Lindsay Marie Harvey -- Three Years Later

Today marks three years since Lindsay Marie Harvey was murdered outside her apartment in Gaithersburg. She was killed in a robbery by a repeat offender who, just moments earlier, said he "had some things handle." The robber targeted Lindsay at random, accosted her, demanded money, shot her in the head, and took $40 from her.

Then he left her inside a dumpster enclosure, where she wouldn’t be discovered for another 12 hours.

Three years later, these facts remain just as chilling, just as frightening, just as heartbreaking as they were when the news first surfaced.

Three years later, I am still very, very sad and sickened by what happened and angry that it was allowed to happen.

And unfortunately, three years later I still feel frustrated, as I find myself in largely the same position I've been since I learned about Shawn Henderson's criminal past. Three years later, I still find myself telling anyone who will listen about what's wrong with the criminal justice system in Maryland…and wondering whether we truly, collectively get it.

Another legislative session has drawn to a close in the Maryland General Assembly. This year, there were several gun control measures proposed in the House and Senate, one of which would have limited good behavior credits for those convicted of crimes involving firearms to five days per month instead of 20. Almost none of these measures got out of committee.

The good behavior credit measure (SB 173 and HB 172) was actually amended in the Senate. It became a "task force" bill, meaning that a committee would have been formed to study the issue of good behavior credits and then report its findings to the Governor by December.

That didn’t become law either.

To be fair, the amended bill actually did get out of the Senate Judiciary Committee and was passed unanimously by the full Senate. But the bill then had to go to the House Rules Committee, and it died there. (The House Judiciary Committee, which let the original HB 172 die, never saw the amended version of the bill.)

Believe it or not, in Maryland, this is considered progress. And the fact that the full Senate has at least warmed up to studying the issue is something of a small victory (baby steps, I am told -- that’s how it works sometimes in Annapolis).

Still, here we are once again. The legislative session is over, the confetti has fallen from the State House rafters in Annapolis, and we still have no new sentencing guidelines on the books to better protect us from violent criminals.

When I announced the creation of the Justice For Safety movement in September 2008, I thought for sure that lots of people in Maryland would rally around it. They would write letters to their representatives in the General Assembly. They would tell their friends, who would then tell their friends and families, and so on and so forth. They would demand change, and new laws. And lawmakers would start listening. More and more of them would hear from their constituents. And it would become a hot-button issue in Maryland. Hundreds, thousands maybe, would hear about Lindsay's life story -- about how she was 25 years old, a well-educated young professional who worked as both a college professor in Frederick and a federal DNA analyst for the Department of Defense in Rockville and, among other things, loved animals. And then they would look at her tragic, brutal, senseless death at the hands of Shawn Henderson, a total stranger and a career criminal who didn’t even think twice about killing her. And they would get angry, so angry that they would flood the General Assembly with letters and phone calls to the point where the General Assembly would have to pass more stringent laws against violent criminals.

It hasn't happened that way. And the issue simply isn't getting the widespread attention I believe it deserves. The local media, all of whom covered Lindsay's murder and Henderson's arrest back in April 2008, don’t seem especially interested. None of the big four TV network affiliates in Washington (ABC-7, Fox 5, NBC-4, Channel 9) covered Henderson's trial or sentencing hearing. Nor have they covered the push for changes in the sentencing laws. The most in-depth coverage of the issue thus far has come in the form of a Gazette series by Patricia Murret, a piece by Patrick Madden on American University's WAMU radio, an article by Dan Morse in The Washington Post, and the column I penned for the Post two years ago. But even all of that has not kept the issue front and center in the minds of most Marylanders. And the legislators who have continually blocked efforts for change got re-elected by landslide margins last November.

One of the strangest conversations I had with a reporter about Lindsay's case was with Dan Morse. The first time I spoke with Morse, who covers the crime beat in Montgomery County, he told me that his editors were on the fence about running his March 2009 story about our initial attempt at legislation. Why? Because of the uncertainty of the bill's passage (the bill failed to get out of committee).

