Law Enforcement

Westminster Police Department will give up to 10 people inside access to local law enforcement starting tonight, when it offers its first Citizen Police Academy. For the next nine Tuesday nights, local businesspeople and others in the class will get a primer on the department's history and structure and law enforcement techniques such as conducting arrests and self-defense. In the three-hour sessions, they will try on the accessories officers wear: bulletproof vests, gun belts and handcuffs.

Deputy Michael A. Zepp was honored as the 2001 Deputy of the Year in ceremonies yesterday at the Carroll County sheriff's office. Zepp, 31, joined the department three years ago after serving as a Taneytown police officer. Last year, he made 43 arrests for drunken driving and had 25 criminal arrests, including 15 drug charges, said Sheriff Kenneth L. Tregoning. "Deputy Zepp is a very conscientious, sincere, dedicated and aggressive law enforcement officer, and he is multifaceted in his approach to law enforcement: equally good at traffic enforcement as well as criminal enforcement, including the narcotics laws," Tregoning said.

IN THE AFTERMATH of the Million Man March, aides to President Clinton said he would consider holding a White House conference, with a blue ribbon commission, to study the current state of race relations in the nation. He is said to be wary of the idea, however, because of the broadness of its approach and the political dangers associated with trying to deal with poverty, housing, education, family breakdown, drugs and all the other problems of the black urban poor all at once.A narrower approach -- focused on law enforcement -- would avoid many of the political pitfalls and could go a long way toward improving police performance and police-community relations.

Howard County's criminal justice system is doing the best it can to punish and rehabilitate convicted criminals, a panel of local law enforcement officials told a cable television audience last night.The panel's comments and explanation of how law enforcement works in the county came during a made-for-TV "town meeting" organized by the County Executive's Ad Hoc Committee on Human Rights.The committee's Law Enforcement/Criminal Justice Group said it wanted to use last night's meeting to explain to county residents how police, prosecutors, public defenders and judges work together.

Carroll and local town officials praised the opening of the state's Driver Training Facility for law enforcement yesterday as a boon to the county's economy and public safety. They also said it will help keep open one of Carroll's largest employers.The one-mile roadway and classroom complex is the first of three phases in the $53 million Public Safety Training Center in Sykesville, a project originally scheduled for completion in 2007.And with an additional $16 million in state money announced yesterday, the center will be completed by 2002, five years ahead of schedule.

In a society where compromise is a pillar of government, it feels almost un-American to acknowledge that some issues defy any middle ground. It feels even worse when there are only two alternatives, and both offer unpleasant consequences.This is the reality of encryption, the scrambling of data to keep it away from prying eyes. Yet at a time when it's essential to hold an honest debate about a difficult decision, encryption policy drifts in a Twilight Zone, where both sides tend to avoid acknowledging some hard truths.

Sandra Lee Owens says her husband began hitting her six months after they got married in 1988 and continued until 1994.Baltimore County police officers who responded when she called 911, she says, were not always trained to help. And when her husband repeatedly harassed her by telephone after being jailed for battering her, she says she got what felt like a brush-off from his probation officer.The less-than-ideal response from different law enforcement agencies is expected to change as the county improves training for officials involved with domestic violence.

WHO IS JAMES N. ROBEY? That is the question Howard County's former police chief will have to answer as local Democrats line up behind him for the race for county executive.This we know: Mr. Robey grew up in the community of Daniels near Patapsco Valley State Park. He joined the police force in 1966, when it had 32 members, and rose through the ranks. He has earned a bachelor's degree in criminal justice, a master's degree in administration and management and graduated from the FBI's National Academy.

In 1986, Chicago's El Rukn street gang struck a deal with Libya to commit terrorist attacks against American planes and buildings.Informed of the plot, FBI agents tapped the gang's phones, gathered information and arrested the bad guys before they could do any damage. The FBI claimed that hundreds of lives were saved.Today, the El Rukn gang members are the prime examples of the FBI's long-running campaign for enhanced authority to tap cellular phone calls and wired communications. Agents say that changes in technology since then have made it difficult, if not impossible, to carry out the kind of surveillance that put El Rukn's leaders behind bars.

This month in Washtenaw County, Mich., a right-wing militia called the Hutaree was raided by state and local police and FBI agents. Nine militia members were arrested and charged with conspiring to murder a police officer then attack that officer's funeral with improvised explosive devices. This was to be the first step in the Hutaree's plot to overthrow the U.S. government. The Hutaree is only one among a number of separatist, terrorist and hate groups that view police as their No. 1 target for attack.