Raras

A teary Emilia D. Raras pleaded yesterday for a reduction in the life-without-parole sentence she received for hiring a hit man in November 1998 to kill her Elkridge daughter-in-law - a woman she claimed to "love like a daughter." Raras and her lawyers asked a Howard County Circuit Court panel of three judges to suspend all but 10 years of the sentence. The review panel likely will file its decision within 30 days. If the judges reduce her sentence and she is paroled after serving the mandatory minimum of five years, Raras could be free before her 70th birthday.

A Howard County grand jury indicted a Baltimore man and the mother-in-law of a slain Elkridge woman on murder charges yesterday, authorities said.Sara J. Williamson Raras, 33, mother of a then 1-year-old child, was stabbed to death at her home on Meadowfield Court in November.On Aug. 24, Howard County police arrested and charged Raras' mother-in-law, Emilia Raras, 63, of Parkville, and Ardale D. Tickles, 19, in the slaying.Yesterday, the grand jury indicted Raras and Tickles on charges of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.

Howard County Police Chief Wayne Livesay said yesterday that his officers were doing everything they could to solve the weekend slaying of an Elkridge mother of a young child."

The jury responsible for deciding the fate of a 63-year-old woman accused in a murder-for-hire plot will continue deliberations today after spending more than six hours yesterday listening to closing arguments. Emilia Raras, of Parkville, was charged in August with first-degree murder, solicitation to commit first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in the death of her daughter-in-law two years ago in Elkridge. Authorities say Raras hired Ardale D. Tickles, 20, a co-worker at a nursing home, to kill her Sara J. Williamson Raras.

A National Security Agency statistician brutally stabbed to death at her Elkridge home nine months ago was a victim of a plot by her mother-in-law, Howard County police charged yesterday.Police said Sara J. Williamson Raras' mother-in-law was charged yesterday afternoon with hiring a hitman -- a Baltimore co-worker whom she allegedly offered $5,000 to kill Raras, 35, the mother of a 1-year-old boy, according to court charging documents.Officials said they are trying to determine a motive.

Howard County Police Cpl. Ellsworth Jones needed a confession, a statement from a grandmother accused of hiring a man to kill her daughter-in-law. But Jones ran into a brick wall when Emilia D. Raras invoked her right to speak to an attorney one afternoon last August, ending her interrogation. An hour later, though, police said Raras approached Jones and begged to speak with him again. Raras' words that day, tape-recorded by police, would eventually become the linchpin of her conviction.

One day after charging a Parkville woman in a plot to kill her daughter-in-law in Elkridge, Howard County police revisited the crime scene and searched the mother-in-law's house, looking to gather more evidence."

In Anne Arundel School officials to leave after racial tensions HARWOOD - Two top administrators are leaving Southern High School in Harwood after a year marked by racial tension and drug problems, school system officials announced yesterday. Principal Cliff Prince, who has worked in county schools for 32 years, is to retire at the end of the month, and Assistant Principal Lee Watkins is being transferred to Severna Park High School. Prince's decision to retire apparently was made abruptly after black students reported last month that racial slurs were frequently directed at them and that he had ignored their complaints.

Tickles given life term for murder of Elkridge woman Ardale D. Tickles was sentenced to life in prison Tuesday for the murder of an Elkridge woman, but Howard County Circuit Judge Dennis M. Sweeney did not impose the "without the possibility of parole" clause that prosecutors sought. Tickles, 20, will serve that sentence after completing a 25-year sentence in Baltimore County on unrelated attempted murder charges. The earliest Tickles could be eligible for parole is 2024. Tickles was convicted of killing Sara J. Williamson Raras, 35, on Nov. 14, 1998.

Council incumbent loses to challenger by seven votes A third Columbia Council incumbent has been defeated in his re-election bid, losing by seven votes to a challenger who had called the city's governing body "asleep at the wheel." Oakland Mills representative Earl Jones captured 290 votes to challenger Barbara Russell's 297 votes, the election committee said Monday. The outcome of Saturday's race -- which attracted unusually high interest -- had been unclear because of uncertainty over the validity of mail-in ballots still outstanding.