As a former journalist myself, I was floored by this. Really? I thought to myself. That's how they determine these things? Don’t get me wrong. There's only so much space for news in your average newspaper. And the media obviously can't cover every little piece of proposed legislation in the state. But I also know that had I been a reporter covering this story, not only would I have found Lindsay's life and tragic death fascinating enough to write about, but I would have jumped at the chance to expose the controversy surrounding her killer's odyssey through the Maryland prison system. Story ideas can be hard to come by, and this seemed like as good an idea as any for an enterprising reporter. Patricia Murret seemed to understand this. Most other journalists in the Washington area did not.

And it doesn’t help that there seems to be a mentality now among some in the media that violent crime isn't necessarily the problem we think it is. This was illustrated in a recent piece written by Christopher Beam of Slate.com about the murder of Jayna Murray at the Lululemon store in Bethesda. What that murder teaches us, opines the writer, is that "most crime isn't random."

Only 15 percent of homicides reported every year are committed by someone who doesn't know the victim, according to the Bureau of Justice statistics. And even then, the two people usually have mutual friends and acquaintances, says Richard Rosenfeld, a criminology professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis: "That explains why they're in the same place at the same time." And yet, we often assume randomness, and treat the discovery that a murder isn't random as news.

…

Even the occasional victim of a "random" homicide—the innocent bystander killed in a gang shootout, for example—is usually less random than people realize: He may not be connected to his killer, but he is from the neighborhood or one close by.

Wonderful. So I guess this means that the friends and family of Lindsay Harvey are among the unlucky few in this world who were affected by a homicide that actually was completely random, where the perpetrator really didn't know the victim and had no connection to her whatsoever. They didn’t even live in the same county, let alone the same neighborhood (Shawn Henderson grew up less than a mile from where he murdered Lindsay but was living in Prince George's County at that time). That makes me feel much better.

Washington Post columnist Robert McCartney drew similar conclusions from the Lululemon homicide in this piece. He quoted a Rockville woman as saying, "It tells us something about what’s going on in society…It’s almost easier to be afraid of the boogeyman.” Then he wrote this:

So, assuming the police are correct, the lesson from the Lululemon case is still that you’re not safe. Only the nature of the threat has changed.

I wonder if Robert McCartney and Chris Beam are aware that Maryland was ranked as the 5th most violent state in the US according to the Census Bureau (with the 2nd highest murder rate, I might add). I wonder how much time they've spent, if any, researching the legislative records of lawmakers like Del. Joseph Vallario and Sen. Brian Frosh and have discovered that neither of them are exactly crime victim friendly, especially Vallario. Maybe then they would view the overall threat of violence -- maybe not random violence per se, but still -- just a little more seriously.

Now I understand both Beam and McCartney's logic, which is basically that random violent crime isn't as rampant as one might think. And they've got a point. The problem is, both of these writers seem to think that just because most violent crime isn't random, that somehow it doesn’t affect those of us that have nothing to do with it. See no evil, hear no evil, right?

Wrong, I say. Lindsay Harvey's murder may have been a rare event in the spectrum of violent crime, but it's still proof that violence affects everyone. You want to know what lesson I took away from Lindsay's murder? That you can do all the right things in life, make all the right decisions, and keep company with all the right people, and it still might not be enough to save you from that kind of fate.

And that’s the truly scary part of all this, that you can cross paths with a violent criminal anywhere, at any time, even if your attacker has absolutely no connection to you or anyone you know. Lindsay Harvey was far from the type of person who went looking for trouble. But on April 13, 2008, trouble somehow found her in the most horrifying way imaginable. So that "fear of the boogeyman" is not entirely irrational.

That aspect of all this is why I started Justice For Safety. Because there are so many people out there like Lindsay Harvey. And I want them to stay alive.

We need to stop taking our safety for granted. We need to stop pretending that violent crime doesn’t affect us. Forgive me, for I am not suggesting for a moment that we spend the rest of our lives constantly living in fear or looking over our shoulder. That's no way to live. I know that. But we need to recognize that we do have a serious problem with the way violent criminals and other dangerous individuals (e.g., drunk and reckless drivers) are prosecuted, processed, and monitored in Maryland, and ignoring the problem or pretending it doesn’t affect us all isn't going to make it go away. Nor is standing pat. Your attentiveness, your vigilence, and your commitment to staying on top of this issue and making lawmakers aware of it is going to be paramount in getting those lawmakers to change the system.

