Byers

On Thursday, December 18, 2008, RICHARD M. BYERS, of Catonsville. Retired employee of BG&E, WWII Navy Veteran and author and illustrated of five published novels. Those who wish may send condolences tot he family are of MacNabb Funeral Home, P.A., 301 Frederick Road, Catonsville, MD, 21228. Interment private.

As Anne Arundel Community College celebrates its 50th anniversary, Opera AACC marks its own milestone as a company now in its 10th year. Founded by musician Douglas Brandt Byerly as artistic director, Opera AACC provides professional training for young artists and students and quality productions for the community. Over the past decade, Opera AACC has created many professional-level opera productions designed to be accessible to younger audiences who might be discovering a new art form, while also appealing to more seasoned opera lovers.

On January 30, 2004, MILDRED "MIMI" ESTELLE BYERS (nee Larmore) of Cockeysville, MD; beloved wife of the late George Leighton Byers and devoted mother of Bruce L. Byers; dear sister of A. Poppy Alderton, Joan E. Horney and the late Doris E. Musgrove. Also survived by nieces, nephews, great-nieces and great-nephews and her friends of Goucher College, where she worked for 31 years. Friends may call at the family owned Mitchell-Wiedefeld Funeral Home, Inc., 6500 York Road (at Overbrook) on Tuesday from 2 to 4 P.M. and 7 to 9 P.M. A Funeral Service will be held at the Grace-Falls Rd United Methodist Church, Falls and Ridge Roads, Cockeysville at 12 Noon on Wednesday, February 4. Interment in the adjoining cemetery.

After the first robbery at Killer Trash, a kitschy vintage clothing store on Broadway in Fells Point, clerk Brittany Byers was shaken. The second time, she and other employees were told to lock the door behind customers. When the same man came back a third time, Byers' boyfriend whacked him about a dozen times in the head and arms with a baseball bat before the robber scurried away. But the man was not easily deterred. He had struck earlier that day and was in the middle of a string of 17 robberies of city business in 22 days, police say. Six blocks away at Tuxedo Zone, Rod Thompson, a former police officer, was held up after measuring the same man and allowing him to try on pants.

On April 27, 2006, FRANCIS BARTON BYERS of Glen Burnie beloved husband of 61 years to the late Susan E. Byers; devoted father of William Byers, Dorothy Byers, Elizabeth Aughenbaugh and Peggy Campbell; loving brother to the late Charlotte Byers and Carl Byers; cherished grandfather of Len and Randy Morgan. He is survived by 10 grandchildren, six great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild. The family will receive visitors at the family owned Singleton Funeral Home, 1 Second Ave. SW (at Crain Hwy.)

On Friday, September 23, 2005, IRENE JULIET BYERS (nee Peppler); beloved wife of the late F. Loring Byers; loving mother of Gene G. Armiger, of Ft. Worth, TX and Nancy L. Mc Kenney, of Reisterstown, MD; devoted and loving grandmother of Karen Snell, Scott Armiger, Donna Mc Cready, Donald Roberts, Jr., Julie Bell and Terrie O'Donnell. Also survived by twelve great-grandchildren, four great great-grandchildren and one great-niece. Family will receive friends on Tuesday 7 to 9 P.M. at BURRIER-QUEEN FUNERAL HOME & CREMATORY, P.A., 1212 W. Old Liberty Road, Winfield, MD 21784, where funeral services will take place Wednesday, September 28, 2005, 10 A.M. Interment Druid Ridge Cemetery, Pikesville, MD. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the American Lung Association, Executive Plaza 1, Suite 600, 11350 Mc Cormick Road, Hunt Valley, MD 21031.

The guess is that a typical sports fan turns to his haunt and peruses a few stories: Alabama appealing sanctions levied on it by the NCAA . . . Miami player locked up for resisting arrest and battery on a police officer . . . Tennessee drops a couple of starters for involvement in a telephone credit-card scandal. A yawn is swallowed and the reader moves on to the baseball box scores or something else. Ho-hum.It's unfortunate. Anything goes. And it has been that way for so long that people who once used to recoil at stories such as these now simply shake their heads and realize another college football season is upon us.Just in time for a sport beginning its 126th season -- and in time for the fabled Southwest Conference to start its 81st and last campaign -- a book entitled "Unsportsmanlike Conduct . . . Exploiting College Athletes" is about to hit the shelves.

He comes with a lot of discipline, a vast knowledge of the X's and O's, a strong appreciation of basketball and 220 wins in 22 years of coaching in Carroll County.He lets everybody know from Day One who is in charge and that the practices belong to him.The games belong to the players.Once that is understood, no one has trouble playing for $l Westminster coach Dave Byers.Byers will push his players to the limit, but only so "they can be the best they can be."In February, Byers pushed the Owls to their limit; they responded with a seven-game winning streak that landed them a fifth seed in the Class 4A, Region I tournament.

