The Washington Post - USA (2022-04-10)

SUNDAY, APRIL 10 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 C3

returned. — Associated Press

VIRGINIA

37-year-old sentenced for fentanyl trafficking

An Arlington man is going to prison after pleading guilty to distributing fentanyl-laced pills designed to look like common prescription medications — deception that prosecutors said could be deadly to unwitting consumers. Taurean Venable, 37, was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison by U.S. District Judge Michael S. Nachmanoff after being convicted last fall of conspiracy to distribute more than seven kilograms of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid. A defense attorney for Venable did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday. According to the sentencing memo, police stumbled into the major fentanyl conspiracy while they were investigating a stolen vehicle. They arrived at an Arlington apartment with a search warrant in June 2020 seeking pertinent records — instead they found a suspicious white powder blanketing items all throughout the home, according to the memo. — Meagan Flynn

MARYLAND

Man charged in deaths of two killed in fire

A man has been charged in the deaths of his girlfriend’s daughter and granddaughter in a fire that was deliberately set at a southern Maryland home last month, officials announced Friday. Firefighters were called to a report of an altercation and fire at a Waldorf home on March 31, the Charles County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release. After the fire was extinguished, Rashawn Cline, 27, and her 1- year-old daughter, Dashawn, were found dead inside the home, officials said. Vincent Anthony Fisher II, 46, who lived at the home, was arrested after the fire and charged with assaulting another resident just before the fire, officials said. Investigators with the Charles County Sheriff’s Office and the Office of the State Fire Marshal determined that the fire was deliberately set and the Clines’ deaths were ruled homicides as a result of the fire. Fisher is being held without bond. Online court records show that the county public defenders office is representing him, but a call to the office seeking comment was not immediately

Results from April 9

DISTRICT Day/DC-3: 8-4-8 DC-4: 1-5-9-4 DC-5: 6-5-3-6-5 Night/DC-3 (Fri.): 7-4-5 DC-3 (Sat.): 9-6-2 DC-4 (Fri.): 7-3-1-2 DC-4 (Sat.): 7-4-1-3 DC-5 (Fri.): 1-5-6-2-3 DC-5 (Sat.): 7-4-3-2-6

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LOTTERIES

Elementary School in Jacksonville, Fla. A second- grade teacher there told WJXT that her class watched as the squirrel cracked acorns on a branch outside. The event was turned into a teachable moment. In other school/squirrel news: An armed man was spotted last month near a day-care center in Hamilton County, Tenn. Two nearby schools went on lockdown. Shortly after arriving on the scene, deputies found that a man on the property next to the day care was shooting at a squirrel. The sheriff’s office determined that the man was shooting in a safe manner. Let’s just hope squirrels never get guns. Then a bite on the finger would be the least of our worries. Tomorrow: S cience has proved that members of this squirrel species have something in common with humans: personalities.

told WWL-TV. Bulling lives across the street from a substation and every morning watches squirrels commuting along the power lines. Meanwhile, last year in Columbus, Ohio, someone posted a sign claiming to have spotted a “big squirrel” in Clinton-Como Park. How big? According to the sign, “Twice the size of a regular squirrel!” A search party was organized — “We will not harm or capture it,” a flier stated. “We just want to get a good look!” — but no trace was found. Seven months later, a WCMH news photographer happened to be at a different park, three miles away, when he recorded footage of a squirrel described as “bigger than average.” However, nothing in the frame provided a sense of scale, so it’s tough to say exactly how big the squirrel was. White squirrels seem to be on the increase. In 2019, one was spotted outside Fishweir

with methamphetamine. “The squirrel is not on meth,” he insisted. “I honestly think that would actually kill it.” The squirrel-on-meth story reminded me of something a reader told me early in the history of Squirrel Week: that the squirrels in Lafayette Square were once high on crack. I’ve never found any evidence of this. I suspect the rumor started in 1989, after President George H.W. Bush launched his war on drugs by holding up a baggie of crack he said had been purchased across from the White House. According to the urban legend, D.C.’s squirrels were nibbling on crack crumbs. But would a crack addict leave anything for the squirrels? Meanwhile, in early March, the power went out in 4,000 homes in three New Orleans neighborhoods. A squirrel got the blame. “We look out here and we can see the squirrels,” Jim Bulling

