Grand Jury

A cabal of corrupt corrections officers and members of the Black Guerrilla Family gang enjoyed nearly free rein inside the Baltimore City Detention Center, federal authorities allege, smuggling drugs and cellphones into the jail and having sexual relationships that left four guards pregnant. An indictment unsealed Tuesday names 25 people - including 13 women working as corrections officers - who face racketeering and drug charges. Twenty of the accused also face money-laundering charges.

A grand jury on Thursday indicted the driver state police said was high on drugs when his car sped into downtown, striking and killing a pedestrian before it overturned outside City Hall. Johnny Johnson, 43, faces nine counts, including vehicular homicide and homicide by vehicle while under the influence of a controlled dangerous substance, in the April 9 death of city finance employee Matthew Hersl. The indictment mirrors many of the charges the Maryland State Police filed on the warrant they used to arrest Johnson on April 15. Test results showed drugs were in Johnson's system at the time of the crash, while investigators found cocaine and heroin in his car, police said.

WASHINGTON -- A retired Army general has been charged with having sex with the wives of four subordinate officers, lying about it and obstructing justice by telling one of the women he would testify against her in a child custody suit if she revealed their affair, Army officials said yesterday.Maj. Gen. David R. E. Hale, 53, who retired amid the allegations in February as the Army's deputy inspector general, now faces the military's equivalent of a grand jury. He could become the first senior military officer in more than 40 years to be called back from retirement for a court-martial.

When he became state's attorney two years ago, Gregg L. Bernstein created the Major Investigations Unit, pulling in elite prosecutors to go after violent repeat offenders using complex techniques. In February, the unit took on a new case: a downtown fistfight among a group of people who work in finance. After police had declined to charge anyone, two 29-year-olds with government clearances and no criminal records were indicted by a grand jury and taken to jail before dawn on a Friday to sit in Central Booking for four days before getting a hearing.

Someone called to testify Wednesday before the grand jury looking into the Ehrlich campaign's deceptive Election Day robocalls tells me Towson attorney Robert B. Green was in the waiting room, offering to consult with any witnesses connected to the campaign. I phoned Green, and his partner, David B. Irwin , took the call. “My firm represents the Bob Ehrlich for Maryland Committee, that's what I can tell you,” said Irwin, a former federal prosecutor and white-collar criminal defense lawyer.

Update: Former Gov. Bob Ehrlich, longtime aide Greg Massoni and former elections board chief Gene Raynor were called to testify before the grand jury, according to my source. Chris Cavey, former chairman of the Baltimore County GOP,   just confirmed to me that he also testified. Former Ehrlich communications director Paul Schurick and Joe Sliwka, a former campaign aide, were not called to testify. I misunderstood my source and I regret the error. Former Gov. Bob Ehrlich and a two top aide s testified last week before the grand jury investigating deceptive Election Day robocalls made on behalf of his re-election campaign, a source close to the matter told me Tuesday.

The cryptic email went out this week to some of the region's news media — including WMAR-TV and The Baltimore Sun — asking journalists to appear before the city's grand jury, which plans to spend the next few months analyzing the impact of crime coverage on efforts to end violence. It's a sort of term project squeezed in between criminal indictments, and a decades-old tradition for the panel. In addition to evaluating state's evidence, the 23 grand jurors in the city also examine a social issue during their four-month tenure and make recommendations for change.

A Baltimore grand jury indicted a 29-year-old woman Monday on attempted murder and seven other charges in connection with the brutal stabbing of her 8-month-old daughter during a supervised visit at a city social services office in April. Kenisha Thomas, who is being held without bail in the incident, was scheduled for a preliminary hearing in district court Tuesday, but the indictment will move the felony case into circuit court. An arraignment on the new charges is set for July 17. According to police, Thomas smuggled a large kitchen knife into a Baltimore social services office April 24 and repeatedly stabbed the infant, named Pretty Diamond, in the head and neck as office staff fought back, with one man throwing a chair at her. The baby, who previously was removed from Thomas' care, survived.

A man accused of shooting and killing a woman in Long Reach and a man accused in a fatal stabbing in Harper's Choice were indicted Wednesday, Oct. 12 by a Howard County grand jury. Dominique Davon McDonald, 21, of the 9700 block of Clocktower Lane in Columbia, is facing one count each of first-degree murder, using a handgun in a felony violent crime, and possessing a firearm after being convicted of a violent crime. He is accused in the Sept. 12 death of Baltimore-based bail bondswoman Nichole Bernadette McNair in the 8700 block of Hayshed Lane.

