Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake on Wednesday rejected the assessment by prosecutor Marilyn Mosby that the city’s legal system is biased.
Rawlings-Blake emphasized that “justice is a process, not an outcome,” and said she has confidence in State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby, who lost four cases against police officers charged with the killing of Freddie Gray in April 2015 and then dropped the charges against the officers who still awaited trial.
Mosby said her efforts were hamstrung by biased investigators and courts. “Unlike with other cases where prosecutors work closely with the police to investigate what actually occurred, what we realized very early on in this case was police investigating police, whether they’re friends or merely their colleagues, was problematic,” she said Wednesday when announcing that the remaining charges would be dropped.
“There was a reluctance and an obvious bias that was consistently exemplified not by the entire Baltimore police department, but by individuals within the police department in every state of the investigation, which became blatantly apparent in the subsequent trials.”
The mayor rejected that assessment. “I have never and will never use my position to give the impression to the community that they should not have confidence in the people who have sworn to serve them,” Rawlings-Blake told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer during a Wednesday interview at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.
“I do [have confidence in Mosby] and I’m optimistic that everything that we do in life, whether it turns out the way we want it or not, is an opportunity for growth and to learn,” the mayor said.
