Criminal Justice System

Defendants awaiting bail reviews are spending extra nights in jail because of court closures throughout the state, and the delays are expected to continue as the second storm in a week dumps another layer of snow across the region Wednesday. The shuttering is particularly burdensome to Baltimore, where the overstressed system already defers hundreds of court cases daily. Roughly 1,000 criminal cases have been postponed in the city since Friday, with 400 or so added to the count each day that district and circuit courts are closed, according to a Baltimore Sun review of available statistics.

Last week, the Baltimore state's attorney's office declined to prosecute a Johns Hopkins University student from New Jersey who investigators concluded "feared for his safety" when he used a samurai sword to kill an unarmed intruder. This week, prosecutors obtained an indictment charging two inner-city men with attempted first-degree murder for wrestling away an Uzi-style gun from a man who police said had just shot their friend in the head at a downtown hotel, and then beating him severely.

Baltimore's incoming mayor, Stephanie C. Rawlings-Blake, pressed Annapolis lawmakers to toughen state gun laws at a packed hearing Tuesday before the House Judiciary Committee, saying "we have to do more" to build on successes in reducing crime. Rawlings-Blake, who will take the city's helm Thursday when Mayor Sheila Dixon steps down, spoke briefly to the committee. The delegates welcomed her warmly, at times calling her "mayor-elect" and "mayor." The legislation she supports would broaden an offense known as "use of a handgun in commission of a crime."

The arrest on Christmas day of a Nigerian man suspected of trying to blow up a commercial airliner en route from Amsterdam to Detroit with nearly 300 people aboard was a stark reminder that the nation can't afford to let down its guard in the struggle against Islamic extremism. The suspect, 23-year-old Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, allegedly tried to detonate explosives concealed in his underwear shortly before the plane landed, but the device fizzled and started a fire instead, allowing alert fellow passengers to tackle him and douse the flames.

For Baltimore's police commissioner, the death of Michael Sidney Guest Jr. offered a perfect opportunity to rail against the criminal justice system. Police said Guest shot two people in the legs outside a court building in South Baltimore's Brooklyn neighborhood on the afternoon of Dec. 14 and, in turn, was fatally shot by an officer. The 32-year-old Guest had a long criminal record that began when, at age 15, he pointed a revolver at his best friend's head and pulled the trigger.

T he other day, while waiting for the bread dough to rise in my kitchen, I filled out a Maryland Sentencing Guidelines Worksheet for the mayor of Baltimore, and this is what it looks like: probation to six months, with the possibility of the judge hitting Sheila Dixon harder or softer - and I'll tell you why it could go either way in a moment. First, I need to give a shout-out to the Honorable Howard S. Chasanow and others associated with the Maryland State Commission on Criminal Sentencing Policy.

E ach year, as many people are released from Maryland's prisons as are employed at the Johns Hopkins medical complex in East Baltimore. And each year, the Johns Hopkins Hospital helps provide meaningful futures for some of these ex-prisoners by offering them new hope in the form of jobs. Studies have shown that former prisoners' ability to find and maintain gainful employment is crucial to their successful return to their families, communities and society. Without good, steady jobs, many return to illegal activities, fueling an unacceptable recidivism rate and eroding public safety.

Lamont Davis, the 17-year-old arrested and charged as an adult in the shooting of 5-year-old Raven Wyatt, should never have been on the streets. He had been arrested 15 times since he was 10, and he had been committed to the custody of the Department of Juvenile Services since February 2008, during which time he was arrested and charged in four separate incidents. Yet in June, a juvenile court judge let him out of the secure detention facility where he had been held after his last arrest in April for assaulting and robbing a teenage girl.