Dodge Von Der Misty Ridge

Meet Dodge, a German Shepherd Dog. The reason I haven't had any free time for this blog or any other hobby or past time. Dodge was purchased early September and is now nearly 4 1/2 months old.

Yes, in order to save furniture, walls and window sills from destruction I must spend most of my waking hours with him, giving him my nearly undivided attention.

A cute little bundle.

Quite the guardian.

The ball gives him a woodie.

Gotta love them ears.

Cherie with Dodge's daddy. He should end up looking just like Pop.

Coming Soon, a New Dog

Two years after the death of our beloved Golden Retriever "Bo" Cherie has talked me into another dog.

This young man, to be named later, is due to be picked up next week. He's a cute German Shepard with German and Belgium bloodlines.

Much more to come......

Abominable Snowman Found

Courtesy of TMZ.Com, it appears the abominable snowman has been located.

More as it develops........

Jay Landsman, the Real Sgt. John Munch

During my years with the Baltimore County Police one of the nicest characters I had the privilege of working with was Detective Sergeant John Munch of "Homicide, Life on the Street".

Well, not exactly. You see the character of Detective Munch, played by Richard Belzer, was inspired by a real life Baltimore Police Homicide Lieutenant, Jay Landsman. Jay was featured in the book by the same title and needless to say couldn't be left out of the television show.




My work with Jay Landsman was however real life. When I first met him he was still a homicide supervisor in Baltimore city. Jay was a wealth of information. He possesses a great, morbid, sense of humor which always came in handy while working murders. Munch was very much Jay Landsman.

His memory is what impressed me the most. While working a murder in Baltimore County I called Jay to run a nickname by him. A witness identified "Peanut" as being the shooter. "Peanut" is a common nickname in Baltimore crime circles but Jay said he believed our"Peanut" had the name of Anthony Williams and lived at 5** Gold Street off of Pennsylvania Ave.
Searching BGE records revealed that Williams did live at that address. We identified Williams as the killer and thanks to Jay saved an awful lot of time trying to track down "Peanut".

Jay had a side business at the time of removing deceased bodies from death scenes, natural and un-natural. His company would transport the victims to the Medical Examiners office for autopsy. On one occasion he responded to one of my murder scenes and immediately recognized our dead guy as a suspect in two previous city murders. In our case he attempted to rob his own cousin of drugs and was shot and killed by cuz.

It was always a pleasure to run into Jay at crime scenes or the M.E's office as he always had a story to tell to make you laugh.

Approx. 1994-95 Jay retired from the city police department and joined Baltimore County Police where he eventually became a homicide detective and later a supervisor.

Jay also became a regular on the HBO crime drama, "The Wire", both as a fictional character and a co-star.

The fictional Sergeant Jay Landsman was played by actor Delaney Williams. He portrayed a homicide unit supervisor.
The real Jay Landsman portrayed Lieutenant Dennis Mello (picture above with uniform on) a commander in the Baltimore City police force.

Now that "The Wire" is off the air Jay Landsman is back to real police work.

The Landsman inspired character "Munch" has gone onto make television history.
Munch has been the only fictional character played by a single actor to appear on eight different television shows. These shows were on four different networks: NBC (Homicide: Life on the Street, and Law & Order franchise), FOX (The X-Files, Arrested Development), UPN (The Beat), and HBO (The Wire). Munch has also been one of the only television characters to cross genres, appearing not only in crime drama series, but also the genres of sitcom (Arrested Development) and science fiction (The X-Files).
A muppet representation of Detective Munch appeared in the Sesame Street sketch "Law and Order: Special Letters Unit".

The Legend of Bob Speed

Officer Bob Speed, a name that brought shivers down the spine of probably thousands of motorists in Baltimore county Maryland. Bob was a traffic cop for most of his career and a fine one at that.

I had the pleasure of working around Bob when I worked the Accident Investigation unit based in the old Towson precinct on Washington Ave.
While I worked a different shift configuration than Bob our shifts would coincide at least one week per month. I would handle flyouts and fatal accidents and Bob would handle the less serious accidents and work radar, tons and tons of radar.

Bob was probably the #1 ticket writer in the county which to me is OK in my book. I didn't enjoy writing tickets and that ultimately led me to leave the unit but speeding can be a real problem and in Bob's defense he was assigned areas to work radar by citizen complaints.

I had heard stories about Bob before I ever met him. Supposedly he was hung in effigy from the old York Road underpass in Cockeysville. I heard enough about Bob to believe it's true. Bob seemed to give no one a break. He heard allot of razzing when he gave Orioles superstar Eddie Murray a speeding ticket. Bob would just smile and take it.

