Sunday, November 12, 2006

We're the Only Ones Mentored Enough

A first-year Bay County judge was ordered to accept mentoring after bringing a loaded gun into his courtroom and announcing he was "locked and loaded."

County Judge Michael Hauversburk said he brought the handgun to court because he was frustrated that a defendant facing a felony parole violation was being tried for a separate misdemeanor charge in a courtroom with inadequate security...
I take this one personally. Many years back, I was summoned for jury "duty," that is, ordered to report as a hostage, to Compton, CA, a city with almost four times the violent crime rate as the national average.

They make you park in a lot several hundred feet from the building, and in order to get from your car to the court house, you need to run the gantlet past friends, relatives and associates of the lovely people being detained inside. Because they make you go through metal detectors to get into the building's main entrance, taking appropriate measures to improve your own safety would assuredly result in detection and resultant violence from the "authorities".

Had I done this, do you think I would have been assigned to a "mentoring" program, or do you think I'd have been thrown in the hole with the "Mother rapers. Father stabbers. Father rapers!"?

But then again, I'm not an "Only One," am I?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Father rapers"?!?!?

Oh, David, did you ever date yourself this time! ('Course, by knowing you did, I dated myself as well!!) ;o)

Anonymous said...

> Many years back, I was summoned for jury "duty," that is, ordered to report as a hostage

"What jury summons?"

> Because they make you go through metal detectors to get into the building's main entrance, taking appropriate measures to improve your own safety would assuredly result in detection and resultant violence from the "authorities".

Not if you don't consent to waive your 4th-Amendment rights.

Does the summons specifically order you to enter the courthouse, or merely to report to the courthouse, and then they rely on your ignorance (and fear) of "the law" to impel you to infer that "report to" must mean "enter"? These little details are crucial to our understanding of how to "think like a lawyer" when dealing with the state, and thereby refrain from inferring what is not specifically stated.

IANALT$D.

Mark Odell