Category: Maryland

That’s a lot of ganja.

NBC4 in Washington, D.C.: Police Find $1.3 Million Worth Of Pot In 72-Year-Old’s Car:

New Carrollton police said they found more than $1 million worth of marijuana in the trunk of a car driven by a senior citizen on Tuesday night.

The seizure, one of the largest in recent memory in the region, was accomplished by the 12-member New Carrolton Police Department.

[…]

The 72-year-old man who had allegedly hit a convenience store clerk’s car did not have a driver’s license, police said.

[…]

Upon opening the large duffel bags, police said they discovered 146 pounds of marijuana with an estimated street value of $1.3 million.

[…]

Police said they believe the drugs were just one part of a shipment. One of the eight bales officers found was numbered 199, police said.

Rice said a van that was following the Camry sped off when police arrived. Investigators said they believe the van may have been filled with the rest of a drug shipment.

Here’s a way to fix Virginia’s budget problems…

From the AP via WTOP: Lawmaker Proposes Hefty Tax on Bongs:

Bongs and water pipes are billed as tobacco accessories – but one Maryland lawmaker says everyone knows they’re used to smoke illegal drugs and should be heavily taxed.

Democratic Sen. Anthony Muse of Prince George’s County proposed a bill Wednesday to add a $20 tax to tobacco paraphernalia.

Muse says the tobacco accessories are now subject only to the regular 6 percent state sales tax. He says the $20 tax proposal isn’t intended to raise revenue, but to act as a deterrent for young people who smoke marijuana.

Muse sponsored a new Maryland law that requires people to be at least 18, the legal smoking age, before buying tobacco accessories such as bongs. Muse says he’d like to outlaw bongs because they’re so seldom used to smoke legal products, but he knows such a bill would not pass.

It them video games’ fault! Oh! And rap music!

Don’t forget that devil music which them kids call “rock ‘n’ roll”.

From The [Delmarva] Daily Times: Reality of violence hits Wicomico:

When Dan Dougherty sat down to listen to rap music lyrics for the first time, he was appalled.

“They talked about sex and killing cops,” Dougherty, the Wicomico County Gang Resistance and EXILE director, said Monday night. “Now you turn on the TV and see carnage … Extreme raw violence is making an impact on our young people, and we’re growing an acceptance for it.”

Dougherty spoke — at times shouted with fury — to a packed Delmar Town Hall, where about 40 residents and Wicomico Neighborhood Congress members received a non-sugarcoated view of their county.

There are nearly 500 known gang members in the county who have helped Wicomico earn the second-place ranking in the state for violent crime per capita. Wicomico County only trails Baltimore City. Dougherty blamed violent lyrics and excessive violence on television and especially in video games.

“In Grand Theft Auto, you score points by killing cops, stealing cars and beating prostitutes,” Dougherty said and cited cases in Maryland where kids re-enacted scenes from the game. “In the ’80s and ’90s, you didn’t have video games, you didn’t have the violence in the media, you didn’t have the Internet. It creates a lack of respect for life and makes violence acceptable.”

This moron is supposed to be preventing gang crime when he knows absolutely no history of gang formation or crime in the United States?

Here’s a brief history for this moron:

1969: The street gang the Crips is formed in Los Angeles.

The number one single that year: The Beatle’s “Get Back”.

Highest grossing film: The Love Bug.

In television: The Brady Bunch and Sesame Street premiere.

In video games: Nothing. They didn’t exist yet!

1971: The street gang the Bloods is formed in Los Angeles.

The number one single that year: John Lennon’s “Imagine”.

Highest grossing film: Fiddler on the Roof.

In television: Masterpiece Theatre; Sabrina, the Teenage Witch; and Soul Train premiere.

In video games: The United States Patent and Trademark Office received a patent for “television gaming and training apparatus”.

1978: The Folk Nation (an alliance of already existing gangs) is formed in the Illinois Department of Corrections.

The number one single that year: the Bee Gee’s “Stayin’ Alive”.

Highest grossing film: Superman: The Movie.

In television: Dallas, WKRP in Cincinnati, and Diff’rent Strokes premiere.

In video games: The arcade game Space Wars is released.

This ignoramus should be nowhere near a government office, much less involved in gang prevention.

(H/t: GamePolitics.com)

With “heroes” like these, who needs bad guys?

From Merrian-Webster Online Dictionary:

Main Entry: he•ro

1 […] c: a man admired for his achievements and noble qualities d: one that shows great courage
4: an object of extreme admiration and devotion : idol

From the Richmond Times-Dispatch: Local heroes:

WILLIAM J. FRAWLEY
Former Mary Washington president

WHY YOU KNOW HIM: He was fired as president of the University of Mary Washington in April after two DUI arrests. He was on the job for 10 months.

