Gaming officials find a compromise; West Baltimore citizens fear police abandonment

It was all fun and games in Annapolis as state officials were celebrating over new regulations for electronic gaming, but for residents of West Baltimore, it was anything but time to celebrate. Homicides are up and arrests have plummeted since the Freddie Gray riots, sparking fears that city police have abandoned the area.

The Maryland State Lottery and Gaming Commission gave its approval Thursday to the new regulations, which were revised based on industry recommendations. The approved changes appear to close out a controversial three-year effort that later became an issue in the 2014 gubernatorial campaign and drew criticism from then-candidate Larry Hogan.

The seven-member gaming commission voted unanimously to approve the new regulations and withdraw prior rules with little discussion and no complaints from industry representatives. A year ago, those same industry representatives, distributors and arcade operators came out in force to oppose what they saw as an attack on their livelihood.

The new rules still need the approval of a legislative committee and are expected to be subject to a 45-day comment period beginning in late June at the earliest.

Thirty-six people have been killed in Baltimore so far this month, already the highest homicide count for May since 1999. But while homicides are spiking, arrests have plunged more than 50 percent compared to last year. The drop in arrests followed the death of Freddie Gray from injuries he suffered in police custody.

Now West Baltimore residents worry they’ve been abandoned by the officers they once accused of harassing them. In recent weeks, some neighborhoods have become like the Wild West without a lawman around, residents said.

“Before it was over-policing. Now there’s no police,” said Donnail “Dreads” Lee, 34, who lives in the Gilmor Homes, the public housing complex where Gray, 25, was arrested.

Police Commissioner Anthony Batts said last week his officers “are not holding back” from policing tough neighborhoods, but they are encountering dangerous hostility in the Western District.

Baltimore was seeing a slight rise in homicides this year even before Gray’s death April 19. But the 36 homicides so far in May is a major spike, after 22 in April, 15 in March, 13 in February and 23 in January. Ten of May’s homicides happened in the Western District, which has had as many homicides in the first five months of this year than it did all of last year. Non-fatal shootings are spiking as well. So far in May there have been 91 — 58 of them in the Western District.