Plea Agreement

A reputed hit man for a Northwest Baltimore drug organization linked to four killings pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court yesterday to racketeering and murder charges and was sentenced to 30 years in prison, federal prosecutors said. The Maryland U.S. attorney's office had targeted Eric Hall, 36, for the death penalty. But as a result of a plea agreement, he will serve prison time and then be on 15 years of supervised probation. Prosecutors say Hall worked as an enforcer for a drug ring led by Howard and Raeshio Rice, brothers who, respectively, are serving 30-year and 27-year prison sentences.

A Howard County gallery owner admitted in federal court yesterday that he siphoned funds from investors who thought they were going to receive a healthy profit from sales he made in the art trade. According to the plea agreement, Thomas H. Akins owned and operated the Galerie Elan, an Ellicott City art sales gallery where he attracted affluent investors with an "art investment program," marketed with a highly profitable rate of return, usually 24 percent a year. In reality, court documents say that Akins diverted those funds - potentially more than $1 million - for his own gain.

A former Baltimore police officer who pleaded guilty to robbing an immigrant will now stand trial for his alleged crimes -- a surprise turnabout in a case that ignited controversy in the city's Hispanic community.Dorian J. Martin, 25, withdrew his guilty plea yesterday after a Baltimore Circuit Court judge ruled that a recent decision by Maryland's highest court made the proposed sentence illegal.He will be tried Nov. 3.Hispanic activists, who had gathered outside the downtown courthouse yesterday to protest Martin's plea agreement because they thought it was too lenient, hailed the development as a victory.

A 20-year-old woman accused of burning her daughter in a bathtub filled with scalding water and bleach in 1997 was arrested yesterday for allegedly failing to comply with a plea agreement that would have spared her a second trial on child-abuse charges.The trial of Mary V. Cabassa of Severn is scheduled for late next month.She was to be sentenced yesterday by Howard Circuit Judge Lenore R. Gelfman under a plea agreement reached with prosecutors.Cabassa had pleaded guilty in February to charges of child abuse and second-degree assault, and prosecutors were going to recommend that Cabassa spend 18 months in jail while attending parent classes and undergoing psychological counseling.

An Arbutus man pleaded guilty yesterday in federal court in Baltimore for his role in the $280,000 robbery last fall of a Loomis Fargo armored car guard who was delivering money to an automated teller machine.Shawn D. Barrick, who prosecutors say used his knowledge as a former driver for the security company to punch in a code to deactivate the alarm at an ATM at a Catonsville gas station, pleaded guilty to interfering with interstate commerce by threats and violence.U.S. District Judge Herbert N. Maletz set a sentencing date of April 15 for Barrick, 23, of the 4300 block of Highview Ave.Under a plea agreement, prosecutors promised to drop a lesser charge of conspiracy.

The chief judge of the Court of Special Appeals sharply criticized yesterday a 1992 plea agreement that would reduce the sentence of a man convicted in the murder of State Police Cpl. Theodore D. Wolf -- but the judge indicated it would be difficult to undo the deal.Chief Judge Joseph F. Murphy said the judicial system must enforce plea arrangements, such as the one for convicted killer Francisco Rodriguez, made by prosecutors and defense attorneys."Somebody dropped the ball very badly in this case, and the question now is what can the judicial system do about it?"

CIRCUIT COURT JUDGE Raymond J. Kane Jr. reached the only possible conclusion he could in rejecting a move to void a controversial plea agreement between state prosecutors and a man who was an accomplice in the 1990 murder of state police Cpl. Theodore D. Wolf of Glen Burnie.The deal was crafted under the direction of former Howard County State's Attorney William R. Hymes. It called for Francisco Rodriguez of the Bronx to plead guilty to first-degree murder and receive a life sentence in exchange for his cooperation in the prosecution of Eric Tirado, the gunman in Corporal Wolf's murder.

A Howard circuit judge let stand yesterday a plea agreement in the 1990 murder of Maryland State Police Cpl. Theodore D. Wolf, dismaying the victim's widow and leaving law enforcement agencies scrambling to find a way to lengthen the sentence of the killer's accomplice.In the long-awaited ruling, Judge Raymond J. Kane Jr. decided that the plea agreement with Francisco Rodriguez cannot be voided because, essentially, a deal is a deal. The once-secret agreement gave Rodriguez a 15-year sentence for his cooperation, the same number of years he was serving on an unrelated drug charge.

The state attorney general's office is challenging a Howard County circuit judge's decision upholding a controversial plea bargain made in the 1990 murder of Maryland State Police Cpl. Theodore Wolf.The appeal of Judge Raymond J. Kane Jr.'s January decision means the fight by law enforcement officials and Wolf's widow to send Francisco Rodriguez to prison for life will continue."As long as there is something else to be done to fix the mess that was created here seven years ago, no matter how hard it is, I have to pursue it," Ginni Wolf, the victim's widow, said yesterday.

