Internal Affairs

A new major heads a list of promotions and transfers announced last week by Baltimore County Police Chief Terrence B. Sheridan.Capt. Rustin E. Price, 47, will be promoted to major and take over command of the Criminal Investigations Division, filling a vacancy created when Maj. Alan Webster retired to become police chief in Salisbury.Price, who has been with the department 29 years, has been acting commander of the division since Webster's departure last month.Capt. Randall B. Russin, 51, will replace Price as commander of the Crimes Against Persons section.

WHEN 18-year-old Herman Charity joined the Howard County Police Department in 1968, he fulfilled a childhood dream.He didn't know that he was also becoming a pioneer.Mr. Charity, who retired last week as a lieutenant and head of the internal affairs division, didn't know before applying for the job that he would become the first African-American on the Howard force. He can't say that his race never mattered during his subsequent 30 years in the department.In the early days, he had to endure the racial taunts of fellow officers as well as the resentment of those residents who wouldn't give him the respect due a law enforcement officer.

THERE'S MORE THAN one kind of terrorism in Afghanistan.What will the world do when half of Afghanistan's population is put into virtual slavery? The prospect is imminent. The radical Taliban is within a relative few square miles and maybe only days of securing its rule all over the country.When it does, a tyranny that is now broad will become universal, with a zealotry and absolutism that makes the ayatollahs of Iran's Islamic republic look like a fun bunch. The Taliban's fierce version of Islamic law falls on all of the population but by far the heaviest on the women.

Avoiding an expected crush of reporters and cameras, former State Sen. Larry Young quietly turned himself in late yesterday afternoon to State Police in Annapolis, where he was arrested and handcuffed and taken by troopers to his first court appearance.After a brief hearing, Young was released on his own recognizance after being indicted Monday on nine counts of bribery, extortion and tax fraud. He said nothing as he walked away from the District Court, accompanied by his attorney, Gregg L. Bernstein.

Cops on bikes. Well-heeled corpses. And a blue-eyed blonde who's just as likely to kill you as say hello.Welcome to the Sunday night lineup on USA cable.With considerable ballyhoo, USA announced earlier this year that it was orchestrating a cable first: an entire night, every week, of original drama series. The lineup debuted in June, and it really kicks into gear tonight, the first Sunday night featuring all-new episodes.From "Pacific Blue" to "Silk Stalkings" to "La Femme Nikita" to "The Big Easy," what USA offers are dramas of varying quality tied together by one dominant thread: They feature some of the best-looking folks on TV. Chances are, you won't see more pecs flexed or shapely legs displayed anywhere.

The highest-ranking state police supervisor ever to be brought up on internal sexual harassment charges has been found guilty of making unwanted advances against six female troopers and one agency secretary, according to the department and sources familiar with the case.A three-member internal disciplinary panel found that Maj. Edward E. "Earl" Dennis kissed, hugged and harassed the troopers and secretary while serving as a supervisor of the agency's high-profile Bureau of Drug and Criminal Enforcement in Columbia.

A top-ranking state police officer is facing charges that he sexually harassed several female troopers while working as a supervisor of the agency's drug enforcement division, according to law enforcement sources and others familiar with the case.Maj. Edward E. "Earl" Dennis Jr., a 22-year veteran of the department, is accused of kissing some female troopers against their will and sexually harassing others at the drug bureau in Columbia.A lengthy internal affairs investigation substantiated the allegations, and the charges are being reviewed by a three-member state police disciplinary board, the sources said.

Richard Alexander now knows that the Maryland State Police is far different than it was when he came up through the ranks eight years ago.Last month he was forced to resign as a trooper in the canine unit at the Westminster barracks after incriminating himself in an internal affairs investigation of a hazing incident last year.Mr. Alexander, 33, is unemployed because, he said, "I did something to a trooper candidate that someone did to me when I was going through" the police academy.When a sergeant buddy assigned to the Maryland State Police Training Academy asked Mr. Alexander to join him on an inspection of trooper candidates one night last fall, the eight-year veteran accepted.

Washington -- The most striking and least discussed aspect of U.N. practices in the current era is the increased number and kinds of situations in which the United Nations Security Council authorizes the use of force: Iraq, Bosnia, Somalia, Rwanda, Mozambique, Liberia, Angola and, most recently, Haiti.Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait posed a classic problem: a clear case of cross-border aggression in which the armies of one state crossed international borders to invade another state. This is precisely the kind of international aggression the U.N. Charter anticipates and provides for. But Desert Storm was the last instance of international action which clearly fit the charter's prescription.

An Anne Arundel County police officer who was leading an investigation of alleged police brutality against youths at a Crofton skating rink has been removed from that job because he was at the scene.Police Chief Robert P. Russell issued a letter Friday afternoon in which he said that Lt. Ronald Bledsoe "has been totally removed from the investigation" and that Lieutenant J. R. Thomas, a Western District patrol officer who has been transferred temporarily to the Internal Affairs Unit, "will lead the investigation until its conclusion."

