Michael Olesker, The Examiner
2007-07-25 07:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

BALTIMORE -

His name is Perry Simms, and he comes to us this morning from Frederick H. Bealefeld III. Simms is charged with murder. He is 19. Bealefeld is charged with being the new police commissioner of Baltimore. He is a 26-year veteran cop with a sense of perspective. He offers us Simms as the heart of the city’s troubles.

Four weeks ago, Simms was charged with shooting and killing Paul Cornish, 28. Maybe he’s guilty, maybe not.

But he was already on probation in connection with charges involving guns and drugs.

He was arrested Jan. 25. He was not given an immediate trial date. Then he got a postponement.

Then, in early spring, he was finally given probation before judgment.

In other words, he was on the street having sworn to everyone an attempt at clean living and model behavior, and this lasted a matter of weeks before the murder charge.

“I’m not knocking the State’s Attorney’s Office, or the judge, or Parole and Probation,” Bealefeld said late Monday afternoon from the commissioner’s office he’s occupied for less than a week. “This is just a fact. Basically half the murders in this city — half — are committed by people who have prior arrests for weapons violations. What if they were in prison instead of parole?”

While you digest that nugget, try another: A lot of their victims have criminal records, too.

There is a culture of crime and violence and self-destruction in certain neighborhoods, and this is the city Bealefeld has now inherited, at least for the moment.

He replaces Leonard Hamm, who lost out to the homicide headlines and to political timing.

An election approaches, and Mayor Sheila Dixon couldn’t afford Hamm as a campaign issue. So Bealefeld becomes interim commissioner, at least until Election Day, though he says he would like the job full time.

He’s a man who made his way through the ranks and became deputy commissioner of operations in February.

Previously, he was chief of the Criminal Investigation Division, overseeing 300 detectives and other officers.

He takes over with homicides at 178 and nonfatal shootings up more than 30 percent from a year ago, and considerable talk that the police department has for too long been under the thumb of City Hall.

“Look, the mayor represents all the citizens of this city,” Bealefeld said. “She’s the voice for every citizen. She’s supposed to be concerned about the police. But I’m not a figurehead, and I’m not a puppet. I’m going to give her frank advice on strategy, and I’m committed to doing what makes sense. That’s what she pays me to do. And so far, since last week, she’s let me do that. In my line of work, they call that a clue.”

Here are clues about Bealefeld’s approach. He makes no mention of zero-tolerance policing: That was another mayor ago. This isn’t about get tough, it’s about get intimate, get to know your neighborhoods.

“We talk about building strong partnerships,” Bealefeld said. “People say, ‘What does that mean?’ I know what it means. It means getting people’s trust back. It means foot patrols. You can’t gain trust at 30 miles per hour behind glass and steel. You’ve got to care about kids, meet people in the neighborhoods, not just ride through. Foot patrols, I’m dedicated to them.”

As part of the fourth generation of his family to serve in the department — his younger brother, Charles, is a homicide detective — Bealefeld has a sense of history here.

“The guns,” he said, “are not new. We’ve been dealing with them for too long, not just in 2007. We have to break down the foundation of violence here. The cultural aspects may be beyond my control or impact. But I’ll tell you what I can control — guys carrying guns on the street.

“I aim to make this a huge priority, to catch these guys and put them in prison. That’s first. Second, the gang situation. We’ve had gangs, or organized crime, in Baltimore. But this is a new manifestation, and we may have to beef up the gang units. Gang enforcement has to be particularized for each area of town. Every sworn member of the department has to be involved.

“And that gets us back to getting out of your car, walking a foot post. At 2 o’clock in the morning, you might not have a gang unit on the street, but you’ve got a foot patrolman who’s out there, and he’s watching. And that’s the backbone of it all.”

Michael Olesker is an award-winning newspaper columnist, author of three books and former commentator on local radio and television. A resident of Baltimore since the age of 4, he is a graduate of Baltimore City College and the University of Maryland at College Park, where he majored in journalism and was sports editor of The Diamondback.