Judge Caprio Encounters a Defendant From His Past — Then Makes a Rare Decision

Detention Is Not Damnation

I’ve been on the bench longer than I care to count, and I’ve watched thousands of faces pass through my courtroom. Most of them blur with time. Which is why that Wednesday morning in 2025 still sits on my chest like a hand—steady, human, unforgettable.

It was 10:12 a.m. in Providence Municipal Court. We were moving through the docket—routine traffic matters, a few continuances, a failure to appear. The next case: 2025 TR-5541, City of Providence v. Anthony Duca—failure to maintain insurance; prior failure to appear. The file said $320 fine plus costs. It should have been a two-minute hearing.

A man stood at the defendant’s table, hands gripping the edge. His voice shook—not with anger, not exactly with fear—but with something closer to a door about to open.

“Your Honor,” he said, “don’t you remember me?”

My pen stopped over the docket. I raised my eyes and searched his face. Nothing came. I set the pen down. “I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “Should I?”

He exhaled. In that breath, I heard a coin flip between hope and heartbreak. “I thought maybe you would.”

My clerk, Ms. Bell, felt the room tilt. The assistant city solicitor, Ms. Newan, had already outlined the facts: a standard traffic case, missed hearing in August, the city requesting the fine and costs. Everything neat and tidy. Except the air had changed.

I addressed him. “Mr. Duca, you’re here without counsel?”

“I am,” he said. He understood the charge.

“Then why did you ask if I remember you?”

He shifted his weight. “Because I’m not just here for the ticket.”

“What are you here for?”

“To say thank you.”

The bailiff, Officer Romano, straightened. I reminded Mr. Duca that this was a courtroom, not a reunion; if he had something relevant to today’s matter, he should say it. He nodded. It was relevant, he said. It was why he hadn’t paid. Why he’d let the failure to appear stand. He needed to stand in front of me.

In all my years, I’d never had someone intentionally miss a traffic hearing to get back into my courtroom. It said something deeper than a violation code.

“How old are you?” I asked.

“Forty-two.”

“And I should remember you because…?”

“Because you sent me away in 1989,” he said. “I was fifteen. You said you believed I could change. I did. But I never thanked you.”

1989 was thirty-six years and another life ago. I asked Ms. Bell to search juvenile records: last name Duca, first name Anthony, Providence—1989.

Her fingers moved; the room held its breath.

Found. Case 1989 JV-00112. Defendant: Anthony Duca, age fifteen. Assault in the third degree. Disposition July 14, 1989.

Ms. Bell read the sentencing notes. I recognized my own handwriting—loops younger, certain, stubborn: “Defendant acted in defense of a sibling under circumstances suggesting provocation. Credible remorse observed. Detention is not damnation. Recommend residential rehabilitation with continued education track. Six-month review at completion.” My signature at the bottom like a bridge I didn’t know I’d built.

I looked up. “I don’t remember your face,” I said honestly. “But I remember writing those words.”

“You said something else that day,” he replied. “You said, ‘You’re better than your worst day. Don’t let anyone tell you different.’”

“Did it help?” I asked.

“It saved my life.”

Three words landed like a verdict and an absolution. What I thought was another fragile case in a long line had, for someone, been a hinge. A turning.

Ms. Newan shifted, ready to bring us back to insurance. I held up a hand. “What happened after 1989?”

He breathed in. He went to a program in Warwick—St. Anony’s. Six months became eight so he could finish junior year. He graduated high school in 1992. No further arrests. Community college. Hired by the city parks department. Twenty-one years on the job. Married. Two kids. A son, sixteen.

“Why now?” I asked.

“My boy,” he said. “He made a mistake trying to protect someone—like I did. The court gave him a choice: program or detention. We chose the program. At intake, they said their model came from a judicial recommendation in the late ’80s. I asked who. They looked it up. It was you.”

His voice caught. A program I’d once written into a judge’s notes for one kid had become a template. A system. Something bigger than my memory, still rippling through other lives—including his son’s.

I told him I was glad it helped. We still had to resolve failure to maintain insurance. He nodded. He would pay. He just needed me to know: I hadn’t just changed his life. I’d built a thing that was still changing lives.

I asked Ms. Bell if we had contact for his 1989 social worker. We did: Linda Perez, retired. Ms. Bell dialed, speaker on.

“Ms. Perez,” I said, “do you remember an Anthony Duca from a juvenile case in 1989?”

Paper rustled. Then: yes. Domestic incident. He intervened to protect a younger sister. The charge was technical. She’d recommended rehabilitation over detention. He graduated in 1992, no further juvenile contact. She’d written a closing summary recommending the record be sealed.

“He’s in my courtroom,” I said. “He came back.”

Silence. Then: “Tell him I’m proud of him.”

I did. His jaw tightened. He nodded once and said nothing—because sometimes silence is the most honest sound we have.

Ms. Newan rose. Given the record and unusual circumstances, the city would reduce the fine to $160 if paid today.

I raised a finger. “I haven’t asked for your recommendation yet.”

This deserved more than arithmetic.

“Mr. Duca,” I said, “why didn’t you write me a letter?”