I once was in court and Bob was ahead of me testifying against his defendants. One gentleman told the judge that he couldn't believe he made the mistake of getting caught. He said everyone in the neighborhood know Officer Speed works radar there. In fact one of his neighbors had a framed photograph of Officer Speed working radar hung in his clubroom.

Where Bob's legend really grew was with a ongoing feud with Car and Driver magazine. Bob would write letters to the editor wherever they would promote speeding or perhaps street racing. Initially the editors didn't believe his name was truly Officer Speed. They would always respond to his letters with an editor's note making fun of Bob. Once they published a photo of a donkey on the table of contents page and titled it, "More letters from Officer Speed". I don't believe at the time they knew Bob was black or they might not have used a black donkey for the picture.

They later published this photo of Bob in their magazine. Before long the powers to be put an end to this and asked Bob to stop writing to the magazine.

My funniest personal story of Bob goes like this.

Bob had locked up a 20 something female for DWI and transported her to the station for a breathalyzer test. I was an operator so went in to administer the test.

After going through the paperwork and pre-testing I explained to the young lady how the test worked. I held the breathalyzer tube to her and explained that she had to put her lips around the tube and blow until I told her to stop. She then said that Officer Speed already had her blow onto a black thing when he pulled me over. Needless to say it was pretty hard not to laugh in her face and Bob and I had a good laugh later. The black thing she was speaking of was a PBT (preliminary breath tester).

I must say Bob was not all about traffic. He started his career working the street in the Cockeysville area. Bob was one of the kind of cop that if he heard me out with a stop and he was nearby he would back you up. He also backed the patrol guys whenever he could.

After I retired and went to work at PHH, I heard from many people that they were ticketed by Officer Speed. This included a few members of my boss's family. It was almost something that people took pride in as they were part of a larger family of ticket recipients.

Bob is now retired and is a bailiff at the Towson District court where he stood to testify in thousands of cases.

I imagine some of his old defendants feel they can't get away from him.

Summer of 2008 Boating Adventures, So Far.

Thought I would give a brief photo synopsis of the summer until now. Hopefully the best is yet to come.

We bought the new boat, a 2004 Sea Ray 280 Sundancer on April 30th. It was originally called Sea Meant.

I quickly changed the name to Cherie Amour.

A Magma gas grill was purchased and mounted with a quick release mount on the swim platform.

This area of Frog Mortar Creek is alongside of Martin Airport property. Years ago only a handful of boats would be here. Now with the price of fuel nearing $5.00 per gallon, this place gets very busy. It's a great place to swim and there are nearby restaurants and bars.What these boats are doing is called rafting. That is tying boats together while at anchor.

This is Cherie's idea of rafting.

Here are a few pictures of an evening with Steve and Lindsay.

At Al & Sandy's pier

From the 4th of July, Me and Cherie

Bill and Jenn.
Here are Brad, Jamie, Cetta and me doing a Brady Bunch impression.

More to follow as we plan some trips to Rock Hall and Fairlee Creek. There is still some good boating weather ahead and if I remember to take some pictures I'll document our travels.

And Then it Was Gone

Somewhere in the neighborhood of 1984 I handled a fatal accident on York Rd. just south of Phoenix Rd. A 17 yr. old was driving northbound, went off the right shoulder and struck a tree.
He died instantly. When I notified the victim's mother of his death I was saddened to learn that he was an only child and his father left his mother a few months before. This poor woman lost her marriage and son and was suddenly all alone.

She had a cross placed at the accident scene which had been there ever since.
I had thought many times of stopping my car to read the memorial plaque on the cross but it's not a safe place to pull over. No shoulder and on a sharp curve.

I noticed today that after 24 years someone crashed in exactly the same spot, taking out the memorial cross.

I wonder if that person saw the smashed cross and realized the irony.

Serpico, How I Met My Hero, Sort Of.

Frank Serpico had always been a hero of mine. From reading the book to watching the film to seeing his Biography episode. Being a cop it was easy to look up to the man. How he got screwed by the NYPD made me hold him in even higher regard.

For those who don't know the story, Paco was a New York cop during a very corrupt time. He did his best to ignore the cops around him who were on the take but eventually felt his life was in danger by the "dirty" cops who didn't trust him. He was too honest. Serpico went to some friends in the department and to a newspaper journalist for help.