Until you start doing this, we cannot and will not achieve justice for safety.

Write to your state legislators now. Keep doing it until they respond favorably to you. And write to these people as well:

Governor Martin O'Malley: http://www.governor.maryland.gov/mail/

Senate President Mike Miller: thomas.v.mike.miller@senate.state.md.us

House Speaker Michael E. Bucsh: michael.busch@house.state.md.us

Rest in peace, Lindsay.

What Makes a Homicide Newsworthy?

It's Friday. A 30-something-year-old female worker in Maryland goes to the store where she is employed and unlocks the door with her set of keys. Later, she is found lying on the floor of the store, unresponsive. She has been attacked and is later pronounced pronounced dead at the scene. Robbery is the suspected motive. Nearby businesses and the surrounding community express concern and are on edge. And this is in a part of Maryland where crimes like this are exceedingly rare.

By now, if you live in Maryland or anywhere else in the Washington area, you are probably all too familiar with the tragic story of Jayna Murray, the 30-year-old clerk at the Lululemon Athletica store in Bethesda who was found dead from a brutal attack inside the store that was initially thought to have been committed by "two masked men" who beat her to death and sexually assaulted her and a coworker. And by now you know about the shocking arrest of Brittany Norwood, the coworker who Montgomery County police now allege made up the story about the two masked men and actually killed Jayna Murray herself.

A tragic incident, yes. But that’s not actually what I'm describing here.

The story I'm referring to is actually that of Jacinta "Patty" Ayala, the 32-year-old mother of two who worked as a manager at a Burger King in Frederick. Frederick Police say that Ayala had just opened the restaurant on the morning of March 18 when she was attacked in an apparent robbery. She was discovered by a fellow employee and a bread delivery man. She had been shot.

It would be understandable if you missed the news about Patty Ayala, considering that so many in the Washington region were still in utter shock and grief over what had happened to Jayna Murray, who had been killed exactly one week earlier. And it just so happened that Ayala's murder took place on the same day that the Lululemon case took its shocking twist, culminating in the arrest of Brittany Norwood. The Lululemon case has attracted all kinds of media attention. The same cannot be said of Patty Ayala's murder. While The Gazette has paid some homage to Ayala's life, other than that, the Washington Post, a nationally recognized newspaper and the by far the biggest daily in the D.C. region, had only brief on the killing that was buried deep inside the Metro section of its March 19 edition (Norwood's arrest made the front page of the very same edition).

For days, a community and business district that had earned a well-deserved reputation for being one of the safest in the Washington area was on edge, wondering how their urban enclave suddenly became a target for what had appeared to be a random, vicious assault on two female employees. I myself was bracing for the possibility, even the likelihood, that two men were going to be arrested for the Lululemon assault, men who had violent criminal histories. That possibility was turning me inside out and keeping me up at night, just as Lindsay Harvey's murder had just three years ago. Could it be, I wondered, that yet another set of violent predators had benefited from the leniency of the Maryland criminal justice system and struck again when they should have been sitting in a jail cell?

My fears -- and everyone else's -- of course, turned out to be unfounded. Jayna Murray's murder was not in fact a random act of violence but one that was perpetrated by a known assailant (allegedly). Her accused killer has no prior criminal record and no known violent history, although she was apparently known to be something of a kleptomaniac. And that was certainly a relief.

But what about Jacinta Ayala's murder? Has it escaped everyone's attention that, as far as anyone knows, this probably was a random attack, by an unknown assailant, one who by the way hasn’t been caught yet as of this writing?

An astute reader of the Washington Post has wondered aloud about all this, noting that the local media have been all over the Jayna Murray story while virtually ignoring poor Patty Ayala. "I suppose the media found Murray’s slaying fascinating because it occurred at an upscale retailer in an upscale neighborhood. I’d like to think socioeconomic factors don’t influence the way you cover news."

Welcome to Journalism 101.

