Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

Jury says it’s “overheated” and wants to be dismissed for the day.

Judge Sweeney sent them home until Monday at 9 a.m.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

After ten hours of deliberations, the Dixon jury still has not reached a verdict.

“Keep praying,” Dixon’s attorney Arnold Weiner told a supporter of the mayor.

No matter the outcome, prosecutor Robert A. Rohrbaugh said Dixon’s March trial for perjury charges is going forward as planned.

If the jury is hung, Rohrbaugh could also re-try the current theft case (which had been thrown out after Ronald Lipscomb failed to take the stand).

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

4:00 p.m.

The jury had a question, requiring all sides to return to court at around 315 p.m.

At that time, Judge Sweeney told the lawyers that the jury wanted a transcript of testimony. The request was denied. The jury was instructed to rely on their notes and memories.

But the brief meeting provided some levity when defense attorney Arnold Weiner’s cell phone went off, just minutes after the bailiff warned the courtroom audience that phones would be confiscated if they rang.

A bailiff playfully marched over to Weiner and took his phone. Sweeney laughed and told him to return it. “This is your one warning,” Sweeney told him.

Even Dixon was laughing.

For summary’s sake, here are the charges that Mayor Dixon’s jury is debating:

Counts 1 and 4 deal with the gift cards from Turner.

1: Theft. She stole gift cards valued at more than $500 from Turner by deception, that she solicited and obtained the cards under the false pretense that they would be used by the council president’s office to aid the needy families of Baltimore.

4: Fraudulent misappropriation by a fiduciary.  That she received the cards from Turner in her official capacity as council president but that she then used them for herself.

The jury can not find Dixon guilty of both charges. If she is found guilty of one she must be found not guilty of the other.

Counts 3 and 6 deal with gift cards from the city’s housing authority.

3: Theft. That Dixon knowingly stole cards purchased by the housing authority and that were given to her to distribute to the needy.

6: Fraudulent misappropriation by a fiduciary. As mayor she received the housing gift cards during the Holly Trolley tour for the purpose of giving them out to needy people, but she willfully used them for herself.

The jury can not find Dixon guilty of both charges. If she is found guilty of one she must be found not guilty of the other.

Count 7: Misconduct in office. That she abused her office by corruptly using the housing cards.

If Dixon is found not guilty of count 3 the jury must find her not guilty of this misconduct charge. If she is guilty of count 3 the jury must then decide whether she is guilty or not guilty of count seven.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

12:45 p.m.

The jury began deliberations at 12:30 p.m. after a morning of closing arguments. Dixon defense attorney Arnold Weiner said the prosecutors are asking the jury to decide Dixon’s guilt based on their “imagination” not the “evidence” that she stole gift cards.

The packed courtroom laughed at several comments made by Weiner and even applauded lightly when he asked the jury to “end this nightmare” and the prosecution’s “three and a half year pursuit.”

Prosecutor Shelly Glenn gave the first closing argument. Maryland State Prosecutor Robert Rohrbaugh provided the final words and said to steal gift cards meant for needy children is “unspeakable.”

Rohrbaugh provided the most dramatic moment in the closings by snapping 19 best buy gift cards into a line atop the wooden rail in front of the jury.

Nineteen out of 20 gift cards were used by Dixon five days after developer Patrick Turner got a call from the then-City Council president asking him to purchase such cards for needy children.

“That’s not a mistake,” Rohrbaugh said.

Prosecutor Glenn told the jury that developer Patrick Turner testified that Dixon told him to buy the gift cards at Best Buy and Target. “Almost like she’s phoning in her order,” Glenn said.

Turner called Dixon’s city-issued Blackberry at 11:04 a.m. on Dec. 13, 2005, slightly more than an hour before he bought $500 in gift cards at Best Buy at 12:21 p.m. About 40 minutes later, at 1:01 p.m., Turner bought $500 in gift cards at Target. At 1:21 p.m. Turner called Dixon again.

Glenn argued that it is reasonable to assume the two discussed the purchases given that timeline.  Turner could not remember the conversations, except to say that at some point Dixon asked him to buy gift cards for the needy. He was also unclear about how the cards were delivered to Dixon’s City Council president office.

Dixon’s defense has said that because the cards were delivered in a white envelope with her name on it but with no note or signature from Turner that Dixon assumed the cards were an anonymous gift from her former boyfriend, Ronald Lipscomb, also a developer.

The only evidence that Libscomb had given Dixon anonymous gifts was a floral arrangement delivered anonymously from him two years before Turner’s cards arrived at City Hall.

The prosecution said none of that matters. The cards got to City Hall, Glenn said. “How do we know? She used them five days later,” Glenn said.

The videocamera, camera bag, video tapes and other items purchased with 19 of the 20 Best Buy cards were found when prosecutors raided Dixon’s home in 2008.

Dixon’s Best Buy Rewards Zone card made tracing the gift cards to her easy, and Dixon does not dispute that she used the cards. Her only defense is that she thought they were hers to use.

Glenn said Dixon’s argument that she didn’t know Turner had given the cards is refuted by Turner’s testimony that Dixon called again in December 2006 to ask him to donate gift cards for needy children again.

