Pointing fingers

Early one morning in June, 2015, a man named Kevin Jones, employed as a security guard at Pimlico Racetrack, was shot to death.  There is no doubt about that.

Who killed him is an issue that's bounced from courtroom to courtroom, and now to the downtown Baltimore waterfront bar called Sandlot.

Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby and her office say that the murderer is one Keith Davis, Jr.  The first time they took him to trial, the result was a hung jury. Second time out, he was convicted by a jury, but his attorneys got that conviction overturned. Third time, another hung jury. 

Then in 2019, his fourth trial brought a conviction by jury of second-degree murder.  The judge sentenced him to 50 years.

And then...last week, Circuit Judge Sylvester Cox granted Davis, 29, a new trial, after the state's highest court said that Davis's defense lawyers had not been allowed to quiz prospective jurors about their feelings about a defendant's right not to testify.  

Davis, his legal team, and his wife still say he did not kill Jones, but that the police pinned the murder on him, chased him for no reason, and shot and wounded him, leaving a planted gun behind to bolster their case.  

So that's where things stand. One of these statements is true: Davis killed Jones, or he did not. Predictably, the case has jumped from the courthouse to the court of popular opinion, which is where people who don't know what happened that morning in June any more than you or I do nonetheless weigh in with their thoughts. It's how we do things, sad to say.

A certain percentage of citizens believe Davis to be innocent, the victim of police and prosecutorial misconduct. One such individual is Sean Gearhart, 32, who has played his bagpipes during at least one "Free Keith Davis, Jr" rally. 

Fate has ways of bringing people together. Last week, Mosby and some work colleagues were enjoying an evening out at this Sandbar when, all of a sudden, here came Gearhart, with his phone video cranking out a mini movie of him hollering at Mosby, and Mosby replying with hand gestures. 

At first she gave him the thumb, and then gave him the finger, so they say. 

“She flipped me off. That’s all that really happened. The whole ordeal lasted 10 seconds,” Gearhart said later. The photo below is a still from that video.

The first statement from Mosby's office, in reply to media questions, said, “This is clearly a thumb guys — enough already. Let’s move on.”

When more questions were raised about exactly which digit the State's Attorney proffered, Mosby said that Gearhart's actions were threatening.

“Last night while I was out with work colleagues, a male stranger aggressively biked towards me and two female friends and shouted into my unmasked face,” she said in a statement. “As he biked off, I responded the way any normal woman would to a threatening strange man. No woman — elected or otherwise — should be expected to put up with that type of behavior from a man.”

“I’ve been following the Keith Davis Jr. case since it happened,” Gearhart told the Baltimore SUN. “It’s clear that this is personal at this point.”

Zy Richardson, spokeswoman for Mosby, said that Davis supporters have been protesting outside the Mosby family residence, putting flyers on cars in her neighborhood, shouted her down at community forums, and shown up at her daughter's school.

Davis's supporters say they did no such thing at the school.

So that's where we are, and no matter how this next trial comes out, you can already see what the losing side will say - all this commotion has muddied the waters, making it impossible for the truth to be seen.

If you thought I wasn't going to have anything else to say, I'm sorry to let you down. 

First, I think it's time for the Baltimore State's Attorney's office to turn this prosecution over to a visiting prosecutor from another jurisdiction, someone uninvolved and uninterested in the case.

And...there was a time that judges and lawyers and the law were held in respect, but now, we have people riding on bikes in sandy waterfront bars hollering at the state's attorney, and the SA, for her part, making a hand gesture that might be seen as an umpire calling someone out at the plate, or suggesting that he go off and find satisfaction elsewhere. 

At any rate, the founding fathers are shaking their heads.