(The following story by Michael Dresser appeared on the Baltimore Sun website on May 17, 2010.)
BALTIMORE, Md. — Amtrak has a problem — and it can use all the help it can get. So why is it spurning a good neighbor who only wants to lend a hand in Amtrak’s effort to protect its tracks from trespassers?
Several times a year, police issue a report of an intruder being struck and killed by an Amtrak train somewhere in Maryland. Occasionally, the death receives extensive news coverage as in the case of 14-year-old Anna Stickel hit by a train in Middle River in January. More often, as in the case of Timothy Francis Jenkins, 41, killed April 6 along the Northeast Corridor tracks south of BWI Marshall Airport, the case gets no more than a brief mention.
Nevertheless, that incident prompted Joe Malecki to give me a call. The 43-year-old Severn resident, who is retired from federal service wiith a disability, lives not far from the site of the most recent fatality. He’s concerned about the safety of the tracks near his home because he periodically sees people trespassing on them — often while aboard all-terrain vehicles and motorbikes.
Amtrak should be equally concerned. Every time a trespasser ends up dead on Amtrak’s’ tracks in Maryland, train service in the Northeast grinds to a halt while the carnage is cleared.
But on April 25, Malecki found out just how efficient Amtrak is about protecting its tracks: not very. I’m going to pass along his story as he told it because he struck me as a straight-shooter and the type of guy you’d want for a neighbor. By the way, Amtrak did not respond to a request for comment about the incident.
ATVs and tracks don’t mix
Malecki acts as caretaker for one of those increasingly rare tracts of undeveloped land in the Baltimore-Washington corridor. It’s a parcel of more than 100 acres of piney woods adjacent to the Northeast Corridor in Severn. Malecki asked me not to be more specific because he doesn’t want to create problems for the elderly owners, who let him and his family hunt deer there in return for his maintenance work.
On that Sunday afternoon, Malecki spotted three young men intruding on the property he cares for right near Amtrak milestone 111. The men were in two ATVS, one of which he saw them take up on the track bed for a joy ride. They were carrying machetes — apparently to cut through underbrush.
Malecki, unarmed and on the small side, said he approached the men and informed them they were trespassing. He told them he would not press charges but asked them to remain while he used his cell phone to call Amtrak’s emergency line and report the incident and the exact milestone. Remarkably, the trespassers complied, perhaps daunted by Malecki’s camouflage clothing.
There the comedy of errors began. Amtrak said it was dispatching an officer, but 40 minutes and four or five phone calls later, no officer had appeared. Malecki was then told that an officer had come by and, seeing nobody, had left. However, no one from Amtrak had called him back on the cell phone number he had left. (Yes, there is a strong signal there.) Malecki said he doesn’t believe the officer ever came out.
Malecki said the Amtrak officer’s supervisor — a sergeant or lieutenant out of Baltimore — told him to call 911 to reach the Anne Arundel County police. But by then the trespassers were getting restless and having second thoughts about staying to chat with authorities. They drifted off as Malecki stayed on the line with 911.
When Malecki went to the entrance to the property to meet officers, he recalled, “I was swarmed by the county police.” He said they treated him more as a suspect than a witness, and told them they had a report he had detained the trespassers against their will. They told him he could go to a court commissioner and charge the men with trespassing but said the trespassers had also been told how to charge Malecki with unlawful detention. He said the officers questioned whether the parcel was posted against trespassing, even though he could show a reporter numerous signs along the property line.
“Their comment to me is that it’s Amtrak’s property and we’re not responsible for it,” he said. Then they started quizzing him about his hunting practices.
That didn’t sit particularly well with Malecki, who was under the impression he was doing the right thing. “I’m a law-abiding citizen. I don’t have no police record or even a traffic violation,” he said.
Getting the runaround
Malecki said that in subsequent days he tried to follow up with Amtrak Police to express concern about the officer’s no-show. He said he was given the name of an inspector in Washington, the officer’s supervisor’s supervisor, and left numerous messages — none of which were returned.
“I wanted to go right up the chain of command,” Malecki said. “Since 9/11 Americans have been asked to be the eyes and ears of the country. They could have been terrorists, you never know.”
Malecki said that incident was far from the only time he’s seen evidence of trespassing on the tracks. When I visited him on the property he takes care of, he showed me ample evidence of ATV users gaining access to the tracks. He showed how the fences had been allowed to deteriorate — where they existed at all. He said that on one occasion last fall, he saw teenagers in an ATV on the tracks with a young child sitting on the gas tank of the vehicle.
That sounds a lot like a tragedy in the making. This is a busy stretch of track — with high-speed Acelas exceeding 100 mph mixed in with Amtrak Regionals and MARC trains. Unlike in Middle River, there’s little reason to believe a better fence would help much in Severn.
So the best asset the Amtrak Police have in protecting the tracks, and that the local police have in protecting the lives of county residents, is to encourage the vigilance of local residents. And Malecki — with his access, extensive local knowledge and cool-headedness — is the type of citizen-sentinel police should treasure.
When an unauthorized person dies on its tracks, Amtrak — like other railroads — is quick to blame the trespasser. But doesn’t Amtrak bear some responsibility for protecting its turf?
There’s a lot more that railroads could do to secure their tracks and prevent needless death and disruption. And there’s a lot more local law enforcement could do to help if police agencies worked together instead of pushing responsibilities onto each other.
Amtrak and the county police were given a chance to comment Friday afternoon but did not. The window is still open for next week. But their time might be better spent talking with Malecki, because the problem of track intruders isn’t going away. And neither is he.