GOCCP Newsletter - Summer 2013

Of the hundreds of bills signed by Governor O'Malley this year, two important public safety bills were the result of teamwork by members of the Maryland General Assembly, led by Maryland Senate President Thomas "Mike" Miller and Maryland House Speaker Michael Busch. The Firearm Safety Act of 2013 was signed by Governor O'Malley on May 16th... Continue Reading

Anne Arundel Sheriff's Office Using Unique Law To Close Outstanding Warrants

There were some smiles in the Anne Arundel County Sheriff's Office when Governor O'Malley signed House Bill 1360/Senate Bill 243 this past May. That's because The Maryland Income Tax Refund – Anne Arundel County Warrant Intercept Program has been extended for five years... Continue Reading

GOCCP Grantee Receives Department of Justice Award

Northwest Hospital's Domestic Violence Program, known as the DOVE program, has been honored by the U.S. Department of Justice with a National Crime Victims' Service Award. In an awards ceremony in April in Washington, the DOVE program was presented with the Award for Professional Innovation in Victim Services. Only 13 of these awards were made this year; the DOVE program received the only award in Maryland... Continue Reading

GOCCP Executive Director Tammy M. Brown Is A "VIP"

Maryland Daily Record, a newspaper that features breaking business, legal and government news, has named GOCCP's Executive Director Tammy Brown to its 2013 VIP List (Very Important Professionals who are successful by 40). Brown was chosen by an outside panel of judges for her professional achievement, community leadership, and commitment to mentoring and inspiring change... Continue Reading

Grants Awarded

July 1st marked the beginning of the 2014 Maryland State Fiscal Year, and the start of many of GOCCP's funding programs. Nearly three-quarters of a million dollars in funding was awarded to local jurisdictions... Continue Reading

Events

Second Annual Governor's Conference on Combating Human Trafficking in Maryland Held May 20

Governor O'Malley welcomes participants at the conference.

More than 400 people from across the state converged on the Catonsville campus of the Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC) on May 20th to take part in the second annual Governor's Conference on Combating Human Trafficking in Maryland. Governor O'Malley opened the Conference by reviewing the progress Maryland has made to raise awareness of human trafficking among the staff in the Departments of Juvenile Services, Health & Mental Hygiene, Human Resources, Public Safety and Correctional Services, Maryland State Police, and the Maryland State Department of Education. Since last year's Conference, each of these Departments has been developing screening tools to help identify victims of human trafficking and provide services and resources for them.

"Until every citizen is safe from the threat of modern day slavery, our job is not done," said Governor O'Malley. "Our goal is to come up with more innovative approaches to supporting survivors and putting traffickers behind bars."

The Conference was the result of a partnership between GOCCP, the Maryland Human Trafficking Task Force, TurnAround, Inc., the Maryland Association of Resources for Families & Youth, the Maryland Coalition Against Sexual Assault, and the Araminta Freedom Initiative.

Attendees included law enforcement investigators, criminal justice professionals, victim service providers, and human trafficking survivors. Twelve workshops were offered, with two general sessions that included remarks from U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein; a report from Rachel Yasser, Assistant U.S. Attorney on the Maryland Human Trafficking Task Force; and a panel discussion on the State Agency Response to sex trafficking in Maryland moderated by Cassie Motz, Deputy Chief of Staff for Governor O'Malley.

Since last year's Conference, government agencies and private sector partners have worked closely together and have made significant achievements, including expanded law enforcement initiatives and victim outreach services. For example, using internet “escort” websites, the Maryland State Police Child Recovery Unit child trafficking operation has pro-actively identified and helped 18 child victims in the first six months of 2013. In 2012, they identified 76 human trafficking victims.

Statewide, 1,211 juvenile caseworkers have been trained in Child Victim Identification and Risk Assessment. The Department of Juvenile Services has deployed its risk assessment tool at two female detention facilities. DJS plans full implementation of the screening tool at all Juvenile Services intake offices in the community and facilities this year.

The Maryland Department of Human Resources is ensuring that child victims are treated as child neglect cases and that the children receive appropriate placement and care. The Department will integrate screening questions for trafficking within its national model screening tool beginning this fall.

Maryland’s Mental Hygiene Administration is working to provide uninsured victims with mental health and addictions treatment. The agency is assisting nonprofit providers in obtaining critical vital records documents for victims at no cost.

