Those Eyes That the Cherubim Drew

<?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Baltimore, Md 2/11-<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

     The first thing we had to do when we got in the jury room was to select a foreman. The mother of seven immediately looked at me and said, "I think you should do it." Uh, yeah, must be my natural leadership aura. I replied that I didn't want to do it. I really didn't. I would love to be the person to stand up and tell a defendant that the jury has found him innocent, but I don't want to be the one that stands up and tells a guy he's going away for a long time. (same reflex that makes me swerve when there's a cat in the middle of the road)

     I said that it seemed a good idea to ask who actually wants the job, and narrow it down from there. The overbearing redhead was the first to throw her hat into the ring. There was a moment of silence, and I was about to change my mind, because I didn't want her running the thing, and I was pretty sure I could get more votes. The black lady must've been thinking the same thing. She'd been looking around, and she finally indicated that she wanted the position as well.

     I blurted out that we could either take a vote, or we could flip a coin, but the young girl in the ponytail just asked them to pick a number between one and ten. They did and the girl indicated that the black lady had won. Now, since it went the way I had wanted it to go, I didn't say anything, but, had it gone the other way, I would have objected and insisted either on a vote or a coin flip, since "guess a number" can be manipulated by the person who's thinking of the number so the outcome comes out the way they want. I don't doubt that's what happened in this case. I believe that was the first time, and not the last, that we were guilty of slanting the verdict. I am guilty as charged.

     So then we started in on the trial. Ponytail girl wanted an immediate vote. Many of us objected to that, and the discussion began in earnest. Mother of seven made the first move. "Does everyone agree that either he's guilty of both, possession and possession with intent to distribute, or he's innocent of both?"

     Heads around the room nodded, and, at the time, I really hadn't thought much of anything through yet (my mind works a lot slower than most), so, for the time being, I went along with it with an, "It appears that way."

     I asked if anyone believed the sister. There was some back and forth, but when it came down to it, nobody believed that she wasn't still living there. Nobody believed that Roosevelt had never lived there. And nobody liked the fact that apparently, this girl was upstairs snorting coke while she was pregnant. We surmised that, either she turned state's evidence in case they ever do catch L.A., or her trial is still upcoming. However, after about an hour of discussing her testimony, we decided that she was irrelevant to the case. She had nothing to say that made any difference. Regardless of whether she lied or told the truth.

     Then we went over the cop's testimony. Mother of seven, who seemed to have taken over the foreman's spot (I don't know why the hell she didn't just come out and ask for it in the first place, she would have had our support over the redhead.) asked whether everyone believed the cop. Ponytail girl, Marlboro Man, and Amish beard boy all indicated that they didn't automatically accept his testimony. I asked whether they thought he had planted the evidence, and after an awkward moment, they indicated that they didn't think so. It was interesting that they seemed to look at the black lady for permission to concede the point. (no, it's not my imagination)

     We discussed the cop’s testimony, and it started to become evident that Ponytail girl and Marlboro Man were dead set on acquittal. Redhead and a woman, a law student who had been quiet up to this point began to express their opinions and it was evident they were dead set on convicting. There was a push and flow to the conversation that makes it unmistakable as to who is walking into the thing without weighing the evidence on both sides.

     The cop’s testimony created the first tension in the room. In my mind, he hadn't come across as manufacturing anything, and seemed believable.

     When the tension rose to the point where people were telling personal stories about the police committing injustices and personal stories of police heroics, our foreman, the real foreman, put an end to it and asked that we take a vote to "see where we are".

     There's a bit of a stage fright that goes along with raising your hand one way or the other in a jury room. It's a parting of the seas. Once that first vote is taken, there are "sides". So, we took our first vote, and I was one of seven hands to raise in favor of convicting. Mother of seven, law student girl, and four women that, at this point, I considered little more than sheep, had voted to convict. Marlboro Man, black lady, Amish beard boy, Ponytail girl, and, surprisingly, redhead all voted to acquit.

     Ponytail girl immediately declared that she thought we'd never agree on a verdict and that we should declare ourselves a hung jury. No way, not before we'd even said word one about the evidence itself. I said we needed to discuss the evidence. Not what the witnesses had said, but the physical evidence in front of us.