“You can’t decide a case based on their imagination,” Weiner said. “You decide it on the evidence.”

He praised her years of public service and touted Dixon’s pastor’s testimony that she is an honest person. Weiner said Lipscomb’s gift cards were the strongest part of the prosecution’s case but that those charges were tossed. Now, he said, “you have the job of “remembering what you are supposed to forget” about Lipscomb.

The jury was instructed to disregard the testimony of six witnesses and more than 30 exhibits.

No one should have a verdict of guilt “based on reconstructed memory,” Weiner said.

He said the office of state prosecutor disrespected Dixon by searching every “nook and cranny” of the mayor’s home in 2008 with “reckless abandon.”

“I ask you to return a verdict of not guilty,” Weiner said. “To end this nightmare. To put the finishing point on a 3 1/2-year relentless pursuit.”

Prosecutors, who have the right to present closing before and after the defense, ended where they started on Nov. 9: with Rohrbaugh invoking the needy children whom Dixon allegedly deprived of gifts at Christmas.

He said his office did not rush to judgment, which is why the probe lasted nearly four years.

The public would expect a thorough investigation. As for Dixon’s confusion defense, Rohrbaugh said: “Do you really think the City Council president’s office is that confused? There was no confusion.”

The case, he said, “is about the citizens of Baltimore, it’s about the children of Baltimore. They expect and demand the highest integrity.”

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

10:00 a.m.

Mayor Dixon’s defense rested its case at 9:45 a.m. after calling two witnesses: a florist and Rev. Frank M Reid III, Dixon’s pastor and spiritual adviser.

Judge Dennis Sweeney scheduled closing arguments for tomorrow morning. He sent the jury home so that the prosecutors and defense attorneys could devise final instructions to give to the jury before it begins deliberating the five charges against Dixon.

Dixon did not take the stand.

The owner of Flower Cart Inc. testified that in January 2004 Dixon’s former boyfriend Ronald Lipscomb sent the then-City Council president a $285 flower arrangement. It was delivered to City Hall with a card that read: “To Sheila, Anonymous.”

The defense has said that it would argue that Dixon used gift cards donated by developer Patrick Turner because she thought they were just another anonymous gift from Lipscomb.

So getting evidence in about an anonymous gift was crucial. The prosecutors objected to the florist’s testimony but lost.

Maryland State Prosecutor Robert Rohrbaugh gambled yesterday by not calling Lipscomb to the stand, taking away the defense’s opportunity to make his relationship with Dixon a key part of the mayor’s argument.

Sweeney then tossed the theft charge related to the gift cards donated by Lipscomb.

Rohrbaugh’s only question to the florist was to reiterate that the floral arrangement was delivered in 2004, nearly two years before Turner’s gift cards were delivered.

Reid testified that he knows Dixon to be “honest and forthright” in her many dealings with his church, Bethel AME in Baltimore.

Afterwards he told me that as spiritual adviser to Dixon he prays with her and tells her what Biblical scriptures to read, like the 23rd and 27th Psalms.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

3:30 p.m.

Judge Sweeney sent the jury home at 3:15 p.m. after hearing two witnesses called by Dixon’s team. The two were character witnesses and fellow members of Dixon’s church, Bethel AME.

It took three bench conferences with the judge to decide how best to ask if Dixon is honest and charitable.

The prosecution asked one witness if she knew Dixon personally. She said, “No.”

“I take it you haven’t gone shopping with her (Dixon),” Rohrbaugh asked.

“No,” said the witness, Karen Daniels.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

After Robert Lipscomb failed to appear for the prosecution, Judge Sweeney agreed with Dixon’s attorneys and dismissed the two charges related to the gift cards that Lipscomb gave to Dixon.

But he rejected Dixon’s request to declare a mistrial and said the jury will decide the remaining charges related to the gift cards given by developer Patrick Turner and from the housing department.

Dixons defense will start afternoon.

The late morning legal tussle started after the jury was given a lunch break near 11a.m. Defense attorney Dale Kelberman said the state failed to show that Dixon ever directly spoke to Lipscomb to request gift cards.

“There is no evidence that Sheila Dixon made any misrepresentation or false statements to Ronald Lipscomb,” Kelberman said.

Sweeney asked the defense if its theory is that Dixon couldn’t distinguish between gift cards for the poor and personal ones because she was “swimming in gift cards?”

Kelberman said it doesn’t matter if she was “swimming in them” or “wading” in them up to “her ankles.” The point is that the state can not prove that Dixon knew Lipscomb intended the gift cards for the poor.

In granting Dixon’s request to dismiss the two charges related to the Lipscomb gift cards, Judge Sweeney said:

“It would require speculation … to decide what Mr. Lipscomb’s wishes were (for the gift cards). It’s a bridge too far. There is simply no evidence” that Dixon solicited the cards from Libscomb to be given to charity.

“There is basis for suspicion,” Sweeney added.

