Fight the Powerless

Regardless of which version is closer to the truth, the encounter resulted in only a misdemeanor citation that afternoon. Ordinarily, it wouldn’t be newsworthy, but the incident spiraled into a bizarre legal and personality showdown, at times rivaling Rosie O’Donnell and Donald Trump for the most overheated feud spun out of virtually nothing. The attorney told implausible tales of a vengeful homeless man stalking him through Nashville, while the alleged aggressor suggested his accuser just might be a pawn in a large-scale effort to push the poor out of downtown.

For years defense attorney Tommy Longaberger lived at The Cumberland, an upscale condominium complex at 555 Church Street. Just across the street from this sleek 24-story high-rise, and clearly visible from Longaberger’s third-story window, sits a small swath of green space the homeless frequent.

It was at this park on the afternoon of Saturday, Nov. 24, 2004, that Steve Reiter, a 52-year-old homeless man, says he first met Longaberger.

Sitting by the fountain in the center of the park and sipping a cup of black coffee, Reiter says he looked up and saw “some guy lurking around the bushes taking pictures of me.” Understandably curious, Reiter approached the man to ask what he was doing. “I tapped him on the shoulder and he flipped out,” Reiter tells the Scene, saying he initially thought the man was homeless too. He jokes, “There are some of us who are crazy.”

The man with the camera was Longaberger, a DUI defense lawyer who maintains he was simply out taking pictures of the vibrant fall foliage. But a few snapshots introduced as evidence at trial—including a close-up of Reiter—clearly reveal he also was photographing the homeless.

And although Longaberger insists he wasn’t intentionally taking pictures of people that day, he admits that he frequently photographed and even videotaped the homeless from inside his condo. When asked why, he sounds like a sociologist, painting a sordid picture of fights and sex and drugs in the park below. In fact, he found the lives of the homeless in the park so fascinating that he even pitched it as a reality show to a Hollywood friend, but not surprisingly the proposal fell flat.

On the afternoon he ventured into the park with a camera, Longaberger claims Reiter came toward him “in a rage with fire in his eyes,” and that he shoved him three times. After the first push, Longaberger says he warned his assailant not to touch him again. Then he claims Reiter shoved him a second time while screaming out to those in the park, “Does anybody know this man?” Longaberger says that after being pushed a third time, he called 911.

“I was scared,” Longaberger tells the Scene, describing a scene reminiscent of Night of the Living Dead. “He was trying to incite the rest of the people in the park. I’ll never forget the look in his eyes.”

That’s when the attorney reached for his cell phone and called police. An officer responded and, after briefly speaking with Longaberger, cited Reiter for simple assault.

Although Reiter denies he did anything wrong, he called Longaberger a few days after the incident to clear up the misunderstanding. As soon as the lawyer realized who was on the line, Reiter claims he said, “See you in court,” then slammed down the phone.

Longaberger refused to drop the assault charge, but within a few months the District Attorney’s Office retired the case, a common course of action for nonviolent misdemeanors. This meant the case basically was in a holding pattern on the condition that Reiter stay away from Longaberger.

Both parties give starkly different accounts of what happened next.

In the spring of 2005, after the case had been retired, Longaberger says he looked out his window and saw Reiter staging a “protest” in the park. When asked to elaborate, the lawyer explains that all he saw was Reiter having an animated conversation with two or three other homeless people, none of whom were carrying signs. The meekest protest ever perhaps. Nevertheless, Longaberger called police, who arrived at the park and left a short time later without making any arrests.

“The protest to me was the first instance of stalking,” says Longaberger, who contacted the DA’s Office out of concern for his safety, but was told there was nothing illegal about congregating in a public place. Longaberger also claimed that Reiter persuaded his homeless cohorts to harass him and ultimately drive him out of downtown. He tells tales of poor people accosting him on the street calling him “lawyer boy” and “homeless hater.”