Albert Small and Thomas Ross were friends. They met through work in Hampden and grew close over the years; Ross, an attorney, represented Small when child support issues cropped up, and Small, in turn, invited the lawyer to his wedding.
Imagine Ross? surprise, then, when he turned on the news one May night in 2005 to hear that his friend was shot in a five-hour standoff with Baltimore County police. They had a warrant for his arrest on rape charges.
“This can?t be my Albert Small,” Ross said Monday in court, representing his friend once more as he recalled his reaction that night. “This can?t be the man I?ve known.”
Ross pleaded with Circuit Judge John Turnbull to be lenient with Small, who pleaded guilty in August to raping at gunpoint a 16-year-old girl he knew and assaulting the police when he shot at them during the standoff days later.
Turnbull sentenced Small to life in prison.
“He wanted to do it,” prosecutor Jason League said, citing doctor?s reports and dismissing the notion that voices in Small?s head turned him into a rapist.
Ross said Small?s marital woes and the prospect of losing his home in a divorce devastated him that spring.
“I still can?t comprehend it,” Small said in court, standing in a wrinkled sports jacket. He had hoped an evaluating doctor would have “told me what happened,” why he attacked the girl, he said, but none did. “Please forgive me for my sin, what I?ve done wrong.”
Small had a pair of guns on him when police tracked him down early on May 16 in a Woodlawn strip mall, court documents say. They ordered him to set them down on the ground, which he did, but then he refused to step away. For five hours, they talked with Small, the documents say, before shooting him with a rubber bullet.
He crumpled when he was hit and grabbed his 9 mm pistol, whipping around and shooting at the officers before they finally grabbed him, the documents say.