A Baltimore police officer was arrested for shaking down an undercover internal affairs officer posing as a drug dealer, the department said. Michael Sylvester, 29, was arrested Thursday morning after he stole $70 from the undercover officer in the 3900 block of Carlisle Ave. in Northwest Baltimore as part of what the department refers to as an integrity test, according to Anthony Guglielmi, the department's chief spokesman. Guglielmi also said police recovered three small bags containing suspected cocaine in Sylvester's locker at the Northwest District police station.

A city judge ruled Thursday that internal affairs files for officers whose misconduct cases were tossed out in a recent wave of dismissals should not be turned over to defense attorneys seeking to question the credibility of those officers. Assistant State's Attorney Gerard B. Volatile said Circuit Court Judge Timothy J. Doory, after reviewing the files in his chambers, ruled that because there was not a finding of guilt or innocence, the officers were entitled to privacy. The ruling came at a pretrial hearing for two men convicted of murder whose convictions were overturned on appeal.

A Baltimore police officer who was criminally charged with assault after he punched an undercover internal affairs detective during an "integrity test" was found not guilty in Circuit Court yesterday. Whether the officer, Jerome K. Hill, hit the detective was not in dispute in the trial. Instead, the verdict turned on whether Hill's action was justified. Circuit Judge John C. Themelis found yesterday that it was impossible for him to second-guess the instincts of the accused officer, saying that Hill might have had good reason to act aggressively.

In a move that could force prosecutors to drop hundreds of cases, Baltimore State's Attorney Patricia C. Jessamy has asked city police to give her files on officers who are being investigated for lying or other offenses that could damage their credibility on the witness stand. In a letter to Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III, Jessamy points to a case in which a detective continued to testify in criminal cases four years after the department began investigating him for deceiving emergency dispatchers in a domestic violence case.

Six Baltimore police officers were suspended yesterday as part of an internal affairs investigation into possible "irregularities" with their overtime pay, a department spokesman said. The officers - two sergeants and four detectives - worked in criminal investigations in the department's Eastern District when they filed for overtime that is now being reviewed by internal affairs investigators, police said. One of the sergeants was recently transferred to the Northeastern District, police said.

The Howard County Police Department will continue its internal affairs investigation of a Howard County police officer who was acquitted this week of indecent exposure charges, a spokeswoman for the department said. On Monday, a Howard County circuit judge ruled Edward Thatcher, a former Baltimore police officer who joined the Howard County force in 2004, not guilty of the charge alleged by a county 911 dispatcher earlier this year. Thatcher, 31, was accused by Maria Elizabeth Kline of exposing himself to her in March outside the county's 911 center in the George Howard Building in Ellicott City.

Howard County has settled a sexual harassment lawsuit by a female police officer for $75,000 after she alleged a hostile "men's locker-room" mentality in the Police Department. All but $8,000 of the settlement covers legal fees. Susan Ensko, a 17-year veteran of the force, had been seeking $500,000 in damages and attorney fees in the lawsuit, which she filed in 2004. The settlement states that both parties deny liability in the matter and are prohibited from speaking with the press about it. The settlement was written Sept.

CAIRO, Egypt -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, touring the Middle East in an attempt to build support for U.S. goals and allies here, found herself on the defensive yesterday about the Bush administration's search for partnerships and its democratic reform efforts. Meeting in Cairo with ministers of eight moderate Arab governments, Rice was questioned on whether her desire to work with them masked an American desire to line up allies against the growing power of Iran. She was challenged by the Egyptian foreign minister and a dubious local press on whether President Bush's campaign of democratic reform was anything more than meddling by a country that doesn't accept election results it doesn't like.

Two Baltimore police officers implicated in misconduct in a search warrant application targeting the Southwestern District's "flex squad" filed a lawsuit yesterday accusing the officers who wrote the document of defamation. Sgt. Robert Smith and Detective Vicki Mengel are asking for $1.5 million. They contend in their suit that two drug detectives made "false statements ... for the malicious purpose of embarrassing [them] and causing them to be subject to public ridicule, scorn, dishonor and embarrassment and to ruin their careers."

The police paperwork told a shocking tale: a police squad accused of stashing drugs in desk drawers and lockers at a station house, making false arrests, stealing property and sexually assaulting two women. It was four months ago that the Baltimore Police Department began investigating officers in the Southwestern District "flex squad." As of yesterday, only one of the many allegations - a rape in December at the district station - had materialized into a criminal charge. The internal affairs unit is continuing to investigate all allegations involving the squad, said Matt Jablow, a police spokesman, with an eye toward possible criminal wrongdoing and departmental infractions.