Shotgun

In the wake of what he says was the accidental firing of his shotgun, James J. Dasher tidied up the mess that had been made in his home. He told police he swept up shotgun pellets that had sprayed across the fireplace, officers testified yesterday. He tossed the casings of spent shotgun shells - although he later said he couldn't remember where. And he dumped a piece of plywood that had been hit by the blast into a trash pit on his sprawling organic farm in northern Baltimore County. "He was cleaning up," Officer Kyle Blackburn testified yesterday at Dasher's assault trial.

Told that he was about to receive a big gift to reward his "integrity," David L. Wonderlin peeked through the swinging doors of his former boss' kitchen and spotted something that he said stopped him in his tracks: Eighteen inches - maybe more - of the barrel of a shotgun. "I turned and ran, and there was a shot," the farmhand and carpenter testified yesterday in Baltimore County Circuit Court. He later added, "I was running for my life, as fast as I possibly could, and wishing I was in better shape."

A 16-year-old from Laurel, accused of trying to pull a shotgun on police officers, had his case transferred to juvenile court Monday. After reviewing reports from the state's Department of Juvenile Services and a psychological evaluation, Howard County Circuit Judge Diane O. Leasure granted Joshua A. Alvandi's request to have the juvenile justice system handle the gun, attempted assault and reckless endangerment charges. Alvandi's lawyer, Clarke Ahlers of Columbia, argued that his client would be better served with the help of the juvenile system.

TURTLE LAKE, Wis. -- What was he supposed to do?It's not a question so much as a challenge. A challenge to anyone who thinks Lenny Miller was wrong to booby-trap his cabin with a shotgun.Three times in eight months, the cabin had been burglarized.His hunting rifles were stolen. His fishing gear, too. And his tackle box. His new chain saw and his leaf blower and his Christmas present, a fillet knife still in its box. His boat had been vandalized. His outhouse trashed. His all-terrain vehicle had been torn apart.

Hamilton Smith never imagined himself trying to answer biology's grandest question.For more than 30 years, he'd been content to study bacteria, hunching over colonies of germs. He left it to others to tease out the secrets in the twisted, tangled and nearly endless coils of human DNA.Hidden there are the answers to the central mysteries of biology and medicine -- how we grow up and grow old, fall ill and get well, how genes influence our instincts and intellects. Inscribed in our DNA is the saga of 4 billion years of evolution and the story of mankind's dispersal across the Earth.

The Maryland Court of Special Appeals ruled yesterday that Michael R. Ruben -- a suspected armed robber who was among the Baltimore defendants ordered released for lack of a speedy trial -- was not denied his rights in spite of multiple postponements of his case.The decision clears the way for Ruben -- charged with attempted first-degree murder and armed robbery in October 1997 -- to be charged again.The Baltimore state's attorney's office, which learned of the ruling last night, said it will soon decide -- perhaps today -- whether to re-charge Ruben, who was accused of firing a shotgun at husband-and-wife liquor store owners in a robbery that netted $3.Last night, Haven H. Kodeck, deputy Baltimore state's attorney, said his office would have no decision until this morning.

An autopsy will be performed on an unidentified man who died yesterday after being shot with two lead-filled "beanbag" shotgun rounds while threatening police with two syringes in the living room of a vacant West Baltimore rowhouse, according to a department spokesman.Sgt. Scott Rowe said the man, in his 40s, died at Maryland General Hospital, and that the incident has been ruled an "in-custody death." Rowe said police expected the autopsy to reveal whether the man died from being shot or some other cause.

A 32-year-old Columbia man was sentenced to 18 years in prison yesterday in a case in which he pointed a loaded shotgun at a man in a parking lot last year but was interrupted by a Howard County police officer.Valentino M. Jackson of the 5400 block of Harper's Farm Road was convicted in May of first-degree assault, second-degree assault, reckless endangerment and possession of an unregistered shotgun. He was acquitted of carrying a deadly weapon with intent to injure.Assistant State's Attorney Sue-Ellen Hantman said she was pleased with the sentence from Circuit Judge James B. Dudley.

Shortly after a judge ruled on his divorce yesterday afternoon, a Columbia man armed with a shotgun and handgun fatally shot his estranged wife and critically injured her daughter in a parking lot outside the historic courthouse in Ellicott City, police said.Police said Tuse S. Liu shot his wife, So Shan Chan, and her daughter Wing Sau Wu, both of Baltimore, at close range about 2: 30 p.m. as they were walking through the lot.Liu fired at least two shotgun rounds, Howard County police spokesman Sgt. Morris Carroll said.

A Crownsville man was resting at home yesterday, recuperating from face and shoulder wounds inflicted by his 12-year-old son, who accidentally shot him with a 20-gauge shotgun during a hunting trip on the Eastern Shore.Eric Scott Gardner, 41, said he will suffer no permanent damage from the Tuesday accident when he trekked with his son, stepfather and uncle to the D & D Hunting Club in Dorchester County just before sunrise.The group was in dense woods about 6: 30 a.m. waiting for turkeys.

