000 x 435 x 4 = $29.6 million for four years -- assuming that there really are 435 kids who would meet the criteria and they're taking the places of out-of-state tuition payers, and none of them go to community college first. O'Neill had no retort and that was that.
Winner: Meh.
 

Finally, after an asscramping full hour of question 4, Maggie Gallagher entered the room  in a purple shirt, black skirtsuit, flats, fuschia lipstick and that bob and took to the stage. On the pro-6 side was the Keiffer Mitchell of hall-walking fame, resplendent in a perfectly fit grey suit, white shirt and blue silk tie, a full two feet taller than Gallagher unfurled to his full extension (fortunately the debate was conducted sitting down). Mark Steiner laid out Mitchell's impeccable bloodline, plus his wife and two children, with no mention of the absence of Sultan Shakir, the promised rep from Equality Maryland. Maggie Gallagher was introduced as the founder of NOM, and refreshingly no mention of a husband or kid(s).
     And with opening statements came some kind of pounding thrash-rap starting up from elsewhere in the student center; over its punishing thuds Mitchell laid out the history of the bill: it had come up twice, the second time the house and senate built a broad coalition and built in lots of protections for religious people, the NAACP supports it, Obama supports it, it's a civil rights issue, making all MDers equal "under duh law." (well it's odd, an otherwise well-spoken person turning out their th like Moose Mason.)
    Maggie Gallagher in turn opined that marriage is about us as a society holding male-female marriage as a special enshrined paragon, or something, and we have marriage because "we need to bring male and female together to create the next generation." If that sounds kind of creepy and also like using the word to define the word, it was. Not to mention creating generations is not a problem in Baltimore city, marriage or no. She also noted she's a Maryland resident (lives in MoCo, apparently) and is voting against 6 because her Roman Catholic church tells her to, and she's supporting the Dream Act for the same reason. "The campaign ads in Maryland I have nothing to do with, but I think they get it right."


 Audience questions were submitted on cards, as is the League of Women Voters protocol, and most were for Maggie. Doesn't the high divorce rate indicate hetero marriage is not so stable? Does she think infertile people should be allowed to get married? What about civil unions? Keiffer zinged back,  "I don't want my child to grow up and enter into a civil union, I want them to grow up and get married," but to the other questions Gallagher laid out various easily challenged statements that he left unchallenged. Like, that other than some tribe in Africa where two women can get married, we don't have any examples of societies with same-sex marriages with which to study what the end result might be (Uh, Europe? Canada?)
    Mercifully the debate wound down. Then some twentysomething woman with a septum ring in a newsboy cap started yelling at Gallagher "I just have to say this to you!" and went on in a not-very-coherent rant about how wrong NOM's strategy was to try to pit the blacks against the gays (but with many many more words). Gallagher smiled beatifically, said nothing and waited for the woman to turn and stalk off down the hall with her female friend before descending from the stage in her small black flats.

Murdered girl was runaway

Police say Ahjee Harrod, shot to death Sunday night, had been missing* since March. ... why was no missing-persons bulletin issued? According to her FB page (though not confirmed by the school) Harrod attended School for the Arts, and "Harrod posted from a cell phone on Sept. 25 that an “Uncle Tony” had been killed. A man named Tony Reese, 36, was shot to death in the 2700 block of Mura St. two days earlier, and Green confirmed that Reese was a friend of Harrod’s mother." The RIP Ahjee Harrod page has 6500+ likes.

Justin Fenton

On RIP Ahjee Fb page, in an RIP note the admin wrote "some of us saw you when you got shot". She was found alone, no one's contacted police

Burglar Larry Washington, 52,  got 20 years for burglaring and 10 for violating his probation

In other malfeasant news, an audit of the schools found massive mismanagement of millions* of dollars, including vendors who kept getting paid after their contracts expired, 1,400 missing computers and bus companies paid for driving kids on days that school was closed.

172

One homicide and two other shootings occur in city

mobile.baltimoresun.com

An unidentified man shot in Northeast Baltimore Monday night died of gunshot wounds.

"City police found the victim lying in the 600 block Dumbarton Avenue, near Mullan Park and a few blocks east of Greenmount Avenue. He was lying in the street and suffering from gunshot wounds to the head and upper body. He died at 10:13 p.m. at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Police are also investigating the shooting of a 33-year-old man, who walked into an area hospital with gunshot wounds to the lower back, arm and leg. He told police he had been shot shortly before 9 p.m. while standing in the 4100 block of West Belvedere Avenue, near Reisterstown Road, in the Park Heights area.Another non-fatal shooting occurred earlier Monday in Govans. An 18-year-old man told police he was walking in the 500 block of Winston Avenue, when shots were fired at him from a pick-up truck. Officers found the victim, who was struck in the arm, in the 500 block of Chateau Avenue, near York Road. He was taken to an area hospital."

