Officers Robert Zabinski and Gary Slater and Detective Jo-Ann Paoline search for bullets or shell casings in the area where a shooting occurred in a tunnel under Union Station on March 7.

Journal file photo / Andrew Dickerman

PROVIDENCE — Last March, in broad daylight, one young man shot another in the pedestrian tunnel between the Bank of America skating rink and Waterplace Park. It was a violent incident more typical of the city’s outlying neighborhoods than of downtown.

The shooter, Johabanny Rosado, 20, of Providence, has now been hit with a 20-year prison sentence in gun court. And an ad hoc committee has been working since the spring on improving security in Kennedy Plaza.

One of the committee’s accomplishments is the city’s enactment three weeks ago of a loitering ordinance aimed at people hanging out at bus stops in the plaza and elsewhere. Committee members also are trying to maximize the use of public and private security cameras and improve lighting, among other steps.

Superior Court Judge Robert D. Krause, who presides over a court calendar informally called the gun court, has accepted a plea deal negotiated by state prosecutors and imposed a 40-year sentence on Rosado, with 20 years to serve at the Adult Correctional Institutions and 20 years suspended with probation.

Bystanders were startled in the late morning on March 7 when shots echoed in the tunnel. Rosado unexpectedly encountered Justin Lawrence, then 18, of Providence, with whom he had been feuding, and the defendant pulled a gun and fired multiple shots, according to law enforcement officials and court records. Lawrence was wounded in the back.

Michael J. Healey, spokesman for Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch, said a digital recording from a security camera in the tunnel showed Rosado preparing to shoot and then shooting Lawrence.

Confronted with that visual evidence, among other evidence, Rosado pleaded guilty to a variety of charges in three cases in what prosecutors call a “wrapped disposition.” He also admitted wrongdoing in cases in which he allegedly spat at a woman and threatened her and in which he delivered a small amount of cocaine to another man.

Rosado pleaded guilty, in the shooting, to assault with a dangerous weapon, a firearm; discharging a firearm and causing personal injury; and carrying a firearm without a license; in the drug case, to delivery of cocaine; and in the spitting case, to obstruction of a police officer. The latter charge related to Rosado having given the police one or more false names and dates of birth when he was arrested in an alleged simple assault against a woman at 645 Douglas Ave.

The state agreed to dismiss one of the felony charges related to the shooting and at least two other charges that had been pending against Rosado.

The fact that Rosado was convicted in 2006 of carrying a pistol without a license and firing in a compact area weighed against him when Krause imposed the sentence on Aug. 14, according to Healey.

“We think that this is an appropriately strong penalty against a young man who clearly was a menace to society,” Healey said. “Number two, we think it’s important that the public … see how quickly this case was disposed of …”

Healey credited the judge and Providence police Detective Sgt. Vincent Mansolillo and Detective Michael J. Fallon for their contributions in satisfactorily resolving the case.

While the tunnel camera — owned and maintained by the Rhode Island Foundation — produced an adequate video of Rosado, the images of Lawrence were shadowy, Healey said. The foundation has agreed to upgrade the camera technology and boost the illumination inside the tunnel, according to Frank LaTorre, director of public space for the Providence Downtown Improvement District.

It was LaTorre and Lt. Michael Figueiredo, commander of police district 1, who created the Greater Kennedy Plaza Security Committee, an ad hoc committee that, in effect, is a spinoff of the Downtown Security Network. The Downtown Security Network is a coalition of the police and private and quasi-public security forces dedicated to enhancing public safety and co-chaired by LaTorre and Figueiredo.

LaTorre said there was a need for a subgroup to concentrate on the plaza, which is defined by the surrounding streets: Exchange Terrace, Dorrance and Washington Streets and Exchange Street. Besides representatives of the police and the improvement district, the committee members include, among others, representatives of the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority; social-service agencies that serve individuals who tend to populate the plaza, and owners of real estate that bound the plaza.

