If you can believe half of the testimony that came out in Harford County Circuit Court in the murder trial of Sean Nelson Smith, then the streets of Edgewood really are as dangerous as Baltimore's, if not worse.
Smith, known as "Ski," 28, originally from Yonkers, N.Y., but living in Edgewood at the time of the crime, was convicted by a jury in January of second degree murder and gun charges in the August 2007 shooting death of Samuel David Horne, 25, also of Edgewood and known as "Shadow," who was found lying in an Edgewater Village street with several gunshot wounds to the torso. Smith and three other people were eventually arrested and charged with the killing. Like Smith, all the other defendants grew up in New York — at least one fled there after the killing. Charges against one of the suspects were dropped after he testified against Smith, whom police had decided was the shooter.
Last week, Harford Judge Stephen Waldron sentenced Smith to 30 years for second degree murder and 20 years for the handgun conviction, 50 years to be served concurrently. But, under Maryland's go easy on criminals system, Smith could get out after 25 years, possibly earlier with good behavior credits, assuming he lives that long. Police and prosecutors said the killing resulted from an escalating feud between the victim and Smith and some his friends, referred to by one prosecution witness as "New York boys," but there was supposedly no gang involvement. Hmmm.
As quoted in Rachel Seawell's story Friday, Waldron told Smith at the sentencing: "You're 28, you're no kid, you should know better. When does a human's life stop being so precious; when does it become cheap and expendable?" After lamenting the rise of violence in society, Waldron said: "Mr. Smith will experience sunrise each day and will experience the rebirth of spring. Mr. Horne will not."
My initial reaction to the sentencing story was to ask the obvious question: If Smith, who is black and with a criminal past, had shot a white man with a child and a standing in the community, rather than a black man with a criminal past and a child, would the verdicts and sentences been different?
Possibly not, since Smith did not deny shooting Horne, saying he was afraid Horne was going to kill him first. But most of the previous killings in Edgewood have involved black on black crime, as is the case in Baltimore, and in those instances, I can't recall anybody being considered for the death penalty or for life without parole, either. Smith was originally charged with first degree murder and one of the prosecutors said it was clearly a case of such, but the jury decided otherwise.
I'm reminded of the two years I lived in Worcester County prior to coming to Harford County.
A young lawyer, young then at least, with whom I shared an office building, took a number of court assigned criminal cases to build his resume in the days before the public defender system. One involved a man who walked into a bar and shot another man at point blank range. The lawyer said he pleaded the case down to voluntary manslaughter, conceding to the judge, Daniel Prettyman, that his client killed the man because they didn't like each other, but also noting the victim had a long record of brushes with the law. "You basically had a situation where one man with a record as long as one arm killed another with a record as long as two arms," the judge was said to have observed before pronouncing a sentence of five years, or something like that. The shooter and the victim were both black.
When I first heard this story, it seemed implausible, but, no, my friend assured me, that's how the criminal justice system works. Certainly, the ensuing years have shown me there's considerable truth to what he said.
Back to the Horne murder. One witness for the defense, who testified from his wheelchair, claimed he had been shot in the back by Horne a year earlier and paralyzed from the waist down, during an argument between Horne and Smith, although police were never told of Horne's alleged involvement when they talked to the victim, Paul Cottingham Jr. Both the witness and the public defender, John Janowich, claimed Horne was a "stick up kid" who was trying "to rule" Brookside Drive. Testifying in his own defense, Smith said he encountered Horne on the day of the murder, who told him to go back inside. He said he fired at least three shots at Horne after he saw Horne reach behind his back, as if to go for a gun. There was other testimony from Smith and the witness that Horne had threatened Smith and some of his associates at the Riverside Waffle House the evening before the killing.
The murder weapon was a .40 caliber semiautomatic, a big game gun in street parlance. According to the medical examiner's report, Horne died from multiple entrance and exit wounds. Although there was testimony four shots were fired and some bullets caused multiple wounds — Smith claimed he didn't remember firing the fourth shot. Police did not find a weapon on or near Horne's body.
The shooting occurred around 2 p.m. on a summer Saturday afternoon. One prosecution witness was on her porch with her young child when the shots rang out. She said Smith called her afterward and told her, "It was him or me."
H. Scott Lewis, one of the prosecutors, asked Smith why he didn't call police after Horne had allegedly threatened him. Smith replied, "If you call police, someone will kill you." Lewis claimed in his closing arguments that Smith had "a duty" to retreat rather than shoot to kill. "This isn't the Wild West," the prosecutor said.
But Janowich said his client had an obligation to defend himself, given his history with Horne and Horne's violent reputation. Smith knew Horne was armed, and he armed himself accordingly. As for calling the police rather than confronting Horne himself, the defense lawyer said, "You don't snitch."
Horne's mother, Mildred Samy, got to testify at the sentencing hearing, as his sister, Desiree Horne, and his fiancee, Stephanie Clancy, with whom he has a child. They talked about their grief and their pain from their loss, though neither said anything about Horne's relationship with the community.
According to criminal records, Smith had some recent brushes with the law, receiving a year suspended sentence for providing fraudulent identity to avoid prosecution and a conviction for attempting to elude police, for which he was sentenced to a year in jail. The convictions were in 2007 — but he wasn't in jail on Aug. 11, 2007, the day he shot Horne.
As for the late Mr. Horne, he pleaded guilty to drug possession with intent to distribute in 2000, when he was sentenced to six months in jail, and again in 2002, when he was sentenced to seven years in jail; a conviction for possession of marijuana in 2002 for which he was sentenced to 90 days in jail; a conviction for trespassing onto private property in 2002, in which he was ordered to pay a $500 fine, and again in 2007, for which he was sentenced to 90 days in jail; a conviction for malicious destruction in 2006, for which he was sentenced to 30 days in jail; and a violation of probation in 2007, for which he was sentenced to six months in jail.
He wasn't in jail either on Aug. 11, 2007. Too bad for him.
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