Child

As bad as Matt Birk and the Ravens must have felt after Sunday night's 34-14 loss to the San Diego Chargers, it was nothing but joy today for the veteran center. Ravens coach John Harbaugh confirmed at today's news conference that the center's wife, Adrianna, gave birth to the couple's sixth child, a boy. Tweets between some of Birk's teammates said the name of the boy was Brady. After 11 seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, Birk, 35, has spent the last three seasons with the Ravens after signing as a free agent in 2009.

The Maryland Senate passed a bill Wednesday morning that would make it illegal for a driver or passenger to smoke in a vehicle occupied by a child under 8 years old. Senators voted 27-19 to send the bill to the House of Delegates after a lively debate over the rights of children to be protected from the dangers of second-hand smoke versus the rights of parents to be free from government intrusion in their vehicles. The legislation would allow police officers to pull over drivers observed to be smoking in cars with a child in a booster seat.

A Forest Hill man was arrested Monday on a warrant charging him with four child pornography counts that resulted from a Maryland State Police investigation conducted in April and May, state police said. Nicholas Alexander Cukr, 25, of the 2200 block of Issacs Way, is charged with two counts each of promoting/distributing child pornography and possession of child pornography, according to court records. State police investigator Cpl. Keith Thomas was monitoring file sharing networks on the Internet in April when he came across a man, allegedly Cukr, offering images and videos of suspected child pornography, according to Lt. John Wilhelm of the state police.

Prosecutors outlined a tale of demons, death and attempted resurrection Monday during opening statements of a child-murder trial that promises to be among the strangest the Baltimore City Circuit Court has ever seen, because of both its substance and its style. The three defendants, all alleged to be cult members, have declined attorneys and are representing themselves against charges they starved a willful baby to death because he wouldn't say "amen" after meals. The trial is expected to involve testimony from the child's mother, who prayed over his body for days in the hopes he would come back to life.

A 21-year-old Baltimore man was arrested and charged Thursday with possessing and distributing child pornography, according to Maryland State Police. Jason Barron, of the 300 block of South Baylis Street, now faces 30 years in prison and $55,000 in fines, police said. Barron was identified after a state trooper on the Maryland Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force identified a computer offering pornographic videos of children to others on the Internet, and then linked the computer to him, police said.

A Montgomery County elementary school teacher was charged Thursday in Baltimore County for possession of child pornography, police said. Lawrence Joynes, 54, of Dundalk, teaches music at New Hampshire Estates Elementary school in Silver Spring, according to the school's website. Montgomery police will be investigating whether Joynes committed any offenses in that county. A spokesman from the school system did not immediately respond to requests for comment Friday morning.

Thomas Leroy Griffin, formerly of Hagerstown and Rosedale, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court on Monday to charges he sexually abused a child to produce child pornography. Griffin, 32, began committing the abuses against his victim when she was 5 or 6 years old, according to the plea agreement, engaging in sexually explicit conduct with the child in order to produce visual depictions on at least five occasions. The victim's mother discovered a videotape documenting the abuse last December.

On Dec. 8, four members of the Howard County Board of Education - Frank Aquino, Sandra French, Janet Siddiqui and Ellen Giles, made a major, anti-child centered decision that this community should be aware of. Their decision to not allow redistricted fifth graders to finish at their current elementary schools clearly delineated who on the board cares about the students of this county and who does not. On the other hand, Brian Meshkin, Allen...

Editor's note: A retelling of the Russian folk tale about a husband and wife and the answer to their wish for a child. The children of the village were playing outside. They were building a snowman as big as a giant. When the snowman was finished and the children had gone, the old man turned to his wife. "Why don't we go outside and build a snow child?" he said. Slowly and carefully they shaped the snow. They made a little body with dainty hands and feet. They rolled a ball of snow and shaped the head.

ANNAPOLIS -- Michael Jenkins always saw the 1986 death of his 9-year-old daughter, Myeshia, as a sacrifice that could save others from child abuse.Now, at Mr. Jenkins' insistence, the bulk of a $250,000 settlement approved yesterday by the state Board of Public Works will be distributed among 10 child-advocacy groups in Maryland -- to be spent on preventing abuse and domestic violence. Mr. Jenkins, who lives in Baltimore, will receive $50,000."There are a lot of heroes in this story, and certainly one of the big heroes is Mr. Jenkins," said Kathryn V. Shulman, executive director of the Public Justice Center, part of Mr. Jenkins' legal team and one of the groups that will receive money as a result of the settlement.