Baltimore officer shot trying to make arrest

 

By Annie Linskey and Brent Jones
The Baltimore Sun

BALTIMORE — A Baltimore police officer and a man he was trying to arrest were shot and wounded this afternoon during a gunbattle in West Baltimore, police said.

Police spokesman Sterling Clifford said the incident began about 2:15 p.m. when plainclothes officers in an unmarked car pulled over a vehicle at Poplar Grove and West Lanvale streets. He said that a passenger got out of the car, fought with the officer and then ran.

The officer chased the man, who at one point turned and opened fire, Clifford said. He said the officer fired back and that both were struck.

As officers raced to help, they “took fire from an unknown shooter in a nearby building,” police said.

Police have surrounded that building.

Students in two schools near the shooting scene were on lockdown, meaning that parents and teachers must stay inside under police guard until the area is secure. The schools were Alexander Hamilton Elementary School, at 800 Poplar Grove St., and Calverton Elementary/Middle, at 1110 Whitmore Ave., according to schools spokeswoman Edie House.

Clifford said the wounded officer is being treated at Maryland Shock Trauma Center. He said the officer was hit once in the leg, but the bullet missed the femoral artery, instead hitting a bone. The officer is scheduled for surgery later tonight. The officer’s family is in Pennsylvania and will be traveling to Baltimore.

The wounded suspect is also being treated at Shock Trauma.

Contraversial Web Site Endangers Police

 

Controversial site raises officer safety concerns, infuriates cops

By PoliceOne staff Watch the video news report on BLUtube.com SAN FRANCISCO — A controversial new Web site has surfaced that has officers fuming over privacy, fairness and officer safety concerns. According to the vice president of ratemycop.com, the San Francisco-based site was allegedly launched on the premise of “[breaking] the stereotype that people have that all cops are bad by having police officers become responsible for their actions.” Although led by a fleeting suggestion that visitors might use the site to praise officers, the remainder of the solicitation for comments bears a distinctly adversarial tone clearly designed to entice visitors to takes “shots” at officers in a highly public way. “Did you witness a cop doing a good deed, or were you involved in an unfortunate altercation?” the site reads. “Tell us about it. Tell others about it. Let it out. Don’t feel intimidated by the badge to remain quiet.” To date, the names of approximately 130,000 officers from more than 450 agencies nationwide are posted under a rating system for “authority, fairness and satisfaction.” According to the site’s creators, additional written comments will be monitored for anything inappropriate, but that’s of no comfort to concerned officers. “Officers who are rated face unfair maligning without any opportunity to defend themselves,” Chief Jerry Dyer, President of the California Police Chiefs Association, told CNN. “The CPCA will work with other law enforcement associations to pursue legislation to stop the Web site.” Of even greater concern are the officer safety ramifications. “Will [visitors] be able to access our home addresses, our home phone numbers, our marital status, whether or not we have children?” asked Kevin Martin, vice president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association. Although the site claims it will post no personal information, the door appears to be open for visitors to do so. Other officers are alarmed by the opportunity the site presents to identify undercover officers, which would obviously put them at tremendous risk.

N. Y. man who shot cops with Uzi acquitted

By Adam Pincus Newsday NEW YORK — A convicted gunman charged with firing an Uzi assault rifle at two police officers outside a Flatbush nightclub in 2006 was acquitted yesterday of first-degree attempted murder and assault and was instead convicted of only a weapons charge. Jurors in State Supreme Court in Brooklyn found Damian Henry, 26, guilty of criminal possession of a weapon but were not convinced of the more serious charges in the Jan. 21, 2006, incident. Police shot him 18 times in a barrage of 30 bullets, his defense attorney said, but he survived the attack. Jurors said they made a compromise decision because they did not find the police or Henry’s testimony entirely credible. “We took things here and there,” said one female juror in her 20s who asked not to be named. Authorities said at about 4 a.m., Henry tried to enter the Rag Top Lounge on Utica Avenue, but bouncers who frisked him found a gun and refused him entry. They later called police, prosecutors said. Two police officers responding to the scene saw Henry shooting at the club with the Uzi, identified themselves and drew their weapons, prosecutors said. They pursued him, and he fired at them, but missed, authorities said. They then shot him several times. Jury forewoman Khadijah Carter, 33, said police did not appear to follow protocol, but she found it believable that they felt endangered. Henry is serving a 25-year sentence on an attempted murder charge for shooting into a Brooklyn diner in 2005. He was free on bail from that case when the January 2006 shooting happened. Authorities say he used a stolen gun in that incident. The same gun was used seven months later to kill Police Officer Dillon Stewart. Police are unsure how the gun got from Henry to Stewart’s killer. Defense attorney Harold Baker called yesterday’s verdict a “split decision” that left his client facing a sentence of between 3 1/2 and 15 years in prison, instead of up to life on the attempted murder charges. Copyright 2008 Newsday

Man Indicted for stabbing Officer 10 Times

Man indicted for stabbing Athens police officer

The Associated Press –

ATHENS, Ga. –

A Clarke County grand jury has indicted a man on an attempted murder charge and other felony counts in the stabbing of an off-duty police officer. According to the indictment, Steven Anthony Eberhart repeatedly stabbed Athens-Clarke County police Sgt. Courtney Gale and intended to murder her.

Gale was working in uniform as a security guard at a grocery store on December 11th when she was stabbed 10 times, including one cut that nearly severed her femoral artery. Gale was unconscious for two weeks and underwent several surgeries during a 45-day hospital stay.

