Around Maryland

Baltimore Police have stopped extracting data from cellphones, a powerful investigative tool, while the department evaluates how to ensure its search warrants meet the requirements of a consequential opinion rendered this week by Maryland’s highest court. The Court of Appeals’ ruling on Monday mandates police in Maryland be more specific when applying for warrants to search people’s cellphones and recommends law enforcement agencies adopt protocols to pull data from the devices under more narrow parameters.

The Maryland Department of Health announced on Thursday that residents can sign up through a new pre-registration system to be alerted when monkeypox vaccines become available. “This pre-registration system is another step to ensure that Marylanders can access the tools to stay protected from human monkeypox,” Health Secretary Dennis R. Schrader said in a statement. “Keeping impacted residents healthy and safe remain our top priorities.”

The Carroll County Sheriff’s Office has taken the first steps toward implementing a state-required body-worn and in-car camera program for all of its deputies. It will be at least a year until the cameras will be installed and used in the county, officials estimate. On Thursday the Board of Carroll County Commissioners unanimously approved a $1.4 million contract to purchase the cameras and related equipment for the sheriff’s office from Motorola Solutions, Inc., of Chicago. The sheriff’s office applied for and was awarded funds from the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program in 2021.

A Baltimore sheriff’s deputy swore to a federal judge that a local rapper’s moniker was an acronym for a faction of a violent gang, then went on to write in an application for a search warrant that several of the musician’s comments were related to violence and organized crime. In 2019, a federal magistrate judge signed the search warrant, finding that the deputy, Sgt. Jamile Boles, who is assigned to a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration task force, provided enough probable cause for a court order requiring Instagram to give him access to the private messages of Xavier Johnson, also known as rapper Lor X.

Easton Newman Field Airport has been awarded a more than $1.5 million grant to extend a runway. Congressman Andy Harris, M.D., MD-01, the Acting Ranking Member of House Appropriations Agriculture Subcommittee, announced Thursday that the Department of Transportation has issued a discretionary grant award in the amount of $1,546,734 to cons truct and extend a runway at Easton Newman Field Airport as part of the airport’s safety improvement plan.

The state of Maryland intends to hand Baltimore’s State Center Complex to the city for future redevelopment, Lt. Gov. Boyd Rutherford announced Wednesday in Annapolis. “Once we get the agencies out of State Center, it is our intent to turn that property over … to the City of Baltimore so that the citizens and their elected representatives can determine the best use for that site,” Rutherford said at Wednesday’s Board of Public Works meeting.

Montgomery County, Maryland, Executive Marc Elrich is hoping that the availability of the latest versions of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines will encourage residents to get their boosters against the coronavirus. Since the Food and Drug Administration announced it has authorized the use of the bivalent vaccines, which defends against more than one strain of the coronavirus, the county has requested 1,000 of the new vaccines.