Violence

On paper, Sunday night's WrestleMania looked as if it could be one of the strongest installments in the event's 28-year history. In execution, it was anything but. I personally avoided Twitter and Facebook, so that the thoughts I would be sharing here would be as purely mine as much as possible. The show lacked the feel of WrestleMania; the first hour felt rushed and most of the matches seemed to be missing something. The show wasn't bad by any means, so I don't want people to misread what I am saying, but I expected more.

Three separate violent acts left two men injured and one dead between Monday night and Tuesday morning in Baltimore, police said. The killing occurred in the Harlem Park neighborhood of West Baltimore, at about 12:15 a.m. Police were called for a report of an unresponsive person in a home in the 600 block of N. Carey St., and found a 58-year-old man in a makeshift closet in a room where hypodermic needles and plastic bags were strewn around the...

At one time, Howard County police Officer Cpl. Susan Goldman would talk mostly about the dangers of drugs when she spoke in county classrooms as part of the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program.But her visit to Bryant Woods Elementary School yesterday dealt with another issue that educators say is of increasing concern to public school students nationwide: violence.Through role playing and lectures in the 17-week D.A.R.E. curriculum, students now learn how to walk away, "cool off" and adopt other alternatives to violence, Corporal Goldman said.

State Del. Pat McDonough told the Sun last week that he wasn't going to back down from claims made in a press release that 'black youth mobs terrorize" downtown Baltimore. And in his Saturday night radio show on WCBM (AM-680), he not only made good on that pledge, he ratcheted up the rhetoric ripping Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake while vowing to bring the issue of downtown public safety to the front burner of public consciousness with a "news conference" Tuesday -- and other actions to follow.

The Arab world is quaking for democracy. Tunisia has led the surge; Egypt, Bahrain and Libya follow in its footsteps. Arab revolutionaries must learn from the events that have unfolded in every struggle for one's unalienable rights in the past, from that of Gandhi to Martin Luther King Jr. Reports continue to pour in ascribing violence to governments under siege. Libyan armies have even bombed certain parts of their own capital. Revolutionaries must consider the government's resort to violence as a weakness.

The Sun's Mary Gail Hare reports this morning more violence: Two shootings in the city Tuesday have left one man dead and another critically wounded. A 22-year-old man was shot multiple times in the torso shortly before 6 p.m. in the 4800 block of Northwood Drive near Winston Avenue in Govans. Police said the victim was approached on the street by an unidentified man who fired at him with a handgun. The victim remains in serious condition at an area hospital.   At 10:05 p.m., officers responded to a report of a shooting in the 4100 block of Norfolk Ave. in the Forest Park area.

Three separate violent acts left two men injured and one dead between Monday night and Tuesday morning in Baltimore, police said. The killing occurred in the Harlem Park neighborhood of West Baltimore, at about 12:15 a.m. Police were called for a report of an unresponsive person in a home in the 600 block of N. Carey St., and found a 58-year-old man in a makeshift closet in a room where hypodermic needles and plastic bags were strewn around the...

My sixth-grade teacher could not bring herself to tell the class that President John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. She returned from having been called to the office to report that "something has happened, but I don't feel that I can tell you what it is. " And so we went on with the remainder of our Friday afternoon lessons in a state of excited wonder. The unfathomable news came to me later, outside the front door of the school, where I was serving on safety patrol. It was on the lips of everyone who passed my station in front of the circular drive, where my duty of keeping students back until it was safe to cross kept me from focusing fully on the magnitude of what I was just now learning.

In his op-ed column of Jan. 25, Thomas Schaller itemizes acts of violence by the right ( "More evidence of violence on the right" . Apparently he denies that the left deserves equal scorn. Really? What about the extremely violent deaths inflicted by liberals on millions of unborn babies? These killings far overshadow the comparatively few killings committed by conservatives. Furthermore, while killings committed by conservatives are condemned by the vast majority of right-wingers, those committed by left-wingers are supported and condoned by the vast majority of leftists.

On June 1, 2010, everything in my life changed. Another young man was killed in Baltimore. He was shot to death in front of his father. He went over to his father's house that morning for a visit. He had an argument with some purveyors of chemical substances, and now he is dead. A verbal altercation over nothing ended in another death in the city. The only difference on this day was I knew the guy. This time it wasn't a nameless, faceless Joe-Nobody-Knows kid. This was a 19 year old boy, and I knew him. He was the father of a beautiful baby girl, and her entire family attends my church.

