Metro veteran slid from cop to criminal

Keith Paul

Wednesday, Dec. 12, 2001 | 10:57 a.m.

David James Smith, handcuffed, shackled and chained to three other accused men, slid forward in his chair Tuesday in Justice Court as the suspect next to him stood. It's an instinctive move for a jailhouse veteran to avoid having the chain yank on his side.

But Smith is no veteran defendant.

He's a nine-year veteran Metro Police officer who took a short, curious spiral from cop to criminal in less than two years.

"I think that he became weak and sometimes one bad decision can lead to another and then to another," said Capt. Rick Bilyeu, commander of the Northwest Area Command where Smith was assigned as an officer. "I think choices point you in a direction and somewhere along the line he made the wrong choices."

The choices started before Smith was fired in April 2000 from Metro for trying to pass bad checks. A few months prior he was suspended for two weeks for failing to report to duty. He was twice disciplined -- in 1997 and 1998 -- for calling in sick when he wasn't ill.

He soon lost his home, and apparently became a vagrant that led to an attempt at becoming a criminal and finally to a mini crime spree last month that included three robberies and a carjacking, according to police.

The beginning of his criminal record started Aug. 3, when Smith pulled up in a parking lot in a stolen car, walked toward a 78-year-old woman and then started wrenching the purse from the woman's arm. An off-duty officer saw what happened and ran after Smith, who got into a car.

As Smith started the car, the off-duty officer opened the passenger side door and snatched the purse off the seat just as Smith started to drive off, according to a police report.

When officers caught up to him, he had crashed a stolen car into a pole and was passed out behind a store, according to a police report.

When officers roused him, "Smith's demeanor was hostile and belligerent. He had the strong odor of intoxicating beverages on his person," the report states "His eyes were red and bloodshot. When placed in custody, he attempted to kick officers. He screamed and yelled obscenities."

But the remnants of the man and the officer he once was returned for a moment. Smith, 47, straightened up and stopped battling police when Bilyeu appeared.

"I got up to him and he asked what I wanted him to do and I told him he's got to cool down," Bilyeu said. "He just started crying. Physically, he wasn't changed, but he was different."

The person who Bilyeu knew was gone.

Smith pleaded guilty to attempted robbery and possession of stolen property on Aug. 22 and was released from jail pending sentencing.

Motives for his downfall were unclear. Smith refused to be interviewed, but when he confessed to police on Nov. 16 he told police he had mental problems and needed help.

David Harris, a professor at the University of Toledo law school who has written about police misconduct and accountability, says addiction is often the reason for drastic destruction of people's lives.

"Addiction does damage to those of any profession, it just seems different when that person was a police officer," Harris said. "The fact that he was a police officer makes us notice it more, but it could have been anyone."

Smith failed to show up in court in October for sentencing on the Aug. 3 charges.

Then there were more wrong choices. The choices thrust Smith into the legal system as just another suspect. He didn't gather much attention. His crimes were not the type that drew media attention in a city used to high-profile crimes and the national spotlight.

On Nov. 14, Smith is accused, along with a female accomplice whom he allegedly met in a mental care facility, of approaching a woman and her 3-year-old in a parking lot, threatening her and snatching the keys from her hand and stealing her car, according to a police report.

Smith, who was arrested on Nov. 16, later confessed to several robberies, according to police reports.

About 12 hours before stealing the car, he robbed a change woman at the slot machines at a Rite Aid store on West Lake Mead Boulevard.

On Nov. 15, about 4:45 a.m. Smith went into an Alberston's grocery store on West Craig Road, told the change woman at the slot machines he had a gun and demanded money. He fled with about $600, according to police reports.

Just 90 minutes later, he told a clerk at a Triple 8 convenience store he had a gun and demanded money. He made off with about $100.

Harris said Smith fell fast and the person people knew at one time was gone.

Smith apparently tried, but too late, to make a correct decision. He applied to be an officer at Henderson Police. He even passed the written test, but his past choices at Metro thwarted any chances of starting over.

For Bilyeu, seeing Smith handcuffed after being arrested will stay with him.

"When I saw him standing there, my heart broke. A lump came up into my throat," Bilyeu said. "But I knew in my mind what had to be done. We recognized he wore a uniform for years, but we also recognized what needed to be done to protect the community."

On Tuesday there were no television cameras to capture him cutting a deal with prosecutors to plead guilty at his next court appearance. Just a man chained to other men accused of crimes.

"What happened to Dave Smith probably happens to people of all walks of life," Bilyeu said. "He got into situations and made wrong choices. It's like in the cases of others, you are just left with what could have been and knowing that it is all gone."