16-year-old girl shot to death

24 hours from the Crime TwitterFeeds ~


Tiara. ‏@xox_tee

RIP Ahjee ! 👼☁👼she didn't deserve that ! A life barely lived, is gone! pic.twitter.com/eJCgEq0H [right]

Kevin Rector ‏@RectorSun

The person found fatally shot in the head Sunday night in NW was a 16-year-old city girl named Ahjee Harrod, said @BaltimorePolice

Francis Scott Kilo ‏@bmorecareful
Maryland State police react to report that troopers asked for Yankees' autographs in dugout - http://baltimoresun.com :http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/orioles/blog/bal-maryland-state-police-react-to-report-that-troopers-asked-for-yankees-autographs-20121008,0,503531.story?track=rss&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter …*

Kevin Rector ‏@RectorSun

East of Notre Dame RT @BaltimorePolice North Baltimore Shooting - 500 block of Chateau Avenue. District detectives are investigating.

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

Oakland mayor says in deposition that she "probably mistakenly" kept Batts on after he sought another job http://bsun.md/UzXpwE *

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

Small world that former BPD commish Tom Frazier's consulting group did the evaluation of the post-Batts Occupy Oakland clash.. [SF Chronicle: Oakland Police criticized for Ocuppy response]

MEHOKIE ‏@MEHOKIE

@justin_fenton Sounds like the Oakland Mayor is searching for a scapegoat for the Mayor's failures.

Kevin Rector ‏@RectorSun

Man with shotgun shot by state trooper in Harford: http://bsun.md/SIFssS 

171

An unidentified woman killed on Fairlawn Ave is homicide #171*, and a man was shot in the leg near where Peter Marvit and Kwame Stern were killed a mere 2-3 weeks ago. There have been 19 women murdered so far this year.

Wasted tax dollars! Lives destroyed! With his Oct 17 City Council conformation hearing "looming," Fenton takes on the Oakland PD's unConstitutional policing problems under former chief Batts.* One probable reason why Oakland got oversight (and Baltimore never has): the sheer # of plaintiffs involved in the 2000 "Riders" lawsuit (aka Allen v. City of Oakland) -- 119 plaintiffs who wound up sharing an $11 million settlement. 

Happy Indigenous People's Day, Piscataway

Conoy, Haudenosaunee, Pascatowies, Paschatoway, Pazaticans, Pascoticons, Paskattaway, Pascatacon, Piscattaway, and Puscattawy and Susquehannock.

Nick Gilbert Gartelman Sr., 50, was killed from blows suffered during an assault in the 600 block of Richie Highway (Anne Arundel county)

NOM-backed anti-gay civil rights ads are set to debut today. I will bet anyone $1 that the NOM name won't appear on them anywhere and they will involve some churchy older black lady clucking about how those awful gays want to "redefine marriage for the rest of us." Update: here it is, the ad to appear on our "state television." Just a lot of stock footage and a voiceover. Not as offensive as you'd expect and not very clear or effective, either. PS. NOM founder Maggie Gallagher is set to debate at Morgan State U's student center tomorrow night at 7. Wonder if Julius Henson will be there...

A shot woman

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

NW RT @BaltimorePolice: Shooting: 6300 block Fairlawn Ave. Adult female reported to be shot. Detectives investigating.

Did Prez Jack really write* this Sun op-ed on the youth jail? Because it really doesn't sound like the way he talks. But anyway it makes some good points. Well, really, just one: 

•Alternatives to detention cost far less and produce better results. For example, "evening reporting centers" cost $44 per day compared to the exorbitant $462 a day for detention.

Please, expand on those evening reporting centers, I would so much like to learn more!  But it's not to be, at that point things go kind of downhill:

"My P.L.A.Y. (Productive Lives, Active Youth) campaign has provided many of Baltimore's youth with a wide range of opportunities to strengthen their self-confidence, develop leadership skills, learn from positive role models, and be rewarded for their academic achievements. ... during the past two years I have created a number of public-private partnerships ...Last summer, over the course of seven weeks, hundreds of youths participated in my Charm City Talent contest. Students under age 18 competed at local recreation centers as singers, rappers and instrumentalists and were judged by a panel of talent experts. A group of seven youngsters performed in front of family, friends and complete strangers for the chance to be crowned Baltimore's best talent. ... "Just being in the contest is a great achievement that I can look back on later in life," [then-12-year-old Immanuel "Mannie" Payne] told The Sun.