Soon after while attempting to arrest a wanted guy in his apartment building Serpico was shot in the face and left lying to die by his fellow cops. After he survived his wounds he blew open the corruption within the department. I believe it was called the Knapp Commission which held hearings leading to the arrests and firings of many police. Serpico retired from the force and was a bit of a vagabond for many years and now in his 70's lives in Stuyvesant, NY (Up state).

My former police chief, Neil Behan, was a former assistant commissioner in the NYPD and had spoke about Serpico and insinuated that he was one of the guys Serpico trusted.

I had found Serpico's website and thought I'd write him. I sent him an email mentioning how Behan had spoke of him and that I had admired him and what he had went through.

The next day I received an email from Vince Serpico who said his was Frank's nephew and was pretty much the middle man in contacting Frank as Frank doesn't own a computer but does use a computer at the library. He said he passed my message on to Frank.

The next day, June 2, 2005, I received an email from Frank Serpico thanking me for writing and asking if I thought Behan was a 10%'er or 80%'er. (Serpico believes that 10% of cops are honest, 80% are not and the other 10% are iffy.) Frank finished the email by writing that he would call me and we'd talk about it.

When I got home from work I checked the caller ID and saw F. Serpico had called. (He had the spelling differently but I'll keep his identity secret as it is a listed number)
I had missed his call. The rest of the day I was a nervous as hell. I felt like a school girl waiting for my boyfriend to call. Finally around 7:30pm he called again. I couldn't believe it. I thanked him for calling and then we discussed our mutual acquaintance, Behan. Needless to say Frank, or Paco, as his friends call him, had nothing good to say about Behan. Apparently Behan's story is a little exaggerated as to how he helped Serpico.
We talked about his career and about corruption in general. I have to say the man did most of the talking and genuinely enjoyed telling his stories. I was however surprised to see how liberal the man is and somewhat radical in his dislike for Bush/Cheney.
We talked for over 90 minutes. My ear was sore and my cordless phone was dying but I wouldn't hang up until he was ready.

He told me to call him anytime and I have his number from the caller ID but I have to say I don't have the nerve to call him as I don't have anything really to say to him.

Hey Paco, this is Greg from Baltimore, what's up dawg?, just wouldn't cut it.

The More Things Change.......

Happened to find some old pictures and noticed a similarity.

If you notice the background in this picture you'll see Conrad Ruth's Villa, a outdoor party facility on Edwards Lane in Bowleys Quarters.

This first one was taken 1989

This one, 2002

Next, 2007

And finally, 2008

Guess I don't Know My Math

The price of crude oil has dropped 15% or so in the last few weeks.
My local gas station dropped their prices by 4%.

What's wrong here?

The Criminal Injustice System

A Sad Story

This story is a true story but the names will be changed as this one hit close to home and those that I'll write about still live somewhat nearby. It's a story where there is no happy ending, no redeeming value, a story of despair and hopeless lives.

Growing up in Perry Hall we had allot going for us. The area was still undeveloped and my group of friends had a wonderful couple of teenage years. There was a group of 15 or so who to this day have remained friends. We for a while had what we called the "fort". This was a 3 story structure that we build in the woods that had a working fireplace, lights powered by car batteries and a Formica outside bar courtesy of my parents redoing their kitchen. We drank quite a bit of beer back there and had parties frequently. One of the neighborhood girls who occasionally visited the fort was "Karen". She and her sister were friends with some of my buddies and I drank some beer with them from time to time at various parties and at the apartment complex where they lived. I'm guessing that 1975 or 1976 was the last time I had seen Karen.

February 12, 1991 I was working the Homicide unit and received a call of a possible homicide. The victim was at the G.B.M.C. emergency room. I met with the attending physician who led me to the victim and described what happened. The victim was a 7 week old female with visible contusions and abrasions on her face and head. The doctor stated that an adult male ran into the emergency room carrying the baby and shouting, "somebody help me, my baby is not breathing". The man was crying and smelled of alcohol. The baby was pronounced dead basically upon arrival. The victim had dilated and fixed pupils and no heart rate. The man cried, "I lost my baby girl".

I requested Dr. Frank Peretti of the State Medical Examiner's Office to respond and examine the victim. We had a good relationship with Dr. Peretti. It is not normal procedure for the M.E. to respond to a scene but Dr. Peretti offered to do so at any time. I guess a man who hunts rattlesnakes and calls that vacation, is not normal anyway.

