Written by admin on November 3rd, 2009
The Baltimore City Police Department continues to act as its own worst enemy as it struggles to earn the public’s trust.
A fine piece of reporting by Justin Fenton in today’s Sun gives the full rundown on a recent string of rapes and break-ins taking place over the past two weeks spanning several neighborhoods in East and Central Baltimore. Fenton is a great young reporter and gives the full details in his story, and there is one line that is particularly revealing on how the department makes information available to the public:
“The eight attacks, which police confirmed after receiving inquiries from The Baltimore Sun, stretch back to…” (article continues)”
We are only now aware of these attacks because the Baltimore Sun connected the dots and took this to the department to find out if there was a possible connection. This is especially remarkable if you consider that the department was blasted for dragging its feet in notifying the public of a similar outbreak of attacks last year in Mount Vernon. When criticized for a lack of transparency, BCPD spokesman Anthony Guglielmi is quick to tout his use of Twitter and Facebook to announce shootings and other violent crimes after they’ve happened, however nothing of the recent sexual assaults was mentioned on these networks. Guglielmi defends the department’s response to the recent attacks in a Sun editorial board blog post today.
Another story in today’s Sun demonstrates the public’s diminishing access to critical information from the BCPD. As part of a reporter exchange program, the Sun is sending Justin Fenton over to the UK and has welcomed British reporter Mark Hughes. The British have a deep fascination with the crime culture of Baltimore due to the wild success of The Wire in the UK. Today, Hughes posted on the public rift between the BCPD and the Baltimore State Attorney’s office, led by Patricia Jessamy. Jessamy naturally blamed the police for the poor performance of her office, which declines to prosecute 10,000 of the 55,000 cases it receives from the BCPD (for some revealing insights into how Jessamy’s office truly works, I suggest reading former assistant state’s attorney Page Croyder’s blog). Hughes offered to do a ride along with the BCPD and an interview with Commissioner Bealefeld, giving the department the chance to tell its side of the story.
Both requests were denied.
Posted in Baltimore, Baltimore City Police Department, Crime | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 29th, 2009
The Baltimore Sun flexed its Fourth Estate muscle on Wednesday and filed a lawsuit against the Baltimore City Police Department, claiming that the department often ignored Sun requests for public information that they are required by law to provide. The suit also claims that when the department did make requested documents available, it did so at an extremely high cost, in one instance attempting to charge the Sun $1,250 for a year’s worth of police reports about rapes. Read the full Sun story by Jamie Smith Hopkins here.
I’m not surprised by this story. BCPD spokesman Anthony Guglielmi is notoriously tight fisted with information that used to be made public on a regular basis. He arrived in Baltimore just over a year ago. In that short time, he has managed to build an impenetrable information blockade between the public and the department. The department must now authorize any officer to speak with a member of the press, and officers who do so face stiff discipline.
Back in March, Guglielmi’s new policy of withholding the names of officers involved in shootings drew the ire of Baltimore’s few remaining true crime journalists. Sun crime reporter Peter Hermann assembled a comprehensive blog post critiquing the new policy. It includes this prophetic moment, from a segment on the Mark Steiner show featuring Guglielmi, former Sun reporter David Simon, ACLU attorney David Rocah, and Bob Cherry, head of the Baltimore FOP:
At one point, Simon told Guglielmi: “State officials cannot go against state law.”
Guglielmi: “David, nobody is going against the law.” He added, “that’s why we have courts.”
Rocah: “You might find yourself there.”
And thanks to the brave remaining journalists over at the Sun who are still fighting for the public’s best interests, he has. My hat is off to you today. This will be a fascinating one to watch.
Posted in Uncategorized | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 27th, 2009
Today I stumbled across a report that was compiled in the wake of the BELIEVE campaign, the famed public call-to-action by the O’Malley administration that called Baltimore citizens to fight against the ills of drugs in their communities. The report I found was a self-congratulatory assessment of the campaign by the advertising firm who worked with the city on the project, Linder & Associates, Inc., based in New York City with offices on Park Avenue. You can view it here.
