Chapter 20: Guilty As Charged

Posted: July 27, 2011 - 05:03:55 pm

Dexter was seated outside the courtroom waiting to testify. The trial of the man who had tried to kill him was in its third day. Even after all the time that had passed between the shooting, and the beginning of the trial, Dexter still had no idea why the man had wanted to kill him. The press hadn’t been interested in the man’s motives, only that the target had been Dexter.

It wasn’t until the opening statement by the prosecutor, that Dexter learned the man had lost his business because his employees had sued him. The judge had slammed the guy, and had ordered additional damages to be paid to the employees. The man didn’t have the money to pay the fines, and his business had died.

On hearing the details about the initial lawsuit, Dexter felt that the judge had done the right thing. His sales personnel had been carrying monthly balances of over ten thousand dollars on their personal credit cards. With sales slipping due to a bad economy, he had delayed reimbursement for an extra month. Suddenly, they were carrying twenty thousand dollars on their credit cards. The sales people were slammed with interest charges and late fees. The cards they were using had interest rates raised to nearly thirty percent. It wasn’t just the cards they were using for work that had the high interest rates, either. All of their credit cards had their rates increased.

Of course, the man blamed Dexter when his employees sued him, and he decided that Dexter had to die. The end result was the scene in front of the courthouse. Hopefully the whole episode would come to an end within that same courthouse.

With so many members of the press there, the trial quickly became a three-ring circus. Everyone was putting on an act for the cameras. The prosecutor’s opening speech had taken almost an entire day. The defense’s speech had lasted just as long. The judge had also pontificated. Dexter had sat there, bored out of his mind, getting angrier with each hour that passed.

Pundits on television were arguing about how good of a job the prosecutor, the defense, and the judge were doing. There were all kinds of legal opinions.

It was all kind of stupid, because there was a film of the entire incident. It clearly showed the man shooting at Dexter, in front of a hundred witnesses.

The first witness in the trial was not Dexter. It was the cameraman who had captured the entire event on the television camera. The video was entered as evidence. Of course, that wasn’t so easy. The defense had argued that the video contained prejudicial statements made by the reporter on the scene that were not founded upon fact. It contained speculation and hearsay. The prosecutor argued that it captured the event. The judge called a recess so that he could consider the legal implications of the reporter’s commentary.

Dexter earned himself a contempt of court warning when he had piped up, “So play the damned thing with the sound turned off.”

The judge retired to his chambers for fifteen minutes and then returned to the courtroom with the decision that the video could be entered into evidence. Dexter knew that little decision was going to be worth a half hour of discussion on the news channels that night.

The next few witnesses were experts who testified that the video showed that the gun was actually aimed in Dexter’s direction. Dexter earned a second contempt of court warning when he had said, “Any idiot with eyes can see that.”

Dexter decided that it would be better if he were to wait outside than get found in contempt of court. He left the courtroom knowing that his exit would make it on the news that night. There would be all kinds of speculation about his behavior.

Seated on the bench, Dexter watched people rushing to and fro pursuing business about which he could only speculate. It seemed to him that there were just too many people there. They were there because of traffic tickets, crimes, lawsuits, and divorces. He wondered if there were any civil weddings taking place. He wondered about the financial burden on society that this level of activity represented. He decided that a courthouse was a more depressing place than a hospital ... and Dexter found hospitals very depressing.

A young man sat down next to Dexter.

“I’m Jack Alexander. I’m a journalism major at the local college. I’ve got a job as a reporter for the college newspaper.”

“Hello, Jack Alexander. I’m Dexter James.”

“I know. I was wondering if I could interview you.”

“Go right ahead,” Dexter said.

“May I record it?”

“Yes, you may,” Dexter said.

“Thank you,” Jack said.

“You’re quite welcome, Jack,” Dexter said.

Jack asked, “Why are you out here rather than inside the courtroom?”

“I’m out here because I couldn’t sit there and watch that tragedy unfold any longer. I’d call it a joke, but it isn’t funny. It’s sad. It’s tragic.”

“Why do you say that?” Jack asked.

“We have the emails that he sent threatening my life. We have a video of him planting a bomb inside my office. There was an explosion in which my office and several other offices in the building were destroyed. We have a video of him trying to shoot me. There’s no room for any reasonable doubt other than establishing that he was, in fact, the person in the videotapes. Of course, since he was arrested on that same video and then booked, there aren’t any doubts about him being the person on the video.”

“He has a right to defend himself against the charges,” Jack said.

“A right to defend yourself against the charges?” Dexter said, and looked thoughtful for a second. “Yes, that is a right under our Constitution. Every accused person has a right to face their accusers. That’s not what is going on in there.”

Jack asked, “What is going on in there?”

“It’s a show by the lawyers and the judge. A defendant is trying to avoid the consequences of his actions. A press corps is trying to gain a fraction of a percent of a market share. There are a lot of things going on in there, other than an accused facing his accusers. You see, there’s only one question that has to be answered in that courtroom.”

“What question is that?”

“Is the defendant the perpetrator of the crime that was captured on the video tape?”

“It’s got to be more complex than that,” Jack said.

“The tape shows a crime taking place. It shows an armed man firing a pistol at an unarmed man who is making no aggressive acts. That is a crime. It’s called: attempted murder.

“Is the defendant the perpetrator of the crime or not? That is the question. All of the rest of the garbage going on in that courtroom, is posturing.”

Jack said, “There can be extenuating circumstances.”

“Those don’t affect whether the defendant is found guilty or innocent. Extenuating circumstances affects whether the full weight of the law should come down on the guilty person or not,” Dexter said.

“That seems too simple,” Jack said.

“It is that simple. That’s why what is going on in there is a tragedy. Everyone in that courtroom has forgotten the purpose of having a trial. A trial has two parts. The first part is coming up with a verdict stating the guilt or innocence of the defendant, with regard to a specific crime or crimes. The second part is the sentencing of the guilty party.

“The first part of this trial should have been over in ten minutes. I’ll admit that the second part could have taken a couple of hours. Was the defendant insane or not? If he was insane, then send him to a hospital for treatment. If he wasn’t insane, then send him to jail for the legally proscribed time.”

“If he’s insane, then he’s not guilty,” Jack said.

“That’s true according to established legal practice. That defense has been around for years. Not guilty by reason of insanity is a compromise between punishing someone for performing a criminal act, and the need to treat someone who is mentally ill. It’s a humane compromise, although it’s one that isn’t well thought out. It isn’t a statement that the person didn’t do the crime, just that they were insane at the time.”