Top Headlines: Local Olympian Takes Gold, Teenage Sex Trafficking, Bait Cars and More

Friends, family, teachers and classmates gathered at Stone Ridge School of the Sacred Heart Friday to root for Olympic swimmer Katie Ledecky, 15, who won the gold medal in the women’s 800m freestyle. .

TAKOMA PARK—A Montgomery County man has been charged with working a teenage girl as a prostitute in Maryland and Northern Virginia, according to U.S. Attorney Neil H. MacBride of the Eastern District of Virginia.

Yimmy Anthony Pineda Penado, also known as “Critico” and “Spike,” allegedly gave juvenile female runaways drugs and alcohol to make them more receptive to being prostitutes, MacBride said in a statement.

Pineda Penado made multiple appointments per day for a girl and told her to lie about her name and age and act like she was enjoying sexual intercourse, the U.S. attorney's office said in a statement. .

GAITHERSBURG—The city of Gaithersburg has a new tool to catch car burglars in the act.

The city announced Tuesday the launch of its "Anti-Theft Vehicle" program, featuring a vehicle operated by the police and containing valuable items to the draw attention of thieves.

The "bait car" is equipped to immediately notify officers when a theft or attempted theft is made, and the criminal activity of the suspect is video recorded, according to the city. It will frequently be left unlocked and in locations identified as a high theft from vehicle area. .

ROCKVILLE — A local performance troupe is making headlines in Germany as it travels and performs in Rockville’s sister city of Pinneberg and in the German capital. 

WHEATON—Supporters of the DREAM Act to help educate illegal immigrants will be marching from downtown Silver Spring to downtown Wheaton on Aug. 5 to raise awareness and educate voters before the November referendum. 

Shark Week: How Was Discovery's Chompie Created?

SILVER SPRING—Downtown Silver Spring's favorite shark is here! Despite his ruthlessness, he seems to get the crowd going, with smiles all around.

Crewmembers started installing the giant 446-foot Great White shark
Friday, July 27, and worked into Saturday. From afar, it looks as
though Chompie's body goes through the middle of the Discovery
Communications' Building at One Discovery Place in downtown.

Shark Week kicks off Aug. 12, featuring Air Jaws Apocalypse, Shark
Week's Impossible Shots and Sharkzilla. Read more on Silver Spring Patch.

POTOMAC—Winston Churchill High School in Potomac is one of three county high schools to expand classroom autism resources this year. Students on the autism spectrum enrolled in the schools will mix specialist-assisted time in regular classes with personal classroom instruction. 

CHEVY CHASE—Politics and Prose—the venerable Chevy Chase, DC, bookstore—was caught in a controversy in the blogosphere this week over a scholar and author's criticism that the store censored the playing of Go-Go music. The store denies the allegation.