THE SEARCH FOR JUSTICE
I know that many of you are as tired of hearing about Judge Kavanaugh. Especially now that he has been confirmed by the Senate. The fight is not over, however. If the Democrats win the House and Senate in November they will try to impeach him along with president Trump. There is no one who believes in justice more than I do. No matter who you are nobody is above the law. If Kavanaugh had been brought before a criminal court for the crime of attempted rape, which could still happen, he could not be convicted without evidence proving his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. With the lack of hard evidence this case would not even have made it to a Grand Jury. I know a little something about sexual assault. As the parent of a seven year old child who was sexually assaulted by a thirty three year old man there is no way that I want to see a person guilty of such a crime go free. In our case the justice system failed us. The man plead guilty and instead of killing him I put my trust in the judicial system. After two years of prosecution the man received a sentence of thirty days in jail to be served on weekends at his convenience. This is all he got for robbing a seven year old girl of her precious innocence. This predator has molested multiple children since. Some children came forward and some didn't. As a result he has spent some time in prison but a man like this should never again see the light of day. This is where the justice system fails us as a society.
In January 1986 I was called for jury duty in Rutherford County Tennessee. I mostly sat on civil trials and two criminal trials. On one trial involving an attempted murder I was an alternate. The other was rape trial and we were sequestered. Which basically means that we were under house arrest for three long tiring days. They put us up in a hotel room. When we traveled it was either in the back of a patrol car or a paddy wagon. A sheriff deputy guarded us when we ate in a restaurant because we were not allowed to speak to anyone that wasn't on the jury. Our jury consisted of ten men and two women. I shared a hotel room with a juror who I had been friends with for years. During the jury selection process I never expected to be chosen as a juror because of what had happened to my daughter. They initially asked the pool of jurors if any of us had personally been affected by a rape or sexual assault. I had to tell them about my daughters experience. The lawyer representing the accused asked me many personal and intense questions about what had happened to my daughter. It was one of the most grueling experiences that I have ever endured and I thought that it would never end. The lawyer kept repeating the same question over and over toward the end. Are you capable of giving this man a fair trial? I finally looked him straight in the eye and told him that I would not send an innocent man to prison. This seemed to satisfy him and he ended the questioning. I was shocked when I found out that I had been chosen to sit on this jury.
For three solid days beginning early in the morning until late at night I heard the District Attorney for Rutherford County present the states evidence against the accused. The state admitted from the start that all of it's evidence was circumstantial. Circumstantial evidence, however; can be used to convict a criminal as long as the evidence is overwhelming. You cannot convict a suspect of a crime in a criminal trial unless you are sure beyond a reasonable doubt. The suspect was a White male and somewhat overweight. As I heard the details of the rape I wanted whoever was guilty of this crime to go to prison for a long time. A young woman had been brutally raped. The rapist entered her trailer while she lay sleeping on a couch and was terrified as she woke up feeling the weight of a strange man pressing heavily down on her body. From that point on he repeatedly raped and sodomized her. After each time that he raped her anally, without a condom, he would force her to perform oral sex on him. He had a weapon but I can't remember if it was gun or a knife. The trailer was dark and the woman admitted that she never saw his face. There were various forms of evidence collected at the scene by police but the case hinged on two things. The woman claimed that the man had a large scar next to his navel and he was wearing a blue fleece lined denim jacket.
I sat and listened as the woman and several police officers stated under oath that the suspect had a large scar right next to his navel. There was a drawing of the scar and it's location on a chalkboard. When each person was asked to point out the location of the scar they all confirmed that the location of the scar on the chalkboard was correct. The defense called the suspect to the front of the courtroom and asked him to raise his shirt. There was no scar. The lawyer then asked him to lower his pants. He had a scar but it was on his hip and not on his stomach. The defense then produced the blue denim jacket and asked the man to put it on. In the mug shot taken on the day he was arrested the suspect was obviously much bigger at the time. He had lost a lot of weight since his arrest. When the man tried on the coat it was way too small on him. The suspect testified on the stand that the coat belonged to his brother who was much smaller. At the end of the second day the prosecution and defense rested. The case was then turned over to us for deliberation. After much deliberation eight jurors wanted to convict the man of rape. One of which was my roommate and friend. Four of us voted to acquit. Besides myself there was a C-130 pilot who had horrible burn scars on one whole side of his face. I never asked him how he got the scars but I assumed that he had been a crash. He also told me how he had successfully landed a C-130 at Pope AFB in North Carolina after three of his four engines shut down in a violent thunderstorm. This is the only known instance where a C-130 was able to stay in the air for any length of time on one engine and make a successful landing. The only two women on the jury also voted to acquit. One was the mother of a friend to my son Robbie.
