David Linthicum, a man who shot two Baltimore County Police officers in 2023 and ignited a dayslong manhunt that closed schools and forced people to stay in their homes, was found guilty on Thursday of four counts of attempted first-degree murder and related crimes.
Linthicum, 26, of Cockeysville, was also convicted in Baltimore County Circuit Court of four counts of use of a firearm during the commission of a crime of violence and one count of armed carjacking. He did not visibly react to the verdict.
Prosecutors argued that Linthicum intended to kill police officers who were trying to help him, while his defense attorneys contended that law enforcement from the beginning botched a response to a mental health crisis.
Outside the Baltimore County Courts Building, Deputy State’s Attorney John Cox told reporters that “justice was done.”
”This was an individual who attempted to take the lives of four Baltimore County Police officers,” Cox said. “There is absolutely no blame on the police for them trying to do their job.”
On Feb. 8, 2023, Linthicum’s father, John, or Whit, called 911 and asked for police. “I have a son who’s being suicidal,” he told a dispatcher. “He has a gun.”
Officers Barry Jordan, April Burton and David Allen responded to their home on Powers Avenue above Sherwood Road.
Police testified that they saw both men on the driveway outside the garage. Linthicum then ran into the house and locked himself in the basement.
His father followed him back inside the home, picked the lock to the basement door with a screwdriver and led police toward a bedroom. “David,” he asked. “You’re going to shoot me?”
That’s when Linthicum opened fire with an AR-15, unleashing an initial volley of 12 bullets and then shooting four more times as the officers ran up the stairs.
Outside the home, Jordan remarked that he felt something but dismissed it as “just shrapnel on my love handles.” But police later realized that he’d been hit.
Police called in armored vehicles, helicopters and drones. The FBI; Maryland State Police; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and other law enforcement agencies took part in the manhunt.
On Feb. 9, 2023, Detective Jonathan Chih drove out in an unmarked 2013 Ram 1500 to check on a report of a man walking along Warren Road.
Chih testified that he saw a man walking with his thumb out and pulled over, believing him to be a hitchhiker.
Next, Chih said, he climbed out of his pickup, turned on the police lights and walked to the bed of the truck.
“What’s going on?” Chih asked. “What’s up?”
“Are you here to kill me?” Linthicum replied.
“No,” Chih responded. “Why?”
Linthicum fired 14 bullets, shooting Chih multiple times. Then, Linthicum stole the detective’s pickup, peeled off and drove over a bridge that spans the Loch Raven Reservoir before eventually ending up in Harford County.
The Harford County Sheriff’s Office on Feb. 10, 2023, apprehended Linthicum after an eight-hour standoff. He repeatedly called out to law enforcement to kill him.
The jury watched body camera video of both shootings multiple times throughout the trial.
In her closing argument, Assistant State’s Attorney Zarena Sita said police were trying to help Linthicum because they believed in the sanctity of human life.
“He didn’t want to talk. He didn’t want help,” Sita said. “He just wanted to shoot.”
Sita said was it was offensive to imply or suggest that the officers did anything wrong. The Baltimore County Police Department, she said, was not at fault.
Linthicum terrorized Baltimore and Harford counties, she said, and over three days embarked on a “homicidal rampage.”
“Do not be distracted,” Sita said. “This defendant tried to kill four officers. Hold him accountable.”
Jordan, Burton and Allen sat in the first row of the courtroom gallery for closing arguments and the verdict in full uniform.
But Deborah Katz Levi, one of Linthicum’s attorneys, implored the jury to zoom out and look at the bigger picture.
Levi is director of special litigation for the Maryland Office of the Public Defender in Baltimore. She represented Linthicum with James Dills, district public defender for Baltimore County.
She said her client was in the throes of a mental health crisis. Police did not act in accordance with their training, policies and procedures, she said, and unnecessarily put themselves in harm’s way.
“David,” Levi said in her closing argument, “never intended to kill anybody but David Linthicum.”
Levi characterized what unfolded as a response to a mental health crisis that went terribly wrong. She criticized prosecutors for viewing the case with rigidity and bringing what she described as trumped-up charges.
“You can say to the state, ‘Everybody was wrong that day.’“ Levi said.
She urged the jury to only convict her client of stealing the pickup.
Linthicum faces a maximum sentence of life in prison on each count of attempted first-degree murder. Circuit Judge Garret P. Glennon Jr. did not immediately schedule a sentencing date.
Meanwhile, Linthicum is looking at a mandatory minimum sentence of five years, and up to 20 years in prison, for each count of use of a firearm during the commission of a crime of violence. Armed carjacking carries a maximum penalty of 30 years in prison.
He’s being held in the Baltimore County Detention Center without bond.
Levi told reporters after the verdict that it’s important for Maryland to adopt alternative responses to mental health crises “so this doesn’t happen to anyone else.”
“What happened to the officers that day was unfortunate, but what happened to Mr. Linthicum — facing potentially the rest of his life in prison for the county’s inability to respond properly to his mental health crisis — is grossly unfair,” Levi said.
She vowed to appeal.