Imagine the amount of positive programming and its impact on Baltimore's youth that a $70 million investment could achieve."

So, wait, what? How much did this talent contest cost us? He want $70 million for talent shows and sports team meet-n-greets? Does Jack Young even live here? did we ever get to see that "damn underwear*"?

Two dancers, three dead ladies and a gun-hoarding miscreant

Finally, almost two years later, the Cherrie Gammon story* can be told. Or vaguely surmised. The 25-year-old mom of two, Block dancer and heroin addict turned dealer and informant, right, owed horse money to one Monica "Money" McCants, a woman who was running a $14k a week heroin ring out of the Club Pussycat with her son and some others. McCants suspected that the dancer/dealer/mom was "snitching" to police (and court records showed that indeed she was*), yet despite her fears "Money" gave her son "Tay" "obscenity-laced commands" on an (intercepted) phone call to recoup her horse cash from Gammon by any means necessary. Gammon wound up dead from five wounds from the gun of one Hassan "Rowland" Muhammad near Leakin Park with the help and/or in the presence of a guy court documents nicknamed "Miami." Junior drug-gang members Tyrone Johniken, 30, and Gary Cromartie, 23, also face drug dealing and murder conspiracy charges.
      ...sOooo is one of those guys "Miami"? Or was "Miami" an undercover officer or some other kind of informant who was with Gammon but didn't/couldn't stop her execution? Note quote from Fenton's story in 1/11:* "Witnesses told police that she was selling heroin and crack cocaine for Donte "Tay" Baker, Muhammed, who is known as "Rowland," and a man nicknamed "Miami" ... The witnesses said the men took her from her home in the early morning hours of Dec. 12 and drove her to the area where she was shot and killed."
      Monica Money Mom McCants is expected to be in prison until she's @52-57, Tyrone and Gary are still yet to be tried. Related story: P. Hermann on Block dancer Takira "Candy" Leray Johnson-Bey,* stabbed outside of Norma Jean's Gentleman's Club in 2008

Suspicious: Reality star Antoine Ashley, aka "Sahara Davenport" from the second season of RuPaul's Drag Race (aka Whitney Houston in the Snatch Game and the live-in companion of runner-up Manila Luzon) sashayed away at the age of 27 (or 33) from heart failure at Johns Hopkins Hospital Monday. ... what was NY resident Ashley doing in Baltimore city? Sounds shady, lady... The funeral will reportedly be held October 12 or 13 at Snowden Funeral Home, (301) 762-2500 - 246 North Washington Street, Rockville, MD 20850. 

Six years after the SW Flex Squad treated newspaper-serial readers to month-long marathons of corruption charges starring Jemini Jones and Vicki Mengel,* it appears the SW Flex Squad is still in business (and not even rebranded). The squad arrested convicted armed robber in Pigtown with a shit-ton of guns, one made-for-TV miscreant Wayne Petty (right). For all of you eager would-be gun consumers I will recount the guns: Seized Weapons: Ruger 22/45 .22 Caliber handgun; Ruger Blackhawk .45 Caliber handgun; Ruger Single-Six .22 Caliber handgun; Ruger Vaquer .44 Caliber handgun; Remington 870 Express Magnum 12 Gauge shotgun; Ruger Blackhawk .357 Caliber handgun;  Ruger 10/22 .22 Caliber rifle; Winchester 1300 12 Gauge shotgun; Winchester 30-30 rifle; Thompson Center Arms .50 Caliber rifle; Connecticut Valley Arms .50 Caliber rifle; Thompson Center Arms .50 Caliber rifle; Braztech 410GA Shotgun;Remington 7600 30-06 shotgun; New England Firearms 12 Gauge shotgun; Ithica Featherlight 12 Gauge shotgun. And what will become of all those fine guns, I wonder...? Tune in next year for the chilling conclusion, or not...

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

Baltimore Co. police confirm that woman whose body was found in Leakin Park was that of 62 y/o who walked away from assisted living facility... County authorities say they don't suspect foul play.

168 & 169, another police-involved shooting, Anthony Anderson's killer revealed

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

Decorated officer Strohman at center of in custody deathhttp://www.baltimoresun.com/news/breaking/bs-md-ci-anderson-death-officer-identified-20121003,0,3549188.story …*

... Todd A. Strohman and two other officers — Gregg Boyd, a 16-year veteran, and Michael Vodarick, a seven-year veteran were named. Strohman had previously been shot during a gun battle on N. Calvert street. "In an unusual move that has rankled some veteran prosecutors and police, the Police Department hand-delivered the autopsy results to the Anderson family on Tuesday, which veteran investigators say is uncommon because of concerns that the dissemination of key facts could compromise the case."

