Review, sort of

[rivkat]

"Justice belongs to God; men only have the law. Justice is perfect, but the law can only be careful."

So says a juror in D. Graham Bennett's excellent A Trial by Jury, an account of his tenure on a jury charged with deciding whether one man had murdered another or had acted in self-defense. (Bennett is one degree of separation from me - the

Comments

[celli]

Wow. This is fascinating stuff.

I'm bookmarking it so I can refer back to it after I've read the book. Very, very thought-provoking.

[ms_hecubus]

Awesome post. You can be sure I'll check out Bennett's book. I'm one of those odd people who wishes for jury duty, but never gets called. I find the ideals of our judicial system to be inspirational, but like our government, disappointing in reality.

[hesychasm]

Heh. My boss recommended this to me a while back and ironically enough, I just got around to buying it tonight. Was going to start reading as soon as I logged off. Coincidences are weird. (g)

[grifyn]

I'm going to track down Bennett's book and read it within an inch of its life. The binding may be harmed in the process.

I envy your knowledge in this arena, and yet I don't -- if that makes sense. Thank you for sharing this slice of your experiences with us.

(Earlier in the Term, on the first anniversary of my marriage, I had stayed at work on another death case until that petitioner gave up and stopped fighting his death, which meant that I could go out for an anniversary dinner. Dinner wasn't a joyful celebration, for some reason.)

I would question the humanity of any one who could immediately wash their hands (or mind) of irony like that. Congratulate yourself for being a good human being.

[typhoid_mary]

If it's traumatic, I certainly wouldn't ask you to go into more detail, but... Surely you don't think a person's right to refuse to have sex is abrogated just because they've consented in the past, right? I realize, though, just how much more difficult a situation becomes when Love joins Sex and Money in the motivating factors, and I don't blame cops for regarding a domestic disturbance as far more frightening than a drug bust -- drug traffickers can be relied upon to value their lives more than murder. In contrast though, practically all rape cases that even make it to the courts are stranger rapes; I think it's legally impossible to make a rape or sexual abuse conviction stick between married partners unless one of them ends up dead. Maybe choosing to take such difficult cases reduces the chance that a court rules wrong, but I just don't think that's the kind of convenience the court system was designed to have.
-Mari

[rivkat]

I see now that the post was unclear -- I don't think that past consent equates to consent from here on out, but a few other members of the panel seemed to, which is what I meant when I said "we." Those people are what make the memory traumatic for me (other than the sympathetic horror of hearing the victim's story in the first place).