I think of those in the prisons at Guantanamo, the prisons of Afghanistan, the prisons of Iraq, held without access to counsel, sometimes in places that don't show up on any Red Cross map, shamefully abused by guards and interrogators. Our country is doing this, and nobody seems able to stop it.
I have two questions. Why is there not an outraged shriek from the peace officers and the judges? These are decent folks, many of them, doing hard work with courage and integrity, and somebody is robbing them all of their dignity -- because the only thing that gives a police officer or a judge dignity is his or her place in a reliable and just system of law.
One more question: how long can the jury system survive in this odd new legal twilight zone? When I was being questioned as part of jury selection, everyone seemed very concerned to make sure that I would evaluate the case on the evidence, in conformity with the judge's instructions about the applicable law. Juries will do that, if they trust that the law will be applied, that the prison guards won't turn rogue -- if they are convinced that the court in which they serve is not at all like Nazi courts in the 30s. But if that trust is lost, if juries begin to think that their job is to protect the accused from the system, that strange wrinkle in common law, jury nullification, may become a central fact of legal life. Juries may undertake to do justice themselves, apart from the system.
So much runs on trust.
Posted by shea0017 at December 26, 2004 1:45 PM