Gunfire

THE COUNT Homicides since Jan. 1: 255 THE VICTIM A contractor renovating a rowhouse at Oswego and Park Heights avenues in Northwest Baltimore found a man fatally shot and another man critically wounded from gunfire. The incident was reported yesterday shortly before 10:30 a.m. LAST YEAR: Baltimore had recorded 234 homicides as of Nov. 8, 2006. ONLINE: Details and locations of this year's city homicides are at baltimoresun.com/homicidemap

At least four males were injured and one was killed after a shooting last night in the 500 block of Baker St. in Druid Heights, a police dispatcher said.Police said multiple gunshots were fired at a group standing on Baker Street around 10: 30 p.m. Three ran to the 1200 block of W. North Ave., where they collapsed from gunshot wounds, police said. One of the three, who has not been identified, died at the scene.Two other victims fell on Baker Street and were transported to hospitals. Police were still investigating the incident early this morning and were unable to provide details.

Police officers responding to a complaint of gunfire yesterday found an unidentified man dead in a vacant West Baltimore rowhouse, but investigators reported no motive or suspects in the case.Lt. Steven R. Ossmus said the victim was found on the second floor of the two-story, boarded-up house in the 1100 block of N. Stockton St. a few minutes before noon. He was pronounced dead at the scene, Ossmus said.Homicide detectives took a young man to police headquarters for questioning, but said they knew little about the slaying yesterday afternoon.

Prince George's County police said they were investigating yesterday whether gunfire on the Capital Beltway caused a Capitol Heights man to veer off the busy highway during the Friday evening rush hour and crash in a wooded area.Police found the body of Charles Frederick Carson, 33, inside his two-door gray Acura about 6 p.m in the woods off the northbound exit ramp of Interstate 495 at Pennsylvania Avenue.Police combed the area because of reports from several witnesses who said they saw a car veer off the road into a ditch after they heard several shots.

A man was found fatally shot last night in a West Baltimore apartment where police found about 4 pounds of cocaine, authorities reported.The slaying in the 2500 block of Winchester St. was discovered after neighbors called police about 8 p.m. to report gunfire -- about two hours after a fatal shooting in East Baltimore.Investigators could not identify the Winchester Street victim last night, said Agent Ragina L. Cooper, a police spokeswoman. He had been shot in the head."Police believe it was drug-related," Cooper said.

A young man was killed and three others were wounded early yesterday during what police described as an attempted robbery that ended in gunfire on a street near Lexington Market.Police were trying last night to piece together an account of the shooting and as of yesterday had not been able to find the relatives of the dead 19-year-old.The shooting occurred about one hour after a Dru Hill concert ended at the nearby Baltimore Arena, but police said they did not know whether the victims or the gunman had attended the show.

A Riviera Beach man who had allegedly just shot his father to death was wounded in an exchange of gunfire with an Anne Arundel county police officer Monday night.Steven Francis Fortmann, 44, who remained hospitalized in serious condition yesterday, was wounded in the chest and arm by Officer Marc I. Gelven after he allegedly fired twice at the officer with a .38-caliber handgun.After the shootout, Fortmann's father, Francis Joseph Fortmann, 72, was found dead inside his home in the 200 block of Harlem Road with gunshot wounds to his neck and back, police said.

Country living great except for the huntersWhen we moved to northern Baltimore County more than two years ago, we were not moving away from life in the city but to a dream of life in the country.We had enjoyed our life in the city, were not overly concerned with crime and had good relationships with our neighbors. We expected that to continue on our 22-acre farm. We have not been disappointed. Except for one thing.As much as we wanted not to be ''city slickers,'' we were dismayed to find that around November our woods were filled with gunfire -- sometimes even from automatic weapons.

The County Commissioners voted to spend an additional $12,000 on the county's new firing range yesterday in an attempt to muffle the noise of gunfire bothering residents in a nearby subdivision.The range, deep in the Northern Landfill off Route 140 north of Reese Road, is shielded on the right by a steep hill and on the left by sound panels and woods. But it is open at the rear.And five days a week, from 10 a.m. to an hour before sundown, the sounds of rifle and pistol fire travel across the open landfill through a valley and up a hillside to the Tannery Manor subdivision off Naugahyde Road.

An auto theft suspect and a bystander were shot by city police in West Baltimore last night as police chased the suspect, armed with a .22-caliber handgun, through a residential neighborhood, according to police spokesman Robert W. Weinhold Jr.Both the suspect and the bystander were taken to Maryland Shock Trauma Center last night. The suspect was in critical condition with wounds in the back and abdominal area and the bystander had leg wounds that were not life threatening, Weinhold said.