     The most obvious evidence in the room was the bag of drugs and paraphinaliea. At this point, the not-guilty crowd made the contention that there weren't enough drugs present to constitute "intent to distribute". It really didn't look like a lot. I told them that I knew for a fact that it was enough to constitute that, because I had known plenty of drug dealers in my day. They don't all have a closet of bales to distribute. Marlboro Man then made the next intuitive leap and asked me if I had been a drug user. I told that I had, and he indicated that, in the army, he'd been in charge of discipline, including the type of discipline resulting from a soldier's possession of drugs.

      He said that, in hismind, it was a quantity for personal use. The mother of seven pointed out what the cop had pointed out, that there was nothing to smoke the weed with. If there is no device, no pipe, no rolling papers, no bong, then how can we assume it's for personal consumption.

     Then the conversation turned to whether the stuff was his or not, the gist of the argument. The acquit-crowd made the claim that is was plausible that the drugs belonged to the drug dealer. It was his house. But why would he keep it downstairs in a basement bedroom? The convict-crowd effectively fought the case that, it was very likely that Roosevelt was staying there, his mail was there. Why wouldn't he or his sister have had it mailed to their mother's house, if they were living there? I asked to have the mail evidence be brought in. It turned out that two of the letters were opened, and one wasn't.

     One of the opened ones was from a storage place, probably where he had some of his things while he was between homes. I have no doubt the cop picked that one up so they could search it, and, had they found anything, we would have known about it. The second piece of mail was from some on-line poker place, reminding him to swing by. This was pretty incriminating. There was a hand-written note inside along with the itinerary, and the envelope was addressed by hand. It was dated after the date his sister had said she had moved out. Why would he be giving out that address after his sister had moved out? This wasn't a case of mail being forwarded from the post office like the other two pieces of mail. Someone had gone out of their way to address an envelope to Roosevelt, after his sister was supposedly moved out.

     He had been there. He had lived there. Maybe not all the time, but at least for a period of time. The redhead changed her vote. Amish beard boy, seeing she had, started to waffle and said that he could see that the drugs probably belonged to Roosevelt.  At this point, the black lady shook her head and muttered, "No. No. No. I don't believe this." She asked if we were all aware of what the penalty was for intent to distribute. Mother of seven said we couldn't take that into consideration. We were thereonly to deliver a verdict.

     I said that I figured he'd get probation. If it was his first offense. If it wasn't...

     Ponytail girl, cheeks red and not knowing what to do with her eyes, stammered, "This-you can't do this to a black guy. The punishment doesn't fit the crime. Has anyone heard of the Jena 8? This is racial."

     At that, there was a wave of indignation fired off at her from about three or four of the white people in the room who let her know they were offended that she would imply that they were making their decision based on race. She denied that, and backed off, saying she didn't know exactly what she meant, but that she would stand her ground. She Wasn't about to let him be convicted.

     The black lady then said she could see convicting him on posession, but she didn't think they'd proven intent to distribute. Marlboro Man chimed in and said that he didn't think there was enough evidence for either. He said there had to be more.

     I looked at the black lady and wondered how the case could be made for posession and not intent to distribute.  I thought about my days of drug use, and wondered what they would have found if they had busted into my placewhile I wasn't there; and I realized I had to change one of my verdicts. While they were still bickering, I announced that I had changed my verdict on the intent to distribute. The pro-conviction crowd looked at me as though I'd betrayed them, a look I'm pretty certain everyone who ever changed his verdict in a jury room got. I explained that, when I was using drugs, I used to roll my own pipes out of aluminum foil or carve them out of apples. When I had enough money to go out and buy a pipe, I'd carry it with me. And, believe me, when I was as poor as Roosevelt, I never had enough money to go out and buy two pipes.

     Mother of seven then asked me how I would explain away the little jewelry bags. Yeah, again, I drew on my experience and told her that I used to go to the store to buy little Glad baggies so that, if I had a stash at home, I wouldn't have to carry the whole stash around on me.

     Now, I could have added that, I also bought the baggies in case one of my friends ever wanted a little and I had enough on me to share, I could give them some. But that was irrelevant at this point.

     That's when Jean-Jacket Lady spoke up. She tried to make the case that it was unlikely, and that, had he had his pipe on him, that would have come out in the trial, but within a minute, she realized she was the only one in the room still clinging to convicting on the intent to distribute. I asked Madame Foreman to take a vote on the three counts of intent to distribute, and, though her hand was the last one to rise, Jean-Jacket Lady weighed in with a not guilty verdict. Three of the counts were decided.

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