The Bum Rap Against Martin O’Malley

If you’re reading this, you’ve probably heard criticism of Martin O’Malley’s use of zero-tolerance policing and it’s alleged impact on crime and unrest in Baltimore. I’ll get right to the point. Don’t believe the criticism. Why do I say this? That’s kind of a long story. But basically, for three reasons.

First, because all the criticism I’ve seen (and believe me, I’ve seen a lot) is based upon serious factual distortions and/or unproven theories. Critics contend that mass arrests during his term as Mayor were prime movers of tense and sometimes violent nights more than twelve years after they peaked.

That may sound theoretically plausible if you imagine that he ordered mass incarcerations and/or had unusually large numbers of Baltimore citizens arrested. That’s why you are so disturbed when his critics tell you (falsely) that Martin O’Malley had over 100,000 people arrested out of a total 600,000 population! They sometimes further say he put 1 in 6 citizens in jail! But neither of these claims is true.

I will explain why shortly. But before I take you into why those harmful claims disintegrate under close inspection, here’s the second reason I’m advising you to doubt Martin’s critics. Quite simply, it’s because they so often point to a darkly pessimistic work of fiction. While it’s obviously true that Baltimore still has it’s share of serious problems, it’s not the bleak and ruined city portrayed in “The Wire”. In that grim drama every person is ultimately compromised or corrupt. The people of Baltimore are not just like the characters in “The Wire” or the villains in “Gotham”. Nor is the fictional “Tommy Carcetti” just like the real Martin O’Malley.

Third, and most significantly, I’m advising you to disbelieve those critics because the people of Baltimore re-elected Martin O’Malley by a landslide in 2003. They not only re-elected him, they did so with what has to be a record 173,030 votes. He won 88% of the vote and every district in the city.

Why is that vote total a big deal? Because it was an enormous vote of approval of his policies after he had increased the arrest rate to its peak. By comparison, once Martin O’Malley was elected Governor of Maryland, his successor as Mayor, Sheila Dixon, won the race for Mayor of Baltimore with only 36,726 votes. Then, in 2011, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake won with only 40,125 votes (see pg. 12). The differences between the number of votes he received and the numbers of votes they received is truly stunning, especially when you consider that none of those elections happened in Presidential election years. The point is that the overwhelming majority of the people of Baltimore apparently loved what Martin O’Malley did with policing in his first term as Mayor!

How can that be true, some of you may wonder, when you may be thinking (incorrectly) that Baltimore police had put 1 in 6 citizens in jail? Well, first of all, you may not be aware that arrest numbers include multiple arrests of repeat offenders. In other words, the annual number of arrests is always greater than the number of people arrested. The number of people arrested during one of those years is more like 10,000 than 100,000. And they were usually pretty much the same 10,000, arrested and questioned multiple times.

Second, you may not realize that many of those arrested don’t spend even one day or night in jail. Many are just questioned and released. Finally, and this is really important, I’m fairly confident that you are not aware that there were 89,000 arrests in 1998 in Baltimore the year before Martin O’Malley became Mayor. Eighty-nine thousand arrests were made in Baltimore the year before Martin O’Malley became mayor. Let that sink in for a minute.

But what about the hard life and the death of Freddie Gray while in police custody? Might that have been prevented? Who can ever know for certain that Freddie’s neck injury was caused entirely by police mishandling? Yes, from what we know, it looks that way. But it’s also possible that he had an un-diagnosed pre-existing herniated disc that contributed to his death. But in either case, Martin O’Malley believes all of us share some part of the blame.

One way that we do so is through our indifference. Another is through our failure to do what we can and should be doing to reduce the worst impacts of sometimes fatal addictions. As Governor, he decriminalized the possession of small amounts of marijuana, which is a step in the right direction. As a Presidential candidate, Martin has a detailed plan for addiction treatment and prevention. And as Mayor, Martin O’Malley put into operation many mechanisms to “police the police”. He regrets that not all of those programs have continued, and he has also wished in retrospect that he had led on the use of body cameras. That would certainly help to reduce incidents of police brutality.

