NEWS
By Tricia Bishop, Robert Little and Don Markus | November 1, 2009
Thomas Meighan Jr. was well-acquainted with accusations of recklessness and dangerous driving, long before Baltimore police charged him with a string of traffic offenses related to the hit-and-run death of a Johns Hopkins University student two weeks ago. He got his first traffic ticket before he even had a driver's license, for speeding and driving without supervision on a learner's permit when he was 17. Within a year, his license was revoked, the...
NEWS
October 16, 2009
WILLIAM WAYNE JUSTICE, 89 Influential Texas judge U.S. District Judge William Wayne Justice, whose rulings shattered old Texas by changing the way the state educated children, treated prisoners and housed its poorest and most vulnerable citizens, has died. He was 89. His law clerk, Kelly Davis, said the judge died Tuesday in Austin. The soft-spoken jurist spent three often tumultuous decades on the bench following his appointment by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1968. To some, Justice was a judicial renegade who disregarded the public's will by imposing his own concepts on a conservative state.
NEWS
By Tricia Bishop | October 15, 2009
The odd and tragic case of Mark Castillo took another erratic turn Wednesday, when the 43-year-old father abruptly pleaded guilty to drowning his three young children in a city hotel bathtub, carefully timing their submersion with a stopwatch. Castillo's unexpected guilty plea to the murders, which he calculated to punish his estranged wife, came after lawyers and court officials spent a week choosing a jury for his trial. Baltimore Circuit Judge Wanda K. Heard found Castillo, who arrived in court in sweats and a T-shirt instead of his customary suit, mentally capable of entering the plea and sentenced him to three consecutive life terms without possibility of parole.
NEWS
By Annie Linskey | October 6, 2009
Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon should stand trial on charges that she perjured herself by not disclosing gifts from a developer boyfriend, a judge ruled Monday as he rebuffed objections from the mayor's defense team that the accusations rest on faulty evidence. The decision sets up the prospect that Dixon will face a pair of trials in the months ahead - one scheduled for November on charges that she stole gift cards intended for the needy, and another later on two perjury counts. "It is not good news from the standpoint of her being able to govern," said Donald F. Norris, chairman of the Department of Public Policy at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.
NEWS
By Tricia Bishop | October 3, 2009
A federal judge sentenced Trenell D. Murphy to 20 years in prison Friday for possession with intent to distribute about 90 pounds of cocaine that Baltimore police said they found in the back of his Chevy truck in February - the department's largest coke bust. Murphy's sentence, though significant, was "substantially lower" than the guideline range of 24.3 to 30.4 years, despite his having been found a "career criminal," with four major felony convictions since the age of 17, noted U.S. District Judge Benson E. Legg.
NEWS
By Tricia Bishop | September 9, 2009
Fingerprint evidence from a 2006 murder case will be admissible in federal court, a U.S. district judge in Baltimore ruled Tuesday, rejecting a decision by a Baltimore County judge that shocked prosecutors and set the defendant free. Brian Keith Rose, 25, is accused of killing Warren Fleming, a Cingular store owner at Security Square Mall, while trying to steal his car. He was linked to the crime by partial prints left on the Mercedes and a stolen Dodge Intrepid that police say was used by Rose and his accomplices in the January 2006 incident.
NEWS
By Frederick N. Rasmussen | September 3, 2009
James Augustine Judge Jr., a career Air Force officer and bomber pilot who flew in the Pacific and China-Burma-India theaters and later participated in the historic Berlin Airlift, died of cardiovascular disease Aug. 15 at Summit Park Health and Rehabilitation Center in Catonsville. He was 86. Colonel Judge was born and raised in Lawrence, Mass. He was a 1940 graduate of Central Catholic High School in Lawrence and attended seminary before enlisting in the Army Air Forces in 1942. Trained as a bomber pilot, he was sent to the Pacific, where he flew B-17 Flying Fortress, B-25 Mitchell and B-29 Superfortress bombers.
NEWS
By Nick Madigan | September 3, 2009
Standing before a judge and facing 60 days in jail, Baltimore County Councilman Stephen G. Samuel Moxley admitted publicly for the first time Wednesday that he is an alcoholic and needs help. Moxley was accused of being drunk shortly before midnight July 23 when he caused a four-car pileup in West Baltimore that injured 44-year-old Justine Matthews. A police officer described him as "stumbling," "swaying" and smelling of alcohol when he emerged from his badly damaged Toyota Highlander.
NEWS
August 28, 2009
Pasadena man arrested for threatening judge A Pasadena man has been arrested for threatening an Anne Arundel Circuit Court judge this month, according to the county sheriff's office. Harvey Branston Burroughs Jr., 57, of the 8500 block of Main Ave. left a threatening message on the voice mail of Judge Paul F. Harris Jr., the sheriff's office said. Burroughs had left several messages for Harris expressing displeasure after the judge in May gave his brother, Dennis Ray Burroughs, an 18-year sentence on burglary and theft charges.
NEWS
By Tricia Bishop | August 28, 2009
A Baltimore judge refused to accept a plea agreement Thursday that would have allowed the 17-year-old defendant, charged with murdering her grandmother, to transfer into the juvenile justice system. After taking a day to consider it, Circuit Judge Timothy J. Doory denied the state-proffered plea deal, apparently unable to countenance what he called the "judge shopping" aspect of the carefully crafted plan. It essentially would have overturned another judge's ruling in March that Jabreria Handy must be tried as an adult, in part because of a history of "behavioral problems" that include nine high school suspensions, throwing a textbook and threatening a teacher's cats.