Tag: maryland

Female, black applicants who failed Maryland State Police tests likely to receive $2.75M in back pay from discrimination suit

The Maryland Department of State Police agreed to settle a Department of Justice lawsuit to the tune of $2.75 million, which will provide back pay to female and black applicants who failed the physical fitness and written tests.

The physical fitness exam, called the Functional Fitness Assessment Test, required applicants to complete 18 push-ups in one minute, 27 sit-ups in one minute, run 1.5 miles within 15 minutes and 20 seconds, and reach approximately 1.5 inches past their toes while seated. Candidates were allowed to take the test up to three times in one year.

“The rate at which female applicants passed the FFAT at least once is statistically significantly lower than the rate at which male applicants passed the FFAT at least once; and the female applicant pass rate is less than 80% of the male applicant pass rate,” the complaint read.

The written exam, the Police Officer Selection Test, included four components: mathematics, reading comprehension, grammar, and report writing skills. To pass, candidates had to achieve an aggregate score of at least 70% on all sections combined and minimally 70% on reading comprehension, grammar, and report writing skills. There was no minimum required score for the math component. Candidates could take the test four times within a year.

The lawsuit said that roughly 91% of white and 71% of black applicants passed at least once.

The lawsuit claimed that both the FFAT and the POST, which are used by MDSP to screen trooper applicants, are “not job related or consistent with business necessity.”

The DOJ argued that MDSP’s screening “results in a disparate impact” on female and black candidates.

“MDSP’s use of the POST has disproportionately excluded African-American applicants, and its use of the FFAT has disproportionately excluded female applicants, from employment as troopers,” the lawsuit stated.

MDSP was accused of violating Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.

On Wednesday, the DOJ announced that the MDSP has agreed to settle the lawsuit.

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Frederick Becomes Largest Municipality in Maryland to Approve Non-Citizen Voting

The city of Frederick, Maryland, has granted non-citizens the right to vote in local elections.

The move by the city makes Frederick the largest municipality in the state to allow non-citizens to vote.

On Thursday night, the Board of Alderman voted 4-1 to grant green card holders and illegal immigrants the right to vote in local elections.

Under the new rule, illegal immigrants and green card holders must only prove they reside in Frederick to vote.

The move by the Alderman board comes after receiving pressure from the ACLU and illegal immigrants residing in Frederick.

WUSA 9 reported that the new voting laws will allow nearly 6,400 non-citizens to vote in local elections.

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HERE WE GO: Voters in Montgomery County Receive Ballots with Incorrect Names

Here we go.

Voters in Montgomery County, Maryland received sample ballots with incorrect names.

According to WTOP, the Montgomery County’s Board of Elections sent 132,217 ballots to voters in the 8th Congressional District and many of them were surprised to see they were incorrectly labeled.

An official with the Montgomery BOE said an issue with the spreadsheet used to print the names and addresses led to the errors.

It is unclear how many voters received ballots with the wrong name.

Every voter in the district was emailed a digital version of their sample ballot.

How convenient!

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Wes Moore apologizes for ‘honest mistake’ in claiming a Bronze Star

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) has apologized for incorrectly stating on a White House application more than a decade ago that he was a Bronze Star recipient. 

Moore, a rising star in the Democratic Party, served in the Army Reserve between 1996 and 2014. He was deployed to Afghanistan in August 2005 through March 2006. 

Though he has won multiple awards for his service, including the National Defense Service Medal, he stated on a 2006 application for the White House Fellowship that his service won him the award of a Bronze Star. 

“For my work, the 82nd Airborne Division have awarded me the Bronze Star Medal and the Combat Action Badge,” Moore wrote on his application, according to documents obtained and published Thursday by The New York Times.

The Bronze Star is awarded to service members who perform “acts of heroism in ground combat,” according to the Air Force’s Personnel Center.

But Moore never actually was awarded the prestigious award, according to the Times investigation. 

In a statement Thursday, Moore said he made an “honest mistake” in 2006 when he wrote on his application for the White House Fellowship that he had won the prestigious military award. 

“While serving overseas with the Army, I was encouraged to fill out an application for the White House Fellowship by my deputy brigade commander,” Moore said. “In fact, he helped me edit it before I sent it in. At the time, he had recommended me for the Bronze Star. He told me to include the Bronze Star award on my application after confirming with two other senior-level officers that they had also signed off on the commendation.”

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HORROR: Military Parents Lose Custody of 16-Year-Old Autistic Son After Refusing to Let Him Transition to a Girl – Son is Currently in Foster Care Living with ‘Non-Gendered’ Chaplain Named “Lavender”

A black military family residing in Maryland is suing a DC hospital after they lost custody of their 16-year-old autistic son for refusing to let him ‘transition’ to a girl.

According to The Daily Mail, the parents hospitalized their teen son for self-harming after he broke up with a girlfriend back in 2021.

While the minor teen was hospitalized, the staff at Children’s National Hospital told the parents their son wanted to become a girl and his preferred pronouns are she/her.

The parents said their son never expressed the desire to become a girl until he spent time in the hospital. They argued in their lawsuit that their son is “impressionable” because he is autistic.

They alleged the hospital staff started a “full-on campaign to transgender this child” and forced him to write letters to friends informing them he is no longer a male.

The teen is now 19-years-old and in foster care living with a ‘non-gendered’ chaplain named Lavender Kelley.

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Maryland Professor Pens Article Suggesting ‘Black People’ Wish Shooter Had Killed Trump

Just days after the attempted assassination of President Donald Trump, a professor at Morgan State University in Maryland penned an op-ed claiming that she and other Black Americans are justified in wishing that the attempt to kill “evil” Trump had been successful.

