Frederick police chief says crime comes with growing city

City police identify man fatally shot by officer; State police continue investigation into murder

Dine said ‘‘you can never look at a snapshot of seven days” as an indicator of increased crime, as police use five years’ worth of data for better trend analysis.

‘‘There is no question, however, that any one crime raises the fear level [of residents],” Dine said. ‘‘We understand that, and work hard to combat that.”

Officer-involved shooting

On Wednesday, Frederick police identified the man who wielded a claw hammer and was fatally shot by Officer Frank Rucci outside of the Elmwood Terrace apartments on Key Highway early Tuesday morning.

David Jeffery Bauman, 52, a resident of the complex, died at Frederick Memorial Hospital at 3:54 a.m. Tuesday.

Lt. Shawn Martyak, of the Frederick Police Department’s Criminal Investigation Division, said Rucci was the first officer to respond to several 911 hang-up calls at about 3:22 a.m. He encountered Bauman holding a claw hammer on a sidewalk.

Rucci ordered Bauman to drop the hammer several times, according to police reports, but Bauman raised the hammer and made a threat to the officer while moving toward him. Rucci then fired several times at Bauman.

Martyak said an autopsy, which would include toxicology results, would take several weeks. He said police would await that report and their own investigation before revealing how many shots Rucci fired.

During the last 10 months, Frederick police have had several interactions with Bauman, Martyak said. During two incidents, officers were called to disturbances in the area of U.S. Route 40 West and at Frederick Towne Mall. Both times, Bauman was taken to Frederick Memorial Hospital for an evaluation.

At 6:15 p.m. Monday, officers were dispatched to Elmwood Terrace again, but the call was handled without incident or a report, Martyak said.

Two hours later, the department received a request from the Way Station’s mental health ‘‘mobile crisis” team to assist with Bauman at his residence. The Way Station is a nonprofit organization in the city that helps people who are mentally ill.

Team members and officers responded, and determined Bauman did not present a danger to himself or others at the time of their visit, according to Martyak.

‘‘There was no indication ... but officers did note odd behavior,” he said. ‘‘Nothing that would be deemed harmful to himself or others.”

Seven hours later, a series of 911 hang-up calls were made from Bauman’s residence, where police believe he lived alone. No one who may have interacted with Bauman that night has come forward to police.

Rucci is assigned to the patrol division and has been a member of the department for eight years.

He is on paid administrative leave, pending an investigation into Bauman’s death and an Internal Affairs Division review of his use of deadly force.

‘‘This is an extremely tragic incident for everyone involved,” Dine said. ‘‘... At this juncture, it appears [Rucci] followed policy, but we will do a complete and thorough investigation, forwarding the information we gather to the State’s Attorney’s Office and a grand jury.”

Dine said Rucci’s ‘‘choices met the circumstances” of the incident.

Two other shootings

Bauman’s shooting came two days after Maurice Williams, 27, of Ladd Court was found fatally shot behind the wheel of a Mercury Marquis that jumped the curb at the intersection of Hannover Drive and Ballenger Creek Pike at about 1:30 a.m. Sunday.

Maryland State Police troopers found Williams in his fiancée’s car after he unexpectedly left a party the two attended on Kelly Court.

Greg Shipley, a State Police spokesman, said an autopsy confirmed Williams’ death as a homicide and the cause as a gunshot wound to the chest.

He said investigators were in the area Tuesday continuing to piece together the murder, but no arrests had been made as of Wednesday morning.

The past week also involved a shooting outside apartments on Willowdale Drive, when a 24-year-old Frederick resident was struck by a bullet while repairing his motorcycle. At about 5:30 p.m. July 16 the man experienced a sharp pain in his shoulder and observed blood and a small hole near his neck and collarbone.

The man was treated and released from R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma in Baltimore, and an investigation remains open.

The chief said that crime is becoming a regional issue outside of Frederick’s borders, with areas as far as Baltimore and Virginia impacting what happens inside the city and county. By taking a local and regional approach to crime through information sharing and crime analysis, Dine said the scope of crime prevention is wide-spread.

‘‘We are seeing the kinds of incidents [in other areas] and we don’t want that to happen here,” he said. ‘‘...The boundaries of a city or county are never relevant to thugs in the first place, so we have to also be aware of that.”

Past officer-involved shootings

Bauman’s death is the first officer-involved shooting for the Frederick Police Department since May 2006, when Officer Douglas Stephenson shot 32-year-old Scott Luty of West Virginia. Luty shot his wife, Jennifer, in the head during an argument on South Bentz Street, and fired at Stephenson upon his arrival at the scene. Luty later fled the scene and shot himself in the head after suffering a gunshot wound to the chest from Stephenson.

Stephenson was found justified in his use-of-force by a Frederick County Grand Jury in July 2006.

On July 11, the grand jury found three Frederick County Sheriff’s deputies justified in fatally shooting 39-year-old Don Steven Garrett of Frederick on June 9 after he lunged at them with a knife following a two-hour standoff at his Wellington Trace apartment.