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Tag: Baltimore

  • Back from Baltimore

    I just got back from a conference (the Eastern Sociological Society) in Baltimore. It was well organized and all three sessions were quite interesting. I got to meet old friends and new. My two contributions were speaking on a panel about the Baltimore Ghetto and also having the privilege of being the discussant for a panel on “The Wire” featuring (among others) William J. Wilson and Sudhir Venkatesh.

    After lunch at Faidley’s I joined a tour of the “Real Baltimore” and it went through the Eastern (yes, it was a classic “slumming” tour). The Eastern looks the same as it always was… but emptier. That’s strange, because it always looked pretty empty.

    But I’m thinking that since I was there (2001) the Eastern has probably lost about 1/4 to 1/3 of its population. [update: though one man was shotin the morning and another stabbedprobably about 15 minutes after we rolled by the location.]

    Baltimore overall is looking pretty good. It’s a great place to visit… It’s amazing how that whole new area between the harbor and Fells Point has just sprung up from nothing so quickly.

  • Eastern District Craziness

    I have no special insight into this. I really don’t know what to make of it. My first thoughts are give the guy a break.

    The deputy major of the Baltimore Police Department’s Eastern District has been suspended pending an internal investigation into allegations that he failed to disclose a series of text messages he exchanged with a man sought on a domestic violence warrant, days before authorities say he killed his wife.

    Here’s the Sun’sreport.
    And Peter Hermann’s.

  • Baltimore NAACP Vice President Arrested, Not Charged

    The Vice President of the NAACP is out there copping like a junkie? He’s arrested and then not charged. I’m shocked. Shocked.

    WJZ reports:

    Police say Staten, who is an executive committee member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Maryland conference, was in the driver’s seat of a car that had stopped near Pennsylvania Avenue and Dolphin Street, which police say is a well-known drug market.

    Officers in an unmarked vehicle say a man walked away from a large crowd of people huddled on a street corner and climb into the passenger seat of a silver-colored vehicle.

    They wrote in charging documents that they watched a back-seat passenger hand cash to a man standing outside his window in exchange for suspected drugs.

    Officers approached the vehicle and found a folded-up dollar bill containing suspected heroin and two pills of suboxone, also known as buprenorphine, a medication used to treat heroin addiction, in the possession of the back-seat passenger, Kevin Logan, 44.

    Police found Staten in possession of additional suboxone pills inside a case, and in the driver’s side door. They also recovered a half-smoked marijuana cigarette.

    Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi says a passenger told officers that Staten had brought him to the area to buy heroin.

    Staten and Logan were taken to Central Booking, where Logan was charged with two counts of drug possession. Staten, of Pikesville, was released without charges.

  • The Ed Norris Bike Ride

    The Baltimore City Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #3 is pleased to announce and support the1st Annual “Ed Norris Bike Ride” Fundraiser to be held on Saturday, March 28th, that will support the newly established Baltimore Metropolitan FOP Police Widows and Children’s Fund.

    How can this be? I’m all for bike rides and raising money for good causes, but I don’t get it. My buddy Ed Norris is a convicted felon. Police are forbidden to associate with felons.

    Granted, in Baltimore it’s hard to go out and not to associate with some felons. A nice guy who served me beer was a felon. Now I pretended I didn’t know that, but I always assumed that if the powers that were came down and tole me I couldn’t drink there, I would have found a new bar.

    Anyway, if you’re not a police officer, by all means ride and raise money. If you are a police officer or a representative of the FOP, can you explain to me why Ed Norris is an A-OK felon but other felons aren’t?

    I guess this is what’s on my mind: if you don’t have sympathy for police officers hanging out with familymembers who are felons, why do you think it’s OK for you to chooseto hang out with felon Ed Norris?

  • Strip Searches

    No longer allowed in Nassau County, Long Island, NY.

    Judge Leonard D. Wexler found that the Fourth Amendment prohibits jail officials from performing such searches on every person sent to the jail, particularly those arrested on a misdemeanor or minor charge like a traffic violation, and those who cannot be reasonably suspected of carrying a concealed weapon or drugs.

    I still say they’re OK for Baltimore City. The courts may disagree.

  • Drug Bust Oscars

    Peter Hermann has a nice article giving Academy Awards for drug busts.

    So, if we’re handing out Academy Awards for cocaine seizures, Bealefeld’s Oscar might read “Best director for a drug bust,” while Clark’s might read “Best supporting director for a drug bust.”
    …
    It is a sad reminder that the drugs keep pouring in despite year after year of “record seizures.” Wouldn’t be nice to see Bealefeld standing in front of an empty pallet declaring victory in the drug war?

  • Reporting the Police and Naming Names

    David Simon, of The Wire, Homicide, and The Corner fame, has written a very powerful article in the Washington Post.

    The Baltimore Police stopped releasing the names of officers involved in police-involved shootings. Personally, I like reading the names in the paper to see if it’s anybody I know. Sure I could call up a friend and find out. But usually I don’t. Odd are I won’t know the officer.

    I also know that if I had been involved in a police-involved shooting, I wouldn’t want my name released. I’d have plenty to worry about without my name in the papers. Reporters love presenting “both” sides of the story. But for most police-involved shootings, there is no “other” side. Often, as hard as it is for some to believe, the police are simply telling the truth.

    I wouldn’t want to read about the bastard’s mother saying what an angel her son was, at least since the last time he got out of jail for shooting somebody. I wouldn’t want to read about “witnesses” (who weren’t there) say how that white officer shot him in the back for no reason at all. No, I shot him because the S.O.B. was trying to kill me.

    Yet names should be released. If nothing else, this policy isn’t fair to officers who names are released. It leads one to think they’re guilty. The department is being sued by one of them.