A Human Trafficking Intelligence Manager has been hired to develop data-driven intelligence and has been assigned to the Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center. The Manager collects, analyzes, and disseminates data statewide, while working to improve communications to resolve confusion or contradiction among various agencies.

The updated recommendations for a statewide approach, presented at the May 20 conference, are available on the GOCCP website.

Maryland continues to establish laws to fight human trafficking. This May, Governor O'Malley signed two bills passed by the General Assembly designed to hold human traffickers accountable for their actions. House Bill 713 authorizes State and local law enforcement agencies to seize property in connection with a human trafficking violation and establishes procedures for the seizure, forfeiture and sale of property related to human trafficking violations. House Bill 933 establishes that a person who is charged with human trafficking of a minor may not use as a defense a statement that he or she was unaware of the age of the victim.

"The more tools we put in place as a State to identify victims and investigate traffickers the more equipped we will be as a State to save lives," said GOCCP Executive Director Tammy M. Brown. "Each case is different, and all of us - each agent, case manager, social worker, law enforcement officer, and citizen - must stay vigilant to identify survivors who may cross our paths."

Return To Top

GOCCP Grants Fund Warrant Initiatives in City of Baltimore and Prince George's County

A $79,000 grant from GOCCP provided funding for a two-week warrant initiative in the City of Baltimore, which resulted in the arrest of 224 offenders. 23 detainers were placed against offenders who were already in custody on unrelated charges. Law enforcement officers from the Baltimore Police Department, U.S. Marshals Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Maryland State Police worked together during the last two weeks of June to target the most dangerous and predatory offenders in Baltimore. The task force disposed a total of 325 warrants for charges including murder, attempted murder, witness intimidation, hand gun violations, and more than 90 warrants for assault.

"This is a message to those who bring violence to our streets," said Police Commissioner Anthony Batts. "We are working tirelessly with our partners to make our city a safer Baltimore."

In July, a $125,000 grant from GOCCP began funding a 12-week Violent Offender Warrant Sweep in Prince George's County. 129 warrants were closed and 92 people were arrested in the first phase of the warrant initiative, which will continue through September. 19 detainers were placed against offenders already in custody on unrelated charges. The warrants served included charges for first and second degree assault, theft, domestic violence, and gun violations.

The initiative began on Sunday, July 14, with 12 warrant teams of more than 60 law enforcement officers working county-wide to find violent offenders who had open warrants. The effort partnered agents from the Prince George's County Sheriff's Office, the U.S. Marshals Service, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Maryland State Police, and officers from the Capitol Heights, New Carrollton, Cheverly, Glenarden and Greenbelt Police Departments.

"GOCCP has given us the resources to serve a significant number of violent crime warrants," said Prince George's County Sheriff Melvin High. "The funding and the team work put together in this warrant initiative give us a hugely improved opportunity for success in apprehending the most violent criminals in Prince George's County."

Return To Top

Maryland Safe Street Sites Begin CPTED Initiatives

Salisbury Safe Streets Team at the CEPTED training in Easton.

Salisbury Safe Streets Team at the CPTED training in Easton.

GOCCP has awarded grants to the Safe Streets Initiative teams to employ Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) programs in their locations. Safe Streets Teams from Cumberland, Frederick, Hagerstown, Annapolis, Harford County, and Salisbury attended three-day training events organized by GOCCP and taught by the National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC). Law enforcement representatives from Prince George's County, Baltimore County, Cambridge, Easton, Elkton, and Montgomery County Police Departments, the National Park Service, and Washington County also attended the trainings.

CPTED is a tool historically used to create safe communities in which people can live and work. Popularized in the 1980's by the "broken window theory," CPTED theorizes that keeping neighborhoods clean and well-lighted makes them less attractive to criminal activity. This theory has been proven in neighborhoods across the nation, where crime rates have dropped when problem areas are cleaned up.

After identifying community areas that needed improvement, the Safe Streets Teams applied for grant funds from GOCCP for equipment, public education and enhancements to public property. NCPC will consult with the Safe Streets areas, and Washington College will provide mapping services, such as terrain mapping, or identifying businesses associated with the risk of crime. In addition to the CPTED grants, the Safe Streets sites can use funds from their new Safe Streets grants from GOCCP, which went into effect on July 1, 2013.

"This is an exciting initiative, because it involves a lot of professionals in a Safe Streets area," says GOCCP Executive Director Tammy M. Brown."Besides law enforcement, there are professionals from local zoning departments, housing and community development, and landlord associations involved in making these decisions about their communities. Working with these partnerships, GOCCP is continuing to incorporate diverse and workable solutions to prevent crime and provide safe and inviting neighborhoods where Maryland residents can live, work, and raise a family."

