Allegations, convictions and oddities
By: Exhibit A
September 23, 2009
Fleming
A science lesson
FREDERICK, Md. (AP) — A community services agency in Frederick says it has fired a caregiver charged with leaving three blind, deaf and developmentally disabled men in a locked car for an hour while he ate lunch at a diner.
MedSource Community Services Executive Director Robert Claxton said Tuesday that MedSource has severed all ties with Brian Fleming (above, left), 47, of Fairfield, Pa., after reviewing the Sunday incident.
Fleming faces three counts of neglect and abuse of vulnerable adults. His first court appearance is scheduled for Nov. 18.
Fleming was released on personal recognizance Sunday from the Frederick County jail. He has no telephone listing and could not be reached for comment.
[Dogs have died when left in locked cars. So have babies, youngsters and other humans. Air gets stale and hot in a car that’s not moving. It doesn’t take a heat wave to cause this. Leaving a window open an inch isn’t enough. So, don’t do this.]
Putting police in awful position
BALTIMORE (AP) — Baltimore police say officers have shot a suicidal man who approached them holding what appeared to be an edged weapon, but turned out to be a spatula.
Police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi says the man called 911 around 6:30 a.m. Wednesday and asked for his mother and a member of the clergy, then said he wanted to die but didn’t know how.
When officers and paramedics arrived, Guglielmi says, the man approached them in the parking lot with what appeared to be an edged weapon held above his head. He says the man refused to comply with officers’ orders to drop the object and officers fired, striking the man in the upper torso.
Guglielmi says the man was taken to Sinai Hospital in critical condition. He says the two officers involved will be placed on routine administrative leave.
Chips and guns at Lexington Market
BALTIMORE (AP) — U.S. prosecutors say the owner of a potato chip stall at Lexington Market has pleaded guilty to selling guns from the stand.
Michael Papantonakis, 53, of Baltimore entered the plea Tuesday and was sentenced to 15 months in prison.
According to the plea agreement, undercover police and a confidential source met with Papantonakis several times, usually at the potato chip stall, to buy guns. Papantonakis was not licensed to sell guns.
That’s a souvenir?
NORTH EAST, Md. (AP) — A severed human hand has been unearthed from the yard of a home, but police say this is no whodunit.
Investigators believe it’s a decades-old medical school specimen left by a former resident.
Still, it was an odd discovery for the electrician who dug it up. It was muddy, but only the fingertips showed signs of decay, the Cecil Whig reported.
Maryland State Police Trooper First Class Dave Feltman says the hand found Tuesday appeared to be surgically removed.
The son of a previous owner of the house tells police it was a souvenir he took home as a student at the University of Maryland’s medical school more than 50 years ago.
Police said they believe his account, but sent it to the state medical examiner as part of routine procedure.
Something stinks
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. (AP) — Fredericksburg police are looking for a Maryland man accused of damaging urinals in restaurants and then posing as a plumber offering to fix them.
Police spokeswoman Natatia Bledsoe said urinals were damaged in at least seven restaurants in Fredericksburg on Friday afternoon.
The suspect then claimed to be a professional plumber and offered to repair the damage. Bledsoe said one restaurant paid the suspect but the work was faulty.
Police have charged Timothy Banks, 39, of Fort Washington, Md., with seven counts of felony vandalism and three counts of attempting to obtain money by false pretenses.
Bledsoe said Banks is charged with similar offenses in other localities, including Prince William and Fairfax counties.
FBI loses guns
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — The FBI wants its stolen guns back.
The agency on Friday offered a $5,000 reward for information about whoever took the FBI SWAT agent’s high-powered guns after breaking into a government vehicle parked in a neighborhood on the northwest side of Indianapolis.
Among the items taken was a submachine gun, a semiautomatic rifle, .45-caliber semiautomatic handgun and two sets of body armor. The theft was discovered Thursday morning.
