By LEONARD GRAY

LAPLACE – The way the story is told by the Rev. Joseph Smith Sr., St. John the Baptist Parish Sheriff Wayne L. Jones had a quite different message to local pastors earlier in his administration.

Jones would permit clergy to provide spiritual comfort to a shooting victim at the crime scene, provided the clergyman could identify himself as such.

What’s more, the clergyman’s connections in the community could likely save police time and trouble by quickly identifying the victims in such cases.

Instead, what happened at the scene of the May 23 shooting death of Edward Stewart of Mt. Airy was quite contrary to the earlier message.

Smith Sr., 62, of 1033 Gemini Drive, Reserve, told reporters he was only stepping inside the crime scene tape to see if he could identify the shooting victim.

When a deputy warned him away instead of asking for identification, he and church deacon, J.C. Williams slipped back out of the taped-off area and were leaving the scene.

That’s when Smith found a deputy at his elbow and, in a moment, cold steel handcuffs were clapped to his wrists.

The pastor soon found hmself charged with resisting an officer by refusing to move on, Smith said, still upset over the incident. He was processed at the Lt. Sherman Walker Correctional Center in LaPlace – which was a touch of irony, since Smith was a detective on that murder case.

Smith, a lifelong St. John the Baptist Parish resident, has been a pastor for 29 years and worked for 15 years under the administrations of former sheriff Lloyd B. Johnson, mostly as a detective.

“When I saw him reach back (for the handcuffs), I wasn’t going to reach for my pocket,” Smith said.

Smith saw the incident of his arrest as nothing short of racial profiling which he said is “a bad thing.”

He added he understood that at a crime scene, where a fellow officer is injured or dead, emotions can run high and judgement can lapse. However, he said that is no excuse for a lapse of professionalism.

“When Sherman Walker was shot, I worked that case. We didn’t run out and arrest everybody. We didn’t arrest any innocent man,” Smith commented.

The cuffing left Smith with bruised and swollen wrists, requiring ice packs and medication.

Capt. Michael Tregre of the St. John the Baptist Parish Sheriff’s Office, commented Smith, like any citizen, was told not to cross the crime scene tape and was arrested when he came anyway. Tregre added: “It’s very short and simple.”

Smith responded, “How could he say that, when he wasn’t even there?”

Stewart, a man suffering from schizophrenia for at least 25 years, but with no history of violence, was shot to death May 23. His funeral was Thursday in LaPlace.

At the wake preceding the funeral services, Stewart’s sister-in-law, Kiesa Taylor of Baton Rouge, said the incident likely happened because he was “off his medication.”

She recalled the man who had been suffering for years, dating back at least to his Army service. “We used to give him a little money, so he wouldn’t have to beg on the streets,” she remembered.

The deputy involved in the shooting, Charles Wale III, 23, of LaPlace, was defending himself from being stabbed by a broken pair of scissors when he fired, according to Jones, and is expected back at work.

“I’m not just going to lay down and take this stuff,” Smith warned.