Return To Top

Milestones

Cecil County Joins Maryland's Safe Streets Initiative

On July first, GOCCP awarded a grant to create a Safe Streets Initiative site in Cecil County. This new site involves a wide range of partners, including the Maryland State Police Criminal Investigations Bureau; the Cecil County Sheriff's Office; the Cecil County State's Attorney's Office; the Police Departments of Elkton, Perryville, and North East; the City of Elkton; the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services and the Department of Juvenile Services.

The GOCCP grant will fund a crime analyst in the Cecil County Sheriff's Office, as well as an investigator who will act as a liaison between law enforcement entities and prosecutors to help create successful cases for prosecution. In addition, grant funding will pay for law enforcement overtime.

The Safe Streets Initiative is an offender-based model established to institute collaboration and information-sharing across all levels of government to dramatically reduce crime. GOCCP forms partnerships with local jurisdictions that demonstrate both a need for and a commitment to comprehensive collaboration across their local criminal justice systems.

"We have by far one of the best working relationships with our allied agencies in Maryland, and everyone is looking forward to this new joint effort," said Sheriff Barry Janney. "In the past, we have always shared resources with our neighboring law enforcement agencies. Becoming a Safe Streets Initiative site will allow us to cooperate even more fully. We will be concentrating on regions of Cecil County that statistics show have a greater incidence of violent crime – that will be our number one priority. I hope our cooperative efforts in Cecil County will become a role model for other jurisdictions."

Cecil County becomes the eighth Safe Streets Initiative site since the inception of the program in 2008. The other Safe Streets Initiative sites are the cities of Annapolis, Salisbury, Cumberland, Hagerstown, and Frederick, Harford County, and a juvenile model in Baltimore City. There have been significant reductions in crime in Safe Streets sites since the initiation of the program.

Return To Top

Governor O'Malley Signs Historic Bills

Governor O'Malley signs the Firearm Safety Act of 2013.

The Firearm Safety Act of 2013 was signed by Governor O'Malley on May 16th. A comprehensive, common sense approach to licensing and gun safety, the Firearm Safety Act was the result of hard work by the General Assembly, and community outreach efforts by Lt. Governor Anthony Brown, who testified in support of the proposal and held public town hall meetings around the state.

Provisions of the bill include a ban on assault weapons, a limit on the capacity of a magazine from 20 to 10 rounds; fingerprint licensing requirements on future handgun purchases, and restrictions on possession of firearms and ammunition by persons prohibited by prior criminal offenses and mental health disqualifications. The Firearm Safety Act of 2013 also provides a comprehensive approach to safeguarding and improving mental health services and making improvements to services to ensure that individuals are not deterred from seeking treatment, but prohibiting those identified as dangerous from possessing firearms. GOCCP is working with the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the Maryland State Police, the Office of Administration Hearings, and the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services on implementing the Act when it becomes effective on October 1st.

Governor O'Malley signed the repeal of the Death Penalty on May 2nd. This new law will also go into effect on October 1st. The bill establishes that a person found guilty of murder in the first degree will be sentenced to life in prison, or life in prison without the possibility of parole. There are currently five inmates on death row in Maryland prisons. The Governor has the legal authority to commute the sentences of those inmates to life without parole, and will review them on a case-by-case basis.

Return To Top

Anne Arundel Sheriff's Office Using Unique Law To Close Outstanding Warrants

This unique law – the only one in the nation that we know of – has resulted in the closure of 304 outstanding warrants in Anne Arundel County, with 269 cases resulting in arrests. It is the outcome of a special cooperative agreement between the Anne Arundel County Sheriff's Office, the Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA), and the State Comptroller's Office.

"We were brainstorming how we could quickly and safely close outstanding warrants," says Lt. Colonel Rick Tabor, Deputy Chief of the Anne Arundel County Sheriff's Office. "One idea we had was to withhold tax refunds from people who had outstanding warrants. We had these people's addresses, but we needed their Social Security Numbers in order to ask the Comptroller's Office to hold onto their tax refund checks."

Lt. Col. Tabor and Sheriff Ron Bateman took the idea to GOCCP Deputy Director Edward Parker, who worked with Ron Brothers, the Chief Information Officer for the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services (DPSCS). Brothers came up with a method that matched Anne Arundel County's open warrant information with MVA's data. MVA sent the Social Security Numbers to the Comptroller's Office, which then mailed a letter to each person who had an outstanding warrant, telling him or her to contact the Anne Arundel County Sheriff's Office.