One of the first things they teach you in journalism school is that if it bleeds, it leads. And the second thing? Well, that’s a little more complicated. All homicides get news coverage of some kind when they occur. But the ones that get the most coverage and have staying power are the ones that the news media deems more fascinating.

There are many different things that factor into how much news coverage a violent crime receives, and it's not really an exact science. But among these factors are location, the nature of the crime, the ages of the perpetrator(s) and the victim(s), and the motive.

Anyone who's lived in the D.C. region for even a year knows where Bethesda Row is. It's one of the most lively urban areas of the Washington area. It's perenially bustling with activity. It's got bars, restaurants, and other upscale establishments galore. You see the Lululemon store on the news, and you say to yourself, "Oh my God! I go down that block all the time!" The Burger King in Frederick? Totally nondescript. It could be anywhere. I would be surprised if anyone living outside a two-mile radius of the restaurant even knows exactly where it is.

Even the nature of the Patty Ayala homicide probably seems rather pedestrian by comparison. A restaurant robbery? A shooting death? Happens all the time, right? But in addition to the location, Jayna Murray's murder fascinated people first because it was thought to be a double sexual assault and now because of the bizarre twist that made one of the supposed victims the alleged culprit.

Brittany Norwood's murder trial is almost guaranteed to attract a local media circus. The trial of Jacinta Ayala's killer, assuming it even comes to that, may only be a blip on the media's radar screen, assuming it gets covered at all.

The sad irony of all this is that it is the Ayala murder may well deserve more attention, because it may well have been the random act it appears to be and could once again bring to light the failings of the Maryland criminal justice system (I know, no arrests have been made yet, but then that didn’t stop people from speculating about what happened in the Lululemon case).

Jayna Murray's blond hair and bright smile have been all over the place for the past few weeks now. And her legend continues to grow in the form of numerous vigils, a memorial page on Facebook where more than 3,700 people and counting as of this writing have pressed the "like" button, and other expressions of sympathy and grief. Patty Ayala? All we really know about her is that she's dead, that she was a mother, and that she worked at Burger King. There's no Facebook page, no massive public outpouring of sympathy for her family, nothing like that.

But Patty Ayala was somebody, wasn’t she? She went to work in the morning just as so many of us do. And she paid for it with her life. Is her story not worthy of our attention or concern?

Please don’t misunderstand me. What happened to Jayna Murray was still a horrible tragedy, regardless of who did it and why.

But we shouldn’t let our guard down just because "two masked men" prowling around ritzy downtown Bethesda proved to be a hoax. The arrest of Brittany Norwood may have provided people with a collective sense of relief, but it may also be giving Marylanders a false sense of security. I hate to keep reminding people of this, but Maryland has been ranked as the 8th most violent state in the nation (2nd in homicides) and has a 51 percent recidivism rate among violent offenders. Jayna Murray's murder may not reinforce this reality anymore, but Patty Ayala's murder certainly should.

"Gun Day" in Annapolis

Feb. 10, 2011, in the Maryland Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee was what committee chairman Brian Frosh (D-Montgomery) termed "Gun Day". It was a day where a total of six proposed bills dealing with the regulation of firearms and the people who use them to commit their crimes were heard, with testimony from various people from all walks of life in the state speaking for and against -- gun rights adovocates, law enforcement personnel, prosecutors, clergy, and past victims of gun violence included.

I tried to listen to as much of the hearing as I could, all the while trying to get a sense of what all these different bills would do. Basically, the bills do the following. There's one bill that would closely monitor the record-keeping practices of gun dealers in Maryland (SB 161, cross-filed with HB 1043), another that would limit the magazine capacity of certain guns in Maryland and in some cases even ban the manufacturing of such guns (SB 162), another that would prohibit peoeple from carrying loaded handguns on themselves or in a vehicle under "specified circumstances" (SB 239, HB 252), another that would make the penalties for possession all types of firearms as severe as those for carrying handguns (SB 240, HB 241 -- this bill would also increase from 5 to 15 years the maximum penalty by which someone can be sentenced if they are caught with possessing a firearm and have already been previously convicted of a violent crime). And then of course, there is SB 173 (cross-filed with HB 172), which would limit the amount of good-time credit that convicted felons who use guns in the commissions of their crimes could receive toward early release. Additionally, there is another bill (SB 174) that would "prohibit the use of specified firearms in the commission of crimes of violence or felonies."