Visitors to Baltimore's downtown on summer weekends will see up to 50 additional police officers, a show of force aimed at preventing a repeat of St. Patrick's Day, when hundreds of youths battled and a tourist was beaten — scenes the mayor described as "a black eye for the city. " Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake toured the streets around the Inner Harbor and downtown for two hours Friday, the first night of increased police presence. During the late-night walk, she made her first public comments since reports that the disturbances on March 17 were far more extensive and more violent than police had initially described.

State Del. Pat McDonough, who stirred controversy this week when he said "roving mobs of black youth" terrorize Baltimore, shrugged off criticism Friday that he is using shock tactics to raise his political profile. McDonough, a Republican who represents Baltimore and Harford counties, refused to apologize for his comments. He has called for Gov. Martin O'Malley, a Democrat, to assign the Maryland State Police to fight the "consistent and dangerous attacks" in the city. McDonough has hosted a conservative talk show on WCBM for 20 years.

There's a swirl of violence occurring around 78-year-old Florence Carter, and she says she doesn't know why. But for the first time in nearly five decades, she's being forced to contemplate moving out of her Northeast Baltimore home. "My daughters, they want me to get up and move," Carter said. "But I've been here so long. I've been here 46 years. At my age, I can't afford another house. " Four homicides and a nonfatal shooting occurred on Mother's Day in Baltimore, and two of the victims are connected to Carter.

As a resident of the Inner Harbor, I was shocked to read the details surrounding the St. Patrick's Day "mayhem" ("St. Patrick's Day violence exceeded initial reports, police dispatch tapes show," May 13). I appreciate The Sun report and Peter Hermann 's excellent investigative journalism. Your front page story, accompanied by extensive play-by-play transcripts, was impressive. Also, I'm grateful Maryland's Public Information Act makes it possible to finally learn the details. Perhaps our city government would rather have had the whole sorry matter swept under the carpet.

Sunday's story on violence at St. Patrick's Day attracted many reactions. Most people writing me emails and in comments at the bottom story said the city had become scary. It's further proof of the uphill battle the city has trying to show improving crime numbers when one incident such as this can undermine the stats. Many readers, as they do time and again, pressed for why the racial makeup of the crowd was not reported. Simply put, we don't include race unless there is a racial issue to the story.

On Saturday night, Denise Kostka and her husband, disturbed by loud voices, peered out from their eighth-floor room in the Renaissance Baltimore Harborplace Hotel and saw at least 100 teens massing on the street below. "I never saw anything like that, ever," said Kostka, visiting from Springfield, N.J., to take in the sights and see her niece who lives in Federal Hill. Then they saw police surround a car. "I thought, 'Oh my God, it's "COPS" live,'" Kostka said, referring to the popular reality television show.

What's the connection between the two random assaults at the Inner Harbor on July 4? It's called "the cycle of violence. " We have one victim, an adult, who "re-engaged" the suspect after a first fight, instead of walking away. And an acquaintance laments that the suspect used a broken bottle "instead of his fists like a real man. " Then we have a second victim, a 4-year-old boy, who says he wants to "punch [the perpetrator] in the face" — that is, to re-engage ("Child shot at harbor rebounding quickly," July 7)

Once again, Thomas Schaller, offers his far left opinion regarding the rhetoric of the last few weeks ( "Violence on the right: more evidence," Jan. 25). The major flaw in Mr. Schaller's opinion is his great assumption, like others of his ilk, that his cited list of incidents prove a direct cause and effect connection to the political right's "violent rhetoric. " He also references David Neiwert's book as support for his opinion; he's a professor at Columbia University (farther left-leaning than Mr. Schaller)

Regarding the recent Senate renewal of the Violence Against Women Act ("Showdowns loom on Capitol Hill," April 26), it's important to remember the tragic life and death of Yeardley Love, who was left battered, bruised and bleeding alone in her room by an abusive ex-boyfriend. I went to the same high school as Yeardley. Notre Dame Preparatory School. We wore the same uniform, walked the same halls, wore the same ring and experienced everything else NDP had to offer. Although I didn't know her personally, I still feel connected to her. What happened to her could easily have happened to me or any other NDP girl.

The news, after all the shootings and courtroom drama is sorted out, is that Clayton "Coco" Colkley has to be tried again for murder but remains convicted of a handgun charge. And Darnell "Pooh" Fields has to be re-sentenced for his conviction and life plus 45 year year term on conspiracy to commit murder. It's a complicated case stemming from a gang war in 2003 in East Baltimore that left three people dead and four others wounded. The judges ruled that trial errors led to the overturning of the conviction and sentencing.