Baltimore mayor wins praise for probe plan

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is winning support from other public officials and praise from legal experts for asking the US Justice Department to investigate her police department for discriminatory patterns or practices.

After previously saying she was determined to fix the department’s problems herself, the Democratic mayor announced on Wednesday that she has asked US Attorney-General Loretta Lynch to order a civil-rights investigation.

“We have to have a foundation of trust,” Rawlings-Blake told a news conference. “I believe we need the assistance of the Department of Justice and the civil rights investigation to shore up that foundation that is weak right now in our city.”

The mayor’s announcement came a day after her closed-door meeting at City Hall with Lynch. Lynch is considering the request, Justice Department spokeswoman Dena Iverson said.

Outside intervention

The broad investigation, if undertaken by the federal agency, could eventually force the city to make changes under the oversight of an outside monitor.

Rawlings-Blake said she would accept outside intervention to repair fractured relations between the police and the public in a city that was torn by riots over the death of Freddie Gray, a black man who suffered a fatal spinal injury in police custody last month.

Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, Baltimore City Council President Jack Young and the president of the city’s police union were among the public officials saying they welcomed the development.

A key figure who didn’t immediately respond was Police Commissioner Anthony Batts, brought in from Oakland, California, by the mayor 2 1/2 years ago to reform the department.