Sen. Frosh, who has steadfastly refused to act on legislation that would limit good behavior credit for violent offenders, has actually sponsored two of the six bills being proposed in the Senate, SB 161 and 162. These just happen to be the two bills that attempt to keep tabs on gun dealers and the firing capability of certain guns. This is not surprising to me. Frosh's passion for gun control has long been known to those who have followed his career. What is disconcerting about this, although again not surprising, is that while legislation to regulate firearms themselves has Frosh's backing and thus will presumably be voted on in committee and moved to the Senate floor, there is no way to know at this point how Frosh will act on the bills that deal with the prosecution of people who carry these weapons and/or use them to commit crimes.

Second Amendment rights activists often view politicians like Brian Frosh as Public Enemy no. 1. Often, these activists like to say that "Guns don’t kill people, people kill people." They are also fond of saying that "If you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns." Although I'm hardly an NRA member or gun enthusiast myself, I have nonetheless always found some truth in these arguments. After all, guns don’t go off by themselves, and if law-abiding citizens with no criminal record or history of mental illness want to have firearms for protection or self-defense, I don’t necessarily see why they shouldn’t have them, provided they can demonstrate that, among other things, they'll train themselves how to use and store them properly.

And while I don’t disagree with the concept of reasonable regulations on gun dealers or putting restrictions on magazine capacity or firing capabilities, it is reasonable to wonder whether Sen. Frosh, a trial attorney by trade, is more interested in regulating the means by which violent crimes are committed, and not so much in passing legislation that would prosecute the actual criminals themselves. And that doesn’t really do us much good. Because if you don’t prosecute violent offenders to the fullest extent of the law, it's not going to matter how many gun control measures you pass. Violent felons who are intent on causing their mayhem always find ways to get guns by any means necessary. So… ban guns, don’t ban guns… I don’t think it really makes a difference. You still have to keep the criminals themselves locked up if you want to reduce the potential for repeat violent crimes.

But there's another element to this that has struck me as rather odd, and that is the stance -- or lack thereof -- of some so-called "gun clubs" in Maryland, such as this one and this one. Predictably, both of these organizations oppose limits on magazine capacity and gun dealers, but they have also taken no position on the legislation that would limit gun offenders' good behavior credits. Why is this? I mean, you would think that even the most ardent second-amendment absolutist would want to keep violent criminals, especially those who use guns to hurt innocent people, in prison longer time, right? What gives? Why aren't these pro-gun enthusiasts taking a stand here? I'd like to know this. Perhaps I should ask them.

The Maryland House of Delegates is going to have their "Gun Day" hearings this coming Tuesday, March 8. I am not planning on attending but will be paying close attention to what transpires, of course. If I hear anything interesting coming out of this hearing, beyond what I already know or have gotten out of the Senate hearings, I will share it with you.

How will this all play out is anyone's guess. As I mentioned already, the two bills sponsored by Frosh will almost certainly be moved out of committee. The other bills are probably fair game, but SBs 173 (the good behavior credit bill) and 174 have the backing of Gov. Martin O'Malley, which I'm told may increase their chances of passing. Whether anything gets passed in the House may be a trickier proposition, what with House Judiciary Committee chairman Joseph Vallario's perennial aversion to passing common sense legislation being almost legendary.

Once in a great while, the top lawmakers in Annapolis will do the right thing and move legislation that might actually be good for the people of Maryland. But it usually only happens when they are pushed into doing so by strong outside forces or more powerful lawmakers and power brokers breathing down their necks. So be it. Whatever works.

As always, stay tuned.

-- David

Introducing: No Good Time For Gun Crimes

And so, a new bill proposing fewer good behavior credits for violent criminals in Maryland has been introduced in the 2011 Maryland General Assembly.

Sort of.

