REPORT CALLS FOR POLICE CHANGES

Past Strategies Condemned For Raising
Violence, Suspicion; 'Justification For Lost Faith'

Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley unveiled yesterday a much-anticipated
blueprint for fighting crime that concludes past policing strategies
contributed to violence and public hostility and suspicion.

"The persistence of high crime has undermined the public's confidence
in the Baltimore Police Department," the 152-page report by a team of
consultants concludes. "And there is justification for this lost faith."

The report was released as city government sources said O'Malley is
getting closer to naming Edward T. Norris, a former New York police
commander hired as deputy chief in January, as his choice for
commissioner.

O'Malley is moving quickly in the wake of the resignation Thursday of
Commissioner Ronald L. Daniel, hoping to head off growing public worry
that the consultants' report calls for police to use draconian tactics
at the expense of civil liberties. The report's release and a series
of community meetings are intended to allay concerns.

Last night, tensions ran high during a standing-room-only meeting of
about 800 people at Unity United Methodist Church in West Baltimore,
as speakers overwhelmingly called for Norris to return to New York.

Daniel has declined to comment on why he resigned, other than to say
he had no input with the consultants. Some public officials and many
residents have expressed fears that Daniel left over disagreement with
police strategies.

But nowhere does the report mention aggressive police tactics. Rather,
it calls for a change in attitude as well as technology -- officers
focused on making the city safer and using computer-generated
statistics to deploy as crime happens.

The report says officers should be moved from desk jobs and programs
such as the Police Athletic League and put into patrol cars, and
hundreds of vacant positions should be filled through accelerated hiring.

"For the first time in years, the Baltimore Police Department will
hold itself accountable for measurable impact on crime, disorder and
public fear throughout every city neighborhood," it says.

Among the findings:

In a survey of officers -- in which 80 percent of the 3,200-member
force responded -- 23 percent said they believed that more than a
quarter of the department "is involved in stealing money or drugs from
drug dealers."

Many residents interviewed suspect officers are complicit in the drug
trade because dealers are "so visible in their neighborhoods." And
many people, particularly young black males, felt intimidated and
unfairly targeted by police who routinely use small gatherings as
justification for a roust.

More than 80 percent of the officers surveyed said that their own
disrespect of people "causes unnecessary escalation of force," and
half those interviewed believed officers did not have the verbal or
tactical skills to defuse such situations.

The report is sweeping in scope and criticisms. It calls for quick
action by police to target drug dealers and leaves virtually no aspect
of the force untouched in its recommendation for reform.

The corruption charge leveled by officers against themselves needs to
be immediately investigated, the consultants said. They linked
residents' complaints of unfair treatment to a lack of police training.

If the consultants' report is a true reflection of the city force,
Norris, named acting commissioner Friday, will have a daunting
challenge to remake the department and fulfill O'Malley's campaign
promises to cut crime and homicides.

The report found a internal cultural problem that has hampered
crime-fighting efforts: patrol officers and supervisors confused over
their mission and what is expected of them.

Instead of working toward one goal, the report said officers are
ingrained with values of "individual survival, group loyalty,
frustration and resentment as needs and expectations have gone
unfulfilled."

O'Malley said he released the report to gain public
confidence.

"I felt that it is critical for the public to see and understand our
plan of action for this Police Department," O'Malley said yesterday.
"The fundamentals of this plan have saved countless lives in New
Orleans and Newark, and it will save lives in Baltimore."

Norris, who is white, implemented New York's aggressive policing plan,
which is credited with reducing crime but blamed for sanctioning
abuse. Many residents in Baltimore's depressed, minority neighborhoods
have expressed a desire for a black commissioner who understands their
complaints about harassment from law enforcement.

Talk show host Larry Young used his morning radio show yesterday to
plug Col. Barry W. Powell, the city's highest-ranking black police
official, as the department's next leader.

But sources said Powell has privately backed Norris, and City Council
President Sheila Dixon said Powell "is interested in being a deputy
commissioner and I support him. I think that he can be a great
resource to us with the distrust in the community."

Sources said Norris will go on a public relations tour of
neighborhoods to win residents' support. Yesterday, he spoke with
Dixon and inquired about his prospects for being confirmed.

The consultants' report was written by Jack Maple and John Linder, who
charge $2,000 a day and have worked in several cities, including
Boston and New Orleans. Their conclusions about Baltimore are similar
to what they found in other cities.

Surveys of residents note continued frustrations over crime and the
way police do their jobs.

People who dial 911 for help found officers "more concerned with
making the caller feel at ease than with trying to find and arrest
criminals. These participants believe the police have become reluctant
in their desire to fight crime," the report said.

One woman interviewed by the consultants told them that she had had
called police 20 times to complain about dealers in front of her house
and got no response. "She stated that she finally asked the dealers
politely to move away from her house and go down the street," the
consultants reported.

Some citizens lamented other changes.

"In the old days, the city used to put basketball hoops in the
schoolyards so kids would gather and have something to do," one
resident told the consultants. "Nowadays, they take the hoops out to
prevent anything bad from happening."

Reaction to the long-anticipated report was scarce yesterday. The
draft was made available to reporters and was being distributed to
city leaders last night. The final version will be released today and
eventually posted on the Internet.

Officer Gary McLhinney, the police union president, said he hopes the
report's release will mute public concerns. "There is a perception
that we can't be effective unless we are brutal," he said. "That
simply is not true. We can do our jobs within the Constitution and do
it well."

The report said that Baltimore's per-capita homicide rate, which has
topped 300 annually for a decade and is seven times the national
average, ranked fourth in the nation last year. It also noted that the
city was first nationally in terms of robbery, fourth in assault, 10th
in rape and 17th in auto theft.

Many of the report's findings deal with the inner workings of the
police force.

The consultants criticized problems such as poor ventilation at police
headquarters and the scarcity of crime scene tape, latex gloves,
reliable police cars and film for Polaroid cameras.

Many of the report's recommendations are under way: moving detectives
from headquarters to station houses, establishing a warrant squad,
attacking open-air drug markets and creating oversight to make sure
crimes are more accurately documented.

The consultants said the previous administration had only five
officers hunting down 50,000 people wanted on arrest warrants,
including 250 "for murder and other heinous crimes," while assigning
88 officers to the Police Athletic League program.

The report mentions many problems that have been made public before:
Only 73 percent of the department's 3,274 funded positions are
available for actual duty. It recommends moving 204 officers from the
administrative bureau to the street.

It also calls for pairing officers in patrol cars in high-crime areas,
revamping the disciplinary process to allow mid-level supervisors to
handle minor infractions, dealing with unresolved racial tensions and
handing out gold shields to detectives to highlight their importance.