A day after becoming the first Baltimore mayor to be indicted, Mayor Sheila Dixon maintained a public schedule designed to show her steely backbone and close connections with the community - donning boxing gloves at a gym in West Baltimore and later giving heartfelt advice to underprivileged girls at a Boys and Girls Club in Brooklyn.
"If you make a mistake today, you can get up the next day and keep focused with what you need to do," Dixon, a Democrat, told the Brooklyn group.
She could have been talking about herself.
Dixon has often said that she is motivated by adversity, and that's just what might have kept her moving yesterday, hours after state prosecutors accused her of theft, perjury and other offenses potentially punishable by 85 years in prison.
The mayor declined to answer questions about the charges she faces. At the Upton Boxing Center, where she was greeted enthusiastically by a friendly crowd as she launched a citywide fitness program, she told one reporter: "Are you talking about Fit Baltimore? Because that's all I'm talking about."
It was a classic Dixon diversion. Despite being dogged by state and federal investigators for more than five years, Dixon, 55, has pushed to the highest levels of city government, becoming Baltimore's first female mayor and a popular figure who champions quality-of-life issues and crime fighting.
Even as court documents have disclosed details and allegations about her private life - first, fur coats and shopping sprees from a prominent developer who is her ex-boyfriend, and now gift cards intended for the city's needy spent on video games and electronics - she has expressed no contrition and has said she has done nothing wrong. The bulk of the allegations stem from 2004 and 2005, when she was City Council president.
The mayor was indicted Friday on 12 counts, including theft, perjury, fraud and misconduct in office after a nearly three-year probe by the state prosecutor's office. She was accused, among other offenses, of stealing hundreds of dollars of gift cards donated by developer Ronald H. Lipscomb and another developer to be used for needy families.
The charge threatens to undermine Dixon's reputation as a leader who emphasizes the needs of residents.
Dondrea Ross, who runs a group called No Family Left Behind, called the gift-card accusation "appalling," especially in a city filled with poor people.
