BALTIMORE - THE LAW, JUSTICE AND MORALITY.

America has an endless fascination and even obsession with the law and its workings. The number of television programs that deal with the subject is endless. There are those that portray lawyers and their pursuit of justice for their clients such as LA law. There are others that cover the day to day workings of the law officers that pursue wrongdoings such as N.Y.P.D. Blue. There are endless movie dramas such as Justice For All and a Few Good Men that have as their theme the playing out of life’s dramas in the court which serves as the forum for pursuing the truth. 

Trials have gripped the public attention from the Scopes Trial in 1925 where the teaching of evolution was debated as to its legality to the O. J. Simpson trial where every minute of the proceedings was broadcast to a nation hungry to learn whether the football icon would be found guilty pf murdering his former wife and her lover. There is a channel on TV solely devoted to Court Proceedings as well as daily features on several networks as to what is going in the nation’s courts. There are reality shows such as Judge Judy where individuals can have their disputes resolved publicly by the Presiding Judge, Finally, the American Constitution has given the Judiciary via the Supreme Court ultimate veto on deciding what is Constitutional or not. 

COURTS ARBITRATE BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG

It is with as a background one needs to examine the happenings in Baltimore following the death of an African American man in custody and the decision to charge six police officers that were involved in his arrest. It is evident that Court proceedings are venerated in America unlike in any other country in the world. The reason for that Jay H. Ell believes is that Americans look to judicial proceedings as the arena where the injustices and wrongs of life’s real dramas can be rectified. Now Jay H. Ell believes that there is much wrong in the whole judicial process in America including the fact that Judges are either elected with legal firms being the biggest donors in their campaigns or are appointed because of their philosophy by the politicians. But more about the shortcomings on another day and rather let us focus on the touching American confidence in their Courts to arbitrate between who is right or wrong, to arbitrate as to what is good and what is evil and to redress the harm afflicted on victims and their families while punishing the offenders. 

AFRICAN AMERICAN PERCEPTION THAT SYSTEM IS RIGGED AGAINST THEM

Much of the anger that has emanated in the African American Community is their perception that the system is rigged and either rogue law officers are not subjected to the judicial process at all or if they are there are unashamed biases at play that mitigate against “justice” for the African American victims. While this is an age old cry the well publicized narrative in recent months has reinforced this perception. First there was the vigilante George Zimmerman who killed an African American Travyon Martin who was minding hIs own business but whom the wannabe cop thought was “suspicious”. Zimmerman in spite of being told not to approach Martin by the police dispatcher somehow got into an altercation with the African American youth and shot him. In the subsequent trial he was acquitted. Then followed two incidents in Ferguson Missouri and Staten Island New York where two African American males died at the hands of the police. In both these cases the State Prosecutors conducted Grand Jury investigations that inexplicably, to most legal authorities, found no grounds for even indicting the Police Officers. Added to those events was the shooting in Cleveland Ohio of a 12 year old boy, Tamir Rice, for which there has been, to this day, no satisfactory explanation. Then there was the cold blooded shooting in Charleston South Carolina caught on video, leaving no room for any interpretation. In the words of the Charleston Mayor had if it were not for the recording there would have been no murder charge. All this lead up to the Baltimore incident where it transpires that someone who was falsely arrested somehow had his spinal cord severed on his way to the police station. 

BALTIMORE  AND IT’S IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH

By the time of the Baltimore incident alleged “police brutality” had become a cause celebre and with national protest movements entitled “Don’t Shoot” and “Black and Brown are Entitled to Live” were gathering momentum, the protests in that city, riddled with unemployment, poverty and crime, did not take long to turn ugly. It was easy in this milieu for a small group of agitators to whip angry youth into a looting and violence spree that was condemned by all and sundry. Then, to everyone’s amazement, for the first time a comprehensive list of charges were filed in record time by the States Attorney, a young African woman Marilyn Mosby, against all six officers involved in the alleged illegal arrest. The charges covered the gamut of police misconduct from false arrest to second degree murder. 

Ms. Mosby’s credentials for such an action were impeccable. She came from four generations of law enforcement, including both her parents, and her decision to become a prosecutor was precipitated by the murder of her cousin. Her swift action had the effect of calming down the protestors to the extent that the city curfew could be lifted. The most significant response by the community who believed that by laying of these charges “Justice had finally been done”. Church services were dedicated to the fact that the alleged perpetrators were being brought to book. The mood changed from being violent and angry to “celebratory”. All this on the basis of the prevailing American folklore that once proper charges have been laid justice will be done.

Ms. Mosby let on that she had reassured the family that no one was above the law and that they would get justice. As much she was championed by the body politic she was reviled by police spokesmen who cried, “Rush to judgement” and chastised her for what they labelled a “political decision”. If anything it underlined the significance of elected representatives from the community who are able to empathize with them. 

Jay H. Ell believes the community is wrong in crying victory at the outcome. What they don’t comprehend, like most Americans, is that law does not arbitrate on the rights and wrongs or morality in society. The courts decide on the law. So this is merely the beginning of getting closure on this sordid chapter and not the end by a long long shot.

