Sep 18, 2007 11:01 am US/Eastern
State Sen. Ulysses Currie Collapses At Event
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) ―
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State Sen. Ulysses Currie, a Democrat who leads the powerful Budget & Taxation Committee, collapsed during a breakfast meeting. (File)
WJZ
State Sen. Ulysses Currie, a Prince George's County Democrat who leads the powerful Budget & Taxation Committee, collapsed during a breakfast meeting with the governor Tuesday and was taken away in an ambulance.
Currie fainted while Gov. Martin O'Malley was laying out his plan for new taxes to meet the state's projected deficit.
People at the meeting said Currie, 71, had finished breakfast and asked a question about education, then fainted and fell from his chair.
"He just flopped over," said Sen. Ed DeGrange, D-Anne Arundel. "He went down pretty hard. ... But he was up, he was talking."
DeGrange and others at the meeting said Currie was unconscious for only a few moments. They said he has fainted before, but they said they weren't sure if he had a condition.
A spokeswoman for Anne Arundel Medical Center said Currie was in stable condition.
"It was scary," said Delegate Talmadge Branch, D-Baltimore City. "That was quite alarming, to see him fall like that."
By the time paramedics arrived, Currie was alert and talking, said Sen. Thomas "Mac" Middleton, D-Charles.
"He was conscious and seemed OK," Middleton said.
Currie was elected to the Senate in 1994, after serving eight years in the state House. A former teacher, Currie has two children and two grandchildren.
(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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