The state prosecutor has empanelled a grand jury to hear testimony about deceptive Election Day robocalls made on behalf of former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. The grand jury will meet this month in Baltimore to hear testimony from at least one person who was subpoenaed Friday but asked not to be identified. It was unclear whether the grand jury has already met. The subpoena and the existence of the grand jury are the first developments to come to light in the case since December, when investigators for the state prosecutor raided the home and office of political operative Julius Henson.

A grand jury in Carroll County has indicted a sex offender registered in Maryland and Pennsylvania on 20 counts of sexual offenses involving minors, according to a statement issued by the Maryland State's Attorney's Office. The grand jury registered the indictment against David Michael Blaker, a 31-year-old Taneytown resident currently incarcerated in Pennsylvania. The move is the culmination of a six-month investigation by the Carroll County Advocacy and Investigation Center, a division of the State's Attorney's Office.

I'm not saying that Jean Marbella deliberately tried to mislead readers in her recent column ("In all these sex scandals, see a double standard," Nov. 18) in which she implied that Bill Clinton had been impeached because he had had a sexual affair with a female intern in The White House. Nor am I saying that she tried to excuse his outrageous behavior by asserting, "...there's no shame in being a stud. " Truth be told, however, President Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives for committing perjury before a grand jury, and for obstructing justice.

A 55-year-old man operating an unauthorized cab in Baltimore witnessed a passenger's arrest, according to prosecutors, then turned down a bribe to give false testimony in the case. Months later, he was shot to death in front of the suburban home he shared with his elderly mother. City and Baltimore County prosecutors revealed the details of the 2011 killing of Ronald Givens on Thursday as they announced the murder indictments of four men, three of whom were also charged with conspiracy, witness intimidation and obstruction of justice.

A Baltimore County police officer was indicted Wednesday in the death of a Randallstown teen, but the charges drew criticism from the boy's mother and the community, who continued calls for an outside investigation. James D. Laboard, a nine-year veteran, faces charges of voluntary and involuntary manslaughter in the asphyxiation death of 17-year-old Christopher Brown, whom police said he chased after a group of teens threw a rock at his front door on June 13. Each count carries a maximum of 10 years in prison.

WEATHER Today's forecast calls for cloudy skies, patchy fog and a chance of showers and thunderstorms, with a high temperature near 79 degrees. Monday night is expected to be cloudy, with a low temperature around 67 degrees. TRAFFIC Check our traffic updates for this morning's issues as you plan your commute. FROM LAST NIGHT... Officer thrown from I-83 sues driver, vehicle owner : The Baltimore police officer who was thrown over the side of Interstate 83 and fell 20 feet after a car crashed into her vehicle as she helped a stranded motorist has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the driver and the owner of the vehicle.

A Baltimore grand jury indicted a 29-year-old woman Monday on attempted murder and seven other charges in connection with the brutal stabbing of her 8-month-old daughter during a supervised visit at a city social services office in April. Kenisha Thomas, who is being held without bail in the incident, was scheduled for a preliminary hearing in district court Tuesday, but the indictment will move the felony case into circuit court. An arraignment on the new charges is set for July 17. According to police, Thomas smuggled a large kitchen knife into a Baltimore social services office April 24 and repeatedly stabbed the infant, named Pretty Diamond, in the head and neck as office staff fought back, with one man throwing a chair at her. The baby, who previously was removed from Thomas' care, survived.

The death of Phylicia Barnes has been added to the city's murder total for 2011, officials said.  The move is merely an administrative issue, though it does bump up the city's first murder count under 200 since the 1970s. Phylicia went missing from Northwest Baltimore in December 2010 and her body was found floating in the Susquehanna River between Harford and Cecil counties in April 2011. State police and Baltimore detectives worked the case together. Last month, authorities charged the ex-boyfriend of Phylicia's older half-sister in her death, indicting him through a grand jury in Baltimore.

There were at least as many police officers as protesters in front of City Hall on Tuesday evening after a group of about 40 people walked there from the site of a planned youth jail in downtown Baltimore. "It's screwed up," said community activist Kim Trueheart of the police presence. "It's a function of not wanting to understand that having a conversation is an important step in healing, solving problems and communicating. " The rally was organized to call attention to the death of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old unarmed African-American who was shot by a neighborhood watch volunteer named George Zimmerman in Sanford, Fla., at the end of February.