DERSHOWITZ CONDEMNS THE INDICTMENTS.

The legendary jurist Professor Alan Dershowitz condemned the indictments in the strongest possible terms. He maintained that there was no hope of convictions on the basis of these charges and they would probably be thrown out on the grounds of lack of evidence. He argued that he understood the need of the Mayor and the State Attorney to quell the riots but that was not the job of the justice system. He panned the decision as being ”political” and further claimed that the police and defendants cannot be scapegoats. He felt that a charge of murder in this scenario was ludicrous arguing that it was inconceivable that anyone set out to kill the prisoner Freddie Gray. This was the justice of Iran or Fidel Castro he fumed. He concluded that there had not been a careful enough evaluation of the facts and that the Baltimore State’s Attorney and the mayor had biased the case against the defendants. The kernel of justice was to protect the defendants’ rights who were innocent till proved guilty. 

Incidentally there are other legal opinions that disagree with Dershowitz, that doyen of Constitutional Law. Professor David Lewis of Pittsburgh Law School who is an expert in Police Racial Affairs maintains that actions are happening quickly and these issues are being taken seriously and not being forgotten. Professor Dershowitz for all his scholarship is known for his hyperbole and to argue that the police are being “scapegoated” is a bit of a stretch. In addition no one knows what “all the evidence” is and it is presumptuous to assume that there is a “lack of evidence”. 

LAWS ARE NOT INANIMATE OR NECESSARILY OBJECTIVE

The belief that Laws are immutable objects of reality is nonsense. Laws are made by the legislatures representing society or by courts creating precedents. The subsequent product can result in discrimination which was the outcome of certain drug laws. By making crack cocaine which is merely a less purified form of cocaine more punishable than cocaine itself resulted in blatant discrimination against the African America community as this cheaper form was used by them. First time offenders with crack cocaine up till 2010 received a minimum of five year sentences sending large numbers of African Americans to prison. 

The “Stand Your Ground” laws of certain states makes it harder to prosecute some homicides which to the layman appear preventable. Conversely the Supreme Court decision that law officers cannot shoot at a fleeing subject is now law. On occasion laws can appear to conflict.

 So the blind faith in the impartiality of laws and the legal process is misplaced. The fact that the investigative process can be biased has already been shown in that more blacks are arrested for the same crime than whites are and are more likely to serve jail time than whites for the same crime illustrates bias in the court process per se.

So much is going to depend in the Baltimore case on the strength of the evidence against the six and how this evidence is interpreted by the court and the jurors. Ms. Mosby has done this incident and the cause of justice a service only in so far that these cases need transparency and the only way to achieve this is by the sifting through of facts that a court case provides. 

THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN LAW AND JUSTICE AND MORALITY

Law and its application, justice, is society’s attempt to set up a process whereby wrongdoings and disputes can be dispassionately adjudicated. In America the defendants’ rights are constitutionally guaranteed and due process is as American as apple pie. So the process is guaranteed and is in fact enshrined by centuries of customs here and in Europe. However it has long been acknowledged that the law is an imperfect instrument to manage society. The statement that the law is an ass, (a donkey), attributed to Charles Dickens is as valid today as it was then. There are legions of examples to support that belief and one just has to look at the armies of corporate lawyers that manipulate and circumvent the intent of the law for their clients benefit. Ironically, the most frequently example that society quotes is the African American icon O. J. Simpson’s trial where the public perception is that OJ was acquitted as a result of his unbelievable defense team of lawyers, known as “The Dream Team”, (one of whom was Dershowitz), exhaustive and imaginative defense of him.

So all the process of Justice attempts to undertake is to see that the laws are appropriately applied and whether the defendant is guilty or not beyond a reasonable doubt in terms of the law. It does not purport to be the arbiter of public morality. For example the prosecution in the Baltimore trial would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the Officers Nero and Garrett had the intent to “falsely imprison” Mr. Gray. It is not enough to argue that Nero and Garrett should have known that the knife that they found on was lawful the prosecution would have to prove more than a mistake which presumably could be corrected at a later stage.They have to prove intent in that situation. They cannot argue in a vacuum “that it is well known that the police totally disregard the rights of African Americans”.

The law is not able to adjudicate whether it was wrong or not for Officer Goodson to drive the police van the way he did, they have to adjudge whether he did so in order to deliberately give Mr. Gray a “rough ride”and that coupled with the fact that they did not put him in a seat belt, refused to give him medical assistance among other activities amounted to murder. 

AT THE END OF THE DAY.

One fact is for certain is the police are under scrutiny and the advent of unofficial recording by bystanders as well as the introduction of police cameras will modify behavior.Also no longer will deaths be routinely  classified as justified without a rigorous investigation. Police are going to want cameras as by far the majority act according to the book. That much has been achieved by the protestors and the outcry and one can but hope that this is a watershed moment in American history.