Pa. fuel tax meant for bridge repair went to state police instead Whyy
Real-Life Baltimore Corruption Report Reads Like Storyline for A Sixth Season of The Wire
A novel-length report on a massive cop corruption scandal is riveting and scary reading
Steptoe & Johnson LLP today released its investigative report on the Baltimore Police Department's Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF) scandal. Entitled "Anatomy of the Gun Trace Task Force Scandal: Its Origins, Causes, and Consequences", the 515-page report provides a rich and detailed history of events and decisions over the past 20 years within the Baltimore Police Department (BPD) and the city of Baltimore that contributed to the scandal.
The Report is the product of a two-year investigation that included more than 160 interviews and the review of hundreds of thousands of pages of documents. The report covers the period from 1999 to the present, beginning with the zero-tolerance/quality-of-life approach to policing brought to Baltimore by former Mayor Martin O’Malley and the two BPD commissioners he recruited from New York, and ending with some of the changes and reforms that have been implemented over the past four years. As part of the investigation, the Steptoe team interviewed every elected Baltimore mayor from O'Malley to Brandon Scott, and every BPD commissioner from Ed Norris to Michael Harrison.
The Report helps to explain how a scandal of such proportions could begin and continue for years without being detected. Until a federal investigation led to the arrests of seven members of the GTTF on March 1, 2017, GTTF members roamed the city stealing money, planting drugs and guns, and committing other egregious crimes against the residents of Baltimore. To date, the federal investigation has resulted in the successful prosecution of a dozen former BPD officers, including several who were never members of the GTTF.
According to Michael R. Bromwich, the leader of the Steptoe investigative team, “Our goal was to determine what factors caused these former BPD officers to violate their oaths and betray the people of Baltimore. We sought to make findings and draw conclusions about the aspects of BPD’s organization, structure, and culture that created weaknesses in BPD that allowed the corruption to take place and go undetected and unpunished for so long.” According to Bromwich, “Our investigation demonstrated that the corruption within the GTTF began long before the officers joined forces on that squad, and was by no means limited to that squad. Our investigation also revealed that several of the officers involved were known to engage in misconduct on a continuing basis, but that the internal mechanisms within BPD were inadequate to the task of disciplining them appropriately and terminating them when the facts justified it."
Two years, more than 100 interviews and thousands of pages of documents into one of the biggest corruption scandals in Baltimore Police history have all led to this, the results of the independent investigation into the disgraced Gun Trace Task Force are out.
Eight officers in the unit, including ringleader Sgt. Wayne Jenkins, were convicted of racketeering, armed robbery, selling drugs, falsifying overtime and planting evidence on suspects they arrested. A total of 13 defendants were charged in the scandal since the initial federal indictment of Jenkins, Momodu Gondo, Evodio Hendrix, Daniel Hersl, Jemell Rayam, Marcus Taylor and Maurice Ward in 2017. Sgt. Thomas Allers was later indicted and eventually pleaded guilty to charges of racketeering conspiracy and racketeering offenses, including nine robberies.
“These former BPD officers constituted not a single criminal gang, but instead a shifting constellation of corrupt officers who discovered each other during the course of their careers and committed their crimes individually, in small groups, and then in larger groups,” the report said.
The final report includes more than 160 interviews and reviews of hundreds of thousands of pages of documents. Every elected mayor from Martin O’Malley through Brandon Scott, and every BPD commissioner from Ed Norris through Michael Harrison was interviewed for the investigation.
Led by former Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Bromwich, the inquiry resulted in a 515-page report that provides a detailed 20-year history of events and decisions that led to the Gun Trace Task Force scandal.
The report also explains how the widespread corruption began and continued for years without being detected, finding weaknesses in the Baltimore Police Department, especially leadership that turned a blind eye to top performing officers–like the ones in the elite unit–who brought in high numbers of arrests and seizures.
Investigators revealed GTTF officers had problems from the start, long before they joined the squad, and warning signs were ignored as special units became “incubators for corruption.”
Met officer was promoted despite misconduct over sexist and racist messages Guardian
Cressida Dick is a protected member of the establishment who was groomed from the get-go. First heard of her in connection with the killing of that innocent Brazilian guy in a London tube station because they thought he might possible have been a terrorist – and so get several rounds into his head from point blank range as he was held down. And Dick was in charge of that operation.
