Blinded Justice

Let's pretend we are indeed a society of laws, that punishments fit the crimes, and there is a rational procedure for determination of guilt that doesn't allow for springing  loose or throwing the book at the defendant based on race, wealth, political clout, family ties, ideology, social associations, spurious, conjurable "mitigating" factors or anything else extraneous to the pure established facts.

And in a giant leap of pig-headed faith, let's persistently insist there is a reasonable expectation that true justice is consistently desired and mostly achieved at every stage in every jurisdiction and on all levels. And that there is an underlying spiritual integrity embedded in our laws, which are executed and upheld with incorruptible impartiality.

The degradation of law confesses itself in the trappings of justice, which has been bought and sold. But our robust yet mistaken faith regenerates like a lizard's tail.

Such is the need to believe in the handiwork of democratic institutions.

In the past, "thought crimes" were not actionable, even when abstractly "committed" to make casual conversation more colorful and perhaps vent frustration with the current scene, clearly without any fantasy of being carried out. Gradually, the bar of presumed innocence of intent was lowered to make it easier for individuals or the government to frame an outspoken person and intimidate and menace them into self-censorship to the point of self-betrayal, or else drive them into total silence. 

In the present, to accommodate and reflect our new golden age of intolerance, the line separating prosecution from persecution has been blurred, and the presumption of innocence has become the presupposition of culpability. 

Penalties for offenders convicted of the identical crime vary. They often receive more brutal or more charitable sentences based on the ideological leanings of the judge, sometimes as a tip of the hat to the mayor or governor, or to signal availability as a future candidate for public service.

They may parlay a judicial oath of public service into an implicit vow and signal of partisan loyalty. Servitude to a partisan party platform can be a gamechanger that cures stagnant careers.

We are catching up with many other nations, like the United Kingdom, where people are being arrested on the basis of speculation by a law enforcement analysis unit or algorithm, of being capable of harboring marginal ideas. Targeted victims need not have entertained, advocated, conceived, or even dreamed of any scheme.

Incompatible ideology is sufficient cause to ravage a freethinker's life.

With nearly the same accuracy that we can predict the rulings of judges, especially when there are ideological overtones, one can not only foretell who their patrons were who appointed them, but who fitted them for their ill-fitting black robes.

Judges have become laws unto themselves. 

In effect, they create laws by tapering findings to suit their prejudices. They are scholars of laws and rule, for the most part, only when the laws correlate with their personal philosophy. 

Their discretionary powers are a bag of tricks, some of them dirty.

Defense attorneys for murderers caught on camera with a hundred witnesses will count as a lucky break, the assignment of the case to a judge appointed by former Mayor Bill de Blasio. And prosecutors will view it as a jinx for the same reason.

This curiosity is observable on the state and federal levels also. No matter the issue or its complexity, any layman can predict the position that will be taken by U.S. Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Ketanji Brown Jackson on almost any issue. 

The actual legal arguments exist for show only. They must be presented in order to preserve the charade of the purity of justice.

That's proven by the blatant "judge shopping" that has become a standard operating procedure to thwart, for instance,  presidential executive orders. Certainly, there must be checks and balances, especially under the current administration, but that's not the point.

Once there has been precedent for abuse, it can never be disestablished.  It will stay dormant until reawakened for future weaponization against more enlightened leadership.  

There are so many federal judges whose ideological affinities are known that it is easy to find one who will do one's bidding.  Activists of all parties, who do their due diligence, know who's for sale and what their price is.

They will sign off on injunctions just like the "doctors" in television infomercials do with prescriptions for viewers seeking medications they might not otherwise be able to access, just to make the transaction legit. 

Chief executives, mayors, governors, presidents, all choose to be enforcers of the creeds of their parties. To stop Biden, his opponents knew exactly which federal judge to tap for a guaranteed favorable ruling, as do the antagonists of Trump when seeking an injunction against his excesses.

We do indeed have three "co-equal" or co-tainted branches of government, but "equal" in which respects and to what degree systemically tainted?  The most advanced computer does not have sufficient memory, acting like a landfill, to store all the dirt on our culture of electing legislators.  

Ever been stuck on a jury of a defendant's peers?

Most of us who have served on juries can attest to the travesty of selection as "peers" of the accused, as first described in the Magna Carta of 1216, and in the sixth amendment of our Constitution. The word "peer" is a misnomer by design. The sanitized modern version refers to fellow citizens. 

We are all peers under the law, but the body of peers consists of uneven classes.

The jury selection system, in New York at least, claims to treat all citizens the same and does not allow exemptions based on status. Ever been impaneled with a surgeon or CEO?

They belong to a unique peerage: those with an angle to escape civic responsibility.

Judges and lawyers interview prospective jurors for the declared purpose of rooting out prejudices and conflicts of interest. This is called Voir Dire. It's a French phrase, which gives it gravitas, like upscale neighborhoods where streets all have British sounding names like Devonshire, to enhance their market value. 

Attorneys for plaintiffs and defendants praise the honorable goal of this selection process, despite seeking and picking jurors more on the basis of who will likely be most advantageous to winning their case, than who will shepherd the vindication of the truth. 

Many are masters of probing, stroking and greasing. They pluck jurors from the pool as though they were sour balls or sweet corn in a candy store.

That's not their fault. It's the system, and it works well.

Except when it doesn't. Too bad there's no such thing as "voir dire," to weed out judges on the same grounds as potential jurors are eliminated from consideration. 

Recently, an NYPD sergeant, with a long and spotless performance history, made a split-second decision under freakish circumstances. He tried to stop a suspect who was filmed fleeing a cocaine-bust in which he had allegedly participated.

The sergeant claimed that the suspect, who was not wearing a helmet, was speeding in the direction of other officers who would have likely been injured. The sergeant hurled an ice cooler, striking the suspect, causing a fatal injury when he hit the curb with full force.

The suspect did not deserve to die. Any of his alleged actions and prior history are irrelevant to that fact.

The victim's family is tormented by the tragedy, and the sergeant will be haunted by his accursed snap judgment.

The sergeant's defense team shared with the Court many character references and petitions from his brothers and sisters in blue.  It also cited his agonized conscience, his childhood memories of the broken lives of his community and how they inspired him to serve in law enforcement.

Despite their poignancy, these should not, and were not, decisive in meting out society's retribution or the temperance of mercy. But guidelines, precedent and common sense should have mitigated the severe decree.

The judge's sentencing him to up to nine years in prison totally ignores many of the factors that he is supposed to consider.

By contrast, the same judge sentenced a defendant who had beaten a homeless man to death, to only nine months for manslaughter and other offenses, after reportedly intending to spare the criminal jailtime all together. Juxtaposed, these contrasting punishments suggest that something apart from respect for the rule of law may have been at play.

All the glory and folly of our laws boil down to interpretations of the intent and possibilities of our Constitution. If it is a living, not merely a static document, then the DNA anchored in its tenets has a lot of evolutionary work to do.