The American Justice System is Flat-Out Broken

We are accustomed to thinking of signs and signposts as pointing us somewhere we want to go, but they are also useful in directing us away from what we want to avoid.  There was a time when I believed that most of the basic tenets of the American justice system were admirable. But the closer you look, the uglier it gets. Note to world:  whatever America has to give the world, it certainly isn't its criminal justice system.

I did have a head start on my disillusionment.  All of the statutes, court decisions, institutions, and practices that supported the growth of slavery and then Jim Crow were evidence enough that a "justice" system didn't necessarily have to have anything to do with justice.  So I got that.

But The New Jim Crow, my experiences as a juror, mountains of research that serve to undermine the logic and operation of key components of the justice system, and the outcomes of several recent celebrated cases have led me to a disturbing conclusion:  the justice system doesn't just have a few flaws.  It is flat-out broken.  Kaput.  Beyond repair. It just isn't acceptable to call something a "justice system" that only works for white and/or rich people.  We need to start over.

Michelle Alexander's  The New Jim Crow performs the remarkable feat of identifying exactly when and how America got on the path to the mass incarceration society we've now become.  If I were teaching high school or college, this book would be required reading.  But she also identifies threads that have now unraveled to a point where even the blind can see the outrageous consequences.

Take, for example, stop and frisk. Alexander shows that the country returned to the philosophy that "people of color are guilty unless proven innocent" in 1968, with a Supreme Court ruling that arrests are justified when police have a "reasonable suspicion" that a person is likely engaged in criminal activity and is dangerous--rather than probable cause that a crime has been committed.  Over the years, it's become clear that suspicions about people of color are, well, normal. First, the police were relieved of the responsibility for identifying a probable cause for arrest.  Then, police were acquitted all across the country for shooting unarmed civilians of color.  Now, just plain citizens are considered "reasonable" when shooting anyone of color, even teenagers.

The result:  hurt and injured teens looking for help can be shot through a locked screen door;  teens out having fun can be murdered in the backseat of a car while (maybe) playing loud music; a solitary teen can be shot to death walking home from a corner store with a drink and a bag of candy.

How far is this situation, really, from  "guilty until proven innocent" ? The scene in 12 Years a Slave, when Solomon Northup was required to show the pass from his master in order to avoid arrest while on an errand, has returned with a vengeance.  If you're a person of color, pass required.