On the Record

As Caryn Tamber reported today, we can no longer tweet from within the courtroom at the Dixon trial. That doesn’t mean the tweets have been silenced, though; they’ve just moved down the hall. You can still watch for updates on www.twitter.com  by “following” @mddailyrecord, or just search for #DixonTrial.

This morning, for example, we learned that “things [were] getting a little out of order” in the jury room last night, and the jurors continue to correspond with the judge seeking clarifications on points of law or, at least, a legal dictionary. (Don’t worry, the judge nixed THAT idea.) What do you think — does this bode well for the prosecution or the defense?

Back in September, I wrote about the University of Baltimore bringing back its long-forgotten alma mater. At the time, the only evidence of the song was a piece of paper from 1958 that included the alma mater and Auld Lang Syne.

The school’s archivists theorized the alma mater was sung as part of graduation programs, but were hoping alumni would come forward with additional information.

Bill Clift (Class of 1951) responded to inquiries with an answer. He checked his Reporter yearbook from 1951 and found two copies of the program from his senior banquet held in June of that year. The alma mater is part of the program, along with Auld Lang Syne. An insert with the program contained the words to both songs.

Both documents are now part of the university archives. So the only question that remains concerns the alma mater’s origins.

Incidentally, the university has also recently digitized all of its Reporter yearbooks, which were published between 1928 and 1975. The yearbooks were started by the first graduating law class.

I was driving on Charles Street by our office this morning when I saw a woman walking across the street with the help of a cane and what I thought was a full cast on her left leg. Upon closer inspection, I thought the woman was Phoebe Haddon, dean of the University of Maryland School of Law.

Turns out I was half right. The woman was in fact Haddon, but she was wearing a brace, not a cast, according to Jamie Smith, a law school spokesman. Haddon has been rehabbing from a summer leg injury, he said, and part of the treatment is to wear the brace.

Haddon is on her way to her goal, incidentally, of a full recovery by Saturday, when she will deliver her first address since becoming dean in July. Ron Kirk, the U.S. Trade Representative, will give the keynote address at the program, titled “Justice & the Global Economy”  but designated on the school’s Web site as “an event celebrating [Haddon's] appointment.” Registration for the event had to be closed after 500 people signed up, Smith said.

Both of Maryland’s law schools are located on campuses that are among the most dangerous in the country, according to a new ranking.

Both the University of Baltimore and the University of Maryland-Baltimore made The Daily Beast’s list of the 25 most dangerous colleges. In fact, UMB is the third most dangerous school in the country, according to this list. The rankings are based in part on crime data the schools are required to report to the federal government and in part on crime stats for the surrounding neighborhoods.

Maryland has the dubious distinction of having more schools on the list than any other state except Massachusetts. The other dangerous colleges in the Free State are University of Maryland-Eastern Shore and Bowie State University. Notably, the Johns Hopkins University is not on there.

No Maryland schools made The Daily Beast’s list of the 25 safest colleges.

Students at the “dangerous” Maryland schools: do the rankings ring true? Do you feel unsafe on campus?

(An aside: I’m proud that my alma mater didn’t make the list. To my dad, who was worried about me going there because of safety concerns: I told you so.)

HT: TaxProf Blog via Above the Law.   

Capitalizing on its appearance in the new Renee Zellweger movie, “My One and Only,” Baltimore’s Peabody Court Hotel has come out with a romance travel package as a salute to the film.

The movie was released two weeks ago and also stars Kevin Bacon and Chris Noth. The film’s story line is based on George Hamilton’s upbringing by his mother along the Eastern Seaboard during the 1950s. To see a shot of the Peabody in the opening sequence of the preview, click here.

“My One and Only” was filmed in Baltimore last summer.

The Peabody’s package includes accommodations for two in a deluxe corner king room, breakfast via room service or in the hotel’s George’s Bistro, valet parking and a late check-out time (2 p.m.)

Has anyone seen the movie yet? How prominently was the hotel featured?

Who knows how much business this package will really stir up, but I do think it’s indicative of how local business here like being associated with Hollywood and the stars that pass through here.