We wanted someone to be held accountable for this crime but the state was not able to convince the four of us beyond a reasonable doubt. The jury became hopelessly deadlocked and tempers flared. We finally approached the judge and informed him that we could not come to a decision. He called a recess for the night and we were transported back to our rooms. My roommate was so angry at me that he asked to be moved out of my room. We never spoke much after that trial. The next morning a mistrial was declared and the suspect went free. As myself and one of the woman jurors walked into the judges chamber to retrieve our jackets the judge was sitting at his desk. He asked why we voted to acquit. I told him that I thought the states case was weak and the lady juror agreed with me. The judge revealed that the state did not even know about the mans brother. The brother, it was discovered, had a long criminal record while the accused had no criminal record at all. With this information I felt vindicated. The moral of this story is that I hate criminals that get off too lightly or are not forced to suffer the consequences of their crimes. People like Hillary and Bill Clinton, Eric Holder, Susan Rice. Barack Obama, and Ted Kennedy just to name a few. I hate injustice of any kind and it angers me when an innocent person is wrongly charged or convicted. I don't care if that person is White, Black, Hispanic, Asian, rich, poor, Democrat, Republican, homosexual or whatever. Everyone deserves justice.
If you are guilty you should be held accountable but a person should be innocent until proven guilty. The Kavanaugh accusers in most cases are the same people that treated the Bill Clinton accusers like whores during the 1990's. If the Democrats had stood up for these women then I would be more sympathetic to the # Me Too movement now. I believe with all my heart that the ultimate target of all of this activity we are seeing today is Donald Trump. The Democrats are so determined to get Trump that they are willing to sacrifice a few of their own in the process. Such as Les Moonves of CBS news, Harvey Weinstein, Morgan Freeman, Tom Brokaw, Stan Lee of Marvel Comics, James Levine of the Metropolitan Opera, Matt Lauer of NBC news and Al Franken. They see Trump as vulnerable in the area of sexual assault and the # Me Too movement is a strategy to bring about his downfall. I am for justice but being able to destroy someone based on a charge that cannot be backed up with hard evidence is nothing but mob rule.
In January 1986 I was called for jury duty in Rutherford County Tennessee. I mostly sat on civil trials and two criminal trials. On one trial involving an attempted murder I was an alternate. The other was rape trial and we were sequestered. Which basically means that we were under house arrest for three long tiring days. They put us up in a hotel room. When we traveled it was either in the back of a patrol car or a paddy wagon. A sheriff deputy guarded us when we ate in a restaurant because we were not allowed to speak to anyone that wasn't on the jury. Our jury consisted of ten men and two women. I shared a hotel room with a juror who I had been friends with for years. During the jury selection process I never expected to be chosen as a juror because of what had happened to my daughter. They initially asked the pool of jurors if any of us had personally been affected by a rape or sexual assault. I had to tell them about my daughters experience. The lawyer representing the accused asked me many personal and intense questions about what had happened to my daughter. It was one of the most grueling experiences that I have ever endured and I thought that it would never end. The lawyer kept repeating the same question over and over toward the end. Are you capable of giving this man a fair trial? I finally looked him straight in the eye and told him that I would not send an innocent man to prison. This seemed to satisfy him and he ended the questioning. I was shocked when I found out that I had been chosen to sit on this jury.
