12 Not Particularly Angry Men (and women)

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Today I changed people’s lives.  Not in some conceptual “if a butterfly flaps its wings” way, but in a concrete, definitive way.  I stood up along with 11 other random strangers and affected the actual path along which people previously unknown to me will follow.

This came about with a simple, unwelcome notice in the mail.  Jury duty.  Ugh.  I’d been called before when I lived in Florida, but all I ended up doing was wasting a few hours sitting in a waiting area and being told I could leave.  As far as civic duty goes there are certainly more challenging activities.  The lesson I learned then was that I never wanted to become a part of the legal beast.  Frankly some of those that would ultimately represent “peers” to those facing the law were so remarkably (and by all appearances deliberately) ill informed that it seemed access to ANY sort of news was beyond their interest.  It was actually frightening to hear people expressing an intent to get things over as quickly as possible with no concern for the actual tenets of the law nor the impact on those they would judge.  Scary to think that for want of a bad decision there go I.

So the Superior Court [ed: is there an inferior one too?] summoned (pardon the phrase) and off I went.  Allow me to make a few observations as a layperson observing the process of law.  It’s slow.  No, it’s tediously, painfully, aggravatingly, exasperatingly and stunningly slow.  My daily work frequently involved contract negotiation and review.  I thought that was sort of similar to what lawyers must deal with.  No, it’s but a minimal fraction of the minutiae with which they fill their days.  How the judge and attorney refrain themselves from shouting “JUST GET ON WITH IT!!” is beyond me.  That was just during jury selection…a process in which every single prospective juror had to review a page full of questions out loud in open court.

A bit of context – this was no mass murdering, OJ caliber case.  It was a domestic violence incident between a couple that had actually become married in the meantime.  It was a days long process to literally discern what occurred in a matter of moments over a year before.  Those moments resulted in almost 40 people being fully vetted and subsequently being dismissed.  For whatever reasons the counsel had, I remained as juror #11.

The entire case, wrenching as it was, hinged on the admission of the defendant that he shoved the victim during a heated argument.  That was it – unwelcome physical contact on another.  The legal definition of domestic battery does not require malice nor intent to injure – just unwelcome contact and the involvement of law enforcement determining such contact occurred.  That’s it.  No injury need be sustained.  Not a single bruise left.  Just contact.

There was a lot of self examination in the jury room as we all considered if we had ever crossed that fine line.

But we were legally bound to follow the law and the bottom line was, he had done it.  He had become so exasperated at the pleadings of a woman, one that was so painfully naive and emotionally immature that she seemed more a kid than a wife, that he shoved her out of his way to cool off away from their home.

The thing that still troubles me is that he was her first love.  She had tried desperately to cover for him – inventing illogical stories about how her mother, someone else, ANYONE else had been the person she referred to in a 911 call and in her initial police report.  This was the guy she was married to and because she had called the cops he was facing deportation and who knows what other legal consequences.

Who knows because we don’t know.  Our role was simply to determine guilt or innocence and then leave.  So we left.  I don’t know if he received jail time or an anger management pamphlet.  All I do know is that poor kid left the courtroom just ahead of me.  Alone.  Weeping as her husband, maybe a truly bad guy or maybe a decent guy that had one moment of monumental stupidity, was standing up to hear his punishment.

We did the right thing, legally, but she was the victim of justice applied with due care and deliberation.

It’s not like in the movies at all.