Jury Verdicts, Apologies, Kangaroos, and Perfection — Random Introspections from a Missouri Attorney
Along with my bankruptcy practice here in the St. Louis area, I am a trial attorney. In most cases, I represent people who have been accused by the government (either the State of Missouri or the federal government) of committing a crime. Someone once told me that I should lose every case. I argued with him again and again until one day it hit me: maybe, in a warped sort of way, he’s right. Maybe I should lose every case! That is, if the government is always right. After all, it is the government that accuses people of breaking the law, and surely no one is supposed to question the government, are they? And so, I pose this question:
Does anyone want to go on record stating that “the government is always right”?
In a Perfect World…
Ahh, the idea of a perfect criminal justice system. In such a system, only the guilty would be charged with a crime, and only those the government could prove guilty would be prosecuted. That’s right, isn’t it? I mean, these ideas of the presumption of innocence and the burden of proof come from somewhere, don’t they? Or is it that, in a perfect system, the government would never fail, and everyone who commits a crime would be held responsible? Or maybe, in a perfect system, we would never accuse someone of something they didn’t do and would only jail people who truly deserved to be locked up. So why don’t we just build a perfect system, save the taxpayers a ton of money, put criminal defense attorneys out of work, and free up judges’ time for more important things like tea, crumpets, golf, and tort reform?
Twelve Out of Twelve
Remember the Casey “Anthawhoever” trial? The trial itself barely caught my attention. What caught my attention were the thousands of comments, emails, TV one-liners, online posts, and the outrage over the not-guilty verdict.
Here we had a government-run system, built on the laws of our land, and people were just stunned. Hate mail ensued, pundits roared, Facebook posts flew (and no, I won’t give the link to Facebook), tweets were tweeted, and emails jammed the airwaves, or whatever it is that they jam. Everyone looking for a “safe” cause had one for a few days. All the same, 12 random citizens who swore to uphold the law made a unanimous decision. Any one of them could have stopped it. Twelve out of twelve agreed. That’s amazing! In what realm do we ever see 12 out of 12 people agree on anything, especially when the government gets involved?
Now, in a perfect world, if she did it, the system would have worked, and she would have been convicted and possibly fried. And if she didn’t, she never would have been put through all of that. Of course, in a perfect world, maybe there wouldn’t be a real trial at all, just a kangaroo court that rubber-stamps whatever the government says, like in a totalitarian state… “Wait a minute, that’s not a perfect world; that’s a very imperfect world.”
As it stands, no one knows what really happened.
Trials don’t determine what happened. Trials determine whether the government made its case.
Many people cannot accept the decision of the impartial jury of peers who sat through the entire trial. And there’s a bunch of people really pissed off because she didn’t fry, complaining about the system because the Nancy Graces of the idiot box told them to. “How dare you go free, Tot Mom!” “Outrage, I tell ya, just plain wrong!”
Why I Won’t Lose Every Case
Hence, I’m forever puzzled. I like my job, though at times it makes me very unpopular. I’m convinced that our system of justice is the best the world has ever seen, but it’s still prone to human error. I won’t lose every trial, because not every trial is one where the state can prove its case. Sometimes the state can’t, because my client simply didn’t do it. In those cases, the government got it wrong, and the people spoke up to protect my client.
I’ve never really won a criminal jury trial. I’ve had plenty of juries find my client “Not Guilty,” which some, I suppose, would call a win. Perhaps it’s better to think of it as: the people have ruled, and “government,” again, you were wrong!
No, perhaps in a perfect world, I wouldn’t lose every time. In a perfect world, there wouldn’t be a need for my services, because there would be no crime at all. That said, I’ll gladly quit my job when the government gets accusations perfect, but I don’t see that ever happening. Until then, I’ll keep pointing out why they are not always right and letting the people decide when, once again, they’ve gotten it wrong.
Side Note: Nobody Ever Says Sorry
Ya know, no one ever apologized to my clients after a not-guilty verdict. “Um, sorry man, we charged you with a terrible crime, but apparently you didn’t do it, just like you told us before we put you in jail, and the people of the land told us we were wrong too, yeah, sorry ’bout that.” Just sayin’! Funny the things we’ll apologize for. Just today, I apologized for not holding the door for the guy behind me at the Quickie-Mart. He was slightly inconvenienced by having to grab for the handle, and I felt sort of dumb for not swinging it wider so he could catch it. But then again, he wasn’t accused by our government, so it was socially acceptable to apologize to him for being slightly wrong.
So, About That Jury Summons…
Now, the next time that slip comes in saying you’re up for jury duty, weasel out of it, don’t show, skip it, or call in sick, because as we know, the government never gets it wrong. They’re always right. If the government says a fella committed a crime, he must have done it. Let the guy fry! And stop complaining about the government, politicians, or taxes, because the government is always right.
Or, in the alternative, show up and go see for yourself: how did the government do this time?
“Throw the witch in the water, and if she drowns, well, then she’s not a witch after all, and they were wrong.”
Charged with a crime in St. Charles County or St. Louis? The government isn’t always right, and you deserve a lawyer who makes them prove it. Call Markwell Law at 636-486-1093, or see the serious felony cases I’ve tried.
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