A Reese store owner who bilked customers of their down payments for carpet and services was convicted yesterday after he pleaded not guilty but agreed not to challenge the prosecutor's statement of facts.Roy D. Marshall, 33, of Westminster was found guilty in Carroll County Circuit Court on nine counts of theft over $300 and one count of attempted theft over $300.The plea agreement says Marshall, who owned and operated Marshall's Carpet & Services, must pay restitution of about $26,000 by March 19, his sentencing date.

Two Baltimore sisters charged in the death of their paraplegic mother pleaded guilty to first-degree vulnerable adult abuse in Baltimore City Circuit Court on Monday. Tia Sewell, 27, and Sharon Jones, 26, face up to six years in prison under the plea agreement. Sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 28. Their mother was 40-year-old April Montford. Paramedics discovered Ford Feb. 29, 2008, after being called to her house in the 400 block of W. Franklin St. According to court records, police said Montford, who was paralyzed from a 1985 gunshot wound, was lying on bedsheets that had been unchanged for years.

The third time was the proverbial charm for Jabreria Handy's defense attorneys, who secured permission Monday to transfer their client to juvenile court for sentencing, after a judge accepted her plea of guilty to involuntary manslaughter in the death of her 69-year-old grandmother. Another judge, Timothy J. Doory, denied the same plea agreement in August, saying it would have overruled yet a third judge's earlier determination that Handy, who is now a week shy of her 18th birthday, must be tried as an adult.

A former Naval Academy professor entered a plea Tuesday morning to charges that he sexually molested an adolescent relative more than a decade ago. Patrick Ryan Harrison, 66, of Hot Springs Village, Ark., did not admit guilt but acknowledged to Anne Arundel County Circuit Judge Michael Wachs that prosecutors had enough evidence to convict him of second-degree sexual offense. A civilian professor, Harrison taught computer science at the Naval Academy from 1976 until his retirement in 2003, according to academy officials.

A federal judge denied a Westminster woman's request to withdraw her guilty plea Tuesday and sentenced her to 10 years in prison for sex trafficking of a minor, a 17-year-old cousin whose sexual services she sold under the Internet heading "Available now." Deborah Gail Frock, who was previously convicted of trying to blackmail a state prosecutor, claimed that the government coerced her to take the plea agreement by outlining plans to file additional charges that carried a minimum 30-year sentence if she didn't accept the deal.

A man who led officers on a chase in Howard County last fall that sparked an investigation into accusations of police brutality pleaded guilty Monday to assault charges. Stephen Zombro, 41, pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree assault and two counts of malicious destruction of property for the Nov. 20 chase that began when officers attempted to serve a warrant on a theft charge. Zombro also must pay $2,500 in restitution for damage to police cruisers he hit with his pickup truck during the chase.

NEW YORK -New York financier Bernard L. Madoff might be nearing a deal to plead guilty to one of the most egregious financial crimes in history. Prosecutors who have charged him with operating an alleged $50 billion Ponzi scheme notified a federal judge yesterday that Madoff had agreed to forgo a grand jury hearing, a step that is typically a precursor to a plea agreement. "He's going to say under oath, 'I did it,' and that's a huge step in the process," predicted Steven D. Feldman, a criminal defense attorney at Herrick Feinstein in New York.

When Nicholas W. Browning is sentenced in December for the fatal shootings of his parents and two younger brothers, the 16-year-old Cockeysville honors student with no prior criminal record will likely join a state prison population that includes hundreds of inmates serving time for crimes they committed as teenagers. He'll be fingerprinted, photographed and, in the language of the prison system, "classified." He could serve out his sentence - up to two consecutive life terms, according to the terms of the plea agreement reached Monday - among other maximum-security inmates convicted of murder, rape and other serious crimes, state corrections officials say. Or, if he is deemed in need of protection, he might spend as many as 23 hours a day in his cell.

The owners of two Ocean City restaurants pleaded guilty yesterday in federal court in Baltimore to hiring illegal immigrants as below-minimum-wage employees and housing several of them at a nearby condominium, according to the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. Husband and wife Bo Hao Zhu, 33, and Siu Ping Cheng, 30, also pleaded guilty to evading taxes and owing the government nearly $7,000 after providing false information on employees' wages, the prosecutors said. Zhu and Cheng ran Miyako Sushi and Seafood Buffet and Panda China Buffet, both in the 12000 block of Ocean Gateway, according to the plea agreement.

Since his death sentence was overturned, John A. Miller IV has accused his attorneys of coercion, deceit and of tricking him into pleading guilty to the murder of a 17-year-old girl. Most recently, he attacked the very foundation of the legal argument that won him the right to a new trial and the plea agreement that spared him a return to death row. Yesterday, a Baltimore County judge postponed Miller's sentencing again - but warned him against using complaints about his lawyers simply to delay the case.

Aaron McCown, a popular youth football coach with a criminal past, pleaded guilty yesterday in federal court to using a loaded pistol to intimidate a referee at a Pop Warner game in September in Montgomery County. McCown, 31, of Baltimore, who won a prestigious community service award from the Johns Hopkins University five years ago, could receive a maximum prison sentence of 10 years after signing a plea agreement with the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. He could end up with a shorter term than that, depending on how his case and background are evaluated by authorities before sentencing May 12, said officials involved in his case.