For years, the top public safety concern for many Federal Hill residents was rowdy frat boys leaving the bars at 2 a.m.
But recently, several incidents of violent crime ? including two homicides over the weekend ? have neighbors there worried the city?s brutal drug trade is spilling into streets they once considered safe.
“One murder is shocking.Two is beyond shocking,” said City Council Member William Cole IV, who represents Federal Hill and is calling for increased police patrols. “Given what?s happened in the last 48 hours, I think additional patrols are warranted until whatever element has crept in has gone away,” he said Sunday.
Around 2:30 a.m. Sunday, police were called to the 200 block of East Montgomery Street for reports of “shots fired,” said Baltimore police spokesman Agent Donny Moses.
Officers drove through the area but found nothing; at 5 a.m., a jogger discovered an adult male on the sidewalk behind parked cars dead from “multiple gunshot wounds to the whole body,” Moses said. The dead man had not been identified Sunday.
At 9:15 p.m. Friday at the 800 block of Battery Avenue ? just blocks away ? police found Keyva Bluitt, 35, fatally shot in the chest, Moses said.
Bluitt, who was on parole for a drug distribution conviction, was left on the street by people in a blue Toyota that was double-parked, police said. Witnesses told officers that several people were in the car and that the witnesses heard at least one gunshot, Moses said.
There have been no arrests in both cases.
The homicides come on the heels of last month?s high-profile melee and triple stabbing in the neighborhood.
“We get a huge amount of people coming out of the bars and creating nuisance crimes, but not shootings. Never shootings,” said resident Paul Quinn, a past president of the Federal Hill Neighborhood Association. “Even if it isn?t against residents of Federal Hill, the fact that people feel comfortable coming in here and committing these crimes, that?s a concern.”
Resident Bob O?Donoghue, who helps put together the community newsletter, said he would like to see more officers walking the beat.
“I never see a policeman on foot, and I?ve been here 22 years,” he said, adding that the second victim might have been found more quickly if officers had gotten out of their patrol cars. “We have a good neighborhood and a low crime rate. But you can?t pretend you?re not six blocks from a bad area.”
Cole said he believed some late-night activities in and around Federal Hill Park, including a drug arrest over the weekend, might be related to the violence.
“It?s disconcerting we?ve had two [homicides] in two days in what?s generally considered one of the safest parts of the city,” the council member said. “We need to eliminate this threat to the neighborhood.”