Today marks the beginning of my 12th annual Squirrel Week. In 2011, I decided that if the Discovery Channel could have a week devoted to sharks, I could devote a week to a wild animal we’re all a lot more likely to see. And more likely be injured by. According to a 2019 paper in the journal Human-Wildlife Interactions by Utah State University’s Michael R. Conover, 3,126 people in the United States sought medical treatment after run-ins with squirrels in the one-year period he studied: 2007. Last year, 47 people were bitten by sharks in the United States. But it isn’t all squirrels messing with humans. Sometimes — more often probably — it’s humans messing with squirrels. A man in Alabama is awaiting trial in a case involving what police called an “attack squirrel.” Authorities allege Mickey Paulk made the squirrel — named “Deeznutz” — more aggressive by dosing it

Reynolds. She had been happily feeding the gray squirrel — “Little Buddy,” she called it — since spring. “All those months he’s been fine; he would even come and take a nut out of my hand,” Reynolds told the BBC. After Little Buddy left a crescent- shaped wound in one of Reynolds’s fingers, she started calling him “Stripe,” after the nasty protagonist in the 1984 movie “Gremlins.” Reynolds later learned the same squirrel had attacked 17 other people in the village of Buckley. “Psycho,” “bloodthirsty” and “bitey” were some of the words used by the British press to describe Little Buddy/Stripe, who was captured and euthanized. Those are just two of the squirrels that made headlines recently, the result not of their bushy-tailed cuteness but of a reminder they painfully provided: Squirrels are wild animals.

Last fall, a
Canadian man
named Jeff
Samler was
emptying the
back of his truck
in his driveway
when he was
attacked by a
squirrel.
“He just ran up
my leg, ran around my head,”
Samler told the Canadian
Broadcasting Corp. “I tried to
get him off my head. He bit me
through my glove. It drew a
little bit of blood, but not like I
needed stitches or anything like
that.”
Samler knew the squirrel —
or thought he did. It was a
regular visitor to his
neighborhood in Carleton Place,
Ontario. Samler called the
squirrel “Short Tail.” It is not
known what the squirrel called
itself.
In December, a (different)
squirrel terrorized a town in
Wales, turning on Corinne

To kick o≠ the 12th annual Squirrel Week, a review of some recent wild news

John
Kelly's

Washington

Davis’s stances have also sometimes made him a polarizing figure on the council and in the community. In 2019, for example, he supported bringing an Ama- zon warehouse to Westphalia Town Center, saying it would be a catalyst for growth in the mixed- use development in Upper Marl- boro, which had struggled to attract retail and office tenants. Outraged residents were sharply critical of Davis, saying they were promised a grocery store, not a warehouse. The plan never came to fruition. Davis also faced widespread opposition in 2020 for his support of a charter amendment that would have allowed the council to raise a cap on the homestead tax credit — which Davis argued was necessary to bring revenue to the county — and his support this year for a controversial redistrict- ing map. Both efforts ultimately failed. Council member Mel Franklin (D-At Large) credited Davis with helping transform Prince George’s over the past decade from a bedroom community into an economic destination. “Council member Davis was not afraid to push the envelope, even when it wasn’t popular,” Franklin said. “But he and the

council listened and changed course when we needed to.” Davis said he has always done what he thinks is right for residents, despite the criticism. “Leadership is not always com- fortable or easy,” he said. “I was elected and led through God’s voice to governance. He said, ‘Prepare to govern.’ So I took that role and responsibility when I walked in.” The candidates who have reg- istered to run in District 6 include Wala Blegay, Barbara Holt Streeter, Belinda Queen, Denise G. Smith and Nakia R. Wright. All are Democrats, and in deep-blue Prince George’s, primaries are usually decisive. Davis said he has not decided who to endorse. Davis was a Head Start program manager and led the Mary- land Automobile Insurance Fund before he won the 2011 special election to fill the seat vacated by Leslie Johnson, the wife of for- mer county executive Jack B. Johnson (D), after she was arrested on corruption charges. Davis was then elected in November 2014 to serve his first four-year term and won a second term in 2018. His current term would have

expired Dec. 5. Asked why he did not wait to finish the end of his term, Davis said he decided there was not much more he could accomplish with his remaining six months.