Dr. Peretti examined the victim and found that her skull was fractured in many locations. He had me feel the skull myself to demonstrate how the fractures feel. He also noted that the baby exhibited visual symptoms of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. These symptoms are an elf like appearance of the eyes and ears. This is a result of heavy drinking of the mother while carrying the child. Having this information immediately at hand instead of waiting for the formal autopsy the next morning helped us quite a bit.

I went and met with the adult male who brought the victim in and began an informal interview.

The man identified himself as "Tim" and that the victim was his daughter "Amy". Amy was born the previous Christmas day. Tim also has a 2 year old son who was home with the mother. They all live together on Magledt Rd. in the Carney section of Baltimore county. They live in an upstairs apartment of a two story home. Tim described that he and his wife were home drinking a few beers and that his wife went to check on the baby and found her unresponsive. Tim immediately scooped up Amy wrapped her in a blanket and drove his pick up truck. Asked why he would drive her the whole way to Towson while she was not breathing and Tim said, "well I was going 100 mph". Tim had no explanation for Amy's injuries. While talking about his family Tim pulled a photograph from his wallet and said that it was his wife, Karen. I immediately recognized Karen as my old teenage friend.

We responded to the home and began the investigation. Prior to my arrival the precinct officers had taken custody of the 2 year old child and turned him over to social services. Karen was picked up by Tim's parents. The apartment was a real mess. It was filthy with trash, dirty clothes strewn about and cluttered with junk. A bottle of Absolut vodka was in the freezer and beer in the fridge. No evidence was found.

The following day we attended the autopsy of Amy. Dr. Peretti conducted the autopsy and found that all 4 sides of Amy's skull was fractured. There were also fresh contusions on her ankles and head. One of the bruises above Amy's right eye was approx. 1 week old.

Dr. Peretti described that his belief was that Amy was held by her ankles and repeatedly swung head first into a wall or similar object.

At approx. 11:00am that same morning a hearing was held at the county courts building to decide temporary custody of the 2 year old child. This child also had signs of bruising which appeared to be abusive. He was placed with the grandparents. Both Tim and Karen had hired attorney's and refused to be interviewed any further.

-

That evening I went to the apartment to interview the occupant of the 1st floor apartment. This was a single female named "Angie". She advised that she knew the couple for awhile now and that she thought Karen was a little jealous of her. Tim had flirted with Angie before and Karen may have sensed it. She said that both Tim and Karen drank heavily and Karen drank while pregnant. They would argue from time to time but Amy never saw any physical altercations. On the evening of the murder Amy said that she was talking to Tim in the stairwell which led to his apartment. After about 5 minutes she heard a door slam upstairs. Tim said that he better get going before Karen got too mad. Amy heard some loud yelling from the apartment and some heavy footsteps. After approx. 20 minutes she saw Tim come downstairs with the baby and drive off.

-

I later spoke with other family members among them Karen's sister Cathy who I also knew. The story emerged of two alcoholics that would drink together and argue together. It was believed that Tim had struck Karen in the past but this wasn't verified. Both were known to take the kids with them to bars.

-

It couldn't be determined as of yet who actually killed Amy. We obtained arrest warrants for both Tim and Karen and charged them both with 1st degree murder.

-

I responded with a female detective to the home of Karen's parents and took her into custody. This was the 1st time in about 15 years since I had seen her. As we were driving back to the office for processing of the warrant she began to ask how I was and how many of our mutual past friends were doing. This kind of freaked me out. She is in custody for killing her 7 week old baby girl and all she talked about was our teenage years.

-

After they were charged and met with their attorneys the following was worked out. Karen agreed to plead guilty to 2nd degree murder and charges were dropped against Tim.

-

The trial took place on October 15, 1991. Assistant states attorney Scott Shellenberger prosecuted the case before Judge William Hinkle.

-

Karen testified that earlier in the day they had received a mortgage approval for a house they had a bid on. She was excited and drank pretty heavily before Tim got home to celebrate. When she caught Tim talking to Amy she got jealous. She was pretty intoxicated at this point and became so enraged that she took it out on the baby. As Dr. Peretti surmised, she picked Amy up by the ankles and smashed her against the wall. She placed her back in the crib, waited a few minutes and "checked" on her. When she was found not breathing she told Tim something was wrong.

-

Karen was sentenced to 12 years in prison for 2nd degree murder.

-

Sadly, on November 10, 1992 Judge Thomas Brennan heard a motion for reduction of sentence and granted the motion to "time served".

-

After killing her 7 week old baby Karen served only 13 months in prison.

