Husband Who Stabbed Wife, Got Shot, is Prominent Community Figure

Every time I think I can’t be more incredulous about this city and what happens here, a story like this one surfaces.  The story was crazy enough, a husband violently stabbing his wife on a crowded city corner gets maced by a cop, then shot twice.

Turns out the guy was the head of the Greater Greenmount Community Association.

So here’s my question – Does Mr. Williams have a criminal history, and if so, why on earth is this guy heading up an anti-violence organization in one of the city’s most violent neighborhoods?

You Can’t Make This Stuff Up

The following comment was posted today on the Baltimore Crime blog:
Just saw this on spotCrime:

11/16/2008 @ 09:30 PM
Shooting 2XX W. LORRAINE AVE

FYI, that’s just south of Johns Hopkins – Homewood Campus, where they’re testing that sonar gunshot triangulation technology.

Guess they don’t need to simulate any more gunfire for it.

To clarify, the BCPD was testing a new technology today that allows them to track gunshots by sound.  To confirm that the system was working properly, they were discharing their weapons into sand pits.  Turns out that there were actual gunshots in the area anyway.  Only in this town can a widely publicized gunshot locator system test be interrupted by gunshots.

From the “western shootout” file - A shooting at a supposedly empty rowhouse leaves one dude dead in the living room, and one wounded lying on the roof of the porch.

The ‘CSI Effect’ in Action – A Case Study on How Baltimore’s Justice System is Broken

The Sun’s Peter Hermann ran a post in his blog today about a victim of assualt who was able to positively ID his attacker, had his stolen credit cards used after the attack, and had visual medical evidence of being beaten, since the poor old guy reported to work as usual, after being beaten that morning. 

Some points to note here:

- Back when David Simon wrote his book Homicide, he dedicated a passage to how cop shows had raised the burden of proof for jurors, with their forensic evidence and “caught red-handed” dramatics.  Homicide was written back in 1992.  Expectations have only gotten higher with the popularity of shows like CSI, Cold Case, and every other unrealistic cop magic show out there. 
- Clearly, we have a problem with juries returning guilty verdicts in this town.  So what is being done about it?  Margaret Burns, flack for Baltimore State Attorney Pat Jessamy’s office said that even though the victim “made an excellent witness”, it “wasn’t enough for a jury”.  My question to Burns – What would have been?  And what is your office doing to prevent cases like this in the future?  Where is the messaging and literature being made available to the community to educate potential jurors on managing their expectations for burden of proof?

Only in this town, can a case so simple, clear, and seemingly open and shut be handed to the defendant.  Victims of crime here are made victims twice – once by the criminal and then by the system that is supposed to bring them justice. 

Just another day in Baltimore…

Crime Problems Continue to be Ignored in Pigtown

Great story today from Luke Broadwater on how activist residents in Pigtown are facing threats of violence from local drug dealers.  Despite the residents’ warnings, the BCPD isn’t able to take action, and perhaps more unbelievably, the court comissioner has said that it is not against the law for these dealers to threaten a private citizen, only a public official like our esteemed mayor, who is under investigation for corruption charges.

Some folks would say this qualifies as second degree assault, but that’s neither here nor there.  The real issue here is the flippant dismissal of threats of violence by our city’s criminal justice system.  Here we have some folks taking pride in their neighborhood, DESPITE the lack of law enforcement on the city’s part, and the city is ignoring their problems. 

This is why Baltimore continues to be plagued by crime.  The people that are in charge of stopping it just don’t care, and, perhaps even more galling, they don’t care that we know they don’t care. 

This issue has been reported on multiple times in Pigtown.  What needs to happen here before action is taken by the Baltimore City criminal justice system?  Have they forgotten about Angela Dawson and her family?

Adam Meister also grabs this in his blog today.

Sterling Clifford Resigns

Story in today’s Sun about Sterling Clifford resigning to head off to San Fran to be with his wife.  Can’t say I blame him.

The Corner is only one “O” away from coroner.

David Simon’s famed “Corner” is keeping it real….bloody.

According to 9 out of 10 local armed thugs, some of the best shopping at Arundel Mills can be had in the parking lot.

A quick FYI to any reader’s I’ve accumulated…interviews with local politicians, community leaders, and other folks of note in Baltimore Politics and Crime coming soon…

Potential Flare-up in Pigtown

The revolving door of the Baltimore City criminal justice system is upsetting Pigtown residents.

This story has been simmering for weeks now, and looks like it’s hitting the boiling point.  People in Pigtown are getting sick of seeing the same drug dealers arrested, and discharged right back onto the corner. 

I never cease to be amazed at the lack of concern on the part of city leaders when it comes to stories like these.  Don’t you think that Dixon, or Clifford, or SOMEONE from the city would at least make it look like they care about a segment of their community that is very angry?  Have things been so bad for so long in Baltimore that when an entire neighborhood is rising up in anger against failed crime policies, no one in charge even notices?

Turn the heat up another notch

Love the headline on this timely piece by Stephen Janis at the Examiner on Dixon living the jet-set lifestyle overseas while Baltimore whips out the scalpel on the city budget.

Big Brother lives…on Fayette St.

Here’s a revealing Sun story on the BCPD muzzling and disciplining its officers for speaking to the media, without clearing it through their PR dept. first.  

I think my question here is, why is the department going to such lengths to ”own the story” here?  And how can they be so shortsighted so as not to see that news of this muzzling, once it gets out, makes them look even worse? 

I need to do some digging in the archives to see where, in the past few years, a police officer speaking to a reporter did real damage to the shining reputation of the BCPD.  Maybe they should focus more on operations. 

It’s amazing to see the degree that PR has permeated society these days.  Who would have thought they’d see the day when a PR flack is chiding a police officer in a major daily newspaper?

Sterling Clifford, like his counterpart in the State Attorney’s office Marty Burns, is beginning to wield just a bit too much influence over the local press here in Baltimore.  He’s the mouthpiece for the mayor, the police department, and the commissioner.  Any time there’s a major crime story, or something involving Dixon, Clifford is where the local press is getting their information.

One local reporter still gets it.  Laura Vozzella at the Sun did a story this week on Mayor Dixon’s costly trip to Egypt.  Clifford has a hard time justifying this one, especially since the trip is on taxpayers, in the same week that cuts are being made to the city budget, including large cutbacks on the BCPD, including far less overtime and the elimination of several special units. 

Yes, because when I think of areas that Baltimore should emulate in terms of economic development, as Clifford puts it, I think of EGYPT. 

The charade continues.

* Meister makes a great point on holding Baltimore criminal justice leaders responsible in his blog today.

Accountability.

In a word, that’s what I’m trying to create with this blog.  Yes, I understand that there’s a local media that is already chasing after the mayor, city council members, state attorney’s office, police commissioner, and anyone else who wields real influence over crime in this town.  But they’re not making the connections for WHY these problems persist here, or WHY we continue to accept non-answers in a discussion on crime that has dragged on for decades now, or HOW the politicians are failing to solve the problem of crime and are actually using crime for their own gain.

I’m here to call out the civic leaders, Justice system officials, politicians, spokespeople, and whoever else is failing this once-great town on the crime problem.  In planning this blog I took a look at what was already in the blogosphere locally, and I feel like I’ve found a small mini-niche here that wasn’t quite being illuminated, though there’s a damn fine blog called Baltimore Crime that I plan on linking to pretty often.

So that’s the story, in brief.  More to come.  Very soon.  Thanks for reading.