WHAT’S NEW: Frawley, 56, was convicted of two separate driving-under-the-influence charges in September and had his driving privilege in Virginia suspended for a year. The charges arose from incidents on consecutive days in Fairfax County and Fredericksburg.

He managed to skirt his way out of the mandatory ten days in jail for the charge in Fairfax County too…

In December, Frawley acknowledged self-treating depression with alcohol, and he lashed out at the university’s board of visitors in an opinion piece he wrote for The Washington Post. He wrote that the board disregarded his illness, his accomplishments and his family’s needs.

Apparently, you disregarded your family’s needs as well…

He acknowledged he had consumed wine after taking an allergy medication the morning of April 10 when he wrecked in Fairfax. Separately, he told police in Fredericksburg that he had consumed six bottles of cough syrup when arrested in the city the next day, April 11.

I quote from the police report, there was a “strong odor of alcoholic beverage coming from his [Frawley’s] person and he was unsteady on his feet.”

Either way, it’s still a DUI.

In an e-mail to the Richmond Times-Dispatch in mid-December, he said he wrote of his account “for my own well-being and clear conscience, nothing else. At no time has my purpose been to elicit any kind of response — just to state the truth.” He thanked the university’s faculty, students, alumni and parents who have sent him notes of support.

Frawley, who said he is writing two books about his experiences, added, “I am moving on. I would suggest that others, including the press, show respect for themselves and others, and move on likewise. There is a point where mere rehash of the past has to stop and we all move to a new phase of lessons beyond incidents. We have reached that point.”

[…]

SARAH ANN HAISLIP
Underage drinking led to fatality

WHY YOU KNOW HER: She caused an early New Year’s Day wreck in Short Pump that killed a local bartender.

WHAT’S NEW: She’s serving a one-year sentence

Sarah Ann Haislip could have become a household name in the Richmond area last year for her soccer skills and academics.

Instead, the Deep Run High School student, just 16, became a one-person warning poster for the consequences of drinking and driving. Some Web sites even included images of her with beer in hand.

Haislip was westbound and driving alone just after midnight Jan. 1 when her car ran a red light and broadsided a vehicle driven by Wesley Hunter Taylor, a bartender at a nearby restaurant. Taylor had been drinking as well, but his condition was not considered a factor in the fatal collision.

He died in front of Short Pump Town Center. Haislip later was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and underage alcohol possession.

She is serving a one-year sentence, part of it in a juvenile-detention facility and the remainder in jail.

Haislip called her actions “childish and stupid,” and she apologized for not realizing the consequences of her acts.

Money raised in Taylor’s memory has gone to dig wells in Africa.

Since the Richmond Times-Dispatch is hard pressed to find heroes I decided to provide a few links:

Deputy Sheriff Jason E. Mooney of the Stafford County Sheriff’s Office, volunteer firefighter, and Marine – Killed in an automobile accident while responding to an accident on I-95.

Deputy Sheriff Jason Lee Saunders of the Campbell County Sheriff’s Office – Killed in an automobile accident while in pursuit of a suspected drunk driver.

First Lieutenant Benjamin Hall, an United States Army Ranger, and fifth generation soldier, was killed in action in Afghanistan. Originally from Woodbridge, his family lives in Fredericksburg.

Stryker, a police canine with the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (M-NCPPC), helped to search for survivors at The Pentagon after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. He also had a 113 drug arrests (worth $159,923) to his credit. He was euthanized on July 30, 2007.

Marlo David McQuillar, whose information helped to put two cocaine dealers away for 10 and 15 years. He was killed in Fredericksburg on July 27, 2007. “He told a judge in October [of 2006] that he had seen the error of his ways and was looking forward to raising his son as a law-abiding citizen. ‘I refuse to let my son go down the same path of negativity that I went down,’ he said at the time.”

Farooq Anwar, originally from Pakistan, was killed while working at his store in Chesterfield. Both his children attend the University of Virginia. American Dream, anyone?

Chief Brad Thomas and Captain Eric Chenault of the Bowling Green Volunteer Fire Department, both of which were seriously burned while fighting a fire on February 18, 2007. They were forced to jump from the second story of a building to escape the flames.

This isn’t all-inclusive, so if I missed someone leave a comment.

H/t: the fred review

Is The Washington Post completely out of it?

The Washington Post runs a story about the valiant efforts to repeal the death penalty in Maryland: Repeal of Md. Death Penalty Still Seems Out of Reach:

Advocates of repealing Maryland’s death penalty are hopeful that New Jersey’s landmark decision to end capital punishment will provide momentum heading into next month’s legislative session. But interviews with key lawmakers suggest that a permanent repeal during the 90-day session remains a long shot.

A bid to replace Maryland’s death penalty with life without parole failed by a single vote in a Senate committee during the last regular session, which ended in April, despite high-profile support from Gov. Martin O’Malley (D). In testimony before the legislature, O’Malley argued that capital punishment is “inherently unjust” and that money is wasted on appeals that could be better spent fighting violent crime.

