Jail

Former Anne Arundel County Executive John R. Leopold was led out of a courtroom Thursday with his wrists handcuffed behind his back and his head lowered, bound for the county jail after being sentenced for his misconduct in office conviction and behavior a judge condemned as "outrageous. " Outside the county courthouse, a Leopold supporter said the judge should be fired, while a woman whose lawsuit alleges that she was wrongly terminated by the Leopold administration walked from the building exclaiming, "Pop the champagne!"

Carl O. Snowden, the former director of the Office of Civil Rights in the Maryland Attorney General's Office, has been ordered jailed for violating probation in an Anne Arundel County drunken driving case, according to court records. Snowden, 59, a longtime civil rights activist, was ordered Monday to spend 10 days in the Anne Arundel County jail, beginning April 12. Retired Judge Diane O. Leasure found that Snowden had violated probation in his 2010 drunken driving case because he had been convicted last year of possession of marijuana in Baltimore City, according to Henry P. Dove, chief trial counsel in the State's Attorney's Office in Talbot County.

Saying John R. Leopold committed "an arrogant abuse of power" by ordering police and other government workers to perform personal and political chores for him, prosecutors are asking a judge to fine the former Anne Arundel County executive $100,000 and sentence him to five years probation and 500 hours of community service. The recommendation by State Prosecutor Emmet C. Davitt comes in a document filed Monday in Anne Arundel County Circuit Court, where Leopold, 70, is scheduled to be sentenced Thursday by Judge Dennis M. Sweeney on two misdemeanor counts of misconduct in office.

A frequent critic of Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake's administration was arrested and jailed Wednesday morning when she tried to enter City Hall to attend a public meeting. Officers told the activist, Kim A. Trueheart, 55, of Baltimore, that she had been banned from the building. Trueheart was held at Baltimore's Central Booking and Intake Facility on charges of trespassing and disorderly conduct until Thursday morning, when she was released, the facility confirmed. "I'm home ... Thank you lord!

I once sat with a group of inner-city Baltimore kids, mostly 12-year-olds, who were being asked what they wanted to be when they grew up. Police officer. Prison guard. Judge. Those were the boys at least. The girls mostly seemed to aspire to cosmetology, which was depressing in its own way. There's nothing wrong, of course, with being a cop or corrections officer or a judge. But the fact that no other jobs came to mind reflected how very narrow was their world: You were either the guy getting arrested, tried and jailed, or the guy doing the arresting, trying and jailing.

The O'Malley administration's decision to scrap its plans to build a $70 million youth jail in Baltimore is a major win for the city and its youth. It is made possible both by the significant successes of recent years in reducing violent crime and by a renewed effort on the part of the Department of Juvenile Services to place troubled youth in more appropriate settings, and it will end the deplorable practice of housing juveniles charges as adults in an adult jail. It is a credit to the advocates who have been fighting against the plan, and it deserves the legislature's support.

After years of community opposition, state officials have abandoned plans to build a new Baltimore jail for juveniles charged as adults, citing declines in youth crimes as they unveiled a plan Wednesday to send more teens to treatment programs and renovate a smaller facility for defendants in violent offenses. The $73 million plan, which needs approval from the General Assembly, lays the groundwork for a shift in the state's approach to teen crime in Baltimore. The state has faced persistent criticism over existing conditions for young defendants, but a proposal to build a new facility for juveniles raised concern that officials were not doing enough to deter children from lives of violence.

Bryan Johnson didn't know he had bipolar disorder until he ended up at the emergency room, where he assaulted a police officer. His family had taken him to the University of Maryland Medical Center because he was acting strangely, staring into the distance and constantly pacing as he struggled with the death of his brother and the loss of his job. He was sent to Central Booking as soon as he was released from the hospital, and wound up with a...

A 22-year-old man who attempted suicide at the Howard County Detention Center in Jessup over the weekend is back at the facility and under 24-hour watch, officials said Sunday. Demetrius Hunt, 22, who was serving an 18-month sentence for second-degree assault, tried to hang himself using a bed sheet Saturday afternoon, county officials said. He was taken to Howard County General Hospital with a neck contusion, then returned to the detention center Saturday evening. "He is under 24-hour supervision," said Mark Miller, a spokesman for Howard County.

An ambitious plan to secure tens of millions of dollars in state funding to fix Baltimore's dilapidated school buildings is the top priority for city officials in the General Assembly session that begins next week. The city's delegates and state senators are also united in opposition to Gov. Martin O'Malley's plan to build a new juvenile jail in Baltimore. "The governor had planned on building a new juvenile jail. That kind of flies in the face of the philosophy for most of us," said Del. Curt Anderson, who chairs the city's House delegation.