"This means that more than 300 times this past year, our Sheriff's Deputies did not have to take the risk of going unannounced to a person's home or business in order to serve an outstanding warrant," says Lt. Col. Tabor. "Instead, they came into our domain, where their outstanding warrants were quickly and safely closed. Once the warrant was closed, they got their tax refund check."

"This law is a great example of how information-sharing between agencies can make our neighborhoods safer," says GOCCP's Parker. "This law allowed Anne Arundel County to close outstanding warrants in a way that was as safe as possible for everyone involved."

Return To Top

GOCCP Grantee Receives Department of Justice Award

Northwest Hospital's DOVE program is one of seven hospital-based domestic violence centers in Maryland. Like other programs, it trains medical staff to screen incoming hospital patients for indications that they may be victims of domestic violence. If a patient is a domestic violence victim, she or he is immediately given crisis counseling and safety planning, as well as forensic records of injuries and referrals to community resources.

What makes the DOVE program stand out is its Strangulation Response Project. The program's start-up costs were funded by a Maryland Victims of Crime Act (MVOC) grant administered by GOCCP. DOVE Program Manager Audrey Bergin developed the program when she realized that victims often did not report being choked or strangled, and that strangulation often leaves few or no marks on the victim's neck.

"Strangulation is similar to a head trauma," says Bergin. "At first, patients may look like they are not injured at all. It is only later that they develop symptoms. In a few rare cases, strangulation can lead to damage to the carotid artery, which could lead to a stroke days or even months after the attack."

DOVE works with local police precincts to encourage them to ask victims specific questions about whether they were strangled or choked. A special forensic light can then be used to detect bruising that may not be visible to the naked eye. Photographing this image allows it to be used as evidence in court against an abuser.

Bergin's goal is to encourage law enforcement and prosecutors to be aware of the damage nonfatal strangulation can inflict on a victim. The Strangulation Response protocol used at the Northwest Hospital Emergency Department gives a specific kind of CT scan to patients who have been strangled. The CT scan reveals detailed images of the tissues and blood vessels of the neck. Bergin says this protocol is now being replicated in Calvert and Anne Arundel Counties.

Return To Top

GOCCP Executive Director Tammy M. Brown Is A "VIP"

GOCCP Executive Director Tammy M. Brown

Brown has been GOCCP's Executive Director since September 2012, and has reorganized GOCCP to make it more responsive to the policy and legislative needs of the state's criminal justice community. This past year she was an active partner in the Administration's successful passage of The Firearm Safety Act of 2013, and the repeal of the December 31, 2013 termination date for the DNA arrestee database.

The former Chief of Staff at the Department of Juvenile Services (DJS), Brown has a long background in criminal justice. She served as the Executive Director of the Baltimore City Criminal Justice Coordinating Council, where she oversaw initiatives that included reorganizing federal, state and local criminal justice agencies to improve cross-functioning within those agencies. She also reformed the systems at the Baltimore Central Booking Center to increase efficiency, while keeping track of inmates who still had open warrants. Brown also assisted the Baltimore Police Department with implementing a lethality assessment tool to help officers identify potential domestic violence victims.

While at the DJS, Brown led efforts to develop and implement the Violence Prevention Initiative. She was also a key partner in DJS' successful efforts to share juvenile information with its juvenile justice counterparts in the District of Columbia.

Brown previously worked under a fellowship from the Open Society Institute, focusing on both legal services for the homeless, and helping ex-offenders re-enter society. She has a Juris Doctor from the University of Baltimore School of Law.

Return To Top

Grants Awarded

More than a million dollars in funding was awarded to organizations that provide services to victims of crime. The Maryland Victims of Crime (MVOC) funds are administered by the Maryland State Board of Victim Services and GOCCP.

Nearly 200 thousand dollars in state funding was awarded to the Domestic Violence Unit Pilot Program (DVUP). DVUP funds support efficient and timely service of protective orders, thereby reducing the time between the issuance of ex partes and protective orders and their entry into the METERS/NCIC database.

For up-to-date announcements on grant awards, please check our Press Release webpage. To find Notices of Funding Availability (NOFAs) that are currently available, please look at the bottom of our website homepage.

A complete listing of a wide variety of federal and state funds that make resources available for public safety projects across Maryland can be found here.

Return To Top