In the months since then, repeal advocates have arranged meetings between lawmakers and well-known death penalty opponents, including David Kaczynski, brother of Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber. They have hired as a lobbyist the former chief of staff to Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert). They are planning several events to spotlight the issue after lawmakers return to Annapolis on Jan. 9, including a visit by suspense novelist Scott Turow, a death penalty opponent.

Yeah, sure, I’m definitely going to agree with the Unabomber’s brother…

[…]

Maryland has had an effective moratorium on capital punishment since last December, when the Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court, ruled that the state’s procedures for lethal injections had not been properly adopted. Five prisoners currently sit on Maryland’s death row.

For executions to resume, the O’Malley administration must issue new regulations — a step the governor has resisted. If the legislature tries to abolish the death penalty and fails for a second year in a row, pressure will mount on O’Malley to issue the rules, some lawmakers said. Miller, who supports the death penalty, said O’Malley should have done so already.

“When he took the oath of office, he swore to uphold the laws of Maryland, and the law of Maryland is now being subverted,” Miller said.

[…]

Under Maryland law, those guilty of first-degree murder are eligible for execution if prosecutors can prove at least one of 10 aggravating factors, such as killing a law enforcement officer or committing murder while in prison. Last session, Mooney expressed a willingness to reduce the number of aggravating factors and narrow eligibility for the death penalty, an idea that few senators would support.

In and of itself, unremarkable.

You know, besides the fact if you bother reading the whole article (don’t, it’s a waste of time), you’ll notice that there is a complete lack of coverage of any pro-death penalty group, any victim rights group, or anyone that supports the death penalty (except for a few members of the legislature) meanwhile the anti-death penalty groups get free advertising for a rally they’re holding!

No mention of how the death penalty has been documented to reduced the rate of homicides, ever.

And the worst part about this story is that it comes two days after the burial of a Smithsburg police officer that was murdered in the line of duty, a story that The Washington Post refused to report on.

The Washington Times, with a little over one-seventh of the daily circulation of The Washington Post, however, did manage to cover it: Funerals mark day of violence:

Hundreds of mourners and law-enforcement officers yesterday packed a high school gymnasium to honor a Western Maryland policeman slain during a night of violence in Washington County.At another Christmas Eve funeral 25 miles away in Hancock, family and friends bade farewell to Alison L. Munson, whose slaying put Officer Christopher S. Nicholson in harm’s way Wednesday night.

Douglas W. Pryor, the former boyfriend charged with stabbing Miss Munson to death, purportedly fatally shot Officer Nicholson after fleeing from Miss Munson’s apartment. He remains in custody without bail, recovering from wounds he sustained in a shootout with police.

[…]

Other speakers, including fiancee Desiree Grimes, remembered Officer Nicholson, of Sharpsburg, as a cheerful and determined young man who strove to become a police officer despite his chronic asthma.

A friend and fellow 2006 Western Maryland Police Academy graduate, Washington County Sheriff’s Deputy First Class Joel Footen said that if Officer Nicholson were alive, he “would tell us to step up, do what needs to be done.”

The funeral was held in Williamsport because Officer Nicholson graduated from the high school there in 2000.

Miss Munson’s funeral, at the Orchard Ridge Church of God, near Hancock, also was crowded. The Rev. Jeffrey Hawbaker said the small, white country church was filled with at least 100 mourners.

Miss Munson, a 31-year-old dental hygienist, and Mr. Pryor, a 29-year-old mechanical contracting worker, had two young children, a son and a daughter. They had lived together in the Smithsburg area for about 10 years until last month, when she moved into an apartment south of Hagerstown after obtaining a protective order against him, according to court records and neighbors. She was a graduate of Berkeley Springs High School in Berkeley Springs, W.Va.

Police say Mr. Pryor drove the children Wednesday night from Smithsburg to Miss Munson’s apartment, where he stabbed her and stuffed her body in a kitchen closet. He then drove the children back home, handed them off to a sister-in-law and shot Officer Nicholson, who was parked a short distance away, awaiting backup, according to charging documents.

Here’s a little tip to you guys at The WaPo: First, stop trying to pick fights with bloggers, stop waiting for press releases from your favorite advocacy group, go outside your office, get in your car, and do some damn reporting!

You know, the kind of stuff that made you famous back in the day: like the stuff that Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein did?

Kill a newborn? Get eighteen (18) months in jail.

From NBC 4 in Washington, D.C.: Woman Gets 18 Months In Newborn’s Death:

A Bethesda woman has been sentenced to 18 months in jail for killing her newborn baby last summer.

Ellen Griever, 22, was sentenced Wednesday on her guilty plea to a charge of child abuse resulting in death.