As part of their campaign, Linder & Associates conducted surveys to get a feel for where city residents stood on the problem of drugs. Two particularly interesting statistics:
- “Caucasians in Baltimore are less likely than African-Americans to see Baltimore’s drug problem as their own problem, at least to the extent that they need to take some action to oppose it.”
- “Only 47% of Caucasians polled said they were likely to take some action as a result of BELIEVE appeals compared with 76% of African-Americans.”
Of course I realize that this was an advertising firm conducting a survey, but this is still revealing, and I think captures a fundamental breakdown in Baltimore’s efforts to right itself and truly change. BELIEVE was a flawed effort but one thing it had right was that for Baltimore to make progress in the fight against drugs, the city will need everyone’s help, not just those living in neighborhoods most affected by the drug trade. This is a complicated problem, but if time has taught Baltimoreans anything it’s that fixing this problem is going to take sustained effort on everyone’s part, not just those who are most directly at risk.
There are many passages in the report that time has made compelling, and I won’t rehash the full contents, but I felt that one section needed to be highlighted for irony’s sake:
“In the words of Baltimore’s Mayor, Martin O’Malley, BELIEVE is a call to the people of the city to rise up and ‘risk action on faith.”
Posted in Uncategorized | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 26th, 2009
Baltimore City has over 30,000 vacant homes. These empty houses serve as tangible barriers to the recovery of blighted neighborhoods who have been set upon by drug dealers and prostitutes who often use the houses as impromtu brothels or stash houses. Residents are driven out of the city by the rising crime problem, and the problem worsens as more vacants appear. Absentee landlords buy up the properties, and let them rot as they wait for the opportunity to flip the houses when the neighborhood turns around, which, of course, it never does. As the city’s population decreases, so does its tax base, which is critical to the city’s economic health.
Mike Miller, CEO of the Chesapeake region’s arm of Habitat for Humanity, appeared on the Baltimore Rapport podcast last week to discuss how the city’s surplus of vacant housing is more than a problem of aesthetics, and how his organization is trying to connect working people to these empty homes. When people are able to own their own homes in these kinds of neighborhoods they can build wealth, the community can stabilize, and there are actual stakeholders in the viability of that community. People that own their own homes care more deeply about what’s going on in their neighborhoods than renters, or squatters, or whoever is haunting the vacant rowhouses of countless Baltimore neighborhoods. Mitchell also mentioned that when the ownership rate in a neighborhood increases, things like crime and education are also positively impacted. He blamed the market of speculators that are passing off the deeds to these vacants to one another, never occupying or improving them, holding out for a payday. The segment was a fascinating reminder that the more visible consequences of an unhealthy city – crime, low-performing schools, homelessness – begin with things like vacant rowhomes. Listen to the full podcast.
Another site, Baltimore Slumlord Watch, documents absentee landlords who have allowed their properties to fall into disrepair. The site features updates on landlords facing legal proceedings for various violations, as well as photos of their properties. A great resource.
There is also a remarkable website called Rebuilding Madison, about a man who purchased a former crack house in West Baltimore, rehabbed it, and turned a back room into a police substation/break room in an effort to combat the rampant drug dealing in the area. Sadly, the crime and the city’s lack of support in fighting it became too much for him, and he gave up the fight, selling the house and reluctantly closing the substation with it. The site is a heartbreaking narrative of an idealist slowly worn down by the bureaucracy and broken promises of the Baltimore City government. It’s an important read, because not much has changed and these problems continue to plague the city.