-

The lives of Tim and Karen haven't gotten much better. Tim has been arrested for assaulting a police officer and both he and Karen have filed bankruptcy and were divorced in 2004. Karen has since been arrested for a Driving While Intoxicated. She received probation.

The Murder of Valerie Brown, Part 3

Chapter 3, The Trial

After a few preliminary hearings the trials of Rowland and Donna began on March 21, 1991. In an unusual request the defendants asked the court to be tried together. Each had their own attorneys, and the the judge granted their request.

Assistant States Attorney Steve Bailey was assigned as prosecutor. I worked with him on other cases and Steve was an excellent prosecutor.

After the opening arguments the witnesses including myself were sequestered. This means we were forced to sit on the hard benches in the hallway. This prevents our hearing any witness testimony, and we are also instructed not to talk about the case with each other.

An hour or so goes by and one of the most bizarre things happened. Steve Bailey rushed out of the courtroom and yelled to Stanley and me, "don't talk to anyone". He then ran down the hallway for what reason we had no idea. We later learned that during a routine witness testimony, such as the motel attendant describing what he knew, the attorney for Donna interrupted the court and told the judge that his client, Donna, had decided to change her plea to guilty and confess to the court what happened. Obviously this is an extremely rare occurrence and one that sent shock waves through the courtroom. Rowland's attorney was broadsided by this and objected. The judge called a recess to study the matter and that sent Steve Bailey running to his office to consult with his boss, Sandra O'Conner. The end result was Donna took the stand to testify against Rowland and also incriminated herself.

Donna stated that she was driving Rowland around were driving north on I-695. Rowland spotted a Chevy Lumina being driven by a white female (Valerie Brown) and told Donna to follow her. Valerie exited onto Rt. 40 West and pulled into the motel parking lot. Donna stayed behind her. Valerie drove to the rear of the parking lot which was closer to her room, parked the car, opened the trunk and removed a box of books and along with her pocketbook carried them into the rear hallway entrance to the motel. Rowland followed Valerie inside. A few seconds later Rowland ran out of the building, got into the car and told Donna to drive away. Rowland had Valerie's pocketbook. They then drove to several gas stations where they would buy $2.00 in gas and a carton or two of Newport cigarettes. Their intention was to make some money selling the cigarettes. Donna testified that she knew Rowland was going to rob the victim but didn't know he was going to shoot her.

After the damaging testimony by Donna, Rowland then changed his plea to guilty. Rowland was sentenced to Life in Prison. Unfortunately in the state of Maryland a life sentence is approx. equal to 18-20 years. The best I can determine is that Rowland is still in prison at this time but likely to be paroled soon. Donna was sentenced to 30 years for her part. I'm not sure how many years Donna served but records show she was arrested at least twice since 2002 for theft and drug charges. She received a 5 year suspended sentence for the theft charge. As of now she's still out of jail.

Throughout the investigation and trial I spoke often with Valerie's mother, Jean and her fiancee, Chuck. Her father Tom was too distraught to come to Maryland for trial and I never met or spoke with him. For several years the Brown's and I exchanged Christmas cards and letters. I haven't contacted them in years and although Jean was very appreciative to know that others remembered Valerie I don't think it's appropriate for me to stir the memories for her any longer.

As I wrote in the earlier chapter this homicide investigation had so many facets to it that it seems unbelievable at times. The fact that the gas station attendant wrote down the tag number, that the one witness positively identified Donna as the suspect using the victim's credit card. But the most unimaginable fact of all was my driving around 30 miles from the crime scene and just happening to drive up on the murder vehicle and suspects.

What or who led me to that point in time, to that location, to allow this case to be solved, I don't know. You could call that great police work, but I know better.

The Murder of Valerie Brown, Part 2

Chapter 2, The Investigation

Rowland and Donna were taken to the Whitemarsh precinct where Stanley and I began to interrogate them. As normal procedure the two were split up and questioned separately.

The story they told was that Donna's mother was moving and needed a truck to haul her property. Rowland's friend Wesley worked at a car dealership and had access (he stole) to vehicles on the lot. Wesley would "rent" vehicles to friends on occasion. They said that Rowland gave them the mini-van the day before to help with the move. This information would put the vehicle in Wesley's control the night of the murder. They also gave us information on Wesley's girlfriend Juanita. We asked where we could find Wesley and was told that he lived on 20th Street in Baltimore city but did not know the address. They also stated that Wesley would pick up Juanita each night at 9:30pm on Mt. Royal Ave. as she got out of night school.