It was a vintage Dave Byers performance, and will probably bring results in February.The longtime successful Westminster High boys basketball coach spent 20 minutes performing mental surgery on his players and the media after his team fell to a 1-3 record last Friday with a 56-53 loss to Centennial.First, Byers met privately with his players and told them what they were doing wrong and what they had to do to become a competent team again.Then the performance got even better when he faced the media while some of the players milled around in the background.

What exactly happened to Maxwell C. Byers, president of the Western Maryland Railway, who was gunned down in a spectacular noontime murder on Sept. 23, 1930, in his fifth-floor office in the Standard Oil Building on St. Paul Place? His murder, nearly eight decades later, still haunts his family. "It's unbelievable. It's like his entire family was placed under a gag order," said a grandson, Dr. Robert Maxwell Byers, 72, a retired Houston surgeon, who is determined to get to the bottom of the case.

On Friday, the same day two more people were sentenced for the contract killing of her son, Margaret Shipley was given the first of what's to be an annual award named after him. The Lackl Award honors victims or witnesses whose "extraordinary fortitude and perseverance ensures that justice prevails," Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein said in a statement. Shipley's son, Carl Stanley Lackl, agreed to testify in a murder case despite grave personal risks, and he was killed for it two years ago. Eight people have been convicted in Lackl's death, and seven of them sentenced, including Patrick Byers, who used a contraband cell phone in prison to order Lackl's murder.

Two more young Baltimore men were sentenced to decades in federal prison Thursday for their roles in the 2007 contract killing of murder witness Carl Lackl, who was shot repeatedly in front of his Baltimore County home. Marcus Pearson, who was paid to mastermind the murder, was sentenced to 35 years in a plea agreement. Ronald Williams, who provided a gun to the teenage shooter and drove him to Lackl's home, received 25 years. Each had faced potential life terms, though U.S. District Judge Richard D. Bennett accepted a recommendation for the lower sentencing ranges based on the defendants' "substantial cooperation" with prosecutors.

A federal jury on Monday spared the life of drug dealer Patrick Albert Byers Jr. for the 2007 contract killing of a murder witness, delivering instead a sentence of four consecutive life terms for a man whose criminal activities continued even while he was behind bars. The case brought renewed attention to two major obstacles to justice in Baltimore - witness intimidation and contraband cell phones. From prison, Byers, 24, used a cell phone to order the hit on Carl Stanley Lackl, a 38-year-old Rosedale man who was fatally shot in front of his children as he waited outside his home to meet a potential buyer for a car. Even as the trial was about to begin, prosecutors said Byers had again gained access to a phone and intimidated a second witness into recanting his testimony.

A federal jury will resume deliberations Monday in the life-or-death sentencing of Patrick Albert Byers Jr., who was convicted last month of using a contraband cell phone in jail to arrange the 2007 murder of a Baltimore witness. Members began deliberations late Friday in Baltimore's U.S. District Court, but the judge dismissed them for the weekend after two hours. Jurors had already found Byers guilty of two murders: the death of a Baltimore drug dealer in March 2006 and, a year later, the hired killing of Carl Stanley Lackl, who witnessed the first murder and was planning to testify in city court.

Anyone looking for Marcus Antwan Pearson knew to find him on the edge of Normal Avenue, a small, hopeless stretch of one-way street pointing toward Harford Road in North Baltimore. Here, he dealt crack cocaine alongside other young men in T-shirts and baggy jeans, red bandannas hanging like flags from their back pockets. In a day, he could make $1,700, which he spent on cheap hotels and feel-good highs from Ecstasy, marijuana and women. Pearson had grown up tall - 6-foot-2 - and narrow in East Baltimore, where he was born.

A federal jury found two Baltimore men guilty Friday in the contract killing of witness Carl Stanley Lackl, bringing to justice the last of eight people - drug dealers, gang members and one nursing assistant - charged in the conspiracy, which began nearly two years ago with a text message sent from a Baltimore jail. The jury will next decide whether to sentence Patrick Albert Byers Jr., who ordered the hit while incarcerated on murder charges, to death. His co-defendant, Frank Keith Goodman, acted as Byers' agent on the outside and faces life in prison; he will be sentenced July 17. Both men are 23. Lackl's mother and longtime girlfriend sobbed as the guilty verdict was read.

A case against a Baltimore man accused of ordering a witness killing from jail using a contraband cell phone is expected to go to the jury Thursday after prosecutors have their final say in the morning. It is a last chance to address defense claims that the government's star witness - the "glue" holding the case together - is a lying "snake." Patrick Albert Byers Jr. is accused of ordering Carl Lackl's death to prevent the Rosedale man from testifying against him in a 2006 city murder case.