Attacked as baby by father, now allegedly killed by him

Man charged with murder in death of daughter, 43, whose dismembered body was found May 12

When Dominique Foster was just 7 months old, her father threw her through a glass door.

Now, more than four decades later, Baltimore police have again arrested her father, Lawrence Banks, and this time they’ve charged him with murder in her death.

Foster, a 43-year-old mother of six, was discovered May 12, her dismembered body hidden in garbage outside a dumpster in Northwest Baltimore. Her head, hands, feet and lower legs were missing and have not been recovered, police said. She was identified only after the department released photos of her tattoos that were recognized by family members.

Banks remains at the city jail, where he has been since being charged with illegally possessing a firearm and ammunition in late May. During a search of his apartment on May 29, police found blood and a gun. They didn’t charge him with the killing then, but the police documents hinted that more charges would come.

The murder charges have brought relief to family members, who say they feared Banks, now 65. He was previously convicted of

“Dominique knew if she left this world, it would be by her dad.”

killing his son and a friend and has been questioned in other family members’ deaths over the past 40 years. They say they long predicted Foster’s grim fate.

“Dominique knew if she left this world, it would be by her dad,” her husband, Willie Foster, said.

Banks killed his 17-year old son back in 1991. That same day, he gunned down a friend, but served only a decade in prison after being awarded “good time credits,” court records show.

It’s unclear what evidence police might have recently recovered that prompted the new murder charges, though court documents in the firearms case show investigators had suspected Banks since the May 29 search of his apartment.

Those documents detailed their investigation into Foster’s death. They said officers interviewed a neighbor who heard some arguing on the night of May 10. A security camera video from that day obtained by police showed a man with a limp in a white jacket and hoodie wheeling a shopping cart toward the lot where Foster was found.

“The team of detectives that worked on this case were simply relentless. There’s no substitute for solid detective work, which is exactly what led to an arrest,” police homicide Maj. Christopher Jones said in a statement.

The department declined to discuss the case further. The statement of probable cause was not yet publicly available. Banks did not have an attorney listed in online court records.

Willie Foster called Banks a “monster” who long traumatized his wife and abused her as a child. He said he and Dominique had been married 19 years, but his wife kept her family away from Banks. The couple moved to North Carolina about 15 years ago, but in the past year Dominique moved to Baltimore to live with her sister.

In recent months, Willie Foster said, his wife began to reconnect with her father.

According to Foster and court records, Dominique Foster had been abused physically and sexually by her father. In the gun case, Baltimore police homicide detectives said Banks had a sexual relationship with his daughter.

Police said Foster had been staying with Banks at his apartment at 4001 Clarks Lane in the Glen neighborhood, around the corner from where her body was found.

At a bail review hearing last month in the gun case, he attempted to tell the district court judge that the gun was not his. A public defender argued for leniency on his behalf and told the judge that Banks is a father of six with a master’s degree from Towson University.

But Sean Welsh, a university spokesman, said Towson had no record Banks was ever a student there.

Banks was also described as a member of the Mount Moriah Baptist Church, but Leroy Davis, a trustee at the congregation on Garrison Boulevard, said the church had no record of a member by that name. Other members say they had no recollection of him attending services.

He was also reportedly a volunteer at The Baltimore Station, a shelter for veterans, but the group did not return messages seeking comment.

Banks has had a history of violence and deception, according to court documents detailed in a 2007 Baltimore Sun story that surveyed court files, police reports and other documents.

“He is not at all the person that he presents himself to be. He lies smoothly and talks smoothly. He is quite skilled at misrepresenting himself,” a presentencing investigator wrote in 1976 after the assault of his infant daughter.

Banks told the investigator he liked to read and travel. He admitted to a temper but told the investigator, “I have a pretty good personality.” He said he disliked violence.

But court records show a history of violent charges.

Dominique Foster was just a baby when, a few days after Christmas 1975, Banks was drunk and got into an argument with his then-wife, Vivian Banks, at his mother’s house in East Baltimore, according to The Sun story. He threatened he was “going to do something to this baby you’ll both regret,” and then the women heard a loud crash.

Vivian Banks rushed her young daughter to the hospital, where she received two dozen stitches on her head, the report said. One of Dominique Foster’s daughters who did not want to be identified by name, citing safety concerns, said the baby was her mother.

Banks was charged with assault in that case. But while he was on bail awaiting trial, police found the body of Vivian Banks in a closet of an East Baltimore apartment she had been renting. He had previously been charged with assault and intent to murder Vivian Banks after police said he held an 8-inch steak knife to her throat, but she successfully sought to have the charges against him dropped.

The Sun story said documents in several criminal proceedings against Banks show that detectives believed he had killed his wife.

But because her body had been badly decomposing, the medical examiner could not determine a cause of death.

Banks was sentenced to 15 years for the assault against his baby daughter. He was released in 1988.

Then, in 1991, prosecutors said Banks had been drinking with two friends in Pasadena when he shot and killed one, Michael Chisholm. That same day, prosecutors said, he drove to Baltimore and shot and killed his 17-year old son, Lawrence Jr., at his foster home on Northern Parkway.

Police said at the time that Banks killed Lawrence because he was angry that the son and daughter, Dominique Foster, reported that Banks had severely beaten them multiple times.

Foster also reported that her father had raped her while he was drunk.

After her brother was killed, Foster told investigators she feared Banks wanted to kill her as well, according to police reports cited in the story. Dominique Foster told investigators her father came to her school and “had threatened her occasionally with meeting the same fate as her mother.”

Banks later pleaded guilty to Chisholm’s murder and no contest to his son’s murder. He received a 20-year concurrent sentence.

After being released in 2002, Banks changed his name to Malik Samartaney, remarried and moved to Laurel. His new wife filed three protective orders against him, and in 2004 Banks was charged with assault in Anne Arundel County for allegedly choking and threatening to kill his then-wife.

According to court documents in that case, Banks told her, “I must kill you.” He then held a knife to her throat and threatened to dump her body in the Patuxent River, according to the Sun story citing the documents.

He spent nine months in jail awaiting trial and then was found not guilty by a jury.

By 2006, Banks separated from his wife and moved in with another woman, Lisa Laverne Brown, 22, and her daughter, Labria. On Dec. 12, 2006, police said Brown and her daughter were fatally shot.

Prince George’s County police questioned Banks and asked Banks’ parole agent to find violations that could keep him behind bars as they built a case. He was never charged, and the cases remain open.