He wants to focus, he said, on his next professional steps — which will likely not include politics. “And it’s just not me to wait,” he said. “It’s not Derrick Leon Da- vis.”

BY RACHEL CHASON

Derrick Leon Davis (D-District
6) will resign from the Prince
George’s County Council on April
15, marking an early end to the
final term of one of the council’s
longest-serving members.
The council will select some-
one to fill the seat held by Davis,
who has served since winning a
special election in 2011. His seat,
along with the 10 others on the
council, is on the ballot this year,
with the primary to be held July
19 and the general election Nov. 8.
Davis, who declined to comment
on his plans, said he decided he
had accomplished what he want-
ed to on the council and was
ready for a change.
“I have always done things on
my own terms,” Davis said in an
interview. “So when I see a natu-
ral break, I take it.”
Davis, who served as council
chair in 2016 and 2017, has
pushed throughout his tenure for

development in this Washington suburb and has been a strong advocate for Prince George’s in the broader region. He said high- lights of his council career were the recent rewrite of the county’s 50-year-old zoning code and im- provements to the county’s health-care landscape, including the opening last year of the re- gional hospital in Largo. “His slogan, ‘Doing big things on purpose,’ is really fitting,” said council member Dannielle M. Glaros (D-District 3), who served for two years as the council’s vice chair alongside Davis. Davis’s leadership was especially important as the county launched a strategy focused on affordable housing and during negotiations about the University of Maryland Capital Region Med- ical Center, Glaros said, noting that, especially in the early days, there were points where it looked as if the deal could have fallen apart.

MARYLAND

Prince George’s council

member Davis to resign

THE DISTRICT

Man admits stealing

pandemic relief funds

A D.C. man pleaded guilty
Friday to wire-fraud and money-
laundering charges after
authorities said he stole about
$31 million in federal pandemic-
relief funds over a 10-month
period.
Elias Eldabbagh, 30, faces 11
to 14 years in prison for
fraudulently obtaining money
from the Paycheck Protection
Program and the Economic
Injury Disaster Loans program,
according to the U.S. attorney’s
office in the District. Through
his company, Alias Systems, he
received more than $30 million
in 25 separate paycheck-
protection loans and nearly $1
million in loans from the
economic injury program from
July 2020 to May 2021, the office
said in a statement.
As part of a plea deal,
prosecutors said, Eldabbagh has
agreed to forfeit a Telsa Model 3
automobile, the contents of 21
bank accounts and an
undisclosed amount of
cryptocurrency. Authorities did
not say how much of the $31
million has been recovered.
Eldabbagh is scheduled be
sentenced Aug. 25 in U.S.
District Court in Washington.
— Paul Duggan

LOCAL DIGEST

BY MARTIN WEIL

Saturday seemed a distinctive
sort of day, although some of its
distinction stemmed from its
similarities to other April days.
Of April’s nine days thus far,
Saturday was the sixth with rain.
As of evening, it went into the
books here at 0.04 inches.
Obviously modest in quantity,
Saturday’s pitter-patter in Wash-
ington may also have escaped
widespread notice for another
reason. It moistened roads and
streets in the wee hours when few
may have been paying attention.

But it officially made Saturday the fifth consecutive wet day this week, a notable atmospheric achievement even in a month known for showers. It brought the April total to 2.78 inches. Saturday seemed undeniably springtime, with the increasingly green tint of trees and branches helping to remind us. B ut although far from winter, it did not seem so warm as to suggest the hot season to come. It showed bright and sunny moments but had more than its share of gray clouds. Often t hey seemed to darken the afternoon

sky enough to give unfulfilled threats of more rain. The gray skies seemed an ap- propriate accompaniment for a day with a high temperature eight degrees below the April 9 average. W ith its top reading of 58, Saturday become the month’s fifth day with a high in the 50s. Our other four April days had highs in the 60s. So many clouds, so much rain and so narrow a temperature range might have seemed almost monotonous. That is, if spring could ever seem monotonous.

THE DISTRICT

Rain falls for 5th straight spring day

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The Washington Post - USA (2022-04-10)

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