Author Archives: Sean Yoes

This week, members of the Baltimore Ravens organization, including team president Dick Cass, tight end Benjamin Watson and Ravens Ring of Honor member (and surefire NFL Hall of Famer), Ed Reed, as well as Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh and Baltimore City Public Schools CEO, Dr. Sonja Brookins Santelises, gathered at Renaissance Academy High School in […]

Under the terms of Baltimore’s Consent Decree with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), an independent monitor must be selected to assist the Court in the implementation of the terms of the Consent Decree. The Court (in this case, U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar), the City, DOJ and the Baltimore Police Department (BPD), are […]

On Sept. 12, the U.S. Department of Justice confirmed it will not bring civil rights charges against the six Baltimore Police Department officers connected to the death of Freddie Gray in Apr. 2015. Gloria Darden, left, mother of Freddie Gray, gathers with family attorney Billy Murphy and clergy for a news conference, Monday, April 27, […]

The 5th annual Baltimore Reunion Expo will take place Sept. 9, at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture. One of the key players behind the success of the Expo and other Baltimore events is Shelonda Stokes, a Baltimore native who has used the grit she learned growing up to […]

Many of the Baltimore’s most prominent religious and political figures gathered at venerable Sharon Baptist Church, 1375 N. Stricker St., in West Baltimore Aug. 28, for the funeral of Corrogan R. Vaughn, a Republican candidate for multiple offices over the years. Vaughn is the son of Dr. Lillian Purnell Bowser Vaughn and Rev. Dr. Alfred […]

The Houston Defender has been publishing and serving the Black community in and around Houston since 1930. Sonceria “Sonny” Messiah Jiles has been at the helm of the newspaper since 1981, reporting the news and events of one of largest Black communities in the United States, with a population approximately the size of the entire […]

When Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh announced Baltimore City Public School (BCPS) graduates, starting with the graduating class of 2018, would be eligible for free tuition at Baltimore City Community College (BCCC), the initiative was met with widespread praise. “We believe that we do have a responsibility to help our young people go to college,” Pugh […]

For many the uprising of April 2015 following the death of Freddie Gray was a tipping point moment in Baltimore’s history. Those perilous hours after Gray’s funeral ultimately revealed the character and resiliency of some of the most underserved communities in our city. In addition, they shed light on some individuals and entities that have […]

Some have lurked from grassy knolls for more than a century, monuments only to White supremacy in the minds of many. But, by early Wednesday morning, the toppling of all four of the city’s Confederate monuments was finished. The Stonewall Jackson, Robert E. Lee statue in Wyman Dell, near the Baltimore Museum of Art, the […]

On Jan. 3, 2000, Col. Ronald L. Daniel, a 26-year veteran of the Baltimore Police Department officially took the chair as the BPD’s Commissioner, after being appointed by then Mayor Martin O’Malley. Fifty-seven days later, Daniel was out as commissioner, replaced by Deputy Commissioner Ed Norris, a Jack Maple disciple (Maple was the architect of […]

One of the goals of the Baltimore Ceasefire, which concluded this past weekend was for no murders to happen during the 72 hour span from Aug. 4 to Aug. 6. We fell short of that goal because there were two homicides on Aug. 5. However, Erricka Bridgeford, one of the movement’s main organizers gave the […]