Fallen Bibb campus officer being honored in Police Week memorial

Thirty-three years after Bibb County Board of Education police officer Euel Thomas Smith was shot to death protecting Central High School, the community is honoring his sacrifice.

Smith, a former Macon police officer, was slain April 22, 1983, while transporting a suspect thought to be selling drugs on campus.

The young father, said to be the nation’s first campus officer killed in the line of duty, becomes the 30th name added to the black granite monuments at Public Safety Memorial Park.

“It’s definitely an honor that’s due, because he served honorably in both of those capacities,” Bibb BOE police Chief Russell Bentley said Thursday. “He went above and beyond.”

Bentley, a former Macon police officer himself, served a couple of years with Smith.

“I remember we answered some calls together,” Bentley said. “He was a people person, very professional.”

Stephanie Prater, Bibb BOE deputy police chief, was in class in the 10th grade at Central High School the day Smith was killed. She calls him “one of the good guys.”

In 2013, Prater was instrumental in naming the campus police headquarters in honor of Smith’s sacrifice.

“It was just really sad,” Prater said. “He was always conscientious and friendly.”

Although the three downtown monuments are dedicated to Macon police officers, Bibb County sheriff’s deputies and firefighters, Law Enforcement Foundation Chairman Warren Selby Jr. said Smith’s friends and colleagues had long hoped he could be publicly honored there.

It seemed fitting to add Smith’s name to the marker of the disbanded police force, Selby said.

All Macon-Bibb County law enforcement officers and firefighters who died in the line of duty will be remembered in a memorial program Friday morning as part of National Police Week.

Bibb County sheriff’s investigator T.J. Freeman, who died in a May 5 car crash in pursuit of a suspect, also will be recognized in advance of his name being etched into the shiny, black stones in the park on Mulberry Street near Second Street.

The service will begin at 8:30 a.m. and will include the reading of the names of the 31 people who paid the ultimate sacrifice while serving the Macon-Bibb County community.

This story was originally published May 19, 2016 at 10:46 AM with the headline "Fallen Bibb campus officer being honored in Police Week memorial."