Police Chase

1 theft suspect caught, 2 escape in police chaseHavre de Grace house broken intoState Police caught a Baltimore man sought in connection with a theft in Havre de Grace, but two other suspects in the crime eluded them after a high-speed chase Thursday down Interstate 95.The chase ended when the get-away car crashed on Interstate 695 near Golden Ring Mall.Baltimore County police arrested Steven Paul Anthony McCain, 23, and charged him with breaking and entering after chasing him on foot from the crash scene.

Funeral arrangements for the state trooper killed in an accident on Interstate 95 over the weekend were released Monday, but details about the crash remain sketchy, according to a state police spokesman. Trooper First Class Shaft S. Hunter died Saturday when his cruiser slammed into a tractor-trailer parked on the shoulder near the entrance ramp to Route 32 in Howard County. According to a witness, a motorcycle with a white-helmeted driver raced by, followed by Hunter's cruiser, shortly after 3 a.m. Saturday.

A state emergency response team was dispatched to the Naval Academy yesterday to contain fuel oil leeching from the school's sea wall.The oily water was noticed shortly before noon near the Robert Crown Sailing Center, and academy officials notified the Maryland Department of the Environment. An emergency response team contained the leak at Santee Basin, where the academy's sailboats are berthed, with absorbent booms."It appears to be No. 2 fuel oil leeching from the sea wall," said Quentin Banks, an MDE spokesman.

Eric D. Stennett, the young Baltimore man acquitted of murder last year in the death of a city police officer, pleaded guilty yesterday to federal drug and gun charges that will send him to prison for 10 years. The lanky 19-year-old, whose high-profile case became a symbol for problems in the city court system, allegedly boasted, "I'll beat that," when arrested in March on the new charges. But on the day he was to have stood trial, Stennett sullenly admitted his guilt instead. The plea agreement was welcome closure for city police and prosecutors and for the family of Officer Kevon M. Gavin, who was fatally injured when Stennett's Ford Bronco plowed into his cruiser in a police chase April 20, 2000.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court gave police much wider power yesterday to use chases or other "shows of force" to stop individuals on the street or in other public places when the officers have only vague reasons for thinking crime may be afoot.An individual's constitutional right of privacy, the court ruled 7-2, does not exist during the time the police are approaching that person, even if the officers make gestures that clearly signal that the individual must stop for questioning.Only when the individual is actually under direct police control, and submits to it, does the privacy right of the Fourth Amendment come into play to limit police investigative actions, the court declared in an opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia.

Police arrest man, find stolen '99 car after chase, search A police chase and a search through the woods in Finksburg ended yesterday with the arrest of a man on the ninth green of a golf course - and, authorities said, the recovery of a car stolen more than three years ago. An undercover state trooper was driving west on Interstate 795 about 7:15 a.m. when he saw a 1999 red Lexus GS 400 speeding and weaving. The car had no front license plate, and the officer used a newly issued personal data assistant to learn that the rear plate was listed as having been stolen in July 1999, said Lt. Terry L. Katz, commander of the state police Westminster barracks.

Three adults and two juveniles were arrested and charged with auto theft Sunday night after a police chase into Carroll across the Pennsylvania border.State police in Westminster said James Edward Franklin Jr., 19, David Lee Franklin Jr., 21, and Michael Leonard Syria, 20, all of Baltimore, were arrested after state police set up a road block on Grave Run Road north of Hoffmanville Road.Two juveniles from Baltimore City also were charged in the theft and were turned over to authorities from the Charles Hickey School.

Police said they arrested an Edgewood man Friday as he attempted to steal a pickup truck from the 1800 block of Pulaski Highway in Havre de Grace and are investigating whether he was involved in a string of automobile thefts in the city the past three weeks.At least nine vehicles were stolen between June 19 and Tuesday in Havre de Grace. Most were driven for a short time and then recovered in the city. Two of the vehicles have not been found, police said.An anonymous call to a police task force Thursday led officers to the suspect, Sheriff's Department spokesman Lt. Tom Golding said.

Baltimore police plan to reconstruct an accident Monday in Mount Vernon that claimed the life of a teen-age girl as they try to determine whether officers contributed to the crash by chasing a stolen Acura Legend.City police are forbidden from chasing cars because the behavior is deemed dangerous on congested streets.Officers involved in the incident Monday told investigators they broke off a two-block pursuit four blocks from Madison and Cathedral streets, where the crash occurred.Killed was Nayshea Monet Saunders, 17, of the 4600 block of Craddock Ave. She was a passenger in a Jeep Grand Cherokee, which was broadsided by the Acura that witnesses said had been speeding at more than 80 mph. Seven people were injured.

Two teen-agers have been arrested and charged with the attempted armed robbery of an off-duty Prince George's County police officer Saturday in Crofton.Both youths, 17 and 15, were charged as juveniles.Police were still searching for a third youth yesterday. All three are from Mitchellville, in Prince George's County.Police said one of the youths allegedly threatened Officer Trudy Louise West-Kulick, 38, at about 3:30 a.m. as she and a friend were coming out of a Dunkin' Donuts on Route 3.The officer told the youth that she would give him money, but instead she pulled out her 9mm service revolver and fired one shot, missing the suspect.