Police Chief

Baltimore police say they plan to change some tactics from last year's Fourth of July celebration to make sure the violence that stained the event won't happen again. Police will use low fencing to restrict access to the Inner Harbor and will shift officers to potential trouble spots such as transit stops as the night progresses, officials said Monday. Several hundred officers, including some from the Maryland State Police and the Maryland Transportation Authority, will patrol the harbor area.

The mother of the Baltimore County teenager who died in a physical confrontation with an off-duty officer called the lack of police representation at a Randallstown community association meeting Tuesday "a cowardly move. " Christopher Brown's mother told a crowd of about 100 residents who attended the Stoneybrook Community Association meeting that she was disappointed that police didn't send a representative to the meeting, where residents met to discuss the teen's death. Western Patrol Division Commander Maj. Evan Cohen was scheduled to attend the event, but police spokeswoman Cathy Batton said Tuesday afternoon that Police Chief James W. Johnson spoke to Brown's mother, Chris Brown, earlier.

The Anne Arundel County Council passed a resolution Monday night commending the county police department — but not its chief — for decreasing crime in 2011. The council passed the resolution only after approving an amendment specifically removing Police Chief James E. Teare Sr.'s name from the language. The councilmanic move follows another council resolution last month expressing no confidence in Teare. The council said it is concerned with Teare's ability to lead the police department in light of certain allegations in the March indictment of County Executive John R. Leopold.

Main Street business and property owners can share their safety needs or concerns with Laurel Police Chief Richard McLaughlin at a Coffee with the Chief, Friday, April 27 from 10 a.m. to noon at Partnership Hall, 811 Fifth St. All Laurel businesses and residents are invited to attend, and coffee and light refreshments will be served. Reservations are requested by Wednesday, April 25. Contact the Laurel Board of Trade at 301-483-0838.

Anne Arundel County Council members voted 4-3 Monday night to adopt a resolution expressing no confidence in Police Chief Col. James E. Teare Sr., the latest example of increasing pressure on the chief in the aftermath of the indictment of County Executive John R. Leopold. The resolution declares that the council is concerned about Teare's ability to lead the department because of allegations raised in the indictment. It follows no-confidence votes by two police unions, as well as union ads calling for the county executive and the police chief to leave office until the charges against Leopold are resolved.

The union that represents Anne Arundel County's upper police ranks plans to run a radio ad beginning Thursday in support of the department's second-in-command, who has called for a federal probe of the department and said the force is "dysfunctional. " The International Brotherhood of Police Officers, which represents Anne Arundel's police lieutenants and sergeants, paid for the ad that trumpets Deputy Police Chief Lt. Col. Emerson C. Davis as having taken a "brave stand" by testifying in front of the County Council about alleged improprieties by his superiors.

Baltimore's top cop on Tuesday warned against "race-baiting" amid rising tensions across the nation, citing the Trayvon Martin case and cautioning that a video generating outrage on the Internet of a tourist being beaten and stripped in downtown Baltimore doesn't appear to depict a hate crime. Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III, appearing on WBAL's C4 program, said the attack on a 31-year-old Arlington, Va. Caucasian man appears to be nothing beyond "drunken opportunistic criminality.

Anne Arundel County Police Chief Col. James E. Teare Sr. appeared Monday night before the County Council but declined to answer questions under oath about allegations of misconduct by County Executive John R. Leopold, citing the ongoing criminal investigation. Teare was placed under oath and answered general questions from council members about himself and Police Department rules but told the council he had testified twice before the grand jury investigating Leopold and could not publicly repeat that testimony.

When the Anne Arundel County Council first subpoenaed Police Chief James E. Teare Sr. to answer questions about police involvement in the allegations described in the indictment of County Executive John Leopold, the chief refused. His grounds were, in part, that the subpoena was not issued after an open, public vote. The council, meeting in public on Monday, will erase that objection. If he ignores the new subpoena, he has no business running the police department. Mr. Teare's attorney, Gerard P. Martin, wrote that it would not be advisable for Mr. Teare, as a law enforcement officer, to provide public testimony on matters that are subject to an impending criminal trial.