The difficulty in testing synthetic drugs is slowing the prosecution of suspects accused of possessing or selling the chemically engineered substances, even as authorities blame them for a spike in violence and overdoses, according to District officials. Prosecutors with the U.S. attorney's office have been unable to charge a number of people recently arrested, and many of them have had to be released while officials await test results, city and federal officials said. Police said they hope to charge them once testing is completed. [continues 930 words]
He Was Stealing Seized Evidence Even As Agency Was Hailing His Work "How do you tell someone you've idolized your entire life that you're a heroin addict?" Matthew Lowry, who kept his addiction hidden from his father and others Matthew Lowry was out of pills and getting desperate. The doctor who prescribed pain medication to ease his chronic and painful inflammation of the intestines had disappeared. He went to clinics, but his wife had begun questioning the bills. He was shaking, sweating, tired. [continues 2360 words]
Here's the reality of the District's new law on legalized pot: Get busted while also holding two ounces of marijuana or less, and D.C. police will give it back to you. It happened this week at the 6th District police station in Northeast Washington. A man who had been arrested returned for the things that police take before they cart you off to jail. Among this man's possessions happened to be a small amount of marijuana - which police now view as property to store rather than contraband to seize. [continues 431 words]
FBI agent Matthew Lowry checked out Item 1B4 from the evidence room at the bureau's Washington field office on an August morning in 2013. He wrote "to lab" on a log sheet to explain why he was taking drugs that had been seized in an undercover operation dubbed Midnight Hustle. But it was nearly a year later when he delivered the drug package to the lab. For 10 months, court records show, the heroin had gone unaccounted for and unmissed. When the package made it back to the FBI office in September, it weighed 1.1 grams more than when it had been seized. [continues 1995 words]
28 Drug Indictments to Be Dismissed in Light of Probe Federal prosecutors said Wednesday they will dismiss indictments against 28 defendants in District drug cases amid an investigation of an FBI agent accused of tampering with evidence, including narcotics and guns, according to newly unsealed court documents. Fourteen of those defendants have already pleaded guilty and were serving sentences - one was a year into a 10-year term - and prosecutors said they can withdraw their guilty pleas and the charges would be dropped. A hearing is scheduled Friday in U.S. District Court for many of the defendants. The stunning action by the U.S. attorney's office came as authorities continue to scrutinize cases that the agent, assigned to a D.C. police task force in the FBI's Washington field office, may have been involved with. The agent, who has not been charged criminally, has been suspended in what officials describe as a misconduct investigation. [continues 772 words]
Hours Before Relaxed D.C. Law Took Effect, Immediate Predicaments Included a Jail Stay, Criminal Citations A man arrested for allegedly smoking marijuana on a street in Northwest Washington. Two people caught in a suspected drug deal near Lincoln Heights in Northeast. A man questioned by police about the scent of burnt pot. A former federal government official allegedly smoking a joint as he drove through Chinatown. The five are among those who were arrested hours before the District's new drug law took effect midnight Thursday, making possession of one ounce or less of marijuana subject to a civil penalty instead of a crime. They were in various predicaments, from allegedly smoking dope to perhaps selling it, and some went to jail for the night while others were in handcuffs a few hours and then released with criminal citations, neither of which might happen under the revisions. [continues 961 words]
Footnotes In Ruling By The State's Highest Court Explain Pop Culture References The marijuana smoke filled the Baltimore rowhouse in a "haze" that "engulfed" the four people sitting around the kitchen table, all of them within arm's reach of the smoldering remains of a "blunt" in an ashtray. One of the men appeared "groovy" and "relaxed" and was "just going with the program." It was, the state's highest court said in a ruling issued Friday, "reminiscent of a scene from a Cheech & Chong movie." [continues 521 words]
The way the attorney for the family suing Baltimore County describes it, heavily armed paramilitary police officers carrying ballistic shields and dressed in camouflage stormed a suburban Dundalk house over trace amounts of drugs without knocking and fatally shot a "devoted mother and wife" armed with a legally registered handgun to defend herself from intruders. The way the attorney defending the police officers and the county describes it, professionally trained members of the SWAT team raided a suspected narcotics den containing marijuana and cocaine that was occupied by a convicted murderer with access to weapons and a teenager who had just shot another youth in a fight, resulting in the shooting of a woman holding a gun who refused to comply with the cop's commands. [continues 521 words]