Now, back to those 89,000 arrests in 1998. Did you remember that number? Have you guessed why it’s important to understanding the truth of what Martin O’Malley did? I bet many of you have.

In the four years following his inauguration as mayor, Martin O’Malley did drive that 89,000 inherited arrest number up to 115,000. That’s a 29% increase, or about a 7% increase per year. (Not exactly a drastic shift, eh?) In the following four years, he dropped it back down to 93,000. So, based on those numbers, it’s hard to see how Martin O’Malley’s so-called “zero-tolerance policing” was all that draconian compared to the policing already in effect in Baltimore.

But still, don’t all those arrest numbers qualify as “mass incarceration”? Nope. As I explained before, those are arrest figures, not numbers of people locked up for days at a time in jail or prison. And this next point may be a shocker to those of you who have believed his critics. Martin O’Malley actually reduced the incarceration rate! And he also reduced homicides, major crimes, and police-involved shootings!

I suppose I could just stop this note on that high note, but I won’t. Instead I’m going to comment on some of what happened in Baltimore in the days following Freddie Gray’s death while in police custody. Remember? That was the time when Hillary Clinton told her group of high-dollar New York donors that “Baltimore is burning,” spoke of issues related to mass incarceration, and promised a criminal justice reform plan. Doesn’t Martin O’Malley have to be held responsible for Baltimore being burned to the ground by all those angry people protesting mass incarceration???? And what about all the people the police shot and killed during those terrible riots??? What about that? Er…

Reality check time. Baltimore was not burning. The fires that were set were to 144 vehicles and 19 structures. That’s substantial, but it’s hardly the whole city of Baltimore. The best part is that no one was shot and no one was killed. However, about 15 police officers and one citizen did receive significant injuries. Hillary did eventually issue a criminal justice reform plan. It fits easily on one page. But before she did that, Martin O’Malley issued his. It’s 9 pages long.

But even so, isn’t this property damage and aren’t these injuries all Martin O’Malley’s fault for temporarily raising the arrest rate 12 years before? That’s a tough one….NOT. Something much more significant has happened since that temporary rise in arrests. The great recession hit in 2008 and it hurt Americans everywhere. It hit the poorest Americans the hardest.

Combine that with centuries of discrimination, and who can deny that those factors provide many people more than ample reason to become actively engaged in mass protests? So, when Freddie Gray died in police custody, it was perfectly reasonable and predictable for some citizens of Baltimore to protest; and they did, for several days, very admirably and peacefully for the most part. It was all pretty well handled by Baltimore citizens and police.

And then someone came up with the idea to start texting a photograph of some protesters standing on a Baltimore police car, superimposed with the text “All High Schools Monday @3 We Are Going To Purge From Mondawmin …” Baltimore police prepared to meet the purgers at the mall. Rumors spread. And thus, that one night of violence was conceived. Not one word about “mass arrests” or “mass incarceration”. Why not? Well, maybe because the arrest rate in Baltimore was then at a historic low.

Remember Baltimore Mom? Her son told her about the planned Purge the night before, and she made him promise not to do it. But he went ahead and joined up with the other students when school was let out. She had a suspicion he might do that, and went right over to the mall. That’s where we see her in the viral video.

The day after the night of the Purge, the good Baltimore citizens began cleaning up the area that had been affected. Former Governor Martin O’Malley had cut short a trip to Ireland and returned to Baltimore to see if there was any way he could help. As he walked the neighborhood, he hugged and greeted old friends and said to a Baltimore TV reporter, “We’re a people who have seen worse days, and we’ll come through this day.”

Martin O’Malley was right. There was no more rioting in Baltimore that night, or in the days since. Apparently, the Purge was so over. But the many different problems that gave rise to it are still there, and it’s going to take bold new leadership at every level to make progress on those fronts.