They remained under the belief that they were stopped only because of the stolen vehicle. We released them without charge because of their cooperation but did photograph them for identification purposes.

Wesley was known to operate a Dodge Shadow however he didn't have any vehicles listed to him through Motor Vehicles. His address on his driver's license was no longer accurate.

The following evening the career criminal squad along with other members of the homicide unit staked out the school on Mt. Royal Ave. Approx. 9:20pm Wesley pulled up in his Dodge Shadow and waited for Juanita. At 9:30pm Juanita got into the car and they began to pull away. At this time we conducted what has to be one of the most exhilarating things a cop can do. A "felony stop".

A true felony stop occurs when a suspect believed to be armed is pulled over by several police officers who use methodical steps to have each occupant of the car exit the vehicle separately while the officers remain behind cover, watching the other occupants. Eventually each is handcuffed face down on the pavement. This takes several minutes at times as safety is the issue and there is no reason to rush things.

What we did was a Hollywood style stop where we blocked the car and rushed to rip the occupants out of the car and onto the ground before they know what hit them. This leaves you with an incredible adrenaline rush which lasts for hours. This style is a little more dangerous but works well when you surprise your suspects and scare the hell out of them.

We took Wesley and Juanita into custody for the "stolen vehicle" charge and transported them to the homicide office. We interrogated them separately. We began with Wesley. Wesley freely admitted to taking the mini-van and dealer tag from the dealership. He agreed that he lent the vehicle to Rowland and Donna to help her mother move. He told us however that he gave them the vehicle 2 weeks ago, not the day before we found the vehicle as Rowland and Donna said. This, if true, put the vehicle back in the hands of Rowland and Donna the night of the murder.

I asked Wesley if he owned any guns which he said he didn't. I asked if Rowland had any guns and he said Rowland has a .32 caliber gun on a .45 frame. Asked what he meant by that he said the gun was "you know, an automatic". Juanita in her interview admitted that she smoked Newport cigarettes. She also said that Donna sold her a carton on Monday night, the night of the murder. Wesley and Juanita were at a friends house on Oswego Ave. Monday night watching Monday Night Football and Rowland and Donna showed up after the game and Donna had some cartons of Newports to sell. Asked what time they came to the house Wesley said Arsenio Hall was on the television. Wesley also said Rowland had the mini-van when he came by.

We later checked with WMAR channel 2 and learned the football game ended approx. 11:30pm and Arsenio was on approx. 11:40pm. This placed Rowland and Donna in the suspect vehicle approx. 1 hour after the murder and in possession of Newport cigarette cartons which were the same brand purchased with Valerie Brown's credit card shortly after her murder.

It seemed that we had the killers and let them go. They implicated their friends with a believable story and now their friends turned it back on them, this time with corroborating evidence. Of course now Rowland and Donna know we are going to be looking for them and they went into hiding.

To further better our case we conducted a photo-array in which you place the suspect's photograph in a folder with 5 other similar looking people to see if the witnesses can pick the suspect out. Sort of a line up with pictures. We used the photograph that we had taken of Donna at the Whitemarsh precinct the night of the initial contact. We showed this group of photos to the witnesses at the gas stations and the one witness who had best described the suspect buying the cigarettes, picked Donna's photograph out as the person buying the Newport cigarettes with Valerie Brown's credit card. Bingo!

It's now about two weeks after the murder. We have warrants for the arrest of Rowland and Donna for the murder of Valerie Brown. We had their names placed in the Crime Stoppers Program along with this information placed in a story in the Baltimore Sun.

A few days later we were on the 3-11pm shift and I came in early to check on a few things.

I received a phone call at the homicide office from a woman claiming to be the sister of Rowland. She said he and Donna were staying at her house in the Park Heights area of Baltimore city and she wanted them gone. She said they had came by a few days before and asked if they could stay for awhile. She at that time didn't know they were wanted. When she read it in the paper Rowland denied it and she initially believed him until she saw Donna reading the article on the murder. Donna asked Rowland, "It says she was shot in the head. Where was she shot?" She knew then they had done it.

As I had come in early my partner Stanley was not with me. I called in some guys from the daylight homicide squad and again borrowed the ever helpful career criminal unit.

The career criminal unit consists of 5-6 undercover detectives which are primarily responsible for tracking down repeat offenders and arresting them. Because they are plain clothed, long hair, and driving non-descript cars, we used them quite often when hitting a house on a search warrant or looking for our suspects.

We met with some uniformed city police officers a few blocks from the house. Since we were going to raid a house in their jurisdiction we notify them whenever possible.

