BALTIMORE POLICE CASES COULD BE DROPPED

Authorities in Baltimore said yesterday that charges in hundreds of
criminal cases may have to be dropped as a result of a widening police
misconduct investigation that has already led to the suspensions of
seven officers, a probe that began when a woman reported that she was
sexually assaulted last month in a police station.

Three of the officers -- Brian Shaffer, 31, Jemini Jones, 28, and
Steven Hatley, 27 -- were indicted on rape charges last week. They are
accused of detaining a 22-year-old woman Dec. 27 and transporting her
to a station in the city's Southwestern District, where one allegedly
threatened to jail her if she did not agree to sex.

Internal investigators, armed with search warrants, arrived at the
offices of the officers' unit -- every member of which has been
suspended -- a day after the alleged assault. The investigators seized
suspected cocaine and marijuana, according to sealed police affidavits
that also said two of the unit's officers allegedly planted drugs to
make false arrests.

"There is no issue more important to me than restoring and maintaining
the integrity of this department," Commissioner Leonard Hamm said in a
statement yesterday announcing that all of the unit's pending cases
will be reviewed and that the unit's supervisor, Sgt. Robert Smith,
has been suspended. "I simply will not tolerate officers who fail to
abide by our high standards."

Many of the cases, particularly those that lack corroborating
witnesses, probably will have to be dropped, said Margaret T. Burns, a
spokeswoman for State's Attorney Patricia C. Jessamy. "It's not likely
that we'll salvage many," she said.

An attorney for Jones, the officer accused of committing the rape,
asserted his client's innocence yesterday. "The allegations don't make
any sense," attorney Warren A. Brown said, adding that anyone could
have walked into the room during the sex act, and the woman could have
screamed.

Mike Marshall, an attorney for the other two indicted officers,
declined to comment last night.

The scandal threatens to become a liability for Baltimore Mayor Martin
O'Malley as he seeks the Democratic nomination for governor. Although
overall crime has dropped during O'Malley's tenure, his Democratic and
Republican foes have seized on Baltimore's stubbornly high homicide
rate and department shortcomings to question the mayor's stewardship
of the city.

"This doesn't help," said Audra Miller, a spokeswoman for the Maryland
Republican Party.

Aides to the mayor said Hamm, the fourth police commissioner to serve
under O'Malley during his six years in office, will not be removed
from his position. Appointed a little more than a year ago, Hamm has
been widely credited with helping improve morale in the department.

On Dec. 27, the three officers handcuffed the woman and an 18-year-old
female associate near Old Frederick Road, according to the affidavits.
Back at the station, Shaffer and Hatley took the teenager to wait in a
cruiser while Jones remained in the offices with the 22-year-old
woman, the affidavits say.

"What are you willing to do to stay out of jail?" Jones said,
according to the affidavits.

Jones allegedly assaulted the woman twice and then brought her to the
cruiser, the affidavits say. The women were provided with a bag of
marijuana and dropped in the city, the affidavits say.