In Drug-Hit Areas, Few Seem Surprised Virginia Johnson walked along Presstman Street on a crisp fall morning yesterday, trying to satisfy her drug habit, ever vigilant for an opportunity -- or for trouble. The 49-year-old watches for the police officers she knows by nickname, Super Cop and Creeper. And she knows the unwritten code of the street: Don't be anywhere near an officer when a hidden stash of cocaine or heroin is discovered. "If you're in the area and they find drugs, it's yours," Johnson said. "That's the way it works. Whoever is closest gets the charge." [continues 1068 words]
Charges Dropped Against Man Arrested By Sewell; Caught In Sting Operation; Prosecutors And Public Defenders To Examine Record Prosecutors threw out drug charges yesterday against a man who was arrested by a Baltimore police officer under indictment on corruption charges, setting free a defendant accused of drug distribution and assault. At least 20 people locked up by Officer Brian L. Sewell may see their charges dropped. The state's attorney's office said they will dismiss any case in which Sewell is the primary arresting officer. [continues 665 words]
Sen. Mitchell asks broad federal probe after officer's arrest; Civil rights inquiry begins At least 20 people arrested by a Baltimore police officer charged with planting evidence might have their cases thrown out by city prosecutors, and the FBI said yesterday that it has begun a civil rights inquiry into the case. The case also prompted the state's top public defender to order a review of all past convictions in which defendants claimed police misconduct, which could trigger scores of appeals from imprisoned drug dealers. [continues 876 words]
Six-Year Veteran Is Charged After Undercover Sting; Crackdown On Corruption A Baltimore police officer was charged with criminal misconduct yesterday after authorities said he fell for a random, undercover sting and falsely arrested a city resident on drug charges. Officials said the case represents the first failure under random integrity checks that are being conducted by Internal Affairs detectives and FBI agents to rout out corruption under a new city police administration. Officer Brian L. Sewell, a six-year veteran assigned to the Central District, surrendered to authorities yesterday; he had been suspended since the incident occurred last month. [continues 917 words]
Convicted dealers can be held liable for related deaths; 'We take tiny steps'; Defense lawyers say proving connections would be difficult Families left grieving over the drug-related deaths of their loved ones have a new way to fight back: They can sue the drug dealers who supplied the dope. The Drug Dealer Liability Act, passed by the Maryland General Assembly and signed into law this year, took effect yesterday. Under the law, people convicted of selling or distributing drugs can be held civilly liable for deaths connected to the narcotics. [continues 568 words]
Prosecutors fear entrapment claims will be successful; Cases seldom go to trial; Police say they aim to make things difficult for suburban buyers A renewed campaign by Baltimore police to pose as drug dealers and round up addicts is being met with skepticism by prosecutors who, fearing claims of entrapment, are reluctant to take most cases to court. Few of the more than 300 people arrested since June have been convicted. Most of their cases have been thrown out before trial - the only jail time being the hours spent waiting for an initial bail hearing. [continues 1201 words]
42 Arrests Made; Links To Cartel In Colombia Noted; 'We'Ve Made Quite A Dent' A violent East Baltimore cocaine organization with direct links to a Colombian cartel has been dismantled, fulfilling the new police commissioner's vow to go after top-level drug dealers, police said yesterday. With a state judge's permission, city detectives broke the drug ring by bugging the phones of suspected traffickers and eavesdropping on their illegal activity. It was the department's first use of a high-tech crime-fighting tool usually used by federal authorities, who in the past led investigations such as the one announced yesterday. [continues 939 words]
In Park Heights, Dealing Flourishes Despite Police Focus; 'It Has Just Shifted' George Johnson and his friends like to talk about the futility of the drug war, about how the street pushers and the addicts are at the bottom of a flourishing business for which they go to jail and other people make the money. But the 54-year-old briefly stopped his discussion outside the Pimlico library branch on Park Heights Avenue to direct the driver of a silver car to the street where crack cocaine and heroin were being sold yesterday morning. [continues 1193 words]
Violence, Drug Deals Decline In Targeted Areas, Police Report Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley's pledge to reclaim 10 drug-infested areas within six months of taking office has been largely fulfilled, police said yesterday, with crime down and fewer people complaining about dealers and addicts. Homicides and shootings also dropped on streets surrounding the designated drug markets, which police say shows they are not simply shuffling the drug trade from one block to another. "The liberation of Baltimore's neighborhoods has begun," O'Malley said yesterday while standing at North Rose Street and Ashland Avenue, ground zero for a band of frustrated residents who have confronted dealers. [continues 1950 words]
