Free Republic

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - The violent assault on Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo’s home late last month was certainly not the first bungled raid by a government SWAT team, but the bad publicity it generated should make it the last time these trigger-happy squads target innocent civilians. Tracking a 32-pound package of marijuana that had been addressed to Calvo’s wife, Trinity Tomsic, Prince George’s sheriff’s deputies forcibly entered the mayor’s home on July 29 and killed his two dogs before handcuffing him and his mother-in-law. But like so many other SWAT team raids across the country, this one turned out...

<p>A police SWAT team raided the home of the mayor in the Prince George's County town of Berwyn Heights on Tuesday, shooting and killing his two dogs, after he brought in a 32-pound package of marijuana that had been delivered to his doorstep, police said.</p>

The FBI has launched a review of the violent law enforcement raid of the home of Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo in Prince George's County last week that resulted in the deaths of the family's two dogs. The agency has begun "reviewing the events that occurred at Mr. Calvo's residence," said Richard J. Wolf, spokesman for the FBI in Baltimore, which has jurisdiction over federal civil rights investigations in Maryland. (snip) Courts across the country in recent years have ruled that it is almost always unacceptable for police to kill pets in the course of searching a home. Cases in...

<p>THE DRUG raid by Prince George's County law officers on the home of Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo last week was a Keystone Kops operation from start to finish.</p> <p>Acting on a tip that a 32-pound package of marijuana had been sent by Federal Express from Arizona to Mr. Calvo's home (addressed to his wife, Trinity Tomsic), Prince George's police swung into action. Which is to say they got on the phone, calling law enforcement agencies to see who might have a SWAT team available to bust the unsuspecting Calvo family. (It seems the police department's own team was tied up.) After being turned down at least once, they finally struck a deal with the Prince George's Sheriff's Office, whose track record with domestic disputes is extensive but whose experience with drug busts is slight. And it showed.</p>

When the shooting stopped, two dogs lay dead. A mayor sat in his boxers, hands bound behind his back. His handcuffed mother-in-law was sprawled on the kitchen floor, lying beside the body of one of the family pets that police had killed before her eyes. After the raid, Prince George's County police officials who burst into the home of Berwyn Heights' mayor last week seized the same unopened package of marijuana that an undercover officer had delivered earlier. No other evidence of illegal activity was found, and no one was arrested at Mayor Cheye Calvo's home. This week Prince George's...

In the community of Shady Grove Woods, trees are becoming more and more scarce. Residents and other anti-Intercounty Connector activists marched through the neighborhood on Saturday, pointing out the trees that were cut down to make way for the six-lane highway. ‘‘It’s just that we didn’t have a say in it in so many ways and we’re not talking about a two-lane road, we’re talking about a major highway running through here,” resident Sam Chim said of the ICC. ‘‘We have a lot of nice, private woods back here and now we’re going to have a highway running through instead....

It's an axiom known by every lawyer and judge in every courthouse in the land: A man who represents himself in court has a fool for a client. Try telling that to Harold J. Stewart. Last month, Stewart, a 42-year-old high school dropout, defended himself in a murder case in Prince George's County, where he was accused of beating a sleeping man to death with a baseball bat. The trial lasted three days. Stewart called no witnesses. The jury deliberated less than an hour. The verdict: Not guilty of first-degree murder. Not guilty of second-degree murder. "Everybody told me I...

I may be overly sensitive on this subject but my first reaction is that these victims of a Maryland street-racing incident were unlucky, undeserving and incredibly foolish: “A car plowed into a crowd that had gathered to watch a drag race on a suburban road early Saturday, killing eight people and injuring at least five, police said. Police said the white sedan was not involved in the street race but accidentally drove into the crowd of about 50 people that had spilled onto the highway to watch two racing cars speed off. *** According to police, two cars had lined...

ACCOKEEK, Md. -- A car plowed into a crowd that apparently gathered to watch a drag race on a suburban road early Saturday, killing seven people and injuring at least four, police said. The car went out of control on Route 210 around 3:40 a.m. and hit people standing on the roadside, Prince George's County Police Cpl. Clinton Copeland said. A tractor-trailer that came by shortly afterward may also have struck someone on the road as it tried to avoid the crash, he said. -snip- Route 210 has two lanes in each direction and traffic lights about every 150 to...

Fixing the Prince George's County hospitals, a ban on panhandling in Prince George's and money for improvements to the Laurel Armory, the Laurel mill dam ruins and the Laurel Boys and Girls Club are among the top priorities of local lawmakers for the 2008 session of the Maryland General Assembly, which opened Wednesday, Jan. 9. In addition, local lawmakers are pushing legislation that would ban the use of special taxing districts in residential developments, an attempt to avoid the type of controversy that has roiled the upscale Victoria Falls community in Laurel. Developers used such a taxing district to help...

ANNAPOLIS -- Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown yesterday said it's "probably certain" that Gov. Martin O'Malley will convene a special session of the Democratic-controlled legislature to address the likely closure of two Prince George's County hospitals. "It's probably certain that in order to complete this, the governor would have to call us back into special session, which is unfortunate because there's literally a daily cost" of running a special session, said Mr. Brown, a Democrat. The nonprofit agency that manages the hospital system was expected to vote Monday whether to shut down the hospital system, which includes Prince George's Hospital...

Montgomery's Unseemly Windfall How the rich get richer Monday, April 17, 2006; A12 AN UNHERALDED, fine-print change in federal tax law means that Montgomery County will reap an accidental windfall in state education funding, in the range of $20 million or more annually, starting in July of next year. That's nice for Montgomery. The trouble is, the windfall is largely at the expense of 20 of the 23 other jurisdictions in Maryland, especially Prince George's County. As a result of the federal change, Prince George's schools would be shortchanged by roughly the same amount, an estimated $20 million. The arrangement...

Hundreds of Prince George's residents packed an Upper Marlboro church yesterday to warn county officials that they are fed up with increasing crime and want some relief. "We are pushing not because we are antagonizing, but because we are terrified," said the Rev. C. Anthony Muse, one of the organizers of the meeting. In 2005, Prince George's tallied 173 homicides, a record for the county. Additionally, sexual assaults increased by 3 percent, robberies by 24 percent and carjackings by 45 percent from the previous year. Residents and a few county officials painted a grim picture of some streets and school...

Doors, Windows Battered At 22 Pr. George's [Maryland] Homes By Avis Thomas-Lester Washington Post Staff Writer Tuesday, January 10, 2006; Page A01 Paul Drake had fallen asleep watching football on the living room sofa when a loud thud woke him. It was followed by a series of thuds as vandals charged his front door with what he believes was a battering ram, splitting the frame and leaving Drake struggling to keep them out. "Let the dog out! Let the dog out!" he recalled hollering to his wife as the vandals fled. The incident, at 1:45 a.m. Sunday in Suitland, was...

<p>Jonathan Kozol, a former Boston schoolteacher, has written 11 books over four decades in a crusade to help inner-city children that government policymakers gently label "disadvantaged."</p> <p>In "Shame," Kozol, 69, denounces the No Child Left Behind education law that President Bush pushed through Congress...</p>

Md. Officials Celebrate End of 8-Year Fight to Build Complex Developer Milton Peterson joined elected officials from across Maryland yesterday to mark the culmination of an eight-year political fight to begin transforming 220 acres of shrubs and dirt on the banks of the Potomac River into National Harbor, a $2 billion complex of hotels, shops and restaurants. The groundbreaking ceremony also signaled the beginning for construction crews preparing to build the project's centerpiece, Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center, which alone is expected to cost $565 million. Described by some as the largest single commercial venture in state history, National...