Julie Scharper

Baltimore

Freelance Journalist at Freelance

Enterprise reporter for @BaltimoreBanner. Mom about town. Happiest among trees. she/ her Tips: [email protected] (she/her)

Articles

Johns Hopkins University bus crashes into Charles Village buildings

5 days ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper |Ariel Zambelich

A Johns Hopkins University shuttle bus careened into a pair of buildings at the corner of 25th and N. Charles streets on Saturday, leaving one person injured, Baltimore City Police said. A vehicle collided with the bus at the intersection around 5:19 p.m., propelling it into a row of brick buildings on N. Charles Street, police spokesperson Lindsey Eldridge said in an email.
Scary Mommy creator Jill Smokler faces brain cancer with wit and warmth

1 week ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

When Jill Smokler awoke at Johns Hopkins Hospital last year, her skull sealed shut with a jagged seam of staples, her first response was wry laughter. “I was like, ‘Of course I get brain cancer,‘” recalled Smokler. “That’s so over the top.” Then reality of the diagnosis sank in. The tumor that the surgeons had extracted from Smokler’s skull was glioblastoma, a particularly aggressive and lethal brain cancer. The average patient lives just 15 months after being diagnosed.
Baltimore Talmudical Academy sued for $3million over alleged sex abuse

2 weeks ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

A man who attended the Talmudical Academy of Baltimore is suing the Baltimore County school for more than $3 million, alleging that he was sexually molested in the 1970s by a rabbi who was hired to work as a dorm counselor despite having a history of sexual abuse.
Family of woman declared dead after Social Security error files suit

3 weeks ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper |Bria Overs

Joyce Evans received an alarming letter two days before Christmas 2023. The Social Security Administration had declared her dead. The letter touched off a bureaucratic nightmare for Evans, then 88, a retired federal worker from Anne Arundel County. Her pension was terminated. Her health insurance benefits were cut off. Her home was listed for short sale. Even her water was turned off. Seven months after she descended into this Kafkaesque situation, Evans was dead.
Emotions run high as trial set to begin in Rachel Morin murder case

3 weeks ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper |Dylan Segelbaum

In the year and a half since Rachel Morin was killed near a wooded trail in Bel Air, her five children have marked many milestones. They’ve packed up their things from their mother’s rented home. Some have switched schools. Some have lost teeth. The eldest became a mother herself. And through all the changes, the children — who range in age from 9 to 19 — have been steeped in grief.
Vulture who appeared to ‘mourn’ its mate has died

4 weeks ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

A Maryland vulture that appeared to be mourning its long-time mate last month has also died, according to the property owner who has been observing the birds for years. The birds’ story drew attention when Martha Midgette posted photos and a video of a vulture dragging its mate’s dead body into the yard of her Accokeek home and other vultures gathering around it. Midgette said her husband spotted the body of the second bird in their yard late last week.
Archeologists find 13,000-year-old tool in Baltimore County

1 month ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

Toward the end of the last ice age, an ancient human held a stone tool in their hand, then let it slip into the soil. Perhaps they had used the tool to scrape a deer hide, a bone or a piece of wood. But the earth soon claimed the tool and held it hidden as the centuries passed and waves of people settled nearby.
Vultures in mourning? Bizarre bird behavior spotted in Maryland

1 month ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

For six years, a pair of black vultures lingered around Martha Midgette’s rural Southern Maryland home, tapping on the windows, snatching cat food and preening each other on the porch. “We called that pair The Old Married Couple,” said Midgette, 74. Midgette, a retired Navy environmental scientist, and her husband are used to seeing wildlife on their rambling 17-acre property in Ackokeek, Prince George’s County, near the Potomac River.
Julie Scharper’s love letter to her chaotic joyful life with three kids

1 month ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Julie Scharper

As I am writing these words, my daughters are arranging several doll-sized toilets under my chair. It’s a bathroom for their Barbie doll day care, which has filled nearly every other surface of our dining room. There are shoeboxes full of paper towel cots, tables covered with chocolate chips and a minefield of miniature playground equipment. Alarmingly, one of them brought in a tray of dirty snow and dyed it red with maraschino cherry juice. This is life with three children: chaotic, messy, sticky.
The NFL is in Baltimore investigating Justin Tucker accusations

2 months ago | thebaltimorebanner.com | Brenna Smith |Julie Scharper |Jonas Shaffer |Giana Han

Content warning: This story contains graphic descriptions that may not be suitable for some readers. NFL investigators were in Baltimore this week interviewing massage therapists who have accused Ravens kicker Justin Tucker of inappropriate sexual behavior, according to three women who participated in the inquiry.