Two Friends

The deadly shooting that claimed the lives of five women on Sunday has escalated into a violent, revenge-filled struggle over drugs as police linked a sixth body to the case and detectives found a suspect with his throat slashed.Police have in custody two of the four men wanted in the execution-style slayings of a grandmother, her daughter, granddaughter and two friends -- all found shot inside a Northeast Baltimore rowhouse.And as officers scour the streets in search of the two others, more revelations are surfacing in one of the city's worst mass killings.

Two friends -- one in power, one in trouble -- are poised to make a decision tangled in emotional bonds and political consequences.Anne Arundel County Executive John G. Gary, whose strong sense of personal loyalty has often come at his political expense, has been meeting with adviser and close friend Aubrey L. Linton after Linton's felony indictment this week on bigamy and perjury charges.The subject: Should Linton, whom Gary appointed as his liaison to public safety employees last year over County Council opposition, leave his post?

A 40-year-old Westminster man pleaded guilty yesterday to burning down a Gamber home last year because his former girlfriend had gotten into a fistfight with family members during her father's funeral in West Virginia.Walter Gilliam Mitchell of the first block of Chase St. agreed to plead guilty in Carroll County Circuit Court to first-degree arson and first-degree burglary. In exchange, prosecutors dropped remaining arson-related charges against him.In addition, prosecutors agreed to seek no more than 30 years in prison when Mitchell is sentenced on Feb. 12.According to a statement of facts, Mitchell became angry on Feb. 6, 1994, when his former girlfriend, Dianna Patton, called to tell him that she and her sister, Carolyn Brown, had gotten into a fight at the funeral in Martinsville, W.Va.

A 27-year-old Arnold carpenter told an Anne Arundel Circuit Court jury yesterday how he was shot in the face in August while fleeing drug dealers after he and two friends tried to buy cocaine in an "open-air drug market" in Annapolis.John Courtney Fargher, of the 900 block of Blue Fox Way, said two men grabbed him from behind near Clay Street. He and two friends had gone to the area with $200 to buy cocaine after a night of drinking at a Severna Park tavern.Mr. Fargher said he escaped but was shot as he leaped into the bed of a friend's Toyota pickup truck.

A 17-year-old boy playing with two friends in his Northeast Baltimore neighborhood was shot fatally early yesterday after he bumped into a parked car and set off its alarm, police reported.Vernon Alexander "Beethoven" Williams of the 4000 block of Sinclair Lane was standing next to a red 1987 Toyota Forerunner when as many as six shots were fired from a window in the 4300 block of Clareway St. At least one shot hit him in the back, and he died instantly, police said.Police charged the car's owner, William Norman Jr., 29, of the 1800 block of E. Belvedere Ave. with first-degree murder and two counts of attempted murder.

A 25-year-old New Jersey man was shot three times early yesterday while helping two friends fight off a gang of men at Howard and Baltimore streets, city police reported.Dean Ilconich, 25, of Marlton, N.J., was listed in satisfactory condition yesterday at the Maryland Shock Trauma Center. Police said one bullet grazed Mr. Ilconich's head and the other two struck him in the shoulder.Police officers were told that Mr. Ilconich was walking along Howard Street with two friends about 2:10 a.m. when a group of five to 10 men attacked them.

New York.--The first fight I had with my wife was in Paris in December of 1978. I have forgotten what it was about or what harsh things were said, but I do remember that one of us was holding a hair dryer and plugged it in while the shouting was still going on. It blew out the lights in our hotel room. Then I looked out the window and saw that every light in the city was out.I thought we had done it. The whole city! That's a fight!It was a coincidence, of course. A power station blew up or something.

OCEAN CITY -- A 24-year-old Virginia man was presumed dead after disappearing in the surf near 15th Street, where he was swimming with friends yesterday, Ocean City police reported.The man, whose name was not given, was caught in a current with two friends about 2 p.m. His friends escaped, but he sank, police said.

ANNAPOLIS -- Call it a Wynn-win situation.Sen. Albert R. Wynn not only picked up the Democratic nomination in the 4th Congressional District -- he also won the chance to be reunited with his best legislative buddy.Del. Thomas H. Hattery, the Mount Airy Democrat who scored a stunning upset in the 6th District by trouncing seven-term incumbent Rep. Beverly B. Byron Tuesday night, started in the House of Delegates with Mr. Wynn 10 years ago.The two sat side by side on the Ways and Means Committee, the beginning of a fast friendship that continued even after Mr. Wynn, a Prince George's Democrat, moved to the Senate in 1987.

ANNAPOLIS -- Call it a Wynn-win situation.Sen. Albert R. Wynn not only picked up the Democratic nomination in the 4th Congressional District -- he also won the chance to be reunited with his best legislative buddy.Del. Thomas H. Hattery, the Mount Airy Democrat who scored a stunning upset in the 6th District by trouncing seven-term incumbent Rep. Beverly B. Byron Tuesday night, started in the House of Delegates with Mr. Wynn 10 years ago.The two sat side by side on the Ways and Means Committee, the beginning of a fast friendship that continued even after Mr. Wynn, a Prince George's Democrat, moved to the Senate in 1987.