Actually, what has been drafted and will be introduced to the Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow is a bill is Senate Bill 173, which would limit to 5 days per month the number of good behavior credits that can be attained by those convicted of violent offenses involving firearms (all violent offenders in Maryland can earn anywhere from 10 to 20 days per month off their sentences through these credits).

Ten Maryland senators, including Nancy King and some members of the Judiciary Committee, are sponsoring the bill, only this time King is not the lead sponsor. It is for this reason that I only learned about the hearing today -- and it is taking place tomorrow. Nancy King herself apparently wasn’t even given notice of tomorrow's hearing until today.

A hearing date for House version of this bill has not yet been announced.

One potential bit of good news about this bill is that it has the backing of Gov. Martin O'Malley. This is important, I'm told, because bills that are on the Governor's agenda generally have a better chance of passing than those that do not. So that's one thing working in our favor this time.

Of course, the obvious caveat with this bill is that it only affects those violent criminals who use firearms to commit their crimes. Which means that it would not have affected Shawn Henderson. Henderson used .40-caliber pistol to kill Lindsay Harvey in 2008, but in the earlier crimes for which he had previously been convicted, Henderson used a knife to injure his victims.

So no, this proposed new law, had it been in place years ago, would not have saved Lindsay Harvey's life. And that’s not quite good enough in terms of providing the next measure of justice for her death.

Still, we need to look at the bigger picture here. This new law, assuming it is implemented correctly, would keep at least some violent felons in prison longer. And that will help save innocent lives. And that's really the whole point of this endeavor. And just because this particular bill doesn't give us everything we want, that doesn't mean we can't pursue even stronger legislation down the road.

Unfortunately, with this General Assembly, you cannot just go in there swinging for the fences. Sometimes in politics you have to lay down a bunt to get the ball rolling.

And, in the grander scheme of things, given the hasty manner in which I was finally obtain all the information about this bill, this does nothing to change the culture in Annapolis, where the scheduling practices continue to make it difficult -- if not next to impossible -- for average citizens to have their voices heard, or at least give their voices more weight.

But this new bill is progress nonetheless. I knew going into this movement very early on that the goal of keeping Marylanders safer from violent criminals was probably going to take years to achieve. Any victory we can achieve, however small, is an achievement we can be proud of.

2011: Now What?

Note: This is the first entry in what I hope will be a weekly column on the Justice For Safety Movement for the Justice For Safety blog. I will continue to post updates and links as I find them on the Justice For Safety Facebook page and on this blog, the latter on which I have not published anything recently. I am looking to get back to making this a regular thing so that the issue of violent crime in Maryland remains fresh.

Hello, and Happy New Year, everyone.

It's been a while since I've written or posted anything related to the Justice For Safety movement. But, if for no other reason than it's a new year and the new legislative session in Annapolis is beginning this week, I have decided to get the ball rolling again. Only now, for the first time, I am going to try and use this blog at least once a week to issue a no-holds-barred and (to steal a phrase from a good friend of mine) "balls-out" commentary on violent crime policy in Maryland and the politics behind it, as well as post any news and/or information that comes my way.

Of course, to start, I would love to be able to tell you something new here. Even better would be the ability to tell you that exciting things are happening with the Justice For Safety cause. Unfortunately, I cannot say that this is the case. As of this writing, I do not know whether any legislation that seeks to keep violent offenders in prison longer is forthcoming in the 2011 legislative session. And even if legislation is introduced, I'm not exactly optimistic that it will go anywhere.

Just to review: On April 13, 2008, Lindsay Marie Harvey, a 25-year-old Gaithersburg resident who worked with my wife at the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville, was murdered in the parking lot of her apartment complex by Shawn Henderson, a convicted felon who served just six years in prison for slashing people's throats, even though he had originally been sentenced to a total of 60 years. It was through a series of mechanisms in the criminal justice system (a consolidation of his sentence, a suspension of the sentence, reconsideration, and good behavior credits) that Henderson served a fraction of his prison sentence. And it was upon learning all this information that I got involved in a grass-roots movement to try and change the laws in Maryland that led to Henderson's early release.

