Target Practice

Nothing extra The Orioles' game against the St. Louis Cardinals yesterday didn't go past regulation because Cesar Crespo wouldn't allow it. Crespo, summoned twice from the minor league camp, singled with two outs in the ninth inning to score Terry Tiffee and give the Orioles a 6-5 victory in Jupiter, Fla. Crespo's hit came against major league veteran Russ Springer. Still struggling Freddie Bynum has been regarded as a leading candidate to fill the last spot on the 25-man roster, but he went 0-for-4 with one strikeout, lowering his average to .135.

Student charged with carrying BB gun at schoolState police arrested a Westminster High student yesterday after school officials found he was carrying a BB pistol on school grounds.The boy was arrested just before school dismissal at 2:30 p.m. and charged with carrying a weapon on school property, police said. He was released into his father's custody.The gun was never fired and no one was hurt, police said."Appropriate disciplinary action is being taken," said Peter B. McDowell, director of secondary education for Carroll County schools.

MANY people have strong feelings for their cars. The direction those feelings take depends usually on how well the car runs.When someone pays several thousand dollars for a mound of metal and plastic that does nothing but consume gas and leak motor oil, those strong feelings tend to be negative. People have been known to swear, kick and make crude gestures to their automobiles on the occasion of flat tires, failure to start and other common auto hazards.On the other hand, there are some people who love their cars.

REDFORD, Texas -- A Marine will be the subject of a grand jury inquiry into the fatal shooting of an 18-year-old who was tending a herd of goats on his family's farm near the Mexican border.District Attorney Albert Valadez said he would proceed with the investigation of the Marine, whom he did not identify, based on reports from Texas Rangers who are investigating the shooting of the youth, Ezequiel Hernandez Jr.Hernandez died May 20 after he was shot by a member of a Marine team from Camp Pendleton, Calif.

Growing up, George E. Raley Jr. heard stories that the military had conducted some sort of testing during World War II on the quiet Southern Maryland peninsula known as Newtowne Neck. As an adult, he would learn that his father had assisted in experiments performed by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory to develop a weapon credited with helping the Allies win the war in Europe. So he was not particularly surprised this month when the sands of the peninsula where he once camped, swam and picked blackberries shifted to reveal a small but substantial stockpile of World War II-era munitions.

While American military bases are being cut and eliminated, business is booming at the Maryland National Guard's Camp Fretterd -- once the site of a reform school for girls."

OFF THE COAST OF BLOODSWORTH ISLAND -- Harold Robinson was crabbing these waters of the Chesapeake Bay about 10 years ago when his fishing boat slammed into something underwater, gouging its keel, hurling his son to the deck with bruised ribs and burying Robinson under an avalanche of crab pots. The 46-foot Chris-Lin had not run aground on rocks or a reef but on another obstacle watermen in this remote section of Maryland's Eastern Shore sometimes face -- the turret of a submerged tank the Navy had been using for target practice.

An indoor shooting range is still looking for a home in Carroll County. News that the pending lease between Eldersburg Business Center and Top Gun Indoor Range Inc. was cancelled means Carroll's gun owners will not have any new ranges -- indoor or outdoor -- to practice their hobby any time soon.Numerous attempts by the county to locate an outdoor public range have been unsuccessful. Proposed sites at county-owned property at Hoods Mills landfill and Union Mills as well as state-owned land at Morgan Run Natural Environment Area were all rejected because of strong community opposition.

Conventional wisdom holds that the Cold War is over. But is it? Consider the implications of Secretary of Defense Cheney's recent commitment to keep large numbers of American troops in South Korea, on the grounds that such defenses are required because North Korea is at the threshold of nuclear capability.Cheney didn't say so, but the implication is clear: The presence of 40,000 U.S. troops currently based in South Korea would deter North Korea from striking its neighbor with nuclear bombs.

Odd double steal The Orioles scored a run in the fifth inning in a most unusual manner. With Corey Patterson on third base, Brian Roberts broke too soon for second and got caught in a rundown after Toronto starter Dustin McGowan stepped off the rubber. Roberts kept glancing at Patterson while trying to stay alive, waiting for him to break for home. It finally happened as shortstop Royce Clayton, who also was checking Roberts, flipped the ball to McGowan covering first. McGowan's throw to the plate sailed over catcher Jason Phillips' head, and Patterson scored.