Justin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

Three shootings last night killed 2 menhttp://www.baltimoresun.com/news/breaking/bs-md-ci-three-shootings-20121004,0,1420024.story …

... 

 Two men were shot to death and a third was seriously injured in three separate shootings that all occurred within an hour Wednesday night in three of the city's west side neighborhoods.*

A 19-year-old man was found at 9 p.m. in the 200 block of North Fulton Avenue in the Franklin Square neighborhood. He had been shot in the chest and died at 9:54 p.m. at University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center. Officers, responding to reports of gunfire in Harlem Park shortly before 10 p.m., found an unidentified man lying on the ground in the 1800 block West Lanvale Street. He died of multiple gunshot wounds at 11:31 p.m. at Shock Trauma."

1h

BaltSunBrk ‏@BaltSunBrk

Baltimore City officers shoot armed gunman http://bsun.md/Vz4CuT 

 Retweeted by Justin Fenton

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1hJustin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

The non-fatal shooting on E Lanvale was police involved; police say officers called for report of armed person, suspect "engaged" officers

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9hJustin Fenton ‏@justin_fenton

If confirmed, would be 4th shooting tonight RT @BaltoFireBlogEASTERN | BALT. CITY | SHOOTING | 1500 E LAFAYETTE AVE | MALE SHOT IN THE LEG

Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Sylvester Cox sentenced Davon McCoy and Frank Richardson to 35 and 25 years, respectively, for carjacking a woman in 2011 and leading authorities on a six-mile pursuit that was captured from the air by Foxtrot and the news media.

Anthony Anderson = homicided

The Med Examiner has ruled Anthony Anderson's death a homicide from blunt-force injury and primarily a pulmonary contusion (bruised lung), fractured ribs, hemorrhaged tissues, a torn spleen and blood from those injuries filling his guts (hemoperitoneum) -- not an overdose or by choking on .
swallowed drugs as the BPD initially reported, though police do say "morphine" was in his system 

(yes, not "opiates," "morphine" in particular. Is the toxicology report finished? If so, where is it?)   Here's the autopsy report released by the family & uploaded by Fenton, and the Fenton story... you may recall that our new presumptive police chief resigned in Oakland after a court found that his department had failed to implement court-ordered policies to control police abuses, that citizens who complained about it faced "cavalier rejection" of their complaints, and that "the agency misused an early-warning system that flags officers who frequently use force or generate citizen complaints." Baltimore, of course, doesn't even have a public system by which to track or address such complaints to begin with, unless you count our citizen review board that's sworn to secrecy and has zero power, or the invisible-to-us internal police "administrative reviews" that the department openly admits take "months or years*" to complete.  

Sooo, why did Oakland get to have federal court oversight and Baltimore never has? We had the "Flex Squad" in the SW planting drugs and framing people,* just like Oakland's "Riders." We've had officers shot in chaotic no-clear-lines-of command incidents,* just like Oakland. So why did the Oakland PD get total federal oversight and Baltimore has never gotten more than a federal visit or two?
In other news, plans for the new youth jail soldier on.* (remind me, is it federal or local money building this jail?)

And thank you Kevin Rector, finally*-- after a slew of confusing rape/ abuction stories a little clarity: three sex assault/ kidnapping/ robbery victims, two perps -- Kenyon Waller and William Campbell -- who're both now in jail. The first incident of a teen kidnapped at gunpoint off the street then robbed and sexually assaulted was Sept. 25, but as far as I can tell only the Catonsville Patch reported it. Wonder why. I'd throw in a dab of snark here about how if it had happened to a blonde girl in Towson you wouldn't have been able to eat your Cheerios without hearing Don Scott recount every filthy little detail, but my outrage fatigue is acting up.

Fifteen years for Timothy Dennison, 22, who bought "sham cocaine" from an ICE Homeland Security Investigations agent (whatever happened to the DEA?)

A scathing report from the Senate found that the Department of Homeland Security has spent about a billion dollars to spy on citizens, while thwarting not a single terrorist attack. Next (or probably already) from Homeland Security: automatically tracking everyone's car's movements using license-plate scanning technology. Grouses a proprietor of a for-profit license tracking service, "I take absolute exception to any government telling me that I can't go into public and take video ... that's taking my freedoms away."