Four people were arrested Thursday night after police found them sitting in a vehicle with a loaded shotgun, a set of handcuffs, surgical gloves and masks. "We believe we thwarted the commission of a heinous crime, but we're trying to figure out what that [crime] was," said city police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi. Northeast District officers were called to investigate a suspicious vehicle in the 6200 block of Tramore Road about 7:40 p.m. and found a tan Mercury parked and occupied by four people, Guglielmi said.

Even a gun bust made by Baltimore's top cop can't buy jail time. Two brothers detained by Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III on New Year's Eve after he chased down men firing shotgun blasts into the night accepted plea deals Monday that will not require them to serve jail time. The arrests were dramatic, an example of Bealefeld personally carrying out his oft-reiterated strategy of going after "bad guys with guns." The commissioner and a member of his executive protection team pursued the suspects through an alley and into a rowhouse, and Bealefeld held one of them at gunpoint as a crush of officers converged to back him up. But the disposition in court eight months later highlights the city's continued challenges in translating such arrests into meaningful convictions.

Man with gun arrested at Arundel Mills mall after spray-painting car Anne Arundel County police arrested a 21-year-old Virginia man Saturday at Arundel Mills mall after discovering he was carrying a loaded pistol and marijuana in his backpack and had a loaded shotgun in his car. Timothy John Barnes, of Wake, Va., was charged with possession of a handgun, possession of a concealed deadly weapon, possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia, police...

Dante McCray was detained by police about 1:30 a.m. Wednesday after surveillance camera operators observed him with a shotgun in downtown Baltimore. By lunchtime, he had been charged in the killing of a woman in Fells Point. City police said officers swarmed the 22-year-old after watching him put a shotgun into the trunk of a white Cadillac parked at Eutaw and Lombard streets. The car had stolen plates and was being sought in connection with the shooting a day earlier of Josephine Lewatowski, 48. McCray, who also had a .38-caliber semiautomatic pistol, was detained by Central District officers and taken in for questioning as detectives searched the vehicle and performed ballistics tests on the weapons.

police reports in baltimore city and county: Southwestern Baltimore Shooting A man, 28, was exchanging information with another motorist after a minor accident in the 3500 block of Edmondson Ave. about 2 p.m. Monday when the occupant of a passing red van fired a shot that struck the victim in the back. The victim entered his vehicle and drove to St. Agnes Hospital, where he was reported in good condition. No arrest had been made. Northeastern Baltimore Shooting Police were seeking an unidentified man who shot another man, 21, in the upper right leg while the victim was in the 4000 block of Elmora Ave. about 8 p.m. Sunday.

Wetlands restoration project to get under way Four Maryland companies will join state and federal environmental agencies today in Queenstown to launch an effort to restore wetlands around the Chesapeake and Maryland's coastal bays. The Corporate Wetlands Restoration Partnership will use public and private money to do six initial projects totaling $2.9 million. They include shoreline erosion controls at Eastern Neck in Kent County and the replacement of invasive phragmites with native habitat at North Point State Park in Baltimore County.

Hal Whitaker, a retired paper business executive who entertained friends and family with jokes and stories, died in his sleep of heart failure Monday at his North Baltimore home. He was 72. Hal Cummings Whitaker was born in Baltimore and raised on Cloverhill Road. He was a 1954 graduate of Gilman School, where he played lacrosse. He received a bachelor's degree in history at Washington and Lee University, where he was a member of the lacrosse team. He belonged to the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.

The county government has announced its schedule for this season's deer hunts, which are intended to achieve a balanced white-tailed deer population in parks. County officials say the hunts are needed to reduce a large population that they say has led indirectly to more incidents of Lyme disease transmission, damage to vegetation and ecosystems in parks, and added to the danger of collisions for motorists. The hunts, which are managed by the Department of Recreation and Parks, will include bow and shotgun hunting, with hours from dawn until noon.

A 28-year-old Glen Burnie man was sentenced yesterday to nearly 13 years in federal prison for robbing two banks with a shotgun last year in Arbutus and in Severn, according to the Maryland U.S. attorney's office. U.S. District Judge William M. Nickerson also ordered Joel Travis Nunnally to serve three years of supervised probation when he is released. Prosecutors said Nunnally robbed a Bank of America branch in the 5200 block of East Drive in Arbutus on June 8, 2007, wearing a dark-colored ski mask and gloves.

A Howard County grand jury has indicted Ronald Derrick McConnell on a charge of first-degree murder in last month's shooting of a 23-year-old Columbia man. McConnell, 21, is accused in the killing of Jason Pridgen Batts, who was found shot in the parking lot of Stevens Forest Apartments in Oakland Mills village on May 17. The 11-count indictment, which was handed up Wednesday, also charges McConnell with conspiracy to commit murder, attempted armed robbery...