Shootings renew mayor's sense of purpose

Newark's young mayor went to bed around midnight that Saturday, after a jam-packed day: At an elementary school reunion, he'd danced as Melba Moore crooned for her old classmates. He'd stopped in at a basketball tournament for teens living in public housing, a job fair, an anti-violence rally, even a couple of neighborhood block parties.

But a few hours after he dozed off, Cory A. Booker's BlackBerry started beeping.

The news shook him. Four young people shot. Three dead.

It angered him. On a school playground. Gunshots to the head.

And it renewed a sense of purpose for the Rhodes scholar and Yale Law graduate who has led struggling Newark for just over a year.

"In times of crisis," he says, "you can either have breakdowns or break apart, or you can forge strength."

Crime, drugs, gangs and violence have become entrenched in Newark's fabric, which Booker has vowed to change. But the latest murders, the execution-style shooting of three college students, has thrust him into a harsher spotlight, unlike one that usually presents him as the harbinger of a brighter future for the downtrodden city.

When Booker bounded into City Hall 13 months ago, he implored Newark residents to hold him accountable and promised crime would be his top priority. The overall crime rate has declined, but the number of killings, 61, is almost as many as during the same period last year. The city's homicide rate has increased 50 percent in the last decade to a total of 106 last year.

Booker, 38, is held to a higher standard than his predecessors when it comes to fighting crime in Newark, partly because he himself set the bar so high. He tackles the culture of crime like the diligent student he has always been, who puts in the extra time and effort to ace an exam.

But Newark's daily challenges are like no other test he has faced.

His unbridled optimism plays out differently in corners of Newark and beyond; he's perceived as a new hope to some and as insincere to a small but noisy group trying to get him recalled and personally blaming him for the violence.

As the mayor struggles to move Newark forward, he accepts responsibility.

"I need help," Booker said at a news conference last week to announce new high-tech police cameras and gunshot detectors. "I cannot get this job done alone."

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Booker was born in Washington, D.C., and the family moved to the north Jersey suburb of Harrington Park when his father earned a promotion. Both parents worked as executives at IBM and helped to integrate the company.

To ensure that they could buy their home, a white couple posed as Booker's parents.

Cary and Carolyn Booker instilled the values of respect and hard work.

"You've got to give 110 percent," said Carolyn Booker, who now lives with her husband in suburban Atlanta.

Cory Booker, their youngest of two sons, left New Jersey for California, where he earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Stanford University and played football.

"He has a wonderful curiosity," said Donald Kennedy, a former Stanford president and a close friend of Booker's. "He likes explanations for unexpected relationships between events or things or between people."

After a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford University and law school degree from Yale, Booker had a decision to make. Peers with similar pedigrees took high-paying jobs on Wall Street or with big law firms. Booker moved to Newark, taking a $31,000-a-year public interest fellowship, where he worked on housing issues.

He moved to Brick Towers, a public housing project, and was soon elected city councilman.

Booker first ran for mayor in 2002 against Sharpe James, a political boss who had run the city since 1986 and was indicted last month on federal corruption charges.

Booker, the lighter-skinned of the two black Democrats, was called a "white boy" and accused of taking donations from the Ku Klux Klan.

James won by 3,500 votes, but the rough-and-tumble campaign became the subject of an Oscar-nominated documentary, "Street Fight," and brought national attention to Booker.

It has also fueled skepticism. Some critics say he couldn't relate to their struggles because he grew up in a north Jersey suburb. They wonder why someone with a golden resume would choose Newark, suggesting he's using the mayor's job only as a path to higher office.

Kennedy dismisses the idea: "It's a job that ambitious people seeking higher office would never pick."

After Booker won in landslide last May (James decided not to run), the spotlight glared even brighter. He has appeared on Oprah Winfrey's show, accepted campaign contributions from her, Steven Spielberg and Chris Rock, and has chatted with former New York Giants star Tiki Barber about economic development in Newark. In May, Barack Obama happily accepted the young mayor's endorsement for president.

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Newark, New Jersey's largest city, has a reputation as a poor, dangerous place, where deadly riots 40 years ago killed 26 people.

Booker sees a different Newark: For example, while many lament the dollar stores and boarded up storefronts in the central business district, he sees the potential for major retail outlets.

And there are signs of progress. This fall, the New Jersey Devils will open a new arena downtown, blocks from an upscale refurbished Art Deco apartment building with valet parking and the decade-old New Jersey Performing Arts Center.

Booker is determined to make sure that killings don't define the city for decades to come.

"This response in the days and weeks and months afterward will be seen as a defining moment for our city," he has said.

If tackling the city's crime problem sounds like a tall order, people who know Booker best say he's up to the challenge.

"He stood out among the geniuses and Olympians at Stanford," says Mark Oldman, a former classmate who said he wouldn't be surprised to see Booker run for the U.S. Senate, or even president, one day.

