Homicide Victims

The Rev. Jan E. Hamill began with Ronny Martin. Then Kristopher Reinhard. Next, Kayla Baker. When she was finished listing the children killed in Baltimore last year, the Episcopal priest had read 32 names. The youngest was Zion Clemmons, a 4-month-old boy who police say was killed by a caregiver. Another name read during the New Year's Day service at the Cathedral of the Incarnation was Jason E. Sanders, a 17-year-old shot, according to police, by his 15-year-old brother. "Each of the 32 matter to us, whether the story of their life is known to us or not," Hamill told several dozen congregants yesterday morning.

Marlin Barnett Hopkins loved his mother's "party spaghetti," which was nothing more than a jar of Prego tossed with shrimp, smoked sausage and ground beef. Janice Letmate used to prepare a shrimp Creole that her children savored. And Steven R. Shores was partial to his sister's homemade Jewish apple cake. Those recipes and dozens more have been collected in a 78-page cookbook that is being released today not by the Baltimore Culinary Institute, but, tellingly, by a part of the city state's attorney office.

In Baltimore CityDarrah drops from mayoral race, endorses O'MalleyDemocratic mayoral candidate Richard A. Darrah said yesterday he has withdrawn from the race and is supporting City Councilman Martin O'Malley's bid to become the city's 47th mayor.Darrah said O'Malley "fully grasps the range of problems facing Baltimore" and his candidacy has gained credibility because of strong support from such state lawmakers as Del. Howard P. "Pete" Rawlings and Sen. Barbara A. Hoffman.Although Darrah is not actively running for mayor, it is too late to remove his name from the Sept.

Donna Dillon knows what it's like to be a victim.In the early 1970s, Ms. Dillon said, she endured marital abuse -- then she was rocked by a devastating blow in 1990 when convicted rapist John Thanos shot and killed her 14-year-old daughter and two others in a Labor Day weekend crime spree.After the burst of media and public attention following the murders, and the trial and eventual execution of Thanos in 1994 -- Maryland's first in more than three decades -- Ms. Dillon found herself abandoned to deal with feelings of loneliness, grief and depression.

It has been a year and a half since Maurice Robinson was gunned down in broad daylight on a West Baltimore street -- and still, his mother cannot bring herself to visit his grave."

When justice finally was done for John Doe, no family members came to the courtroom to see his killer sentenced to eight years in prison. No one stood to tell Judge Elsbeth L. Bothe yesterday how they grieved for the young man who died from two stab wounds to the chest, surrounded by about 15 adversaries on a South Baltimore street.That's because two years after his death, no one has been able to figure out the name of the man who died that night. Not even Brian K. Abrams, 25, who yesterday pleaded guilty to manslaughter with the victim's knife.

Oakland, California.--Inner-city mortuaries -- once sanctuaries where people went to honor the dead -- have become new battle fields in America's urban war. Those on the front line who tend to the bodies say their jobs have become entangled in the violence of the street.What has changed most in Trent Brown's career at East Oakland's C. P. Brannon Mortuary over the last eight years is the growing number of youthful homicide victims he now sees. Eight years ago it was rare for him to work on a body under 25 years of age.Now, of the 25 to 40 bodies C. P. Brannon tends to each month, four to eight are teen-age African-American males -- all homicide victims.

When Michael Dukakis was asked in a nationally televised debate during his run for the presidency in 1988 whether he would favor capital punishment if his wife had been raped and murdered, everyone but the candidate knew the proper response:"I'd want to tear the suspect apart limb by limb, but that's not what a civilized society does."This same line of thinking should have been used in the streets of East Baltimore last week. But it wasn't and now 13-year-old Vernon Holmes is dead.dTC It doesn't matter if the boy was a lost soul, was a punk, a smart mouth, a fighter, if he threw rocks at someone's car. You can't take out a gun and shoot the child.

Homicide was the cause of more than twice as many on-the-job deaths of Baltimore workers in 1992 as all other causes combined, a new U.S. government study shows. Half of those workplace slayings were by gunshot.This latest study contradicted many widely held assumptions about what is the chief threat to human life in the urban workplace and raised perplexing questions about how to make it safer."Most people would think of workplace fatalities as getting mangled in a machine, or falling from a high place," said Alan M. Paisner, regional commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS)

Dr. John Smialek, chief medical examiner, slides a sheet of paper filled with names and notes across a table. It is the overnight sheet from Jan. 5, 1993. It lists the 12 freshest cases -- grim scientific mysteries of varying degree -- that require forensic investigation. "This was an average day in the state of Maryland," Smialek says.White male, 36, Montgomery County, collapses: Cause unknown. . . . Black female, 25, Prince George's County, collapses: Chronic alcohol abuser; bruises on body.

