Killer Wants to Become Police Officer

BOSTON —  Prison guard Hassan Smith wants to be a police officer. He took the civil service exam, his background check cleared, and on paper he looks to be a good candidate.

There’s just one glitch. As a 16-year-old nine years ago, Smith shot a man to death on the street.

“I don’t want to go into graphic detail about the incident. It was an unfortunate situation that I’ve been sorry about ever since,” Smith, 25, said recently.

Sorry may not be enough.

Boston’s police commissioner said no killer will wear a badge on his force. Those who know Smith say that, having paid his debt to society and turned his life around, he should not be punished for life.

The case has opened a debate between dueling philosophies on juvenile crime in Massachusetts.

Those working with juveniles say rehabilitation is possible and should be rewarded. Tough-on-crime politicians say treating juveniles like adults, with stiff punishment, will reduce violence among teenagers.

Massachusetts, like many states, keeps juvenile records secret, so Smith’s past should not legally affect his job search. But word about Smith’s past got out and Boston police vowed a fight.

Judge Mark Lawton, who handled Smith’s juvenile case, is torn. He calls Smith a friend, but feels that police departments should consider a candidate’s juvenile record.

“It’s hard for me to reconcile my feelings about Hassan,” Lawton said. “When you talk to him you’re looking into the eyes of someone who truly wants to do good.”

Politicians are lining up against Smith. A bill is expected to be proposed to allow law enforcement agencies access to juvenile criminal records.

“I don’t want anyone to be able to hide behind a sealed record,” state Rep. Paul Caron, a Democrat, said. “You can have a second chance, but not for murder.”

In June 1988, Smith shot Jeffrey Booker outside a church in Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood, where much of the city’s gang activity and minority population reside. Smith was 16; Booker was 21, a musician and father of a 1-year-old boy. The bullet was apparently meant for someone else.

Smith spent two years in the custody of the state’s juvenile system. He earned a high school diploma, took college courses and counseled teenagers.

“I’m a product of the system and the system did work,” Smith said. “Now they are fussing over the fact that they did rehabilitate me.”

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Jill Brotman of the Massachusetts Prison Project said Smith’s case poses the question of whether society will let a former juvenile criminal “become whole again.”

“This is part of our tradition, the same as commutation or parole,” Brotman said. “Anything that allows people who have been convicted of crimes to resume full duties as citizens is opposed by a lot of people.”

For most of this century, Massachusetts would not allow juveniles to be treated as adults, and mandated their release at age 21 no matter what the crime.

That changed some years ago, when prosecutors were allowed to ask a judge to remove a case to adult court for certain violent offenses. The state went further last year, giving prosecutors the power to takes cases directly to adult court, and loosening secrecy laws.

Such measures reflect a nationwide trend.

Twenty-eight states allow public access to some juvenile crime records while dozens have passed laws allowing prosecutors to try teenagers as adults for the most violent crimes.

The laws are a response to a juvenile crime rate that has shot up 145% in the last decade nationwide, said James A. Fox, dean of Northeastern University’s College of Criminal Justice. But the policy may be wrongheaded, he said.

“[Smith] reinforces the notion that today’s trend toward trying all juvenile murderers and rapists as adults is an unwise policy,” Fox said. “I guess from the point of view of the politicians it’s wise because it wins a lot of votes.”

Smith said if he can’t become a police officer, he’ll keep working as a corrections officer and on a planned youth counseling program for Roxbury children.

But his example of redemption for young people will be less powerful if he is forced to abandon his dream, he said.

“I think that’s sad,” Smith said. “A lot of the people who make those laws, they don’t know what it’s like to grow up in a family of seven with just a mother, to grow up in poverty or in the projects.”

Sonia Booker, the mother of the man shot by Smith, thinks a second chance is fine. Just not one that includes a service revolver.

“I know a person can change. But it still bothers me. Has he really changed that much?” she asked.