Griever brought the body of the full-term baby girl to Holy Cross Hospital in June 2006 and told workers there that the baby was stillborn. She later told police that the baby was born alive in the bathroom of her boyfriend’s house.

Prosecutors asked Montgomery County Circuit Judge Eric Johnson for a term of 12 to 20 years. The judge said he imposed the shorter sentence so she would go to the Montgomery County jail to receive some meaningful treatment.

More disturbing details from The Washington Post: Woman Gets 18 Months In Death of Newborn:

Yesterday, reality came into sharp focus for Griever, a former child-care worker, as a Montgomery County judge sentenced her to 18 months in jail for delivering a full-term baby girl into a toilet last summer and doing nothing to keep her alive as the newborn made “gurgling” noises and moved around.

[…]

Investigators called Griever’s behavior before the birth unfathomable and her calm demeanor afterward bewildering. She told detectives in videotaped interviews that she kept the pregnancy from her boyfriend, Joey Piemontese, because she was afraid he would leave her.

“She is not remorseful in those videotapes,” Assistant State’s Attorney Deborah W. Feinstein said. “She was not sad. It was chilling watching those videotapes.”

Prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum that Griever was at Piemontese’s house June 25 last year when she delivered the baby on his toilet about 5 a.m.

Griever told detectives that the baby “like gurgled” for less than a minute, prosecutors said. According to the memorandum, when a detective asked why the baby stopped moving and making noises, Griever said, “I don’t know, unless it was choking on its own mucus or whatever.”

Her boyfriend came to the bathroom shortly after the delivery and helped Griever move to the shower, prosecutors said. She told detectives that she left the baby in the toilet most of the day before placing her in a plastic bag that night, they said.

Griever called Holy Cross Hospital that evening and spoke to someone who encouraged her to come in with the baby. Early the next morning, Griever placed the baby, in a bag, in the trunk of her boyfriend’s car.

Griever and Piemontese then drove to his father’s house, where Griever took a bath and the two watched the animated film “Finding Nemo” and “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.” The baby’s body was left in the trunk, prosecutors said.

That afternoon, Griever went to Holy Cross, where she told hospital workers that she hadn’t known she was pregnant and that the baby was stillborn. Medical examiners later determined that the baby’s head was in a position that prevented her from breathing and that she was asphyxiated.

Later, Griever told homicide detectives that a previous pregnancy had resulted in an abortion. “I was mostly worried, also, because I was like, I was afraid Joey would leave me,” she told detectives, according to the memorandum.

Police Dog Who Helped in 9-11 Recovery Dies

From WUSA 9 in Washington, D.C. [photo credit: Ibid]: Police Dog Who Helped in 9-11 Recovery Dies:

Stryker Stryker [pictured right] worked some of the most high-profile cases in our area.

After the terrorist plane crash into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 the German Shephard–along with his handler, Park Police Officer Alice Hanan, searched the building for survivors and the dead. The Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission (M-NCPPC) says Stryker made 108 finds in the disaster’s aftermath.

Stryker helped search for missing persons Michelle Dorr, Susan Stottmeister and Chandra Levy. He was also brought in after the water taxi accident in Baltimore Harbor in 2004.

The dog also helped in 113 drug arrests that resulted in $152,923 worth of drugs being taken off the streets.

In all, Stryker worked close to 900 crime-fighting and rescue missions during his service with the M-NCPPC Park Police, Montgomery County Division. He was with the department from 1997 to 2004.

M-NCPPC tell 9NEWS NOW that on July 30th Stryker had to be euthanized. He was suffering from muscular problems that resulted in him not being able to use his hind legs. Stryker was 11-and-a-half years old.

The Park Police adopted Stryker when he was one years old. He was born in Czechoslovakia.

In a news release, M-NCPPC Park Police describe Stryker as “one of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission’s most beloved K9 workers.”

Handler, Alice Hanan, says “Stryker was an incredible K9 partner and I am honored and thankful for our time together….He had the best life possible for a dog and I am pretty sure he knew that. Thanks to everyone who helped us along the way.”

Stryker and Hanan were named the Park Police K9 team of the year 4 years in a row from 1999 to 2002.

Purely medicinal…

From NBC 4 in Washington, D.C.: Four Teen Girls Arrested In 33-Pound Pot Bust:

Frederick police said they found 33 pounds of marijuana in the car of a group of teenage girls on Friday morning.

Police said the car was weaving down Interstate 70.

Police have charged the four teenagers with possession and intent to distribute marijuana. The driver, 19 year-old Summer Rockenbaugh, of Thurmont, faces additional counts of contributing to the delinquency of a child.

The other girls have not been identified because they are minors. They are a 16-year-old from Thurmont, a 17-year-old from Hagerstown and a 14-year-old from Hagerstown. The girls were charged as juveniles with possession and intent to distribute marijuana.

Police estimated that the marijuana has a street value of about $100,000.