Past Strategies Condemned For Raising Violence, Suspicion; 'Justification For Lost Faith' Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley unveiled yesterday a much-anticipated blueprint for fighting crime that concludes past policing strategies contributed to violence and public hostility and suspicion. "The persistence of high crime has undermined the public's confidence in the Baltimore Police Department," the 152-page report by a team of consultants concludes. "And there is justification for this lost faith." The report was released as city government sources said O'Malley is getting closer to naming Edward T. Norris, a former New York police commander hired as deputy chief in January, as his choice for commissioner. [continues 1257 words]
Zero Tolerance Strategy Generates Fear For Rights The era of feel-good policing is over in Baltimore. Any doubt about that ended Friday when former New York police officer Edward T. Norris was named acting commissioner of the city's police force after the abrupt resignation of Ronald L. Daniel. As a deputy commissioner hired by Daniel, Norris is a driving force behind a new law and order regime being modeled on crime-fighting strategies of the New York Police Department. [continues 1927 words]
Police, residents work to improve life in Pen Lucy There are many ways to measure what has made Pen Lucy a safer neighborhood. Statistics show crime is down. Residents note the streets are virtually clear of gun-toting drug dealers and glassy-eyed addicts. No one has been shot since October. But there is another way people here keep track of the violence that for years held this pocket of North Baltimore captive as two gangs battled for control of the lucrative cocaine trade. [continues 1008 words]
Federal Agents Say Suspect Delivered Cocaine Packages A Baltimore police officer was in custody yesterday after he was arrested by federal agents who charged him with delivering 2-pound cocaine shipments for a suspected drug organization. Officer James Scott Fullwood, 34, assigned to the Southeastern District, was being held by the U.S. marshal's office pending a detention hearing scheduled for Monday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. Stephen M. Schenning, first assistant U.S. attorney for Maryland, said Fullwood, a 13-year veteran, was arrested Wednesday afternoon at a bowling alley on Harford Road in Baltimore County by federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents and charged with possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. [continues 401 words]
O'Malley says police haven't done enough to curb drug markets; `I want them to get rolling'; New leaders warned to act swiftly in wake of 19 killings this year An impatient Mayor Martin O'Malley said yesterday that his new police leaders have not moved fast enough to target Baltimore's open-air drug markets and curtail violence that has claimed 19 lives this month. The Police Department has not acted with the same quick determination as the Department of Public Works, whose new agency head cleared more trash from streets last week than was picked up in all of January last year, O'Malley said. [continues 689 words]
New police leaders hear angry comments at a council forum; `The city is dying'; Public meetings are prelude to Daniel confirmation hearings Baltimore residents fed up with crime, angry with police and afraid of drug dealers took their frustrations to the city's new police leadership team last night and sounded a desperate cry for help. Some called the police an occupying force that needed to be checked. Others said officers do nothing as drug dealers openly ply their trade on street corners. [continues 743 words]
Business Break-In Leads To Discovery Of Drugs, Guns A routine call for a suspected break-in at a business near the southern edge of Baltimore led police to 200 pounds of marijuana that detectives believe was smuggled here from Mexico. The drugs, worth an estimated $300,000 on the street, were discovered Monday afternoon by a maintenance man who dialed 911 after finding a broken lock. The office is in a strip of businesses in the 3100 block of Lorena Ave. [continues 393 words]
Resettled gangs escalate the misery and terror for residents in O'Donnell Heights, Baltimore's "concentration camp." It has gone beyond the daily echoes of gunfire and the lines of addicts who stagger up Gusryan Street looking to cop their next cap of crack. That has been going on so long in the O'Donnell Heights housing project that it has become a way of life. What frustrates people is the loss of simple amenities. The phones often die because dealers cut the lines to prevent calls to police. Cable television goes out because the outside boxes are pried open to hide cocaine. The streets are dark because the lights get shot out. [continues 1801 words]
A man being sought for skipping a court appearance was shot and killed yesterday by a plain clothes Baltimore police officer who apparently mistook a cellular phone he was carrying for a gun, a Police Department spokeswoman said. Police confirmed accounts from several witnesses who said the man, Mardio House, did not have a weapon when he was shot at least three times in the abdomen by Officer Christopher Graul about 11 a.m. at Llewelyn and North Montford avenues in East Baltimore. [continues 911 words]
Police Say Shooting Over Drugs Claimed 13-Year-Old's Life; 'She Was Innocent' Shenea Counts, suffering through another humid night in Baltimore, grabbed a quarter, stepped onto South Bentalou Street and walked to Rosie's corner bar, where a sign in the window advertises: "Cup of ice: 25." The 13-year-old, slurping on the fast-melting cubes, walked back toward her small rowhouse across the street. She was shot just steps from her front door -- struck in the chest by a stray bullet fired during what police said was a drug dispute at the corner. [continues 1064 words]