We parked a few houses away and as I approached the house Rowland's sister was sitting on the porch. She walked out to greet me and whispered that Rowland and Donna were both upstairs. I asked if she saw any weapons and she said no.

A group of about 5 of us entered the house. Others stood guard out back and in front. We hid the best we could which wasn't very good at all. When we got to the stair case we shouted the usual police stuff to Rowland and Donna. The ol' come down the stairs with your hands in the air routine. Rowland came into view quickly, cooperated and came down the steps where he was arrested. He was unarmed. Donna wasn't so quick to cooperate. She refused to show herself so we had to go up the stairs and search for her. We found her hiding in a bedroom also unarmed. We search the home with the consent of the owner but the murder weapon wasn't found.

Rowland and Donna were charged with the murder of Valerie Brown. They were read their Miranda Rights and refused to be questioned.

Next Chapter - The Trial

The Murder of Valerie Brown

Of all the homicide cases I worked during my time as a "murder police" the case which is the most tragic and compelling and has stayed freshest in my thoughts is the murder of Valerie Brown.

I always thought I should put this to paper but never had and I'm sure as I type this more memories of the case will come to me. This case had an unbelievable amount of twists and a combination of really good police work and a allot of luck which to this day makes me wonder, was it just luck?

This is a completely true story.

Chapter 1, The Crime

It was September 17, 1990. I had just returned to work from a vacation in Ocean City, MD. and was ending my first night of 3-11 shift. I cut out maybe 10 minutes early and received a page while driving across I-695. My partner at the time Stanley Harmon paged to let me know we picked up a homicide call at a motel in the 5800 blk Rt. 40 West in the Woodlawn Precinct.

When I arrived Stan and I began the investigation. A white female 29 years of age was found in an entrance hallway just inside of a rear entrance to a wing of the motel. She was lying on her back, there was an apparent gunshot wound to the center of her chest and a box of text books scattered on the floor. There was a single black hair consistent with that of an African-American visible on the victim's shirt. We learned shortly that Ms. Brown was a college text book salesperson and was in town from her home in Philadelphia to visit with some college clients. She had checked into her room at 8:00pm and was found dead approx. 10:30pm. Her pocketbook was missing so we began the investigation with the belief she was the victim of a robbery. The only "witness" to the murder said she heard a young white girl say, "Oh my God, Oh my God".

I spoke with the victim's mother, Jean, and fiancee, Chuck, both of whom lived in Philly.
It's hard enough to make a death notification but to have to do it by telephone is a unusually cold way to do it. We had a local Philadelphia officer respond to their house and have him stand by as her mother called me.
They gave us the back story and also assisted with providing information regarding Valerie's credit cards and such.
I also spoke with a friend of Valerie, a local girl named Marie. Marie had tried phoning Valerie at the motel around 10:00pm and when she didn't get an answer she called the desk. The attendant went to Valerie's room and found her in the nearby hallway. Marie said that Valerie had met her out for a few drinks after she arrived in town and left her to go back to the motel.

An autopsy was conducted the next morning and it revealed that Ms. Brown had been shot once with a .32 caliber pistol. The bullet pierced her spinal cord which caused her to drop instantly when shot.

Early in the morning we cancelled her cards and flagged them so that any transactions occurring with her credit cards would immediately be reported to us. Within a day or so we received information that Valerie's credit cards were used at a few gas stations in the general area of Woodlawn and in Baltimore city. We went out to interview the employees working at the times the cards were used. It was learned that the person using the card was a black female wearing a fluorescent green jacket who would purchase a few gallons of gas and a carton of Newport cigarettes using the stolen card. Most of the attendees didn't remember the female using the card but one described her very well and another wrote the tag number of her vehicle on his copy of the receipt. He noticed the vehicle was a dark mini-van and had dealer tag, 1A29581, which he found odd so he decided to make a note of it. (Luck #1) The tag was found to be reported stolen from a car dealership located right next to the murder scene. I researched all the previous thefts from the dealership and also obtained a list of all employees. One employee named "Wesley" who worked the lot as a car wash jockey would come into play later. Also at the time of a recovery of a previously stolen vehicle from the dealer, a prescription bottle was found with a name and address from Radecke Ave. in the Garden Village area of northeast Baltimore at the County line. This too would come into play. (Luck #2)

A few days after the murder I was working overtime and Stanley and I split up to follow up on some different aspects of the investigation. I thought I would head out to Garden Village to speak with the owner of the prescription bottle found in the previously recovered stolen vehicle from the car dealership. As these things often turn out, the woman no longer lived at the address on Radecke Ave. and there was no other address on file for her. I drove a few blocks away to the Cedonia Mall parking lot and wrote up some notes and kicked back for a few minutes to relax.

