Standoff

Recorded 911 calls released Tuesday reveal frantic reports from neighbors who described the scene as Baltimore police said an off-duty officer shot and killed his girlfriend then barricaded himself in a home for six-hours. "The neighbor across the street she's laying down on the ground beside about four police cars," one woman told an emergency dispatcher as the West Baltimore incident unfolded. "One ambulance came and backed out. She's laying on the ground and bleeding terrible, and I haven't seen an ambulance since.

Recorded 911 calls released Tuesday reveal frantic reports from neighbors who described the scene as Baltimore police said an off-duty officer shot and killed his girlfriend then barricaded himself in a home for six-hours. "The neighbor across the street she's laying down on the ground beside about four police cars," one woman told an emergency dispatcher as the West Baltimore incident unfolded. "One ambulance came and backed out. She's laying on the ground and bleeding terrible, and I haven't seen an ambulance since.

This is truly absurd ("City won't pay lead damages" April 3.) What are the mothers and fathers of children affected with lead poisoning to do? How long will the children stricken with lead poisoning, going to survive? What about the medical costs? This aliment came from some landlord too lazy to fix the paint problem before renting these homes to residents. What other recourse do these people have? Anyone who understands HUD should know that it's all about the numbers!

Frank James MacArthur, the local Internet personality known as the Baltimore Spectator, pleaded guilty Wednesday to possession of a short-barreled shotgun after a December standoff with police that he broadcast live. MacArthur's lawyer said his client was not happy with the outcome, but realized he faced another two months in jail before getting another trial date because the prosecutor was tied up in another case. "Baltimore jail is not a good place to be," attorney Mark Van Bavel said.

(From the Baltimore Crime Beat blog) A man who police say shot and wounded his wife and then barricaded himself in his Baltimore County house in Randallstown for hours was found dead inside this afternoon, a police spokesman said. Police identified him as Terrence Joseph Wilson, 36, who lived in the 9500 block of Oak Trace Way in a subdivision off Liberty Road. His wife, who escaped the house before the standoff, was being treated at Maryland Shock Trauma Center for multiple gunshot wounds.

Four "persons of interest" in a shooting were taken into custody following a standoff that lasted more than two hours Tuesday in West Baltimore. Police said an unidentified man was shot three times about 1:30 p.m. in the 500 block of Sanford Place and collapsed around the corner in the 500 block of Cumberland St. He was taken to Maryland Shock Trauma Center with non-life-threatening injuries to his arm, back and midsection, according to Anthony Guglielmi,...

It's cop against cop in a standoff over the use of a police badge in a race for the Baltimore County Council. Baltimore County Police Chief James Johnson has sent a cease-and-desist letter to council candidate Charles "Buzz" Beeler of Dundalk over the retired officer's use of a police badge in campaign literature. The chief threatened legal action in the Aug. 11 letter to Beeler, a veteran of the county force for more than 30 years, if he did not immediately stop using the badge and retrieve any fliers or mailers with the symbol.

A man suspected of shooting a Johns Hopkins Hospital doctor has fatally shot himself and his mother, who had been hospitalized, according to Baltimore police. The shootings ended a four-hour standoff at Hopkins' sprawling East Baltimore campus. The suspect — whom police did not identify — had barricaded himself on the eighth floor of the hospital's Nelson Building after a doctor was shot during the morning, according to police. The doctor, whose identity has not been released, was shot in the abdomen and was in surgery, but his injuries are not life-threatening.

A Carroll County man was arrested Thursday evening after an eight-hour standoff with police. Maryland State Police arrived at the Union Bridge home of Robert L. Mellema, 31, at 11 a.m. to arrest him for violating his probation. But Mellema, who lives with his grandmother in the 1400 block of Marble Quarry Road, went into the house when he saw police and refused to come out, according to a statement from police. Mellema, who was know to have access to firearms, was in the house with his grandmother until 7 p.m., when police entered the home and arrested him without incident.

After barricading himself in a beer distribution plant Wednesday, a 32-year-old Dundalk man was charged by Baltimore County police. Clifton Rodney Duncan Jr., of the 2600 block of Yorkway was identified as the suspect who ran to a Kmart on North Point Boulevard before breaking into a home in the nearby Colgate neighborhood and then locking himself in an office at the Winner Distributing Company. Officers were first called to the nearby Kmart store at 2:20 p.m., and remained outside the distribution center until about 7 p.m., after Duncan was subdued with a Taser.