In Dr. Stacey Patton’s article, “‘Is He Dead?’ Why Black People Are Not Grieving The Failed Assassination Of Donald Trump,” the professor likens the attempt on Trump’s life to two failed attempts against Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and pushes the type of “Trump is Hitler” narrative that lead to the failed attempt on his life.

Patton describes how the world would have been better off had the assassination attempt been successful.

Patton writes:

Is it immoral to yearn for the death of another human being? Of course it is, in most cases.

But when we look back upon the past and see the acrid smoke of crematoriums and mountains of bodies, can you blame people for weighing the value of a single life against the salvation of millions?

Patton uses that twisted logic to say that the July 13th attempt on President Trump’s life is an equivalent moment in time to killing Hitler and thus Black Americans would wish for the former president’s death because they wish for “the death of evil.”

Violence is America’s main currency and Donald Trump has served as the spark for the official rebirth of white supremacy.

Black people are not reveling in violence. We are wishing for the death of evil. We are longing for the prevention of evil. For a moment on Saturday, we held our collective breath. We were suspended in uncertainty, caught between desperation and hope, asking: What if?

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Leader Of Maryland LGBTQ+ Dems Caught In Alleged Pedo Sting, Trying To Meet With Young Boy

The head of the Maryland Democratic Party (MDP) LGBTQ+ Diversity Leadership Council (DLC), Michael Knaapen, who, of course, uses pronouns and lives in ultra-progressive Montgomery County, Maryland (as per his own profile on the Maryland Dems website), was caught on video in a very disturbing predator sting.

“We just busted the head of the LGBTQ Dems of Maryland going after a 14-year-old. Groomers are about to be mad,” Alex Rosen, founder of Houston-based vigilante organization Predator Poachers, which conducts sting operations on adults nationwide who seek sexual activities with young boys and girls. 

Pedophile Hunter Rosen posted a video on X featuring Knaapen discussing his role as the head of the MDP LGBTQ+ DLC

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Maryland Elementary School Tries To Force Students To Say The Pledge

It’s been over 80 years since the Supreme Court ruled in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette that schoolchildren can’t be forced to say the Pledge of Allegiance. One Maryland elementary school, however, has yet to get the memo.

According to the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a First Amendment nonprofit, Twin Ridge Elementary School officials sent an email on April 26 informing staff that state law requires “all students and teachers are required ‘to stand and face the flag and while standing give an approved salute and recite in unison the pledge of allegiance.'” 

But the email failed to note that there is a clear exception to this requirement encoded in state law—not to mention a decades-old Supreme Court ruling. Maryland law explicitly states that “any student or teacher who wishes to be excused from the requirements” of the pledge law would be excused.

“While non-participation may upset others who believe the pledge is an important expressive act, that reaction cannot overcome the First Amendment’s protection of those who decide to abstain,” Stephanie Jablonsky, a senior program officer at FIRE, wrote in a legal letter to the school last week. “Peaceful refusal to endorse a specified viewpoint cannot be grounds for punishment. The same holds for teachers and staff.”

FIRE has called on Twin Ridge Elementary to “correct its April 26 directive and notify staff of their rights and their students’ rights” to not recite the pledge.

Unfortunately, this is far from the first time that public schools have attempted to force students and staff to say the Pledge of Allegiance in recent years.

In 2018, officials in a Texas school district settled with a student who was expelled for refusing to stand for the pledge. But before the case was over, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton publicly took the school’s side and attempted to intervene on their behalf in the federal case.

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U.S. Capitol Police Officer Of Calvert County Convicted In Child Porn Case

Jared Michael Lemon, 43, of Owings, was convicted on Friday, May 10, 2024, of five counts of unlawful possession of child pornography.  The conviction followed a trial in Calvert County Circuit Court before the Honorable Mark S. Chandlee. 

In late 2022, an acquaintance of Lemon’s found disturbing images on Lemon’s cell phone.  She reported it to the police and to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. 

Members of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force of the Maryland State Police obtained a search warrant for Lemon’s electronic devices.  A forensic exam of these devices revealed 59 images of children under the age of 16 engaged in sexual conduct.  Lemon was charged in connection with 5 of the images. 

Sentencing is set for July 29, 2024.  Lemon is facing up to 25 years in prison and a $12,500 fine. 

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18-year-old female trans student charged for planning two Maryland school shootings, manifesto said she wanted to be ‘famous’

An 18-year-old high school student who identifies as transgender was arrested and charged over alleged plans to shoot up a Montgomery County, Maryland school. The suspect had a 129-page manifesto in which the student strategized how to undertake the crime.

Andrea Ye, of Rockville, who goes by Alex Ye was arrested on Wednesday by local Montgomery County Police. This follows an investigation carried out by local police in association with the FBI field office out of Baltimore. The manifesto was discovered after a search warrant was carried out. 

“Ye was taken into custody and charged with threats of mass violence. He is currently being held at the Montgomery County Central Processing Unit where he awaits a bond hearing,” read the news release from the Montgomery County Department of Police, referring to the female student as “he.”

Parts of the manifesto were reportedly included in the application for statement of charges. It read:

“I want to shoot up my school. I’ve been preparing for it for the past few months. As I sit in front of my dad’s gun case and stare at the sleek, black gun inside, all I can think about is my finger on the trigger, taking aim, and killing people. The gun is an AR-15 style semi-automatic rifle. It’s the kind of gun with a long barrel and a stock you put up against your shoulder. The gun is going to change lives tomorrow.”

“As I walk through the hallways, I cherry pick the classrooms that are the easiest targets. These ones are close to the entrance and have windows in the doors. I need to figure out how I’ll sneak the gun in. Maybe a duffel bag will work. I just hope security doesn’t stop me.”

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