Millionaire Robert James Smith, father of four, grandfather of 13 and owner of two Rolls Royces, greeted Baltimore County police with a handshake and a smile at his 40-acre estate the evening of Jan. 13.
Almost before the smile had faded, the 6-foot-1, 240-pound former Marine was arrested, read his rights, handcuffed and placed in leg chains. A heavily armed county tactical squad waited on a rural road a quarter-mile away in case there was resistance.
Mr. Smith, 59, was accused of firing six .45-caliber bullets into the front door of Christopher's -- now Graffiti's -- a popular bar at York and Padonia roads, in the early hours of Dec. 17. More than 100 patrons were inside at the time.
After his arrest in January, Mr. Smith was taken to jail for nine hours and held on $50,000 bail while 10 officers searched his English Tudor home in northeastern Baltimore County for a .45-caliber pistol. They did not find one.
The retired businessman is convinced that if he hadn't been wealthy enough to afford $91,000 in legal and investigative fees, he would be in prison now for something he didn't do.
David B. Irwin, his defense attorney, said, "The state's case was so thin you could see through it, but a serious injustice might have occurred if Mr. Smith did not have the means to expend a small fortune on lawyers and investigators."
Six months after Mr. Smith's arrest, he heard county Circuit Judge John Grason Turnbull II declare after a nonjury trial, "I would not convict Attila the Hun in this case. The verdict is not guilty as to all counts."
Judge Turnbull called testimony by the prosecution's main witness "preposterous" and said the conduct of a police officer in the case "borders on the outrageous."
There was no physical evidence linking Mr. Smith with the crime, but the main witness popped up nearly three weeks later and implicated him. Of that witness, Judge Turnbull said, "I would not believe Kevin Earle on a stack of Bibles. I am convinced he got caught up in some type of situation where he was bragging . . . I'm not sure Mr. Earle shouldn't be indicted for perjury."
So how did Mr. Smith, a man apparently with the world at his elbow, get in such a mess?
Mr. Irwin thinks his client's large estate, flashy cars and lack of visible means of support suggested that he was a drug dealer and that police placed themselves in a position where they had to go after him.
"They didn't make the effort to find out who he really was," Mr. Irwin said. "And they made practically no effort to find out who really did it. It's frightening what the system can do to someone."
Mr. Irwin said Assistant State's Attorney Dean Stocksdale offered Mr. Smith a generous plea bargain before the trial: reckless endangerment, with a maximum sentence of five years, with no recommendation of prison time. It was rejected. Mr. Stocksdale would not comment.
The situation that could have put Mr. Smith in prison for 30 years began on the evening of Sept. 14, when he drove his 1993 white Rolls Royce convertible onto the Christopher's parking lot, where he was approached by Lisa Marie Young.
"She told me she was a TV actress from New York and asked me to buy her a drink," Mr. Smith said.
"I said 'Sure.' I was going through a terrible time in my life with a divorce, and I was lonely."
At that time, Young, 24, lived with her mother in an apartment in Cockeysville, and was on probation for a drug conviction stemming from an incident in Ocean City in 1991.
Drugs were concealed
There, she had delivered 45 grams of cocaine concealed in a tampon to a man she thought was her boyfriend but actually was Thomas V. Manzari of the Ocean City Police Department.
Young was convicted of possessing and distributing a controlled dangerous substance and sentenced to eight years in prison in October 1991, with all but three years suspended, and three years' probation.
She was released on probation in June 1993. By the time Mr. Smith met her, she had failed a urinalysis and was facing revocation of her probation.
Her probation was revoked on March 7. She is in the state correctional institution for women in Jessup. She was in leg chains when she testified against Mr. Smith in July.
Former friends of the 5-foot-9, 110-pound woman, interviewed by Mr. Smith's private investigators, described her variously as "manipulative," "violent" and "vindictive." One added, "She created havoc wherever she went."
Baltimore and Baltimore County court records show five charges against Young for battery or assault, one charge of theft and two charges of drug possession, beginning in December 1989.
All were dropped, but Bergen County, N.J., records show she was jailed there twice in 1991 and 1992 for distributing illegal drugs.
Judge Turnbull said, "If there was ever a more discreditablwitness, it is Ms. Young."
Mr. Smith, who describes himself as a "nondescript nobody," was reared in West Baltimore, dropped out of Mount St. Joseph High School in the 11th grade and was a millionaire by age 40.
Business begun in 1965
He worked in the business departments at Johns Hopkins and Union Memorial hospitals but made his fortune with a collection agency he started in his living room in 1965. By 1974, City Finance, in the 2200 block of Maryland Ave. in Baltimore, had 44 employees and the money was rolling in.
Eventually, his company represented almost every hospital in the state.
By 1982, when Mr. Smith built his house, he had two helicopters, three Rolls Royces and eight racehorses. He closed the business and retired seven years ago. He spent the next several years traveling.
"Most people say they work hard, but they just spin their wheels," he said. "I actually worked hard, but making that money was a terrible strain. My health wasn't so good. I was overweight, smoked three packs of cigarettes a day, so I retired.