Baltimore police dispatchers put out a call just after midnight yesterday that captured everyone's attention: Unit One ... Signal 13. In other words, the police commissioner needs help - fast. The city's top cop, Frederick H. Bealefeld III, was alone in the basement of a Southwest Baltimore rowhouse holding a suspect at gunpoint. A member of his executive protection unit, Peter Sullivan, was upstairs searching the house for a second man with a gun. "I was worried about him," Bealefeld said yesterday, referring to his fellow officer.

A 24-year-old Baltimore man was sentenced yesterday to 25 years in prison for shooting and killing an innocent bystander, a Patterson High School senior and lacrosse team captain, during a gunfight. Jerome Whitaker was sentenced along with Brandon Green, 23, who was given a five-year term as an accessory after the fact in the murder of Christopher Clarke in March, 2007. The hearing yesterday in Baltimore Circuit Court lasted only a few minutes, as the judge had agreed to the sentences in October in exchange for guilty pleas.

THE COUNT Homicides since Jan. 1: 255 THE VICTIM A contractor renovating a rowhouse at Oswego and Park Heights avenues in Northwest Baltimore found a man fatally shot and another man critically wounded from gunfire. The incident was reported yesterday shortly before 10:30 a.m. LAST YEAR: Baltimore had recorded 234 homicides as of Nov. 8, 2006. ONLINE: Details and locations of this year's city homicides are at baltimoresun.com/homicidemap

It started out as a family errand: Ahmed Haithem Ahmed was driving his mother, Mohassin, to pick up his father at the Baghdad hospital where he was a pathologist. As they approached Nisour Square at midday Sept. 16, they did not know that a bomb had gone off nearby or that a convoy of four armored vehicles carrying Blackwater guards armed with automatic rifles was approaching. Moments later a bullet tore through Ahmed's head, he slumped, and the car rolled forward. Then Blackwater guards responded with a barrage of gunfire and explosive weapons, leaving 17 dead and 24 wounded - a higher toll than previously thought, according to Iraqi investigators.

BAGHDAD -- Millions watched yesterday as the underdog Iraqi national soccer team won its first Asian Cup, beating three-time champions Saudi Arabia, 1-0, in overtime. Fans took to the streets to celebrate across Iraq -- in Kurdish areas to the north, Shiite holy cities to the south and several neighborhoods in the capital. Revelers painted their faces with the tricolor Iraqi flag, throwing candy or shooting fireworks in triumph. Iraqi soldiers waved from passing vehicles. Honking cars clogged the main route into Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, home to the U.S. Embassy and U.S. military posts.

A Baltimore police officer was wounded early yesterday in an exchange of gunfire with a suspect who also was wounded, police said yesterday. The officer, Jermell Rayam, 26, was one of three patrolmen, along with a sergeant, who were on patrol in the 2300 block of Barclay St. about 12:40 a.m., said Officer Nicole Monroe, a police spokeswoman. The officers came across a group of men in an area known for drug transactions and "saw what they believed was suspected drug activity," Monroe said.

A Baltimore man who in 2004 was shot twice by police officers was sentenced to 35 years in prison yesterday in an armed robbery of a restaurant that was interrupted by a Maryland Transit Administration officer, according to city prosecutors. Jurors were unable to reach a verdict for Dale Fauntleroy in January 2005, and a judge declared a hung jury. Prosecutors retried the case and got a conviction Feb. 1 on charges of conspiracy to commit robbery and armed robbery. Police said the MTA officer, Orlando Bordley, exchanged gunfire with Fauntleroy and another man as they ran from the robbery scene in October 2004, hitting Fauntleroy in the buttocks.

Antonio Hill, 16, of Reservoir Hill, was named by city police yesterday as the victim of gunfire early Sunday on a street in West Baltimore - the city's latest reported homicide. The teenager's death brought to 219 the number of homicides in the city so far this year, compared with 213 at the same time last year, police said. Hill, of the 700 block of Lennox St., was found about 2:40 a.m. lying on the pavement next to a parked car in the 800 block of W. Baltimore St. by officers responding to reports of gunfire, said Agent Donny Moses, a police spokesman.

Nearly a dozen bullets were fired along a narrow and crowded street in East Baltimore late yesterday afternoon, wounding a man and a 4-year-old boy, city police said. Police said they were seeking a gunman who fled after the shooting about 5:30 p.m. in the 700 block of N. Rose St. The names of the victims - both of whom were expected to survive - were not available last night. One shot hit a 26-year-old man in the lower back and another struck the boy in the left hip as he was playing outside a rowhouse, police said.

WASHINGTON -- Police locked down a House of Representatives office building for nearly five hours yesterday as they investigated reports of gunfire in an underground parking garage. In the end, police concluded that the sound had come from a jackhammer or some other piece of equipment being used to perform routine maintenance in an elevator shaft in the Rayburn House Office Building. Until police sorted out the matter, some members of Congress and their staffs found themselves trapped in their offices, forbidden to leave.