Incompetence

A splashy run of spy cases -- including the first-ever FBI agent convicted of espionage for the Russians, and the first CIA agent to defect -- led Time to label 1985 as "The Year of the Spy." Now, 2002 is shaping up as the Year of the Spy Book. Before Groundhog Day, five major new espionage books are already out. Three feature FBI double agent Robert Hanssen, an extraordinarily damaging spy who went undetected for over 21 years, and was then caught only because a Russian gave him up. The other two trace the massive and ultimately unsuccessful government persecution of Los Alamos nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee. Together, these books -- and an increasing flock of more peripheral ones -- offer a sweeping survey of two decades of U.S. intelligence successes and failures.

A former Patuxent Institution inmate who was charged with murder after he allegedly set a fire that induced another inmate's fatal asthma attack was deemed incompetent to stand trial yesterday and committed to Clifton T. Perkins State Hospital in Jessup. Dewayne E. Braswell, 41, will remain in custody of the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene until he can be found competent to assist in his defense on charges stemming from the Feb. 18, 2000, fire and subsequent death of Joseph Jenkins, a 31-year-old prisoner, court officials said.

A Baltimore lawyer who was a former assistant federal prosecutor and one-time deputy director of the Legal Aid Bureau had his law license suspended yesterday by the Court of Appeals. Michael G. Middleton, in private practice since 1988, received a suspension of at least three years. In a 16-page opinion, the state's top judges said he was incompetent in representing several criminal defendants and he had been found in criminal contempt last November for lying to a Baltimore County judge to win a delay for a trial.

A Baltimore lawyer who is a former assistant federal prosecutor and former deputy director of the Legal Aid Bureau had his law license suspended yesterday by the Court of Appeals. Michael G. Middleton, in private practice since 1988, received a suspension of at least three years. In a 16-page opinion, the state's top judges said he was incompetent in representing several criminal defendants and had been found in criminal contempt in November for lying to a Baltimore County judge to win a delay in a trial.

DENTON -- A Guatemalan teen-ager who was ruled incompetent to stand trial in the death of her newborn baby has been handed over to federal immigration authorities, who began deportation proceedings yesterday. Jailed for nearly a year, Erminia Escalante Berdugo, 18, is eligible for bail -- set at $10,000 by the Immigration and Naturalization Service -- and could be released to the custody of a Queen Anne's County couple who have volunteered to act as her guardians. Supporters who have rallied to defend Berdugo say she is the victim of a legal system she cannot understand.

DENTON -- Nearly a year after being jailed in the death of her newborn son, Erminia Escalante Berdugo has been found incompetent to stand trial but cannot be released without the approval of federal immigration authorities. Found by two psychologists to be mildly retarded, with an IQ between 52 and 62, the wan 18-year-old, who entered the country illegally in 1998, appeared in court yesterday for a hearing to decide whether she is able to help in her defense. Circuit Judge William Horne said he remained bound by a detainer order filed in February by the federal Immigration and Naturalization Service noting that if Berdugo is released, the INS wants 48 hours to decide whether to take her into federal custody and start deportation proceedings.

Despite an unusual public repudiation by the CIA, Daniel Shykind clings to the belief that he is a secret agent, making him mentally incompetent to stand trial on fraud charges, a Montgomery County Circuit judge ruled yesterday.Judge S. Michael Pincus agreed with defense experts who said Shykind will not help his lawyers because he thinks it entails giving away government secrets."His factual understandings are distorted," Pincus said. "In other words, he can't tell his counsel the truth."

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- Americans are not the only ones with a national dream. The South Africans, in their majority-ruled nation, have started dreaming, too."The South African dream exists and is every bit as big and impressive" as the American dream, contend the authors of a new book, titled simply "The South African Dream.""Reveal the dream, and the nation itself stands revealed," write John Hunt and Reg Lascaris, who base their assertions on a public survey of South Africans' aspirations -- and fears -- and a slew of interviews with influential personalities.

The Navy has scuttled the Arsenal Ship program, the missile-bristling robot ship that several Maryland companies were competing to build."Secretary of the Navy John H. Dalton has reluctantly determined that insufficient funding exists to continue the next phase of the program," Navy spokeswoman Lt. Denise Shorey said yesterday.The Arsenal Ship was touted as a revolutionary concept because of its concentration of firepower -- 500 missile launchers crammed onto one platform -- and its almost fully automated, remote-controlled operation.

Less than an hour after Annapolis fire Capt. Gene Kirchner broke down crying, the Civil Service Board voted unanimously yesterday to reinstate him as a captain and clear him of charges he acted incompetently and in a racist manner on a mid-July emergency call.The board did find that Kirchner used offensive language and suspended him for four weeks, two without pay.Despite the testimony Thursday of a new Annapolis firefighter, who said Kirchner made racist remarks about an African-American heart-attack patient, the board concluded that the city proved only that Kirchner's remarks were offensive -- not racist.