>>> Baltimore County Prosecutor Scott D. Shellenberger wants to show his
>>> LOVE for ALL convicted pedophiles and child molestors and is inviting
>>> them to a night of "trick or treating" at 12 Perine Court, Parkville,
>>> MD 21234.
>>> Scott says he just loves supporting pedophiles in the community. And
>>> Scott has done EXACTLY that when he represented Timothy Van Pelt in
>>> District Court in 2005 and 2006.
Scott D. Shellenberger asks: "How far does this go?" Yeah Scottie, How
far does your "love" for convicted pedophiles and child molestors go?
http://groups.google.com/group/balt.general/msg/47a6e0cfc980ea28 notes
that:
Baltimore County Prosecutor Scott D. Shellenberger wants to show his
LOVE for ALL convicted pedophiles and child molestors and is inviting
them to a night of "trick or treating" at 12 Perine Court, Parkville,
MD 21234
Judge's ruling shocks prosecutors
Oct 24, 2007 3:00 AM (2 days ago)
by Luke Broadwater, The Examiner
BALTIMORE (Map, News) - For more than 100 years, police have relied on
fingerprints to help identify criminals.
But in a groundbreaking ruling, a Baltimore County judge has
disallowed prosecutors from using fingerprint evidence against a man
facing the death penalty in a 2006 carjacking and murder at Security
Square Mall.
"Fingerprints - along with DNA - are the gold standard for evidence,"
said Scott Shellenberger, the Baltimore County state's attorney, who
said he was "shocked" by the judge's ruling. "The judge took 100 years
of history and rejected it."
In her Friday ruling, Judge Susan Souder wrote that just because
fingerprints have been used by police for years does not make them
reliable.
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"The long history of use of fingerprint identification does not by
itself support the decision to admit it," Souder wrote. "Courts began
admitting fingerprint evidence early last century with relatively
little scrutiny. Relying on precedent, later courts simply followed."
Caught off-guard by the ruling, prosecutors asked - and received - a
postponement Tuesday in the death penalty case against Bryan Rose, 23,
of Baltimore, who is charged with first-degree murder and attempted
armed carjacking in the January 2006 killing of Warren Fleming, 31,
outside the mall. The trial is rescheduled for April 7.
In her ruling, Souder cited problems with fingerprint evidence in a
joint investigation conducted by Spanish and U.S. authorities.
After the March 11, 2004 terrorist bombing of commuter trains in
Madrid, Spanish National Police recovered fingerprints from a plastic
bag containing explosive detonators, but the FBI used the prints to
misidentify a suspect in the case, Souder wrote.
That case is not alone, wrote Souder, lamenting the lack of the
certainty with fingerprint evidence - which is not 100 percent
reliable - especially in a death penalty case.
"For many centuries ... humans thought that the earth was flat," the
judge wrote, comparing fingerprint evidence to an old, discredited
idea. "... But science has proved that the earth is not flat."
Souder's decision was immediately hailed by Rose's defense attorneys,
but Shellenberger and his prosecutors worried other judges might soon
follow suit and eliminate the crucial form of evidence for police and
prosecutors to use.
"How far does this go?" he asked. "In Baltimore County and the state
of Maryland?"