To date, the efforts of this movement have not gone very far. True, I was able to get Sen. Nancy King (D-Montgomery Village), my state senator, to introduce legislation that would have reduced good behavior credits after writing to her about Lindsay Harvey (she's done this for two legislative sessions in a row now), and we were able to bring some media attention to this issue in the form of a two-part series in the Gazette in December 2008, an editorial and then an article in the Washington Post, and a column I had published in the Post. But the two gentlemen who chair the House and Senate Judicial Proceedings Committees in Maryland, Del. Joseph Vallario (D-Upper Marlbaro) and Sen. Brian Frosh (D-Bethesda), have refused to move the legislation out of committee. And with these two men having been re-elected to the General Assembly by landslide margins last November, there is no reason to expect that they will have a change of heart and move it to a vote this year either.

Given the recent election results, which firmly established the Democratic Party's dominance in Maryland, it looks like it is going to be business as usual in Annapolis. Frosh himself basically acknowledged as much after winning 70 percent of the vote in the general election over his Republican opponent Jerry Cave. The issue of keeping violent offenders in prison is just not a politically expedient one at the moment, and it's certainly not at the top of Brian Frosh's or Joseph Vallario's to-do list. And with the state facing major budget issues right now, the possibility of any legislation getting through that is perceived to cost the state prison system more money becomes even more remote.

The reality here is that nothing is likely to change unless something dramatic happens. I can't imagine right now what that might be, and I'm not sure I want to.

Vallario has taken a beating in the press over the past year over his reputation for squelching common-sense legislation that could save lives, not to mention his perceived rude treatment of victims' advocates during House Judiciary Committee hearings. Inexplicably, Frosh seems to be immune to such criticism despite being equally callous towards those who testify in support of legislation he is not interested in passing. During the 2010 election campaign, Frosh was actually lauded by both the Post and Gazette for serving his constituents well, being an ardent environmentalist, and being, of all things, honest -- really. Some blogs and this Facebook page tried to make the case (correctly, I might add) that Frosh is nothing like his supporters say he is, but to no avail.

In the end, it doesn’t matter all that much. Frosh and Vallario remain in power because they basically have no competition for their jobs; they are part of a system that is far more favorable to power brokers in Annapolis than it is to average Maryland citizens. They set the tone for judiciary policy in Maryland. Therefore, they can get away with rejecting even the most sensible legislation, because no one else really has the resources to challenge them for their jobs.

I know this probably all sounds very cynical on my part. But I've spent almost three years fighting now, all the while researching as much as I can and educating myself about Maryland politics. In theory, in a representative democracy, the government is supposed to be responsive to the will of the people. Every so often, in practice, it can work that way. But more often than not it doesn’t, especially in a state like Maryland where the top lawmakers are more beholden to special interests than they are to the general population.

Not that I'm giving up. I will continue this fight because I made a commitment to the friends and family of Lindsay Harvey, and I know in my heart that this is the right thing to do. As such, I will continue to educate all of you. But it's going to take a lot more than me merely informing you to get real change done in Annapolis. To quote Thomas Jefferson, "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."

So find out who your representatives are in Annapolis. And then write to them or call them and tell them about this issue and any other issues in the state of Maryland that you care about. And who knows? If enough of you do this, they may actually listen and try and do something for you, just like Nancy King has done for me. But if you don’t do anything, they won't either.

Once again, Happy New Year, and stay tuned.

"No Confidence" in the Justice System

This article appeared in last week's Gazette. The paragraphs at the end where Debra Harvey is quoted are worth repeating here.

Debra Harvey of Oneonta, N.Y., whose daughter Lindsay, a Gaithersburg woman, was killed in April 2008 by a repeat violent offender whose early release from prison came in part through diminution credits, wrote a three-page letter to legislators.

She said that after more than one year of meetings, hearings and trials, she watched her daughter's murderer sentenced to life without parole plus 20 years in prison.

"I don't know whether this means he will die in prison or whether he will get out of prison again somehow," Harvey said. "I don't know what to believe and I have no confidence in the Maryland judicial system."

We are now on Facebook

It took me a while, but I finally created a Justice For Safety Facebook page. Check it out and join, and tell your friends about it, too.