He smiled sadly. He had. Fifteen times over the years. He never sent them. He thought I wouldn’t remember; if I didn’t remember, the letter wouldn’t matter.

“It would have,” I said.

“I needed to say it to your face,” he replied. “Some things you have to finish standing where they began.”

I understood.

I asked if we could reach his former probation officer, Robert Hughes. Retired, but we had a number. He remembered Duca immediately: good kid, tough home, came out solid, stayed clean. “He’s a worker,” Hughes said. “Tell him hello.” Decades later, the impression remained.

“Do you still have one of those letters?” I asked.

He did. He’d brought it. Officer Romano carried a worn fold of paper to the bench. The creases were white; the ink had softened with years. I read silently, then aloud.

“Dear Judge Caprio, you probably don’t remember me. I was fifteen. You sent me to a program instead of detention. You said I could change. Everyone else said I couldn’t. I’m writing to tell you you were right. I did change. I’m not asking for anything. I just wanted you to know. Respectfully, Anthony Duca.”

“When did you write this?” I asked.

“2003,” he said. Twenty-two years ago.

“You thought I wouldn’t care,” I said. “I would have.”

Judges almost never get to see what happens to the people we decide for. We make choices; we send hope into the future like a message in a bottle. Most bottles never come back. This one did.

I opened the current file. “The fine is $320,” I said. “But you’re not here to save money. You’re here to close a circle.”

I waived the fine. In exchange: one hundred hours of community service as a mentor at the Providence Youth Center, with monthly reports to the court. A two-page reflection at completion on second chances and memory in justice. No press, no interviews. If his name appeared in a story, he owed me the $320 and another hundred hours.

“Let the work speak,” I said. “Real change lives in quiet rooms.”

He agreed. Ms. Bell prepared the order.

Six months later, the reports became some of the most meaningful pages of my career. Month one: four sessions, sixteen hours—feedback: he listens without judging. Month two: thirty-two hours—he led a workshop on accountability; he told them what a judge once told him: you’re better than your worst day. Month three: fifty hours—he asked to bring his son; they co-led a session on family responsibility. Month four: sixty-eight hours—he helped with intakes; staff said he built trust fast. Month five: eighty-four hours—he submitted a draft reflection, honest and quiet. Month six: one hundred hours—closing remark: “You’re not your worst moment; neither was I.”

On August 5, 2025, he stood before me again. Three teenagers from the program sat behind him, uninvited but welcome. I told him he’d met and exceeded expectations. He said he simply showed up.

“That’s more than most,” I said. I held up his reflection. He’d written that for years he believed my forgetting his face meant the moment didn’t matter. Then he understood: what mattered wasn’t whether I remembered him. It was whether I remembered the principle that saved him.

“Justice is not perfect memory,” I told him. “It’s consistent principle.”

His obligation complete, I asked if he would keep volunteering. He’d already signed up for two nights a week. The three teens in the gallery? Program kids who wanted to “see what accountability looks like.” One—Marcus—raised his hand. “Mr. Duca told us you gave him a second chance. Now he’s giving us one,” he said. “We just wanted you to know.”

“Keep showing up,” I told him. “That’s how second chances work.”

Eighteen months later, the Youth Center renamed its mentorship program Second Chance Circle. Enrollment doubled. I added a memo to our new-judge training: “You will forget faces. Remember the principle. Detention is not damnation.”

The model spread to three other cities. The phrase “You’re better than your worst day” found its way onto a bulletin board where kids signed their names under it like a pact. Anthony never gave an interview. He never stood for applause. He showed up on Tuesdays and Thursdays, listened more than he talked. His son finished the program, graduated, enrolled in community college, then started volunteering beside his father.

Years later, near retirement, a reporter asked if I regretted not remembering Anthony’s face. I told them regret taught me something. Justice isn’t about remembering everyone who needed you. It’s about remembering why you chose to believe in them.

One morning, a package arrived with no return address. Inside: a framed photograph of Anthony, his son, and twelve teenagers in front of the Youth Center. A note taped to the back: “Your Honor, you asked if it helped. It did. It still does. Here’s proof. —Anthony Duca, 2028.”

We hung it in the judges’ breakroom. Beneath it, a small plaque: Memory fades. Principle endures.

New judges ask about the photo. Senior judges tell the story. The story travels, the principle travels with it.

Anthony never returned to my docket. His son never appeared in court. The cycle didn’t vanish. It was redirected—by a sentence written in a younger hand and a man who decided to carry it forward.

When I stepped down in 2029, I told the incoming judges: You will forget names. You will forget faces. But never forget this: the person in front of you is more than the worst thing they’ve done. Detention is not damnation. Mercy is not weakness. It is policy, if you’re brave enough to write it that way.

That Wednesday morning in 2025 taught me what the law looks like when it remembers its humanity. Thirty-six years separated a juvenile case and a traffic ticket. They were connected by a single principle—and by a man who walked back into my courtroom to close a loop that began with four words and became a tradition.

The fairest verdict is kindness. And sometimes, the cases we forget are the ones that remake the world.