After barricading himself in a beer distribution plant Wednesday, a 32-year-old Dundalk man was charged by Baltimore County police. Clifton Rodney Duncan Jr., of the 2600 block of Yorkway was identified as the suspect who ran to a Kmart on North Point Boulevard before breaking into a home in the nearby Colgate neighborhood and then locking himself in an office at the Winner Distributing Company. Officers were first called to the nearby Kmart store at 2:20 p.m., and remained outside the distribution center until about 7 p.m., after Duncan was subdued with a Taser.

Police captured a man Wednesday evening after he barricaded himself inside a beer distribution facility in eastern Baltimore County, bringing to an end a standoff that followed a disturbance at a Kmart and a break-in at an empty home. The chaos, which led authorities to evacuate two businesses and place nearby Colgate Elementary School on lockdown, lasted most of the afternoon. Authorities initially said the man might have been holding a hostage, but police said they did not find anyone with him. Officers initially responded to the Kmart in the 200 block of North Point Blvd.

Is this really the best anyone in Washington can do to avert sequestration? President Barack Obama's call for delaying the automatic spending cuts past the March 1 deadline would seem reasonable enough, except he hasn't really offered up a specific plan to do so. Instead, he's recommended that a few months of delay might be achieved through a "smaller package of spending cuts and tax reform. " Republicans are flatly rejecting any form of tax increase (and, apparently, ending a tax break on corporate jets is regarded as just that by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell)

A man barricaded himself in a Northeast Baltimore apartment building Friday night after confronting a police officer there with what authorities described as a makeshift blowtorch, city police said. Around 11 p.m., police said they had taken a man into custody. City police were called to an apartment building housing elderly residents in the 6400 block Loch Raven Boulevard about 8:30 p.m. for a report of breaking and entering, according to city police spokespeople. The officer encountered a man in the lobby carrying a blowtorch, police say. The suspect directed a flame at the officer, who returned fire with his weapon, police say, and then the suspect ran into the building, barricading himself on an upper floor.

A Baltimore circuit judge denied another bail request Friday for the blogger who held a publicized standoff with city police this month that was broadcast live to thousands of listeners. Judge Lynn K. Stewart said Frank James MacArthur, also known locally as the Baltimore Spectator, posed a continuing threat to public safety and should remain jailed without bail. It was the third time that MacArthur, 37, who lives in the Waverly neighborhood, has been denied bail. MacArthur's attorney, Jill P. Carter, called the revocation a knee-jerk overreaction when many other suspects facing similar charges are often offered bail.

Frank James MacArthur always said what was on his mind. But sometimes, his sister told him, that wasn't the best idea. "Frank is the kind of person who once in a while you wish he would lie because it wouldn't get him in trouble," Jean Arthur said. "Unfortunately for good or bad, he likes to give you his opinion. " "And when it comes to police officers," she added, "they don't like to hear your opinion. " MacArthur's confrontational, brash persona drew thousands to his Baltimore Spectator blog and Twitter page, where he railed against the city of Baltimore, police and the mainstream media.

At a lively Central Booking hearing, a Baltimore judge denied bail to Frank James MacArthur, the local blogger who live-streamed a standoff with police on the Internet, two days after a different judge ordered him to be released. MacArthur, 47, appeared Wednesday dressed in a yellow jumpsuit, his head shaved and his hands cuffed behind his back. District Judge Joan B. Gordon pointed to MacArthur's criminal history and apparent "violent and assaultive nature" as reasons for denying bail on gun charges filed against him late Monday.

New gun charges have been filed against the Baltimore blogger who broadcast his standoff with police online via live radio as they tried to arrest him on an outstanding warrant last week, according to court records and police. Police said they found an unregistered sawed-off shotgun in his home. Frank James MacArthur, 47, a cab driver and prolific social media user who has branded himself as a citizen-journalist and city watchdog through Twitter posts and online radio broadcasts under the name Baltimore Spectator, peacefully turned himself over to police outside his home in the 600 block of McKewin Avenue about 11 p.m. Saturday.