Judge in School Case Called 'Decisive, Hard-Working'

Peter J. Messitte

By Lisa Frazier
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 19, 1997; Page B04

Even though he was just two months shy of 13, Peter J. Messitte understood the significance of that historic day in 1954 when the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed racially segregated public schools.

Now, 43 years later, he finds himself at the center of a debate over ending a 25-year effort aimed at desegregating schools.

The 56-year-old federal judge in Greenbelt is presiding over the trial that will determine whether Prince George's County, the largest school district in Maryland, has done enough to integrate its classrooms and eliminate the discriminatory policies and practices of the past.

In the end, Messitte will decide whether to lift a 25-year-old court order, which would free the school system from mandatory busing and send children to schools closer to their neighborhoods. He joins the legion of judges throughout the country who have examined the issue in recent years, many of whom have released school districts and the governmental bodies that finance them from court orders that critics claim are outdated and irrelevant.

"This obviously is an important case, and it goes beyond anything a judge is going to decide," Messitte said in a recent interview. "The future of the county is at stake."

Those who know Messitte say he is an intellectual, thoughtful and fair judge who has shown an aptitude for handling sensitive cases.

In 1992, Messitte convicted a white Montgomery County police officer, Christopher J. Albrecht, of involuntary manslaughter for shooting an unarmed black woman. Although Albrecht's attorneys argued that his gun fired accidentally, Messitte said police must be held accountable to the people they protect. His decision defused a racially charged atmosphere, observers said.

"He was very careful," said Roscoe Nix, a former Montgomery school board member and chairman of the county's NAACP. "He sentenced the man to jail, but at the same time, he said there was no malice involved. Most of us knew with him handling the case, he would be fair."

Messitte knows that the Prince George's school board and the county government, both defendants in the case, agree that mandatory busing should end. But the school board and the NAACP want Messitte to maintain at least partial supervision over the school system.

School officials also hope that Messitte will order the county to finance new and renovated neighborhood schools. The county wants Messitte to end his involvement, with no strings attached.

All three parties say that they are negotiating and that they may reach a settlement in the case before Messitte issues a ruling.

At least once in the past, Messitte helped mediate a settlement between the opposing parties in a potentially divisive case scheduled to go to trial before him.

As a Circuit Court judge in Montgomery County in 1992, Messitte was specially chosen to handle a civil rights lawsuit filed in Frederick County on behalf of African Americans who said the police department in Frederick discriminated against them. He participated in meetings and telephone conferences with the opponents in the case, who decided to settle before the trial. The police department agreed to sensitivity training and affirmative action hiring.

"I regard my participation in the settlement process as one of the most significant things I have done as a lawyer or judge," Messitte wrote in a questionnaire he completed before his confirmation as a federal judge.

Messitte, who was born in Washington, was just 4 years old when his parents moved to Chevy Chase. His father, who died in 1970, was a "New Deal" lawyer and administrative law judge. "My father was a very patient, very fair man," Messitte recalled. "With him, your opinion counted."

His mother, now 80, was a science writer for the National Institutes of Health and a more "gregarious sort," the one who often pushed him "to be a man of action," Messitte said.

Messitte and his siblings attended public schools, which were mostly segregated at the time. His decision to pursue a career in public service was influenced greatly by the keynote speaker at his 1959 graduation from Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School, a young senator from Massachusetts named John F. Kennedy.

"I think we felt with Kennedy, government was a good thing, government was there to help, government was concerned about the least advantaged in society," Messitte said. "The place to be if you wanted to make a difference was in government. It was all part of the JFK spirit."

After graduating from Amherst College and the University of Chicago Law School, Messitte spent two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and learned to speak Spanish and Portuguese fluently. He returned to Chevy Chase and spent the next several years as a trial lawyer.

Messitte began dabbling in politics, working mostly on campaigns behind the scene. When he was about 40, Messitte began thinking about becoming a judge. "I wasn't a rough-and-tumble legislator. That's not how I saw myself," Messitte said. "And I wasn't really a trial lawyer in combat."

Twice passed over by the governor for appointments to the local bench, Messitte took the unusual step in 1982 of running against four circuit court judges. Messitte lost resoundingly, but then-Gov. Harry R. Hughes appointed him to the court to fill a vacant seat in 1985.

Messitte began eyeing the federal bench, but he figured the chances of a Republican president appointing him were slim. Then came Bill Clinton.

"Suddenly, it looked like Clinton could win this thing," Messitte said. "I thought 'Whoa, there may be a future for me.' "

Messitte was celebrating his 30th class reunion at Amherst in 1993 when he learned that Clinton had nominated him for the federal bench. Sen. Paul S. Sarbanes (D-Md.) tracked him down at the reunion and called him to deliver the news.

"It was a thrill for all of us who knew Peter well," said Jim Thompson, a trial lawyer in Rockville, former president of the Montgomery County Bar Association and a high school classmate of Messitte's. "He's a very decisive, hard-working, even-tempered man."

Among lawyers, Messitte is known as a perfectionist who is sometimes fanatical about procedure -- sometimes to the annoyance of those who end up in his courtroom.

But Helen Louise Hunter, Messitte's longtime law clerk, said no one drives himself harder than her boss.

"Before he publishes an opinion, it is not unusual for him to go through 16 or 17 drafts," she said. Messitte declined to discuss the Prince George's desegregation case but said he will give it careful consideration.

"I think most people understand that as a federal judge you apply the law as best you can and try to come up with the best result," Messitte said. "You should be able to defend intellectually the decision you make. . . . Beyond that, I don't know how much more can be asked."

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