Erickan King News Today

Injustice happens in empty courtrooms. If any proof of the validity of this maxim were needed, one need only read the 21-page report “Inside Prince George’s County Bond Hearings” just released by Howard University’s Movement Lawyering Clinic. After observing hundreds of bond hearings over two years, participants witnessed: “[J]udges dismissing defendants’ needs for medical attention ...

The Maryland General Assembly Thursday gave final legislative approval to the creation of a referendum asking voters whether to codify a right to abortion into the state constitution. This issue now heads to voters in the 2024 election. We support both the referendum initiative and also the amendment of the state constitution for this purpose. ...

Baltimore is one of the country’s preeminent health care cities. Yet studies have shown that hospitals here as well as all Maryland hospitals have the longest wait times in their emergency departments for seven years running. The legislature has put forth HB274/SB387 to find out why. SB387 proposes creating a task force to study the ...

The Youth Equity and Safety Act, SB93/HB96, seeks to eliminate the practice of automatically charging minors as adults in Maryland. The proposed bipartisan bill would end the practice by repealing statutory provisions that prevent cases from beginning in the juvenile court for children alleged to have committed certain offenses. Under current law, children as young ...

We encourage Maryland legislators to take a close look at the tax sale process.

Attorney’s fees often finish last, although we have a hard time understanding why. Defendants don’t want to agree to pay them, and courts don’t like to award them. When courts do award fees, they are often pared back. Recently, the Appellate Court of Maryland ruled that a person convicted of a crime and ordered to ...

On March 17, Lydia E. Lawless will step down as Maryland Bar Counsel after having served in that post since 2017. We wish Lawless much success in whatever her next professional endeavor may be. We have no doubt that any future undertaking will be highly successful, given her stellar career achievements to date. The current ...

Some in the know say that the outgoing Baltimore state’s attorney provided to the incoming, newly elected state’s attorney very little in the way of transition, particularly an office adequately staffed with a sufficient number of seasoned prosecutors who can effectively prosecute the city’s large criminal docket and engage in efforts to prevent violent crime. ...

Although we have confidence in the integrity of the Supreme Court of Maryland, sadly, we no longer have the same confidence in the integrity of our nation’s high court. There is much blame to go around, but most of it lies at the feet of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. The latest episode in ...

During the 2022 General Assembly session, we urged passage of House Bill 559/Senate Bill 265, to broaden the scope of the current Probation Before Judgment (PBJ) law. The bill had broad support, was favorably passed in both chambers, but unfortunately perished in the waning moments of the legislative session. The bill is back this session, ...