Senior Will Not Receive Diploma

Lowell House senior Brittany J. Smith ’09—one of two students linked to last month’s shooting in a Kirkland House entryway—will not receive her diploma at today’s Commencement exercises, the Boston Globe reported yesterday.

Smith is the long-time girlfriend of New York songwriter Jabrai J. Copney, 20, who last month pled not guilty to charges of first-degree murder for the May 18 shooting that led to the death of 21-year-old Cambridge resident Justin Cosby early the next morning.

After the incident, Copney and the two individuals accompanying him allegedly fled the scene and headed toward Lowell—where Smith lives—and met an unidentified witness, said Assistant District Attorney Daniel Bennett at Copney’s arraignment last month. Copney then told the witness, “there was a fight, and then a shooting,” Bennett said.

According to a Lowell resident who requested anonymity because they did not want their name associated with the incident, Harvard police officers stood outside Smith’s room the evening of the shooting and entered her room between 2 and 3 a.m. the next morning.

Lowell House Masters Diana L. Eck and Dorothy A. Austin said they could not comment on Smith’s status yesterday. Harvard spokesperson John D. Longbrake also declined to comment.

Smith was friends with Kirkland House resident Chanequa N. Campbell ’09, the other student who has been linked to the Kirkland shooting, said Campbell’s lawyer Jeffrey T. Karp.

Campbell’s diploma has also been withheld by the College, Karp said. Campbell received two letters from Harvard administrators on May 22 informing her she must leave campus and would not be allowed to participate in any graduation activities, according to Karp.

While Smith has kept mum about her potential involvement in the case and her relationship with Copney, Campbell has since taken part in interviews with multiple media outlets, challenging Harvard’s action and alleging that the University’s decision was motivated by bias. While she is not making an “overall claim of racism,” she told The Globe last week in an interview moderated by her attorney, “I do believe I am being singled out...I’m black and I’m poor and I’m from New York and I walk a certain way and I keep my clothes a certain way,” she said. “It’s something that labels me as different from everyone else.”

University spokesmen have also declined to comment on Campbell’s status, citing policy not to comment on any disciplinary action involving individual students.

Smith hails from the Harlem neighborhood of New York City, where she attended Frederick Douglass Academy in 2005. Smith could not be reached for comment yesterday.

—Staff writer Lauren D. Kiel can be reached at lkiel@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Laura G. Mirviss can be reached at lmirviss@fas.harvard.edu.