    But what it comes down to for me is that deep down I strongly believe in the press (mistakes and all). My uncle was a newspaper editor before I was a cop. Before I ever held a gun I was raising hell writing for the Evanstonian, my high-school newspaper. You might believe in the Second Amendment; I believe in the First.

    Freedom of the Press is listed in the First Amendment for a reason. As a free country, we need a free press. In a free society, police should be held accountable to the public. What’s the alternative?

    Read Simon’s piece. He’s a good writer. It’ll make you think. And that good.

    In an American city, a police officer with the authority to take human life can now do so in the shadows, while his higher-ups can claim that this is necessary not to avoid public accountability, but to mitigate against a nonexistent wave of threats. And the last remaining daily newspaper in town no longer has the manpower, the expertise or the institutional memory to challenge any of it.

    Part of the reason this country is in such a mess right now is because not enough people know what’s going on. They don’t read newspapers. They don’t know the facts. They’re ignorant.

    Talk radio and the morning zoo is not a recipe for a well-reasoned worldview. Even the best TV news is horrible (except for the NewsHour). Between the right blaming “The Media” for almost everything (the answer to media bias is more media) and the economic realities killing the newspaper business, I worry. A less powerful press is not good for our country or our freedom.

  • Four Shot in Eastern

    None killed.

  • Was that all a dream? Or Baltimore?

    Was that all a dream? Or Baltimore?

    My wife, a friend, and I were on the 10:05 train to Baltimore this morning. Twelve hours and one Bull & Oyster Roast later, we’re back in New York City. It’s a shame we couldn’t stay longer, but a good time was had by all.

    On the menu:
    About 2 1/2 dozen delicious Maryland Oysters.
    3 deep fried oysters (about 3 oysters each).
    1 cup of delicious oyster soup (1 oyster).
    3 big hunks of pit beef burnt ends.
    A few regular slices of pit beef.
    One small Italian sausage.
    One piece of cake.
    One diet coke (to keep the girlish figure)
    And God only knows how many buckets of beer.

    I don’t like oysters as much as crabs. But these were very good oysters. Unlike the crab feast, this was almost a stag affair. 80% male. And lots of tables brings cards and gamble at their table. Drinking, gambling… all we needed was whoring to make this church party complete.

    I also learned from my friend cooking the beef (strange coincidence he’s a guy I actually know from meeting him in a bar in Somerville, Mass, many years ago…) that pit beef is not, as I’ve described it, smoked roast beef. Well it sort of is. But it’s marinated overnight first. Then baked to 100 degrees. Then grilled and smoked to 130. It’s delicious.

    If this were in New York City all this would probably cost, including tax and tip, close to $200. Of course it’s notin New York. And that’s why we go to Baltimore, hon.

    At St. Francis of Assisi, it’s all included in $38 ticket (plus maybe another $10 in tips).

    Incidentals: On the money wheel I broke even (played $4 won $4). I didn’t play the liquor raffle (I won 3 bottles last time and didn’t want to press my luck) but my buddy did win.

    Nor did I win any other raffle for a grand loss of about $10. And I bought a souvenir hat, also $10.

    Using Amtrak miles, the train trip was free (otherwise that would be the $200 bank-breaker).

    Before:
    During:
    After:
    No carry outs seems like a fair rule. Though some people always try.

    Back behind my sergeant’s Baltimore police home bar:

  • Stories of the Eastern

    I got Badges, Bullets & Bars in the mail and started reading it.

    I am amazed (maybe pleased is a better word) to find that one story — a police urban myth I constantly heard — is true. There are many crazy stories cops tell. And every squad has its own ghosts. Most of the stories are probably true (you really “can’t make this shit up”). But cops are also good bullshitters, so you never know for sure.

    There are stories that come to mind that I fully believe are true but weren’t in my book because, well, I didn’t see it.

    One involves fake snow and a sleeping police officer.

    another involves an officer who dragged a cold dead body across the street so he wouldn’t have to do paperwork.

    Turns out the dead guy had the misfortune of dying right on a post boundary line. What made it even worse was the the line wasn’t even a districtline (I mean if he dumped the body on the Southeast… or even gave it Sector 1, well, that is a littlefunny). But the SOB dragged the body across the street so another member of his own squad had to deal with it! What a prick.

    Or who knows? Maybe it never happened. (But it did.)

    Another story I heard (many times) involved brothers on Durham St. One brother stabbed his brother with a butcher’s knife. On Thanksgiving. At the family dinner table. Why? Because they were arguing about who would get the turkey legs.

    Now that’s certainly a doozie of story! True? Who knows? I mean, I wouldn’t kill my brother over a bird leg. But then there’s a lot of behavior in the Eastern I wouldn’t do.

    But I rarely heard stories that weren’t true… I mean, why make shit up when there’s such much true that is unbelievable?

    But still… Thanksgiving? turkey leg? brothers? carving knife? table all set up and everything. It seemed too picture perfect to be true. I mean, maybe they were just “brothers.” And it wasn’t Thanksgiving. And it was while eating a chicken box. But really it was about something else.

    Well… I’ll be damned. In his book, Dan Shanahan was working Sector Two in the Eastern and says not only is the story true, but hewas the primary at the scene! On Durham Street. In mysector. It happened back in 1976. (The way the story was told, it always seemed like it happened just nights before I hit the streets in 2000). Twenty-five years later (only one officer I worked with had more than 24 years on) this story was still being told to represent everything that was f*cked up about the Eastern.

    Still. I’m happy to read this. I feel like Mythbusters. “Man in Eastern stabs and kills brother over turkey leg at family Thanksgiving dinner.” Confirmed!