Documents

If you're spring cleaning and want to purge piles of outdated and unnecessary documents and electronic media full of sensitive information, we've got the shredding event for you. The Maryland Attorney General's office , Incred-A-Shred and Junior Achievement will host a free shredding event from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, April 9 at the Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, 1400 W. Cold Spring Lane. Both businesses and residents are invited to bring their shred-worthy items to be destroyed, keeping your personal information --- or your clients --- out of the hands of identity thieves.

Joanna Sullivan knows what she saw Saturday night as she and her husband peered through the window of their home overlooking Patterson Park - more than 20 youths involved in a "melee" on the tennis courts. But police statistics and incidents reports won't show that any such incident took place. The reason points to a disconnect between residents' experiences with crimes and longstanding police policies. The incident occurred at about 9 p.m. on the Patterson Park tennis courts.

The assistant principal of a Northeast Baltimore high school was arrested Tuesday and charged with stealing eight Apple iPads that the school was going to use in its graduation ceremony, according to court records. Leonard Sheppard Hart, 38, was arrested at the Antioch Diploma Plus High School on Harford Road and released from central booking on his own recognizance, facing one count of theft under $10,000. A system spokeswoman said he was placed on administrative leave. Charging documents filed by city school police Sgt. Akil L. Hamm allege that Hart stole the devices and chargers, with a total value of $3,992, from the school's main office on June.

Gov. Martin O'Malley has long promised that Baltimore and the Washington suburbs would each get a new light-rail line and that the Red Line and its Purple counterpart outside D.C. could be built at the same time. But state financial documents recently submitted to the Federal Transit Administration show that O'Malley's promise, to the state's most populous regions, will be difficult — if not impossible — to keep. The General Assembly's recent rejection of the governor's proposed gas tax hike makes it increasingly likely that the state will have to choose to build one line before the other, state and local transportation officials say. With no new tax revenue dedicated to transportation, finding the money for even one of the light-rail lines will be difficult, the officials say. The state hoped to begin construction on both lines in 2015, with the 14-mile Red Line — which would ultimately run from Woodlawn to the Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center — opening in early 2021 and the 16-mile Purple Line opening between Bethesda and New Carrollton by late 2020.

At the same time he was selling U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union, former FBI Special Agent Robert Philip Hanssen was a key supervisor in a 1980s domestic-spying program questioning the loyalty of U.S. citizens and monitoring their activities, newly obtained FBI documents show. In this program, federal agents filed reports on teachers, clerics and political activists who were primarily affiliated with liberal causes. FBI domestic spy operations under the Reagan and first Bush administrations came to light a decade ago, prompting congressional rebukes.

A four-page personal handwritten letter from John Jay Audubon to Gideon B. Smith, dated May 18, 1843, taken from the Connecticut Historical Society. A single-page letter from Marie Antoinette written in French on Oct. 2, 1784, taken from the Connecticut Historical Society. A letter written in French from Napoleon Bonaparte on Sept. 17, 1878, taken from the Connecticut Historical Society. A letter written by Karl Marx on April 14, 1874, to P.H. King inquiring about the title and price of a book bearing Marx's signature, taken from the Wilbur Collection at the University of Vermont Library.

Every now and then, you get a press release that breaks new ground in the areas of creativity and hilarity. This is one of those times. Yesterday, the CIA sent out an Earth Day press release highlighting the agency's environmentally friendly initiatives.  Their plan? Burning documents.  Seriously. You can't make this stuff up. The release said:  "The Central Intelligence Agency’s practice of shredding and burning classified papers—often referred to in movies and books as “ burn after reading ” —is one of several ways the CIA conserves energy, reduces its impact on the environment, and lowers costs through its sustainability efforts.

Less than four months after a Maryland Historical Society employee uncovered a cultural property heist called "truly breathtaking" by national archivists, one of the men charged in the scheme has pleaded guilty. Jason James Savedoff, 24, admitted Thursday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore that he and co-defendant Barry H. Landau, 63, conspired to steal and sell valuable historic documents from museums in several states, including Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania and Connecticut.

Leaders of the embattled Baltimore City Foundation must provide documents explaining how they collect and distribute funds, the number and type of accounts that belong to each city agency, and how much work is done for the nonprofit while employees are on the city's clock. The demands came at the end of a two-hour hearing Wednesday night, during which members of the City Council's legislative committee barraged the foundation's president, the city's finance director and the heads of city agencies about how the nonprofit handles money.