Police say at least 12 homes, garages and vehicles broken into in the neighborhood. Police said the bandits also made off with a shotgun, a sheriff’s deputy’s badge and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Someone needed a lesson
MONTROSE, Mich. (AP) — A masked police chief planning to surprise Michigan high school students in a forensic science class ended up sparking a brief lockdown after being spotted by a cafeteria worker.
The Flint Journal reports Montrose Police Chief Darrell Ellis and another person from the department were seen Thursday putting on stocking masks outside Montrose High School for a mock robbery.
Ellis said the lesson called for students to write descriptions of the suspects and do interviews.
Principal Jim Ply says about 180 students eating lunch were evacuated to the gym and the school went into lockdown for about 10 minutes. The mock robbery went on as planned.
A mock robbery has been part of the class for about 12 years.
Personal smoking ban
WAILUKU, Hawaii (AP) — A judge has ordered a 19-year-old Hawaii man who pleaded no contest to starting a restaurant fire with a flicked cigarette to stop smoking for a year.
Makaio Bachman-Majamay of Makawao was originally charged with third-degree arson for allegedly igniting the shake roof of the Wei Wei Bar-B-Q Restaurant in Pukalani in July 2008. A witness extinguished the blaze using buckets of water, The Maui News reported.
Deputy Public Defender William McGrath says his client didn’t mean to set the fire.
Bachman-Majamay pleaded to a reduced charge of third-degree criminal property damage.
Second Circuit Judge Joel August ordered him to do community service and pay a $1,025 fine to fix the roof. He also told the teen not to use tobacco for a year.
“That means no cigarettes,” August said. “Perhaps it will add about 10 or 15 years to his life if he stops smoking permanently.”
‘Taxi!’
WESTERLY, R.I. (AP) — Two suspected bank robbers needed a getaway car, so they called a cab.
Westerly police say the man and woman took a taxi Tuesday to the Washington Trust Bank, went inside and demanded money, saying they were armed with explosives.
The teller gave the woman an undisclosed sum.
Outside, the duo got back in the cab and took off. Police Chief Edward Mello says the driver had no idea what had happened.
A few minutes later, police found the cab, and the man, across the border in Stonington, Conn. The woman was nowhere to be found.
Ronald Hayes was arrested and being held Wednesday before a court appearance.
Mello says they’ve identified the woman but won’t release her name. He says they’re suspected in another robbery in Montville, Conn.
Jaws of crime
ROME (AP) — Italy’s anti-Mafia police unit said Wednesday it has seized a crocodile used by an alleged Naples mob boss to intimidate businessmen from whom he demanded protection money.
Officers searching for weapons in the man’s home last week found the crocodile living on his terrace, said police official Sergio Di Mauro.
The 88-pound, 5-foot-6-inch crocodile was fed a diet of live rabbits and mice, Di Mauro said.
He said the suspect, an alleged boss in the Naples-based Camorra crime syndicate, used to invite extortion victims to his home and threaten to set the animal on them if they didn’t pay or grant him favors.
The man was not arrested but placed under investigation for illegal possession of an animal, Di Mauro said. Investigators are also working on extortion charges against him.
Crime from above
STOCKHOLM (AP) — Masked gunmen used a stolen helicopter and explosives to engineer a spectacular raid on a cash depot in Stockholm on Wednesday, breaking into the building through the roof and flying off with bags of cash, police and officials said.
The daring predawn heist stunned police in the Swedish capital, who were unable to deploy their own helicopters to the scene because suspected explosives had been placed at their hangar.
Investigators believe at least 10 professional outlaws were involved in the heist.
Pot(ted) plants
MILLVILLE, N.J. (AP) — Maybe this is why they call it High Street.
Police confirm the odd-looking plants they pulled last week from a flower basket there in Millville’s business district were indeed marijuana.
The plants were discovered by a passer-by. Police responded with a ladder and confiscated the 3-foot-tall plants, which were growing in a basket hanging from a lamp post.
The city’s parks and recreation department, which tends to the baskets, says it has no idea how the pot plants got there.
No arrests have been made.
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