School Police

This was supposed to be an exciting week at Maritime Industries Academy, with students preparing for a Jan. 9 visit from the secretary of the Navy. Instead, the little Baltimore high school - in a strip mall in the 700 block of W. North Ave. - is in turmoil, railing over the sudden departure of the principal and the assistant principal. Dozens of parents and students marched about 10 blocks to school system headquarters yesterday morning in support of Principal Marco T. Clark, who has resigned, and Assistant Principal Kevin Brooks, who was placed on paid administrative leave.

After a series of violent incidents on its buses in Baltimore, the Maryland Transit Administration will announce plans today to improve cooperation with city law enforcement agencies. Jawauna Greene, an MTA spokeswoman, said yesterday that the agency's police officials were meeting "around the clock" with their counterparts in the Baltimore Police Department and the Baltimore school police to develop a plan to improve safety. Among other steps, the MTA police will ease any jurisdictional policies that might keep officers from the other departments from responding to incidents on MTA property.

James McHenry Elementary School was placed on lockdown yesterday after gunshots were fired in the parking lot. Two or three shots were fired away from the school about 2:20 p.m., and a witness saw a male run away afterward, said Marshall "Toby" Goodwin, chief of the city school police. No one was injured, but students were locked in their classrooms for about 15 minutes while city and school police searched the area, Goodwin said. Police were unable to find the gunman, and school was dismissed under police supervision.

The Baltimore school board has named a former state delegate who was running for a seat on the City Council as its new school police chief. Marshall "Toby" Goodwin, 50, has withdrawn from the 7th District council race and is urging voters to support the incumbent, Councilwoman Belinda K. Conaway. Conaway also works for the city school system, as a teacher and counselor, though she is currently on leave. Goodwin was appointed to the House of Delegates in December 2003 to replace the late Howard P. Rawlings, beating out Rawlings' son, Wendell, for the position.

The Howard County Police Officer of the Month award, which highlights the achievements of the nearly 400 employees on the force, offers insight into criminal activity by students in the county's highly rated school system. Since the start of the 2006-2007 school year, two school resource officers have been chosen for the distinction in The Beat, a publication of the Howard County Police Department Office of Public Affairs. Summaries of the officers' accomplishments detail gang activity and theft at Hammond and Reservoir high schools.

Acting on a tip from two students, a Howard County police officer yesterday arrested a 15-year-old freshman carrying a semiautomatic handgun in his waistband at Hammond High School in Columbia. Two students reported to a teacher that they had overheard their classmate talking about having a gun. The teacher relayed the students' suspicions about 10 a.m. to the police officer at the school. The officer removed the student from class and, during a search, found an unloaded gun in his waistband and an ammunition clip filled with nine or 10 rounds in his pants pocket, said Pfc. Jennifer Reidy, a spokeswoman for the department.

Teenage girl's body found at city school City police are investigating an apparent homicide of a teenage girl whose body was found yesterday morning in a courtyard at Bentalou Elementary School in West Baltimore. Police were still on the scene as parents escorted their children into the school building. A man walking his dog discovered the body about 6:10 a.m. and called police, authorities said. A preliminary investigation showed that the girl - whose identity was not known - might have died from multiple gunshot wounds, police said.

I entertain a strange and ridiculous thought while sitting for a moment in the District Court of Maryland, Baltimore Division, listening to a handsome and well-tailored police detective describe a young man's botched attempt at murder by handgun last month in the city: Couldn't we get Dr. Benjamin Carson, the esteemed neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins, to rewire some brains? Wouldn't that help reduce the homicide rate? As I said, strange and ridiculous. ... Excuse me. Here we are in June, approaching the halfway point of the year and the edge of summer, and I must be going through my annual fed-up Baltimorean thing.

Antonio Williams is resigning as police chief of the city schools to become the head of law enforcement for the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in early June, the school system confirmed yesterday. Williams, 43, has overseen the city schools for 18 months and is responsible for 100 sworn officers, 24 vehicles and a $6.6 million operating budget. In February, a plan to merge the schools' police force with the larger Baltimore department was publicly supported by Mayor Sheila Dixon but blocked by the school board, which has authority over the schools' police.

Amid parental and community concern about youth violence and gangs, Baltimore's school system has come up with a safety plan that aims to reduce offenses committed in and around schools by creating a more supportive learning environment within them. The plan, which will be presented at neighborhood forums in the next few weeks, also relies on parents and community residents to help create positive environments outside of school that support academic success. It's a comprehensive, thoughtful approach that deserves support as it heads for a likely final vote by the school board next month.