Free Republic

More than a dozen Los Angeles gangs are targeting some of the city's wealthiest residents in a new and aggressive manner, sending out crews in multiple cars to find, follow and rob people driving high-end vehicles or wearing expensive jewelry, according to police. In many cases, they're making off with designer handbags, diamond-studded watches and other items worth tens of thousands of dollars — if not more — and then peddling them to black-market buyers who are willing to turn a blind eye to the underlying violence, police said. In some cases, suspects have been arrested but then released from...

Crews of burglars publicly smashing their way into Los Angeles’ most exclusive stores. Robbers following their victims, including a star of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” and a BET host, to their residences. And this week, the fatal shooting of 81-year-old Jacqueline Avant, an admired philanthropist and wife of music legend Clarence Avant, in her Beverly Hills home. After two years of rising violent crime in Los Angeles, these incidents have sparked a national conversation and led to local concern about both the crimes themselves and where the outrage over the violence will lead. “The fact that this has...

Four top executives at the University of Maryland Medical System have resigned amid investigations into accusations of self-dealing among the hospital network’s board members, the system announced Thursday. Those resigning are Megan Arthur, the system’s primary lawyer; Jerry Wollman, the chief administrative officer; Christine Bachrach, the system’s chief compliance officer; and Keith Persinger, the chief performance improvement officer. **SNIP** The resignations come as Nygren Consulting of Santa Barbara, Calif., works to finish its examination of deals worth millions of dollars that led UMMS CEO Robert Chrencik and Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh to resign from their jobs. The consulting firm was...

Three of six Baltimore police officers charged in the death of Freddie Gray argued in court filings this week that they provided statements to police investigators under duress because they feared losing their jobs. Two of the officers said that when investigators asked them to provide statements about the circumstances surrounding Gray's arrest, they were led to believe they were doing so as witnesses — not as suspects.

The armed guard who protected Geraldo Rivera as he covered the Baltimore riots has been under arrest since May 1 due to the fact that he did not have a license to carry a gun in Maryland. According to the The Baltimore Sun’s Kevin Rector, the guard “has been in jail since May 1 for carrying guns around Baltimore protest w/o an MD carry permit.” The Sun reports that Baltimore Officer John Potts “spotted a man holding handcuffs and an ammunition box” on May 1. He kept watching and saw Donald F. Scott allegedly “open the rear hatch of a...