Crisis In Courts Proves Obstacle To Crime Plan News Conference Delayed On Campaign To Cut Homicide Rate; U.S. Attorney Backs Out A crisis in Baltimore's court system prompted representatives from 14 city, state and federal law enforcement agencies to postpone their announcement last week of an unprecedented campaign to lower the city's homicide rate. The news conference, planned for Thursday, was abruptly postponed despite being on Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's public calendar. Officials overseeing the plan's implementation attributed the delay to scheduling conflicts. [continues 1325 words]
Investigators Say Bank May Have Lost $200,000 It starts, simply enough, with stolen checkbooks. It ends, commonly enough, with cocaine on Baltimore streets. Along the way, federal prosecutors say, two men accused of drug dealing may have swindled a bank out of nearly $200,000. Amos Clarke, 21, and Daiwor Togbah Woah-Tee, 26, are in jail awaiting a Friday arraignment in U.S. District Court in Baltimore, each charged with a single count of distributing cocaine. Court documents detail a scheme by which the suspects allegedly raised front money for drugs by stealing checks and recruiting addicts to cash them at First Union Bank branches in Maryland and Washington. [continues 303 words]
Blacks have claimed they are singled out WASHINGTON -- Police chiefs from the nation's largest cities agreed yesterday to devise a national standard for traffic stops to deal with complaints that black motorists are more likely to be pulled over by suspicious officers. The plan, which has not been formulated, would address, among other things, the way cars are chosen for stops and the demeanor of the officers. It comes out of a meeting between the nation's top police executives and community leaders. [continues 660 words]
As inmates meet with their children, the question is: `When will you be home?' Darlene Green's four children gathered around and traded stories about Christmas, schoolwork and friends yesterday. But most of all, Green said, "They want to know when I'm going to come home." It is not an easy question to answer at a Christmas party for inmates at the Women's Detention Center in downtown Baltimore. Doing time is something they want to forget. "My children understand that I can't go home until somebody lets me," said Green, 38. [continues 583 words]
Shootings: Amid Baltimore's triumphs, the mayor gets a first-hand look at crime on the city's west side. Yesterday, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke hailed a new retirement community for the deaf as a monument to all that is good about Baltimore. Monday night, he stood at a crowded West Baltimore corner and saw all that is bad. On a ride-along with police, the city's chief executive sped to three shootings and at one point stood over a wounded young man lying face down on a street with four bullets in his back. [continues 1024 words]
Baltimore Police Charge Traffic From Counties Helps Foster Crime Corrie Simpson wakes up every morning in a stone rancher outside Westminster and heads to Shipley Street and Fairmount Avenue, a drab pocket of sagging brick rowhouses and concrete front yards in Southwest Baltimore. There, her boyfriend, Patrick Cook, 35, leans out of the 1984 Chevrolet and shouts to a stocky man wearing a red bandanna. "Any Ready?" he asks, using street-corner slang for crack cocaine. The seller nods. "Give me six." [continues 2350 words]
Police pose as dealers at public housing complex A Towson University math professor has been charged with buying cocaine at a public housing complex in Northeast Baltimore, the latest of more than 100 suburbanites arrested in the city this year on drug charges. John Morrison, 49, of the 200 block of Midlass Drive in Middle River, was arrested at the start of a weeklong undercover initiative in Hollander Ridge by the Housing Authority of Baltimore City police force, authorities said. Morrison, who was not teaching this semester, and two women in a Toyota minivan were arrested about 10: 50 p.m. Monday when, police say, they walked up to a vacant ground-floor apartment being watched by police. [continues 256 words]
A convicted drug smuggler from Anne Arundel County who authorities say has been a fugitive for nearly a decade has been arrested in Georgia and will now serve the 13year prison sentence he has avoided, federal officials announced yesterday. Members of the U.S. Marshal's Fugitive Task Force said they arrested Abdul M. Hakim last night outside his wife's home in Decatur, Ga., a residential neighborhood in suburban Atlanta. Deputy U.S. Marshal Matt Burke said the 53yearold suspect, who was born Calvin Tyrone Fleming in Cleveland, tried to pass himself off as a West African and produced a passport from Ghana. [continues 172 words]
By Peter Hermann Sun Staff Police on Baltimore's east side continued their crackdown on the illicit drug trade yesterday with a multifaceted sting that included officers posing as dealers and members of a gun squad targeting weapons. Though far broader than a similar operation last month in which 60 wouldbe drug buyers were arrested in four hours on one street police arrested fewer suspects in yesterday afternoon's districtwide sweep. "We want to send a message that drug buyers and users are not welcome in East Baltimore," said Lt. Walter A. Taylor, adding that the number of robberies and shootings usually drops after such an operation. [continues 219 words]