A terrifying cell-phone video of a Chicago high school honors student being beaten to death by a brawling mob threw a national spotlight on the issue of youth violence and the toll it takes on victims. Last week, U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan visited the city to open what they called a national conversation about the homicide epidemic that kills dozens of Chicago students every year. As officials there scramble to adopt new strategies to keep kids safe, they might look to Baltimore, where efforts to quell juvenile violence are focusing on identifying the youngsters most at risk before they are killed or commit a crime.

Baltimore police identify homicide victims Baltimore police have identified several recent homicide victims. David H. Hunt, 23, of the 3500 block of Ashe St. was identified as the man fatally shot Friday in the 1600 block of Elmtree St. near Curtis Bay, an incident in which police say another man was stabbed at a playground. Jamaal Holmes, 25, was shot and killed earlier that day in the 1600 block of Presstman St. in West Baltimore. Chris Hester, 38, of the 1700 block of N. Smallwood St. was fatally shot Sept.

Police have identified three recent homicide victims, bringing to five the total number of people killed over the past weekend as violence continued on the city's West Side. Among the victims was Marcella Lawson, 64, who was found behind a vehicle that was being taken away by a tow truck driver. An officer had called for the tow truck after noticing the Honda Accord with its lights on in the 2800 block of Edgecombe Circle North, in Northwest Baltimore, and determining it was abandoned, said Nicole Monroe, a police spokeswoman.

Lucio Solorzano can be described lots of ways - immigrant, patriarch, business owner. He was, without doubt, an American success story. A week ago today, Lucio Solorzano, born in Peru in 1925, became part of an American tragedy, fatally beaten with his own cane after arguing with a man during an evening stroll along Reisterstown Road in Northwest Baltimore. A horrific end for a man who spoke little English but who, with the help of his sons and daughter, had run a successful landscaping company.

Panel backs utility regulation The Senate Finance Committee has approved legislation to give Maryland regulators more authority to direct utilities to build new power plants. The 6-4 vote Tuesday sends the measure to the full Senate. The bill would restore some of the authority the state's Public Service Commission lost after the state decided to deregulate in 1999. High energy bills have caused many lawmakers to consider the 1999 decision a mistake, but industry representatives say markets have not had enough time to translate deregulation into cheaper electricity bills.

Reporting dehumanizes victims of homicide During the recent spike in homicides in Baltimore, I have been dismayed at the continued dehumanizing manner in which The Baltimore Sun has reported on the victims. In consecutive articles last week in which homicide victims were identified in The Baltimore Sun, the descriptive information for each victim included his name, age, address and a statement regarding his prior convictions or criminal record ("Baltimore police identify four killed in shootings," Dec. 3, and "Violent surge continues in Baltimore as teen becomes 24th killing in 18 days," Dec. 4)

Baltimore police identified yesterday two recent homicide victims, including one from the weekend. Derrick Phillips, 42, was shot in the head about 1 a.m. Saturday in the 1800 block of N. Regester St. in East Baltimore, police spokeswoman Nicole Monroe said. Phillips, whose last known address was in the 3400 block of Alto Road in Woodlawn, was pronounced dead at the scene by Fire Department medics. Gregory Boston, 48, of the 2500 block of Oswego Ave. was shot Thursday near home, in the 2700 block of Oswego Ave. in the Greenspring community, police said.

On Monday, the House of Delegates passed a bill that would establish a Maryland Commission on Capital Punishment. The commission, which will have 19 members, is to issue a report by Dec. 15 of this year on at least seven recommendations. Guess what's at the top of the list of recommendations? You'd be right if you guessed "racial disparities," and you'd have guessed that even if you had just beamed in from Planet Dimwit. No. 2 on the list is "jurisdictional disparities." No. 3 is "socio-economic disparities," while "the risk of innocent people being executed" comes in at numero quatro.

The officer shouts a warning to his colleague staking out the backyard of the Northeast Baltimore house: "He's a small, little dude. And he's fast." Fists pound the front door. "Police!" It's 8:15 in the morning. The door swings open, and two officers rush in, past the toddler in the entryway, around the silver-and-gold decorated Christmas tree, down the basement staircase. There, they find their man: a 13-year old boy on a mattress, wiping sleep from his eyes. "Why are you home today?"

Sean Taylor dies nearly every single day in Baltimore. Tragic. Senseless. Wasted promise and stolen potential. No, he's not usually a professional football player with an enviable bank account. But he is usually young, black and the victim of a crime. Last Monday, in his Palmetto Bay, Fla., home, his name was Sean Taylor. At the exact time Taylor was shot by an intruder, in Baltimore, his name was Michael Crowder, a 33-year-old man who was found unresponsive not far from his Coppin Heights home.