Howard County Police said crime around The Mall in Columbia has dropped since patrols were stepped up this spring, while county prosecutors pursue a life sentence with no parole for the 18-year-old charged in last summer’s deadly shooting near the mall’s food court.
“The implementation of the mall-area patrol unit in April 2025 appears to have had a stabilizing effect,” said county police Lt. James Zammillo, who oversees the Technology & Analysis Division. “We’ve already seen offense totals drop back to 76 [year to date], which aligns closely with 2022 and 2023 levels.”
The new patrol unit was launched in response to high-profile violence like the killing of 17-year-old Angelo Little outside a food-court-area bathroom in the summer of 2024, and February’s double shooting in the bus loop outside the mall.
The number of times police responded to the mall has shot up dramatically over the past two years.
There were 1,383 calls for service or patrol checks between April 1 and Oct. 22, versus 1,225 during the same time last year and 823 in 2023. That’s a 68% increase since 2023.
Police spokesperson Lori Boone said the 2024 increase was prompted in part by homicides, while “the addition of the dedicated mall beat in 2025 further increased these self-initiated calls.”
The county’s crime dashboard clocked 76 confirmed crimes, and 71 total cases, for the “Town Center”/central Columbia area this year, but that’s only through June 30, because police were revamping their system in August.
Nevertheless, police believe the new 24-hour mall-area patrol has had an impact, even in that span of just a couple of months.
That same time period last year saw a total of 107 offenses, across 97 cases — a significant spike from the 84 offenses in 2023 and 73 offenses in 2022.
“Overall call volume has remained consistent year over year, with the only real spike in 2024 being within trespassing and larceny-related offenses,” Zammillo said. “Those categories account for most of the increase in total offenses last year.”
The mall-area crimes this year include one weapons violation, as well as 23 cases of larceny or theft, 18 motor-vehicle thefts, 13 assaults, 12 cases of vandalism and five burglaries.
By comparison, the same time period last year saw almost double that number of assaults (22), nine additional larceny/theft crimes and five more vandalism cases.
There were also two sex offenses — including rape — and three drug-related crimes.
Crimes that happen on actual mall property are excluded from these numbers.
And, there have been a few noteworthy crimes in the “Town Center” area since April, such as August’s fatal shooting of a Salisbury man in the Merriweather Row shopping center parking lot. There are no updates in that case, police said Tuesday.
Meanwhile, a March 16 trial is set for William Marshall III, of Columbia, in the 2024 food-court killing. Marshall was apprehended in New York City this past May.
Last month, prosecutors filed a notice of intent to seek a life sentence without the possibility of parole, because, “according to Maryland law, a defendant can be sentenced to life without parole for first-degree murder only if the State provides written notice at least 30 days before trial,” noted Howard County State’s Attorney spokesperson Yolanda Vazquez. “Our office simply decided to submit the notice well in advance of the trial.”
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