Although the plaza security committee had its first meeting the month after the tunnel shooting, the discussion of having a subgroup to enhance plaza security predated the shooting, according to LaTorre.

Making the most of security cameras in and around the plaza that are controlled by RIPTA and private parties is one of the committee’s aims. Quality-of-life issues, not just serious crime, are the concern.

For example, the police have the capability of viewing at least three non-police cameras through a monitor in their substation on the plaza. One morning Sgt. George Smith was watching the monitor and saw a man urinating in a nearby alley named Arcade Street. The police arrested Dennis J. Brooks, 53, of 47 Pine St., Central Falls, who has a considerable criminal record, and charged him with disorderly conduct.

Brooks appeared in Municipal Court Tuesday, where he asked Judge Joseph Abbate for leniency and said he had to relieve himself in the alley because the restroom in the bus station at the plaza was closed.

“It wasn’t as if I was at the park near [the statue of] General Burnside, urinating,” Brooks said.

Abbate ordered the case to be held in abeyance for six months, meaning that if Brooks is not arrested again in that time, the charge will be dismissed.

The committee, to maximize the visibility of uniformed personnel, has coordinated the scheduling of the police and park rangers; has prevailed on Johnson Controls, which owns 100 decorative streetlights in the plaza, to replace burned-out bulbs; is studying the addition of decorative lighting in dimly lit spots; and has lent assistance to the city program to step-up activities to enliven the plaza and to crowd out undesirable habitués with money-spending visitors.

Committee members, including Sergeant Smith, also lobbied the City Council and Mayor David N. Cicilline to enact a loitering ordinance. Figueiredo said the existing state loitering statute is antiquated and that when the police have brought statute violations to District Court, the cases have not been given satisfactory attention.

The new ordinance is not meant to target the young people who crowd the plaza in the morning and afternoon to catch buses to and from school, but older people “who hang around all day” and cause trouble, Figueiredo said.

The law says that an offender shall be subject to a fine of $5 to $100 if that person “shall loiter or remain about in any bus terminal or platform, or at bus stops designated by the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority (RIPTA), or on the grounds adjoining any bus stop terminal, after being requested to leave by any officer or agent of the company operating or using the facilities …”

“There really shouldn’t be loitering, open drinking [of alcohol],” LaTorre said. “It’s a place to go get your bus.”

Efforts to improve the perception and reality of safety at the plaza and throughout downtown are nothing new. It was one of the primary goals in the founding of the four-year-old improvement district.

The district has safety teams and clean teams who wear bright yellow shirts for high visibility, and members of the former have been instrumental in helping the police keep order. Although the safety team members’ primary functions are to serve as ambassadors to the public and as eyes and ears for the police, the unarmed team members nevertheless have been involved sometimes in solving crimes and apprehending suspects.

This year, for example, safety team members helped a private security guard detain a purse-snatching suspect and helped the police to locate a customer who ran out on a bill at Blake’s, reported Frank Zammarelli, director of operations in Providence for Block by Block, a company that provides cleaning services and safety patrols to improvement districts.

In other cases in 2007, safety team members witnessed an assault of a 15-year-old pregnant girl in a parking lot and facilitated the suspect’s arrest, in February; physically helped the police to arrest someone who had assaulted a bouncer and a policeman at Lupo’s, in April; helped to find a lost boy, in August; pointed the police to a thief who had taken items from a parked car, in December; and discovered a fire in a large trash bin.

Zammarelli, a retired Providence policeman, recalled yesterday his own involvement two years ago in the pursuit and apprehension of a man who had used a sword to intimidate the proprietor of the 7-Eleven store on Weybosset Street.

With the police having joined the chase, Zammarelli used his official vehicle to cut off and halt the suspect’s car.

Referring to a comprehensive effort by the city and the improvement district to invigorate the plaza with planned activities, better lighting and security, and more flowers, among other steps, LaTorre said, “It’s about welcoming people to this area. … It’s the heart and soul of the city, truly a gathering place …”

gsmith@projo.com