A 9/11 Memorial Race, Then A SWAT Raid

Thursday morning was a busy one for me. First, I covered a 9/11 memorial race -- the St. Joseph Medical Center Run To Remember -- in downtown Baltimore. I shot video and then fed a 500-word (or so) story to my editor by email, from my laptop while sitting in my car.

Then, while heading back to the office, my editor called to say that a SE Baltimore resident called the newsroom to report that the city SWAT team had swarmed into his neighborhood and wouldn't let anyone in or out. Turns out, I was only minutes away from the scene because I had driven a little out of my way due to downtown morning rush-hour traffic.

So, I told my boss I'd check it out on the ground. Good thing. I think I may have been one of two media people there. Police warned me away from the scene at first, so I took some steps back and relied on my Sony Handycam's zoom lens to get closeup shots. I was able to come back with decent video and a couple photos, one of which was of some SWAT guys. Our photo editor cropped it and it ran in the paper.

Unfortunately, the best tales were told by the residents, who live on the street of the drug house that was raided -- and they didn't want to appear on camera or be quoted by name. That's understandable, if you know how Baltimore rolls.

The first video is the Run To Remember race:



And here's the SWAT team raid. The raid was part of a huge drug investigation where 18 locations were raided Thursday morning in a joint federal/local law enforcement take-down of a big drug org.