Posted in Baltimore, Urban Renewal | 1 Response »
Written by admin on October 24th, 2009
On Thursday, Oct. 22, Ignite Baltimore #4 moved from its former home at the Windup Space on North Avenue to the Walters Art Museum in Mount Vernon. Though the event had moved to a larger venue, the space was filled with attendees eager to hear from an eclectic collection of speakers. Tracy Gosson, former head of Live Baltimore and now head of marketing firm Sagesse, Inc., delivered a presentation on fear. Adam Meister delivered a fiery speech on “breaking free from the Machine” of consumerism and how Baltimore is a prime place to do just that. Ignite co-founder Mike Subelsky stood in the wings with a smile on his face as his event unfolded.
Ryan Boddy (at right) discusses the synthesis of brewing beer and creativity.
One piece of constructive criticism. At times, the event was in danger of veering off into a podium for forwarding political agendas or indulging personal hobbies. I think it’s great that certain artists are into surprising or unexpected media, or that we’re trying to amend the arcane wine and beer shipping laws in Maryland. But when Baltimore is a city facing monumental social problems like crime, youth violence, and drug abuse, filling a room with the city’s young and creative types to talk about surviving a zombie attack can ring a bit hollow.
That said, I applaud what Mike Subelsky and his co-founder, Patti Chan are doing. I hope that Ignite continues, and that future presenters bring a bit more gravitas to this worthy event. Let’s harness the community brought together by this event to affect change where it’s really needed. Ignite #5 is March 4, 2010.
Posted in Baltimore, Blogging | 2 Responses »
Written by admin on October 20th, 2009
There is a large credibility gap between many of the citizens of Baltimore City and the Baltimore City Police Department, and the problem continues to persist, due to actions that are entirely within the department’s control.
Many will remember the controversial decision made by department spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi back in March to stop releasing the names of officers involved in the shootings of civilians, putting an end to a practice that had been in place for the life of the department. When challenged, Guglielmi claimed that officers involved in shootings were at risk for retaliation, citing 23 threats against officers in 2008. What he failed to mention, and what former Baltimore Sun crime reporter and Wire creator David Simon revealed in a remarkable Washington Post story on the new policy back on March 1, was that none of these threats was in response to a police-involved shooting. Inconsistencies plagued the department’s stance, and deepened its adversarial relationship with the same citizens it is tasked with protecting.
Perhaps more importantly, the policy comes at a time when detectives cannot convince a witness to take the stand because of the city’s entrenched witness intimidation culture. ”Do as we say, not as we do” doesn’t exactly motivate a kid on a bike who just saw a drive-by and knows that if he wants to live, he’ll keep his mouth shut.
And today, Justin Fenton at the Sun has done a follow-up story on the mysterious death and disappearance of 16 year old Annie McCann one year after her death. The family is claiming that the BCPD has botched the investigation, and has written letters to the Mayor’s office in the hopes of re-opening the investigation. Perhaps most interesting is how Annie’s father was pushing to prosecute the teens that claimed to have moved Annie’s body to take her car for a joyride, but that the BCPD talked him out of it, saying that they and the State Attorney’s office would take another look at charging the teens, or at least interrogating them, which never happened. The teens have not been charged or questioned yet.
Even if the BCPD cannot charge these teens in the murder of Annie McCann, or even determine that she was indeed killed and didn’t take her own life, they’ve failed to fully convince the teen’s parents, and more importantly, the public, that this case was handled as professionally and thoroughly as possible. By intervening in the family’s attempt to press charges against the teens for auto theft in the hopes of learning more about their daughter’s death, the department now must face questions on its motives. Was this an attempt to prevent another unsolved murder in the stat column? An attempt to cover the botched investigation?
The department only has itself to blame for its failure to earn the people’s trust in Baltimore City, and the situation isn’t improving.
Posted in Baltimore, Baltimore City Police Department, Crime | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 19th, 2009
George Pelacanos, DC crime novelist and former HBO’s The Wire writer, and Vincent Schiraldi, head of D.C.’s Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services appeared on the Kojo Nnamdi show on WAMU 88.5 fm DC radio today to discuss youth violence, its protrayal in the media, and some of the myths associated with the problem.