The grand jury also indicted Eberhart on 10 other charges including aggravated assault on a police officer and another aggravated assault charge for allegedly threatening the store manager with a knife during the incident.

ST. LOUIS — A car thief who said he didn’t want to go back to jail engaged a St. Louis police officer in a gun battle Thursday that left the officer out of bullets and using his police car as a shield, police said.

Dozens of shots were fired, but no one was injured in the incident about 11 a.m. in the 1500 block of Irving Avenue.

A 23-year-old man with a robbery conviction was arrested after he jumped into the officer’s patrol car and drove away, crashing minutes later into a duplex at Goodfellow Boulevard and Switzer Avenue, police said. Charges were pending.

Police Chief Joe Mokwa said the shootout capped a morning of incidents — including car thefts and thefts of credit cards — that may be related. Mokwa said as many as four other people involved were being sought.

St. Louis police said the incident began when a man used keys taken in a robbery last month to steal a red Ford Mustang in the 5600 block of Waterman Boulevard.

An officer on his way to that address after the car owner reported the theft spotted the stolen Mustang at Page Avenue and Goodfellow, police said.

The officer followed the car, which sped away and crashed at Hodiamont Avenue and Martin Luther King Drive. The driver ran off but was later spotted by the officer in a gangway. Ordered to show his hand, the man pulled a pistol and began shooting, police said.

The officer used his police vehicle to shield himself after he fired all his ammunition, including the rounds in his gun and on his belt, police said. The car thief continued firing as he climbed into the officer’s patrol car and drove away. Other officers arrived and also fired.

Police chased the stolen police car until it hit the duplex at Goodfellow and Switzer. The driver ran west on Switzer until he was arrested, police said. A pistol was found at the scene.

Mokwa said the officer involved in the shootout was shaken but uninjured.

The man arrested told police he had fired at the officer because he had been in prison and didn’t want to go back, Mokwa said.

Sonya Murray, who owns the home struck by the police car, said she rents it to a woman who works nearby at a day care center.

Murray came by to see the destruction. Cracks spread through the living room and kitchen of the home, apparently from the foundation shifting. The front bore a 3-by-4-foot hole.

“I’m just distraught,” she said. “I’m angry at the guy who hit my house.”

91 Arrested

91 arrested in Me. drug blitz

By Nok-noi Ricker
The Bangor Daily

BANGOR, Me. – A 24-hour statewide blitz by the Maine Drug Enforcement Agency has netted more than 90 people who were arrested for everything from trafficking heroin or marijuana to probation violations.

“We’ve been working on them for a while,” said Garry Higgins, MDEA supervisory special agent for the Bangor-based North Central Regional Taskforce, District 5. “We charged seven people just in our office with various drug charges.”

The drug busts, dubbed Operation Byrne Blitz, were part of a national operation held from Wednesday morning to Thursday morning to spotlight what drug task forces do in one day and how a drastic drop in federal funding for state drug enforcement agencies across the nation will hurt efforts, Roy E. McKinney, MDEA director, said Thursday.

“There is no other word than devastating” to describe the cuts, McKinney said.

Federal funding was cut 67 percent from 2007 to 2008, which caused Maine’s figures to drop from $1.7 million to just $629,096, said McKinney.

The cuts mean 13 Maine task force officers and six prosecutors will lose their jobs.

“The sale and use of drugs affects every Maine community,” he said in a press release. “Drugs ruin people’s lives and bring crime and violence into our communities.”

The 24-hour blitz resulted in the seizure of 5.5 grams of crack cocaine, 8 grams of powder cocaine, 5 grams of heroin, 1 methamphetamine tablet, 61 illegally possessed narcotic prescription pills, 4 LSD tablets and 1.8 pounds of marijuana. One vehicle and $13,350 cash also were confiscated.

Of the 91 arrests statewide, 34 dealt with cocaine or cocaine base, 13 involved marijuana, 22 were a result of probation violations or violations of conditions of release, one was for unpaid fines and another was taken in for operating after suspension, according to the arrest log.

Of the seven arrests resulting from investigations by the Bangor-based MDEA office, three were made in Bangor, one in Brewer and one in Dover-Foxcroft. Also, two University of Maine students, who are on spring break, were arrested in their southern Maine hometowns, Higgins said.

Two of the Bangor arrests were connected, he said. After Jeffery Paoletti, 24, was picked up for possession of Schedule W drugs, police got a warrant for his girlfriend Heidi Henderson’s apartment.

“She’s also charged with possession of cocaine and for falsifying criminal evidence because she was flushing it down the toilet,” Higgins said.

The third person arrested in Bangor, Kevin Walsh, 43, was brought in for an outstanding warrant based out of the midcoast MDEA office after agents in that office found out he was living in Bangor, Higgins said, adding he had no information on the case.

Christopher Brown, 31, of Brewer was arrested for trafficking cocaine and Gerald Roussel, 46, of Dover-Foxcroft was caught for trafficking in morphine. University of Maine students Benjamin Wade, 18, of South Berwick and Michael Sarwari, 19, of Windham were arrested at their homes for trafficking marijuana.

Last year’s blitz, which lasted a week, nabbed about 82 people, McKinney said.

Though fewer people were arrested, “I believe the number of drugs seized was significantly higher [last year],” he said. “With a week they were able to do more searches.”

Copyright 2008 The Bangor Daily

Hello all. My name is Capt. Chet Bowen. This blog is solely for keeping you up to date with current police news and crime. Be safe.