"I would give it all up if I could find someone who would truly care for me. I would like to be happily married right now. I didn't spend enough time with my family. I had no way of knowing the tragedy this money would cause."
Mr. Smith said he went out with Young "four or five times" between Sept. 14 and the night of the shooting.
"She was just someone to go out with," he said. "I get lonely."
On the night of Dec. 16, Young called him, and he picked her up in his black Rolls Royce. They ate dinner in Little Italy and went to four or five other places for drinks, although Mr. Smith himself rarely drinks.
They ended up at Christopher's shortly before midnight. Mr. Smith became upset when she began flirting with the bartender and told her that her actions were "disrespectful" to him. He admonished her for her "unladylike behavior," he said.
They left Christopher's arguing, and he got into his car and left. She went back inside.
Five to 10 minutes before Mr. Smith left the area, Christopher's doorman Gary Dubeck had ejected an underage patron who tried to use someone else's driver's license as identification. According to testimony by Mr. Dubeck, the photo didn't match the patron, and the doorman kept the license.
No one injured
Within 10 minutes after Mr. Smith departed, someone fired shots from the middle of the parking lot. No one was injured.
Police arrived about 1:30 a.m. in response to a 911 call. Young told Officer D. C. Howell that Mr. Smith had been her boyfriend and that he had threatened to kill her. She said she thought Mr. Smith had fired the shots, with her as the intended victim. She said she was about 30 feet inside the bar's door, which was closed, when the shots were fired.
Officer Howell also interviewed Jonathan Hawes, 29, who lives in Baltimore.
Mr. Hawes later testified that he arrived at Christopher's with a friend shortly after midnight. They had a beer and were leaving when they noticed Mr. Dubeck, the doorman, arguing with an agitated young man.
The young man walked past them to the center of the parking lot, Mr. Hawes said, and as they arrived at their car, they heard gunfire. Mr. Hawes said he saw the young man run up an embankment and cross Padonia Road.
Mr. Hawes and his friend left, but Mr. Hawes, curious, returned about 2 a.m. He went to the area where he thought the shots were fired and found six shell casings. He gave four to an officer and pointed out the location of the other two to him.
Private investigators working for Mr. Smith are certain they know the identity of the "agitated young man" and even photographed him during a surveillance. He is now in prison for attempted murder in an unrelated incident last year.
On the evening after the shooting, Officer Sylvia Reddy, assigned to investigate the shooting, showed up at Mr. Smith's home.
Officer Reddy asked Mr. Smith whether he had any guns in the house. Mr. Smith said he had two AK-47 assault rifles, a Winchester rifle and a .32-caliber automatic pistol but that he hadn't fired a gun in five years.
Witness turns up
Officer Reddy asked whether he would submit to a test of his hands to determine whether he had fired a gun recently. He responded, "I'll be more than happy to!" she wrote in her report. The test was never made because, Officer Reddy later said, it was "too late." Mr. Smith subsequently passed a lie detector test, the results of which were given to the state's attorney's office.
On Jan. 6, Kevin M. Earle, 29, a Christopher's regular, met Officer Reddy by chance as she was doing follow-up interviews at Christopher's. Mr. Earle told her he had seen a man at Christopher's firing a gun on Dec. 17.
Mr. Earle told Officer Reddy he was in front of Christopher's the night of the shooting and saw an "older gentleman" with gray hair pacing back and forth on the parking lot. "As I was about to enter, I heard a pop and saw the man firing a gun."
He said he recognized the man as a regular patron who drove a black Rolls Royce. Mr. Earle said the man ran up a hill to a car on Padonia Road after the shooting.
Officer Reddy asked Mr. Earle why he took so long to come forward. Mr. Earle said he had told his story to an officer the night of the shooting. (In court testimony, he identified the officer as Thomas M. Siwek, the first officer on the scene.)
On the basis of Mr. Earle's statement, Officer Reddy prepared charges of assault with intent to commit murder and three lesser counts against Mr. Smith, which led to his arrest on Jan. 13.
At the trial, Officer Siwek testified that he didn't remember Mr. Earle's coming to him the night of the shooting and said that if he had, he would have taken his name and address.
He also said his supervisor, Cpl. Ron Farinetti, had asked "me something in reference to me making a supplemental report to the original report in reference to a witness."
In court, Judge Turnbull said Corporal Farinetti had meddled in a case that was "not his business."
Action called 'outrageous'
"We have a corporal . . . who calls and discusses this case with [Officer Siwek]," the judge said. "I think that borders on the outrageous.
In an interview, Judge Turnbull said that he decided to "say something to Sue Schenning," a deputy state's attorney.
Ms. Schenning said recently that "we've decided not to go any farther with it."
Mr. Smith is seeking a lawyer experienced in civil rights cases to represent him in any legal action he might take. He wants his $91,000 back and a public apology, according to a letter he sent to State's Attorney Sandra O'Connor.
The complaint has been turned over to Michael A. Fry, assistant county attorney, who said he is working with the police internal affairs unit on the case.