For three solid days beginning early in the morning until late at night I heard the District Attorney for Rutherford County present the states evidence against the accused. The state admitted from the start that all of it's evidence was circumstantial. Circumstantial evidence, however; can be used to convict a criminal as long as the evidence is overwhelming. You cannot convict a suspect of a crime in a criminal trial unless you are sure beyond a reasonable doubt. The suspect was a White male and somewhat overweight. As I heard the details of the rape I wanted whoever was guilty of this crime to go to prison for a long time. A young woman had been brutally raped. The rapist entered her trailer while she lay sleeping on a couch and was terrified as she woke up feeling the weight of a strange man pressing heavily down on her body. From that point on he repeatedly raped and sodomized her. After each time that he raped her anally, without a condom, he would force her to perform oral sex on him. He had a weapon but I can't remember if it was gun or a knife. The trailer was dark and the woman admitted that she never saw his face. There were various forms of evidence collected at the scene by police but the case hinged on two things. The woman claimed that the man had a large scar next to his navel and he was wearing a blue fleece lined denim jacket.
I sat and listened as the woman and several police officers stated under oath that the suspect had a large scar right next to his navel. There was a drawing of the scar and it's location on a chalkboard. When each person was asked to point out the location of the scar they all confirmed that the location of the scar on the chalkboard was correct. The defense called the suspect to the front of the courtroom and asked him to raise his shirt. There was no scar. The lawyer then asked him to lower his pants. He had a scar but it was on his hip and not on his stomach. The defense then produced the blue denim jacket and asked the man to put it on. In the mug shot taken on the day he was arrested the suspect was obviously much bigger at the time. He had lost a lot of weight since his arrest. When the man tried on the coat it was way too small on him. The suspect testified on the stand that the coat belonged to his brother who was much smaller. At the end of the second day the prosecution and defense rested. The case was then turned over to us for deliberation. After much deliberation eight jurors wanted to convict the man of rape. One of which was my roommate and friend. Four of us voted to acquit. Besides myself there was a C-130 pilot who had horrible burn scars on one whole side of his face. I never asked him how he got the scars but I assumed that he had been a crash. He also told me how he had successfully landed a C-130 at Pope AFB in North Carolina after three of his four engines shut down in a violent thunderstorm. This is the only known instance where a C-130 was able to stay in the air for any length of time on one engine and make a successful landing. The only two women on the jury also voted to acquit. One was the mother of a friend to my son Robbie.
We wanted someone to be held accountable for this crime but the state was not able to convince the four of us beyond a reasonable doubt. The jury became hopelessly deadlocked and tempers flared. We finally approached the judge and informed him that we could not come to a decision. He called a recess for the night and we were transported back to our rooms. My roommate was so angry at me that he asked to be moved out of my room. We never spoke much after that trial. The next morning a mistrial was declared and the suspect went free. As myself and one of the woman jurors walked into the judges chamber to retrieve our jackets the judge was sitting at his desk. He asked why we voted to acquit. I told him that I thought the states case was weak and the lady juror agreed with me. The judge revealed that the state did not even know about the mans brother. The brother, it was discovered, had a long criminal record while the accused had no criminal record at all. With this information I felt vindicated. The moral of this story is that I hate criminals that get off too lightly or are not forced to suffer the consequences of their crimes. People like Hillary and Bill Clinton, Eric Holder, Susan Rice. Barack Obama, and Ted Kennedy just to name a few. I hate injustice of any kind and it angers me when an innocent person is wrongly charged or convicted. I don't care if that person is White, Black, Hispanic, Asian, rich, poor, Democrat, Republican, homosexual or whatever. Everyone deserves justice.
If you are guilty you should be held accountable but a person should be innocent until proven guilty. The Kavanaugh accusers in most cases are the same people that treated the Bill Clinton accusers like whores during the 1990's. If the Democrats had stood up for these women then I would be more sympathetic to the # Me Too movement now. I believe with all my heart that the ultimate target of all of this activity we are seeing today is Donald Trump. The Democrats are so determined to get Trump that they are willing to sacrifice a few of their own in the process. Such as Les Moonves of CBS news, Harvey Weinstein, Morgan Freeman, Tom Brokaw, Stan Lee of Marvel Comics, James Levine of the Metropolitan Opera, Matt Lauer of NBC news and Al Franken. They see Trump as vulnerable in the area of sexual assault and the # Me Too movement is a strategy to bring about his downfall. I am for justice but being able to destroy someone based on a charge that cannot be backed up with hard evidence is nothing but mob rule.
Comments
Post a Comment