Mamma Mia!, the film of the international stage smash showcasing the greatest hits of ABBA, is like a party where everyone is so desperate to have a good time that it makes you miserable. With Meryl Streep as a former pop-rock star who now runs a decaying Greek tourist hotel and Christine Baranski and Julie Walters as her ex-band mates, the movie has a set of actresses who can sing and dance. But you won't be able to gauge their skill from the evidence here. The director, Phyllida Lloyd, encourages them to embellish their tunes with campy humor or belt them at the top of their lungs.

Exhausted, waterlogged and stung by jellyfish, musician Orlando Phillips had thoughts of gratitude, but not happiness, when he was pulled from the choppy waters of the Chesapeake Bay after his boat went down near Deale. "I had the feeling that I didn't want to live without my brother, and that my friends were gone," he said yesterday, recalling his desperation. When Phillips' boat became entangled in fishing net and sank about 10:20 p.m. Sunday, he became separated from his brother, Gregory, and two friends.

Warrants have been issued for a man and a woman in the stabbing Sunday morning of a Marine who was killed when he went to the aid of two friends during an altercation on an East Baltimore street, said a detective assigned to the Regional Warrant Apprehension Task Forced. Maurice Crosby, 19, of the 5200 block of Saybrook Road and Erica Ammenhauser, 20, of the 200 block of S. Durham St. are each charged in warrants with first-degree murder and related offenses in the stabbing death of Michael LaMaris Simms, 18, of Northeast Baltimore, said Detective Keith DeVoe.

The two friends hung out at least twice a week. Brian O'Neil Jones, a popular high school coach, and Alfred Winborne Jr., a mortgage consultant, bonded on the basketball court eight years before they were together for the last time one night in November 2005. The two had just left a bar on a well-lighted street in Canton about 1:30 a.m. when a man approached them carrying a rifle with a scope. Winborne, testifying this week in the Baltimore Circuit Court trial of the man charged with killing Jones, said the armed man yelled a profanity and then fired four shots as the two friends ran in opposite directions.

James Cameron, 92, who survived an attempted lynching by a white mob and went on to found America's Black Holocaust Museum, died Sunday in Milwaukee. In 1930, in Marion, Ind., Mr. Cameron, who was then age 16 and worked shining shoes, and two friends were arrested and accused of killing a white man during a robbery and raping the man's companion. A mob took them out of jail and hanged Mr. Cameron's two friends, then placed a rope around his neck. "They began to chant for me like a football player, `We want Cameron, we want Cameron,'" he recalled in a 2003 interview with the Associated Press.

Two weeks ago, Matthew Beirne held his best friend's head as the teenager was dying in the car seat next to him. Last week, Matthew wanted to honor Jesse H. Elkins - and so did half a dozen of his other friends. So the group went to Baltimore County elections headquarters and filed to run for office. "He always wanted to do new things - he didn't even care if it was anything out of the ordinary," said Nicki Cohen, 18, referring to her friend Jesse's decision to run for office before he was even eligible to vote.

They're all wearing 21s on their blue-and-white jerseys, the players on the defending national champion Johns Hopkins University men's lacrosse team. Matthew Stoffel was No. 21 until he graduated two years ago. "Stoff," an affable young man who practiced hard even though he was never a star, died in December in a crash on the Jones Falls Expressway in Baltimore. His best friend, No. 33, was driving. Gregory Raymond will be sentenced in May to up to a year in jail. He pleaded guilty last month to driving while intoxicated.

Twas a time not long ago when college students would arrive on campus like newborn fawns - nervous and wide-eyed, looking 'round desperately for someone or something familiar. To make friends, they'd actually have to get out and about, say hello to strangers on the Yard, join clubs, talk to people. No more. These days, the computer-savvy just hop on TheFacebook.com, an Internet meet-and-greet site that has become a surprise hit across the nation, growing from a couple hundred thousand users at its inception last year to 3.2 million today.

AM I THE ONLY one who read Sun reporter Sarah Schaffer's story with a sense of dM-ijM-` vu? I certainly hope so. The story ran Sunday under the headline: "Questions persist in death of black teen." Schaffer's story was about the death of Noah Jamahl Jones, whose 17 years on this Earth ended prematurely July 24 after he and two friends were involved in a fight with another group of guys in Pasadena. Four men were charged with Jones' death. Anne Arundel County prosecutors have dropped the charges - for now. Jones was black, and the four men are white.

Kenneth Jay Lane has long been known as jeweler to the stars, having designed pieces for Jackie O, Elizabeth Taylor and Audrey Hepburn. Now he's venturing into new territory, creating his own Home Gift Collection of jewelry-inspired frames, napkin rings, votive candle holders, place-card holders and boxes, all available to the public. Pictured above, center, is the Elaborate Pave Frame With Carved Stone, which fits a 3 1/2 -by-5-inch photo and retails for $300. Animals and other critters feature prominently in his jewelry as well as in this collection.