In its request for a mistrial, Dixon’s defense team also alleged misconduct by prosecutors. Kelberman said state prosecutor Robert Rohrbaugh knew from the start of the trial that he wouldn’t be able to show a direct line between Lipscomb’s intent for the cards and Dixon’s personal use of them. That is why, Kelberman argued, Rohrbaugh never mentioned Libscomb in his opening statement even though Lipscomb is the alleged victim of one of the theft charges.

Rohrbaugh protested the allegation and said he was prepared to put Lipscomb on the witness stand. But that his trial tactics changed when Dixon’s defense revealed that they would make their case about Lipscomb’s many gifts to Dixon in order to show the mayor simply thought the cards were more gifts from the developer, who used to be her boyfriend.

There are still five charges pending.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

11:00 a.m.

Major surprise this morning! The state rested at 10:53 a.m. without calling Ronald Libscomb.

Prosecutors called one witness, a Circuit City representative, this morning. The company official walked the jury through records that showed how Dixon and her driver, Howard Dixon (no relation), spent gift cards in December 2006 that had been purchased by Ronald Lipscomb’s employee, Randell Finney.

The defense had no questions. After a few minutes of paperwork the state rested.

The jury was excused until 1 p.m. Once the jury had left Dixon lawyer Dale Kelberman asked for an acquittal. But the judge called for a five minute break.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

4:45 p.m.

Developer Glenn Charlow took the stand after lunch today, but was asked to step down after a meeting between the lawyers and Judge Sweeney.

It’s unclear if he will be permitted to testify as to what Patrick Turner told the jury already. The judge had ruled that the cards Charlow (the previously unnamed “third developer”) says he delivered to Dixon in 2006 could not be entered into evidence directly because it was added to the prosecution’s case the day the trial began on Nov. 9.

Before Turner’s testimony, Mary Pat Fannon, an aide to Dixon, took the stand to face questions about the Toys ‘R Us gift card Dixon gave her at a holiday party in 2007.

Fannon said she bought her daughter “something nice.” The prosecution made it clear that Fannon, unlike other staffers who have gotten cards, is not facing economic hardships. Quite the opposite, prosecutor Tamara Gustave pointed out: Fannon and her husband make close to $500,000 together.

Gustave then displayed a note Fannon gave to the mayor: “Thank you for the Toys R Us gift card for my daughter.”

The same Toys ‘R Us gift card was one of the nearly 120 purchased by the city housing department to be distributed to the poor during the Holly Trolley tour in 2007.

Earlier Lindbergh Carpenter, a former housing official, testified that he had coordinated the Holly Trolley tour. He said Dixon was handing out gift cards to people along the trolley’s stops in low-income city neighborhoods. Carpenter also testified that he had been caught stealing gift cards for his personal use and that he pleaded guilty to a theft charge in January and no longer works for the city.

The testimony from Turner and Fannon was the first to directly show that cards meant for the needy were used or given away by Dixon.

A former investigator for the Office of State Prosecutor testified about how prosecutors traced gift cards to prove who bought them and who spent them.

Christopher Thesing said of the 20 Best Buy gift cards bought by Patrick Turner, Dixon used 19 of them—18 were used to buy a video camera on Dec. 18, 2005. He also said that of the 20 Target gift cards bought by Turner, he was able to prove that 2 were used by Dixon. They were used to buy a handbag, called a Loella Hobo, on Jan. 29, 2006.

He also traced the cards given to Dixon by an associate of Ronald Lipscomb, the mayor’s former boyfriend. Of the 18 Best Buy gift cards, Dixon used 12. The 14 Giant cards bought by Lipscomb’s associate, Randell Finney, were used by Dixon, her current boyfriend and housing official Edward Anthony, and Dixon top adviser Beatrice Tripps.

City Councilwoman Rochelle “Rikki” Spector was on hand today to support Dixon: “I’m praying they get her out of this mess,” she said.

Our reporter Doug Donovan is sending updates from the coutroom throughout the corruption trial of Mayor Sheila Dixon.

1:45 p.m.

Mayor Dixon’s trial got off to a stunning second week today when developer Patrick Turner testified that Dixon asked him to donate gift cards to a city hall charity for the needy. Prosecutors have shown that Dixon spent the cards for personal use.

Turner’s memory was vague but he said whomever dropped the cards off at the then-council president’s office put them in an envelope with Dixon’s name on it. Turner said he did not put his name on the cards.

Dixon’s attorneys have argued that Dixon thought the cards were a personal gift from another developer, which is why she spent them.

As damaging as Turner’s testimony appeared to be, his time on the stand provided some of the best comic relief. Turner had to borrow Dixon attorny Dale Kelberman’s eyeglasses to read ducuments detailing phone calls between Dixon and Turner.

Dixon lawyers have said that Dixon never thanked Turner for the cards because she believed they were from her former boyfriend, Ronald Libscomb.

Turner testified she did not thank him, even at a surprise birthday party for Turner’s wife at Charleston restaurant.

In Decemer, 2006, Dixon called Turner again while he was in the Cayman Islands about the holiday gift cards. Turner then called his business partner Glenn Charlow to buy cards and deliver to city hall.

Was this a personal gift to Dixon, prosecutor Shelly Glenn asked.

“No,” Turner said.

Who did he intend the gifts for?

“Christmas gifts for children,” he said.