At the age of 16, Daymar Wimbish and two other boys set fire to a house in northwest Baltimore, killing a man on the second floor.

Charged with first-degree murder after the 2006 fire, Wimbish pleaded guilty to manslaughter and was released from jail after serving eight months of a 10-year sentence.

Three years later, Wimbish -- a member of the Bloods gang who goes by the street name Sincere -- sits in a Howard County jail cell, again accused of first-degree murder. This time, prosecutors say, Wimbish and fellow gang members conspired to kill a drug dealer in the parking lot of an Oakland Mills apartment complex.

The trial of another man accused in the murder, Ronald Derrick McConnell, began last week in Howard County Circuit Court.

Wimbish's case illustrates what police say is a growing gang presence in Howard County.

Police now estimate 500 gang members live, work or pass through Howard County on a daily basis -- the most ever.

"Gang-related activity ... is increasing. We're not going to deny that we have a degree of gang-activity here, and we're going to meet that proactively," said Sgt. Dave Trapani, the supervisor of Howard County Police's Crime Analysis, Criminal Intelligence and Gang Section.

In the past few years, the number of gang-attributed incidents, from graffiti to murder, has increased steadily, from 123 in 2005 to 580 last year.

Police also note an increase in the number of Bloods gang members, like Wimbish, moving from Baltimore to Howard County.

"Our Bloods gang problem is greater than any of the other gangs," Trapani said. "They're the biggest group we're dealing with now."

Awareness pumps up stats

Howard County police are quick to point out that the county's gang problem pales in comparison to other jurisdictions. In Baltimore, for example, police have said the city has about 2,600 known gang members and 170 criminal street gangs.

County police also say the increase in gang-related incidents in Howard is partially due to heightened awareness by county officers, who now are recognizing known gang symbols they may have missed before.

"A lot of people might become alarmed, but those statistics are low compared to surrounding jurisdictions," Trapani said.

Doug Ward, director of the Johns Hopkins' Division of Public Safety Leadership, who retired from police work as a major with the Maryland State Police in 2000, said area police have only recently become aware of the gang problem.

"When I was with the Maryland State Police, there was almost a denial that gangs existed in this area," he said. "In the last five or six years, the emphasis has increased, and we have seen a subsequent rise in gang violence."

Around the time Ward retired from the State Police, Howard County was starting to pay close attention to the notorious El Salvadorian gang, MS-13, which was making inroads in the county.

Between 2001 and 2005, police identified 55 members of MS-13 who had been arrested for or involved in crimes that include rape, robbery and assault, and documented the gang's activity and graffiti in Savage, Elkridge, Columbia and Ellicott City.

But since a 2005 federal bust that targeted MS-13 in Maryland, and the nearly 50 indictments that followed, the violent gang influence has noticeably weakened in the county, police said.

"MS-13 has waned a lot," said Lt. Mike Price, Howard County's Commander of the Operational Preparedness Division. "We don't see the influx of MS-13 we had ... four years ago."

Fighting the gang problem

More recently, Howard County has beefed up its efforts to fight the gang problem.

The police dedicated one full-time investigator to gang intelligence five years ago and is in the process of adding a second full-time gang investigator within the next few months, said Howard County Police Maj. Gary Gardner.

Moreover, the county has increased training for its patrol officers to help them identify and disrupt potential gang activity.

Officers have also begun compiling detailed statistics about gangs in the county. Last year, for instance, Howard County police arrested 218 known gang members, Gardner said.

"We want to be ahead of the curve," he added.

"If it falls off the radar, you can have yourself a problem very quickly."

Howard County police have received $67,000 from the federal government to help with their gang problem.

Of the money, $12,000 went to fund "investigative functions," such as surveillance equipment, while $50,000 went to funding the PLEDGE camp, which teaches leadership skills to young people, Gardner said.

Ward said the U.S. Department of Justice has done a good job of directing local law enforcement agencies to target gangs.

"I don't think they're motivated by money, but it does cause people to look at things they might not have been (looking at)," Ward said of local agencies. "The federal government wants people to pay attention to gangs, and it's working."

---

user comments (1)

user juiceman says...

This should be of far greater concern that this article indicates...any gang activity is an absolute serious public safety and health problem. As a community, we need to dedicate far more resources to this issue and far fewer resources to "red light" cameras and "speeding" cameras...we're in much more trouble than most realize...ask any HCPD officer off the record and they'll tell you the truth...we're surrounded by EXTREMELY SERIOUS gang problems in PG and Mont. counties...the problem's on our doorstep and it's picking the lock...sooner or later, the door is going to open if the police do not form an interdiction unit.

Posted 11:04 PM, 04.02.09

• Permalink