Document thief Barry Landau may have sold more of the national treasures he stole from museums — including the Maryland Historical Society in Baltimore, where his scheme unraveled — than previously thought, according to the National Archives inspector general, who said Wednesday that his investigators have uncovered new evidence. Members of the agency's Archival Recovery Team are now targeting historic document dealers who illegally, if unknowingly, bought pieces from Landau for $500 to $6,000 apiece, based on the disgraced collector's own sales records, which were found during an FBI search of Landau's Manhattan apartment.

One document proposed a deliberate plan to suppress black votes: "The first and most desired outcome is voter suppression. " Another depicted the campaign of former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. promising a bonus to consultant Julius Henson if he made "the city turnout stay low" on Election Day 2010.  A third document contained notes from a Henson employee that said: "Suppress turnout in black communities," next to the words: "Obama, O'Malley,...

Internal Fannie Mae documents show the mortgage financier was about to launch a principal reduction program in 2010 after determining that it would save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, a Baltimore congressman says -- contradicting claims by Fannie's regulator that such a move would be costly. U.S. Reps. Elijah E. Cummings of Baltimore and John F. Tierney of Massachusetts, Democrats who sit on the House Committee on Oversight & Government Reform, sent a joint letter Tuesday to regulator Edward DeMarco demanding more information about why the program was "mysteriously terminated" in July 2010.

The defense attorney for 28-year-old Michael Johnson, charged with first-degree murder in the killing of Phylicia Barnes, told reporters on Thursday that his client had been struck and kicked during his arrest. He disputed a statement from the city's top prosecutor that the arrest went down "without incident. " But trying to track down what actually happened has been a frustrating ordeal, not just on the allegations of mistreatment, but the aura of secrecy surrounding this high-profile case.

Late on a Friday afternoon, Anne Arundel County announced that it had conducted an “exhaustive search,” and found nothing to indicate that County Executive John R. Leopold had a political “enemies list”. The response to a Maryland Public Information Act request didn't do much to quiet the criticism that has followed Leopold's March indictment on misconduct charges. He's accused of having county officers collect information about his foes, as well as directing them to drive him to sexual encounters with a county employee.

The city's spending panel on Wednesday approved a $95,000 payout to a 90-year-old Baltimore woman who said she was roughed up by police. The sum was the result of a deal brokered between city lawyers and Venus Green, who alleged that her shoulder was separated during a scuffle with officers in her home on Poplar Grove Street in west Baltimore's Walbrook neighborhood in July 2009. According to documents the city's legal department filed with the Board of Estimates, three officers — Officer Kimberly Hanline, Det. Mark Spila and Sgt. Darryl T. Collins — entered Green's home against her objections while investigating a shooting at K&K Carryout, which is on Green's street.

At first glance, the image could be a Rohrschach inkblot, or maybe abstract art. What it doesn't resemble is public information - because, really, how informative can a blacked-out chart be? This image was given to The Sun by Baltimore's housing authority in response to a records request made under the Maryland Public Information Act. It illustrates the challenges reporters regularly face in trying to obtain public information from government agencies. (The agencies would probably say it shows how effectively the law keeps prying eyes from seeing things not meant for public consumption.)

Federal agents seized documents related to insurance claims during a search earlier this year of a Rosedale auto body shop, possibly indicating that a corruption probe into a towing scheme that has ensnared 30 city police officers may now be broadened to include insurance fraud. According to court documents that were recently made public, boxes of documents and other items were seized during searches conducted at Majestic Auto Repair Shop and the Rosedale home of one of the shop's owners, who has been charged with paying kickbacks to city police officers for steering business his way. Prosecutors say that officers who responded to car accidents got $300 for each damaged car they sent to Majestic.

The two New Yorkers charged with stealing historic documents from Maryland were indicted federally Thursday in a far broader scheme in which prosecutors say they stole many more valuable manuscripts from museums in both states. A National Archives official called the scope of the case "truly breathtaking," with the indictment charging that the two men pilfered and sold copies of speeches from a former president and took a land grant signed by Abraham Lincoln along with a letter to John Paul Jones.

Every day, stories appear in The Baltimore Sun that are driven by investigative reporting. Some are major data analysis projects, while others are smaller glimpses into how institutions of power operate. This blog will help us highlight the results of those investigations, share primary source documents and give readers a better understanding of how journalists do their jobs.

The Ames United Methodist Church Scholarship Committee has applications available for the 2012 Ames United Methodist Church Scholarship for graduating high school seniors residing in Harford County. To request a copy of the scholarship packet and for more information, email Ames UMC Scholarship Committee, amesumcscholarshipcommittee@live.com . Completed applications must be postmarked by April 15. All incomplete applications and those that are incomplete will be rejected and returned to the applicant with no further action taken for consideration by the scholarship committee.