But meanwhile, can one single mayor really make a difference?

"There's no quick fix. These are long-term social investments," says Andrew Karmen, a professor of sociology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, noting that the mayor can crack down on crime or tackle its social roots.

Previous Newark mayors haven't been as ambitious as Booker, says Clement Price, a historian at the Newark campus of Rutgers University and a longtime resident.

"Newark in terms of mayors has been a minimalist city: take care of the basic stuff, clean the streets, collect the trash, provide minimal law enforcement," he said.

Minimalist isn't Booker's way. Except in this sense: He repeats a mantra about the power of one.

"One person, when they join with others, can accomplish impossible things," Booker says.

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Booker sees the youth of Newark as the key to its promising future, and seems to be trying to combat city's problems one kid at a time.

He spends a lot of time talking and making friends with teens, using his athletic cred (the 6-foot-3 mayor was a tight end at Stanford) and his tech savvy (he's a relentless text-messager).

He actively pushes policies aimed at helping teens. For example, early one morning just before classes let out for the summer, he showed up outside a high school.

"You looking for a job, man?" he asked the arriving students. Wearing a suit and tie, he handed out applications for summer work. And he offered jokes, banter, even advice _ like this comment to a 16-year-old wearing a long white T-shirt hanging out over his jeans:

"You need to wear a collared shirt. It's all about presentation. People make snap judgments. You gotta show them you're dressed for success."

The mayor seems to understand he's a role model for young folks _ showing up to work early, staying late, working hard, earning good grades.

He told other students that they must get a physical from the school nurse before they'll get a job.

"You know Olivia Newton John?" he asked to confused looks. "When I was younger that was a big song, 'Let's Get Physical.'"

The youngsters didn't understand the reference.

"Get the physical," he told them. "Go on iTunes and find out who Olivia Newton John is."

Booker often makes references to '80s pop culture. On the city's Web site, residents can download a video of him talking about income tax credits, which he says his staff begged him not to film. He mentions Donna Summer's hit song, "She Works Hard for the Money."

A goofy side of Booker emerges.

"I'm a little bit of a dork, a cornball," he later admits.

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Booker has the ability to weave back and forth between worlds _ erudite and silly, wealthy and poor, black and white.

He's comfortable giving an interview to Charlie Rose. He's also at home preaching, or giving powerful orations at this month's funerals of the slain three college students.

Though he usually dresses like the investment banker he could have easily become, he showed up at the opening of a recreation center this summer without a tie. He looked sleek and GQ-like with a light blue shirt and dark suit.

He made his way through the crowd, hugging people, later sparring with kids in the boxing ring and hamming it up with ex-champ Joe Frazier and promoter Don King. (King later said Booker has the potential be the champion of the world.)

Even though Newark is a city of 280,000 people, it often seems like a small town when Booker walks around. Booker is like a rock star, recognized on the streets.

He was stopped as he walked out of the recreation center by Francis Nunez, a 15-year-old who creates podcasts for a show, "YOPAT."

He recorded a snippet: "My name is Cory and that's my story."

A little later, Jonathan Weems approached, wanting Booker to help him find a job. Weems was just released from prison after serving 13 years and 8 months for robbery.

Booker took a cell phone and dialed Kirsten Girardi, who heads an agency that places ex-offenders.

The mayor's black SUV Ford Expedition was idling, and he was late for a meeting with the provost of the Newark campus of Rutgers. As lights and sirens went off to make way for his vehicle, he left Girardi a message.

"It's Cory Booker," he said, giving quick details about Weems. "He's a great candidate for violent offenders. He just got home and is desperate for help."

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On the Friday night before the schoolyard shootings, Booker was at the movies seeing Harry Potter with a few teenagers. And there's another Booker story in that: These kids had made threats against him shortly after he took office. His response: He asked to meet them and became a mentor.

Life would change dramatically for Booker a night later when his Blackberry awoke him with news of the shootings.

Four young friends were attacked in a schoolyard. The three who died were forced to kneel against a wall and were then shot in the head. The fourth survived and helped identify suspects.

Booker quickly set up a mini-command center in his apartment. He visited the crime scene several times and jumped into the case as if he were lead investigator.

Three people have been arrested _ two unidentified 15-year-olds and 28-year-old Jose Carranza, who was free on bail after being charged with assault and child rape. Authorities also have obtained a warrant for a 24-year-old man and are searching for two other juveniles.

In a strange twist of events, Carranza surrendered directly to Booker. Barely concealing his anger, Booker said he had nothing to say to the suspect.

"I don't think words can describe the level of emotion I feel about what these individuals have allegedly done to these families and what they have done to our community," Booker said.

Today, a few weeks after the killings, Booker's optimism is back on display.

"If anything, I see the way our city has responded to this crisis," he says, "and it gives me more hope, in the strength, the spirit and the potential of Newark."