While much of the state’s government will be shut down on Friday by Executive Order 01.01.2009.11, the courts will be up and running under Chief Judge Bell’s Administrative Order Pertaining to Temporary Salary Reduction etc.

The distinction might seem clear enough, but as Julie Bykowicz writes in today’s Sun, lots of the lawyers who will be expected to appear in court on Friday are state employees, including those in the offices of the public defender, attorney general and the state prosecutor.

Deputy State Prosecutor Thomas M. McDonough says he’ll be in court Friday, since the Paterakis arraignment is on the schedule. Granted, if it’s anything like Helen Holton’s arraignment on Wednesday, that will amount to about a nickel’s worth of time on a parking meter — but it’s still his own nickel.

If you look at the Judiciary’s Administrative Order, McDonough’s just being prudent. In no uncertain terms, Chief Judge Bell warns:

Persons with business before a court shall not be excused because of the Executive Order.

The Executive Order, though, is equally clear:

F.  An employee may not work during furlough time except that in the event of an emergency the appointing authority may revoke furlough time and the employee shall be paid for that time. An employee whose furlough time is revoked due to an emergency shall be required to take the furlough time on another day.

It’s possible an emergency was declared and McDonough’s furlough was revoked, or that whatever procedure is required to make that happen will, in fact, happen before he puts in his timecard. I sure hope so.

I’d hate to see an ethics prosecutor brought up on a payroll technicality, let alone for refusing to follow a direct order from the chief.

A few news organizations, including The Sun, were fooled today by a prank Web site carrying a message that purported to be from Mayor Sheila Dixon. The backstory is this: a British official compared the city of Manchester, which has had a spate of violence, to The Wire, which was, of course, about Baltimore.

A British blogger then made up a fake Web site made to look like Dixon’s official one, in which he, as Dixon, took the politician to task. The post read, in part:

To present a television show as the real Baltimore is to perpetuate a fiction that dishonours our city. It is as pointless as boasting that Baltimore has a per capita homicide rate a fraction of that in the popular UK television show Midsomer Murders.

The Baltimore Police Department is working hard to protect the people of this city and it should be remembered that The Wire was just a television show. As this video shows, there is so much more to Baltimore than The Wire.

The site, which appears to be no longer accessible, then linked to a video showing scenes from the violent Midsomer Murders show, accompanied by the theme song from The Wire. The video points out that there are more deaths in the British show than in the American one, then ends with the “Visit Baltimore” logo.

This afternoon, Dixon’s (actual) office sent out a statement correcting the record and saying that “The city’s Law department as well as the Mayor’s Office of Information Technology have been informed and are currently investigating this violation of the city’s website for copyright infringement of the City of Baltimore and the Office of Mayor.” Mayoral spokesman Scott Peterson also forwarded an e-mail from the blogger behind the fake site:

Scott,

I made a joke for my friends that was circulated more widely than intended. No-one was supposed to be fooled beyond the words “Midsomer Murders” and just in case, I made a little video and linked to it which was in no way conceivably genuine. I registered the domain in my own name, I wrote using English spelling, I left a message in the source code and at the bottom of the page I attributed the copyright to my blog pseudonym. I didn’t imagine anyone in the US or in the UK would believe it.

Please could you pass on my apologies to anyone in your office who has been inconvenienced by this prank. I will be editing the masthead to make it clear that it’s not the real site.

Yours,

Alex Hilton

The mayor’s spokesman told me that, despite the statement about the law department investigating, the city plans no litigation against blogger Hilton. “No, at the end of the day it’s a hoax,” Peterson said.

That said, “We want to make sure people understand that this is serious,” Peterson said. “It’s not a joke when you lift the website’s information…. It is dangerous and we’re just lucky that it wasn’t anything more of a serious intent.”

They didn’t set out to hang out their shingles — at least, not yet — but the economy made it the most attractive option for these new solo practitioners. Read The Accidental Solo, this related story on setting up shop, and these tips on running your own practice.

The University of Maryland law school’s Appellate and Post-Conviction Advocacy Clinic highlights its summer wins and is taking a setback in stride, as one of its recent clients got arrested on a charge similar to the one the clinic helped get expunged.