Schiraldi was convinced that more juveniles are committing crimes than are caught or documented, and that we should look at the causes rather than focus all attention on the punishment end. He indicated that good parenting is crucial to give kids the opportunity to succeed.
Pelacanos stressed the importance of male role models, and how the offenders he has visited in juvenile justice facilities have had this missing in their lives. Schiraldi mentioned the importance of opportunities, and how kids in rougher neighborhoods aren’t afforded the same ones.
A caller who came from broken home contested the guests, and said that despite his disadvantage background he had acheived in life and that we are making too many excuses for this generation’s juvenile offenders.
Pelacanos said that once a juvenile offender is locked up, rehabilitation needs to begin and that further punishment while incarcarated is counterproductive. He was impressed with what Schiraldi is doing to keep juveniles from becoming life-long wards of the criminal justice system.
Another caller had a great point – there are many successful rehabilitation stories that are never told. I’d say this is especially true in Baltimore City -Can you remember a story of a juvenile offender who had turned his life around?
I’m not one to focus on happy feel-good stories when there are glaring social problems affecting the city, but it sometimes can seem that there are more avenues for lamenting the failures of our young people than for celebrating their victories.
Listen to the segment here.
Posted in Crime, DC, Youth Violence | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 17th, 2009
According to a survey of 1800 Baltimore residents by the Schaefer Center of Public Policy at the University of Baltimore taken earlier this year, there is a disconnect between declining crime stats, and how safe city residents feel about crime in the city.
The Mayor’s office has decided that people’s perception of Baltimore as an unsafe city is incorrect, citing declining numbers of violent crime, down 7 percent. In the Sun story, Mayor Dixon also offers the obligatory and ill-informed slam against the media, blaming them for the city’s image problem.
This story is an example of a breakdown in the Mayor’s office, and a refusal to handle the city’s biggest problem in an honest way. Instead of fighting to change the perception with any number of measures (increased visible police presence, comprehensive cime prevention campaigns, frequent press conferences to keep the public informed on progress in their neighborhoods, etc.), Mayor Dixon is clinging to any statistic that shows numerical progress. What the Dixon administration chooses to ignore is that people in Baltimore have been hearing how safe their city is for years from politicians, in the meantime they are getting mugged on their way home from work, having their cars broken into in a regular basis, and living with the spectre of crime every day. People don’t want more statistics.
In this case, perception is reality. Baltimore City leaders would be wise to traffic in it more often.
Posted in Uncategorized | No Responses »
Written by admin on October 15th, 2009
After an online voting process, The Mobbies held their first award party last night in Metro Gallery in Station North.
Very cool step for the Baltimore blogging cognoscenti. I hope to be there next year.
Posted in Baltimore, Blogging | 1 Response »
Written by admin on October 13th, 2009
Annie Linskey has picked up an interesting story in Baltimore this morning. The Maryland chapter of the NAACP has asked state legislators to remove Governor O’Malley’s power to appoint a success to Mayor Sheila Dixon who is facing corruption charges.
Several things going on here. This shows that the black community in Baltimore has no faith in O’Malley, Dixon’s predecessor as former Mayor of Baltimore. Marvin Cheatham, president of the Baltimore NAACP chapter, even goes as far as saying:
“Here you have a predominantly African-American city. What if the governor appointed somebody white? … Would he appoint someone Irish to be the mayor?”
This reveals how black leaders view O’Malley in Baltimore City: an opportunist who made plenty of promises to their community while running for Mayor, and, once elected, began plotting his campaign for governor. I can’t say I blame them.
Nevertheless, to make this statement now adds a little more to the already considerable racial chasm in Baltimore. The fact is, this move is unecessary. As Linskey reports, the city’s charter overrides the state constitution on this matter, and the city council president would be appointed Mayor in case of Dixon’s removal.
More racially-charged politicking in Baltimore City.
Posted in Baltimore, Politics, Uncategorized | No Responses »
