Baltimore Mayor Martin O?Malley vigorously defended on Thursday his police department?s policy of mass arrests for minor crimes.
“In the seven years that I?ve been here, I?ve never had a community leader say to me, ?Mr. Mayor we have a problem in my neighborhood. We?re seeing toomany police and they?re getting out of their cars too often and they?re confronting the people urinating in my doorway and doing the craps game all night long,? ” O?Malley told The Examiner. “Never once have I had a community leader say that to me.”
But Billy Murphy Jr., an attorney and former judge ? who is supporting Gov. Robert Ehrlich ? said the mayor must not remember numerous community meetings, including a heated legislative hearing in January, where residents voiced those concerns.
“Why is he having amnesia about that huge meeting in the city?” Murphy said. “He?s missed the 800-pound gorilla in the room.”
The American Civil Liberties Union and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People filed a class-action lawsuit in June, calling Baltimore police?s practice of arresting thousands of individuals each year who are not prosecuted “a gross violation of rights.”
O?Malley said the reason police arrest about 100,000 people a year is because the department is battling criminals in every part of the city, not just the rich neighborhoods. More than 25,000 of those people arrested are released without charge, according to the two groups.
O?Malley said the department?s policies are having a positive effect.
“It is false to conclude that [dropping a charge] is the equivalent of an arrest being illegal or that the officer lacked probable cause for that arrest,” O?Malley said. “Officers are asked to enforce the law, and their standard is probable cause. Prosecutors have another standard, and that standard is beyond reasonable doubt.”
According to Maryland State Police statistics, categories of violent crime, other than murder, are down in Baltimore between 2001 and 2005.
“We?ve made some pretty impressive progress in the most violent city in America,” O?Malley said. “If the definition of progress was to move our city in seven years time fromthe most dangerous to the safest, there?s no mortal on the planet that could do it.”
Baltimore 2001/2005
» Homicide: 256/269
» Rape: 299/162
» Robbery: 5,762/3,935
» Assault: 8,520/ 6,943
Source: Maryland State Police