Topping the news are stories about the firing of Public Defender Nancy Forster and a citation against a Charles County judge for letting the air out of a court worker’s tire. In Legal Briefs, Chief Judge Bell sends another letter – this time, seeking Social Security numbers for the Client Protection Fund.

In Verdicts & Settlements, a Baltimore jury awards more than $1 million to the children of a young woman who died after surgery to resolve her blood clots. And, in Unbillable Hours, meet a Montgomery County lawyer who coaches high school football players in more ways than one.

PLUS: On the Move; columns by Legal Aid’s Joe Surkiewicz and Dolan Media’s Justin Rebello; and our weekly Law Digest, featuring eight opinions by the 4th Circuit.

Wednesday’s reindictment of Mayor Sheila A. Dixon is reinvigorating our interest in the fight between her lawyers and the state prosecutor over three grand jury subpoenas issued well after her first indictmen.

Even though the state prosecutor withdrew the post-indictment subpoenas shortly after her lawyers sought to quash them earlier this month, the presiding judge asked for more discussion of the issue.

And lawyers on both sides, none particularly shy, have obliged, poised to make pretrial hay of the controversy.

Last Monday, State Prosecutor Robert A. Rohrbaugh said the public filing of Dixon’s motion to quash — to prevent two current city employees and one former city employee from offering testimony and evidence to the grand jury — was “in direct contravention” of the Maryland rules and that it could “inappropriately influence the potential jury pool and prospective jurors.” He promised to say more in a private hearing.

Dixon’s lawyers called Rohrbaugh’s two-page response “paltry” and accused the state prosecutor of blaming Dixon for his mistake.

“By withdrawing the subpoenas, the State impliedly admits that it abused the grand jury process by issuing them in the first place,”their motion reads. “Yet, in what can only be described as the height of irony, the State Prosecutor complains that the defendant has wrongfully exposed his abuse of process by filing her motion on the public record.”

“The grand jury is not the prosecutor’s private discovery cell, and he should not be permitted to undermine the integrity of the Court’s processes to his own advantage, nor hide behind the veil of grand jury secrecy for that purpose.”

Rohrbaugh argues it’s a moot point, but Dixon’s defense team thinks there might be “other potential similar violations.”

In light of yesterday’s reindictments, is the subpoena question even more moot, or even more relevant?

– BRENDAN KEARNEY

Yesterday’s ninth-inning comeback from the Red Sox — one night after the Orioles executed a similar feat against them — highlighted what has become a theme for Baltimore this year: you never know which O’s squad you’re going to get.

The Orioles have been streaky this year, to say the least.  Seven-game losing streaks, five-game winning streaks. They blanked the Rays one night then allowed 11 runs the next. They were scoreless against the Yankees on May 8, then touched home plate 12 times the next night. More than half of their wins have come from runs scored in late innings.

I recently heard a radio ad highlighting the fact that the Orioles have been an exciting team to watch because you can’t count them out in the later innings. Last year, the O’s marketing team launched a tongue-and-cheek promotion around the team’s bad luck on Sundays. At that point, the Orioles had a 13-game losing streak at Camden Yards on Sundays and marketers launched a “You Win We Win” promotion on July 6 that promised to give fans a free ticket to a future, non “prime” game to fans in attendance that day if the O’s broke their Sunday streak.

From talking with fans, I get the sense that there isn’t really any ill will about the streakiness because most know it’s just a characteristic of a young squad.  That being the case, can you market this unpredictability? The radio commercial I mentioned touches on it, but I wonder if team marketers can take it a step further and design a promotion around the team’s come-from-behind drama they’ve frequently displayed at home.

For example, they could print up a bunch of $8 off and $9 off ticket coupons and have them ready to hand out after a game for an eighth- or ninth-inning comeback (making it clear to fans that the go-ahead run is scored in one of those innings for the promotion to take effect).

On the other hand, as the manager of a ball club, you want to see your team jump out early and hold on to the lead. Would a promotion like the one I mentioned be a conflict in philosophy?