When investigating a homicide we basically work 24 to 36 straight hours and then work 16 to 18 hour days until exhausting all leads. Sometimes a 15 minute power nap or at least an extended coffee break is in order.

While sitting at the Cedonia Mall lot I started to think about my days working the Parkville precinct which handled the county area of Garden Village. This neighborhood was a bit of a problem area. Garden Village was in both Baltimore county and Baltimore city and in order to get from one section of the county to another section of the county you had to drive through an alley by the basketball courts and transverse a section which was in Baltimore city.

Just for the heck of it I decided to drive that route I remembered. It had been 5 years since I was around here and I thought I'd look around. I drove through the section of the county and into the city. I was driving along a road which had a upcoming curve to the right. I glanced at a mini-van parked along the curb and noticed it displayed a dealer tag. A closer look revealed the tag 1A29581, the tag wanted in the murder of Valerie Brown. (Luck #3) I also noticed a female in the driver seat wearing a green florescent jacket. I quickly went around the block and came back to a spot where I could watch the van. I originally had no idea what road I was on but saw I was on Schering Road as I came back around. I immediately called in the troops. As it turned out I was in Baltimore city so they were called to assist. Being in an unmarked car the suspect had no idea I was there so I had the city police set up out of sight on both ends of the street. I waited what seemed like forever for my backups to arrive. The homicide office was 30 minutes away but at least the uniformed city guys were nearby. From the distance I could see the brake lights light up on the van indicating that someone was hitting the pedal on occasion but the vehicle didn't move. I couldn't see if anyone else was around the vehicle due to my limited visibility.

This bit of "luck" has to be defined a little clearer. I was in the general vicinity of this neighborhood only because a pill bottle was found in a recovered vehicle from a past crime that really had nothing to do with this case. This was one of those follow-up investigations which 99% of the time leads to absolutely nowhere. This also led to nowhere but did at least put me in the area. My driving down this road where the murder vehicle was located was by absolute dumb luck. I should not have been there, should have been on my way back to the office, but for reasons unknown to me I decided to goof off a little and ride around a neighborhood I hadn't been in for 5 years. A neighborhood that I never liked anyway and as it turns out I was driving in the city believing I was still in the county. This was one of those moments where you have to think, "maybe there is a God". Certainly the odds of me being at this place at this time, by accident, is astounding. As it turned out the mini-van had been at that place for the first time and I showed up within a few hours.

A few minutes went by and some members of the county career criminal unit showed up. One of them sat with a city officer so that we all were now in communication with each other.
After a total of maybe 15 minutes the van began to pull away. I got up to the rear bumper and as we got to the end of the block we stopped the vehicle. The vehicle was driven by "Donna" who was wearing the florescent jacket and she was accompanied by her mother and younger siblings. She related that her mother was in the process of moving that day into a house on Starleigh Rd.

We asked and received permission to search the house. Donna's boyfriend "Rowland" was in the house at the time of the search. Nothing of evidentary value was found in the house. Donna and Rowland lived elsewhere so none of their personal property was there.
Still Donna and Rowland possessed a stolen vehicle and tag. That's all I told them at this point, didn't mention the murder just yet. They had some splainin' to do.
We drove them to the Whitemarsh precinct to begin their interrogations. These would lead to another series of twists.

Next chapter: The Investigation

The year 1957: A little history. I was lucky enough to be raised in my home town of Perry Hall, MD. A once small community with only a handful of fast food joints and a couple of meat markets and liquor stores.

Our house was located on Kahlston Rd. off of Belair Rd. (Earl Weaver Way). A dead-end street which abutted up to the Gunpowder State Park and plenty of woods and trails.



This was a wonderful area to grow up. Plenty of kids our age, plenty of places to explore and the safety of a country setting.
I've never lived more than a few miles from here and at least 3 of my childhood friends still live in the homes they were raised in.

Fast forward to 1975. I graduate from Perry Hall High School and after a short stint serving the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (A&P food stores) in 1976 I realize my childhood ambition and join The Baltimore County Police Department. My various bouts of underage drinking and small town thievery prepared me nicely to become a cop.

This seems like a good drop off point. I'll bid you adieu and will continue soon with a little police history and a story that still makes me think, maybe there is a God.