Justice.
Our tour of 100 Centre Street was filled with discussions of injustice and inequality. However, I was very interested in the way we discussed approaching change in the justice system. Thomas brought up a point that caught my interest. How would a judge feel if his daughter was in this system? Would he be comfortable allowing his daughter to be processed the way he processes hundreds of human beings daily? And of course, there is this issue with the word "processed." This likens human beings to a product! Are we going to label individuals in society the way we label our milk? Thus far, our adversarial system seems to have shown that it does just that.
Throughout the tour of the court house, I was continually reminded of my position as a Criminal Justice Agency Intern. While at work, I always address the defendants as "ma'am" or "sir" and I make sure that I am polite. As of late, I have been discussing defendants with my co-workers, who almost exclusively say that "the defendants are so nasty. They should not be disrespecting us." I sit there and wonder at this phenomenon. How is it that I have only had one out of many interviews where I have been greeted with hostility? The answer was found today at 100 Centre Street. Being arrested is a difficult and traumatic process. When you are being shuffled around from person to person all day, of course there will be agitation. Also, if you are greeted with hostility and condescension, would you not also return the attitude? We, as a society, promise that "justice shall be denied to no one." How do we expect a defendant to trust us, when etched into the very walls of the building which "serves them justice" are words which, so obviously displays our inadequacy?
My question to everyone is this: how do we, in and with our agencies, help to stop the injustices of the adversarial system? Do you believe that we could stop this "conveyer-belt" mentality of the court with social change? Is it possible to create real equality in the eyes of the law so that justice may really be denied to no one?
I leave you with this.....Justice. What does this word mean to you?
15 comments:
Lauren I appreciate you displaying the images of the building to remind us of what is actually engraved and what those words mean. Justice is a word with various interpretations. I spent two summers at Queens Criminal Court with a defensive attorney from Legal Aid. I observed how the case load would "pile up" to almost 60 cases and preparing for a trial. Clients would get upset that the attorney could not remember their names but my attorney remembered their cases. I've also observed arraignments and the first interactions the lawyers have with the clients and many times the clients would refuse to speak to him. After the discussion with Thomas I wondered is it because he is a middle-aged white man in a suit. How did the defendants feel about me observing? At one point a defendant asked me to leave because "it's not a zoo" and they aren't meant to be observed. That has stuck to me.
I have had various family members enter the criminal justice system and as the attorney I shadowed and Thomas echoed, nearly all cases result in a plea to avoid jail time. My father is a prime example, the DA requested 10 years in prison if there is a trial or 5 years with probation and accept the plea. He took the plea. Why are those options so extreme? Its like the saying in the Hunger Games "may the odds be ever in your favor" but the odds are against you ESPECIALLY as a poor minority. Justice to me would be equal treatment and access to resources with no regards to race and class. Justice is equal representation.
At FedCap all the clients have equal access to the resources, however, the time and dedication of the account managers based on efforts of the clients. If the client demonstrates no initiative in job searching to reintegrate back into society then they are removed from the program....a bit extreme.
I'm sad to have missed the tour of the courts on Thursday, but I still have many thoughts on justice.
This article, in many ways, shaped my vision of what justice should look like (except for the terminology used throughout the piece- criminal, convict, murder etc.)
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/feb/25/norwegian-prison-inmates-treated-like-people
In my mind, justice should be synonymous with redemption, hope, and healing. It should be focused on rehabilitation. Innocent or guilty of crime, a person brought to court has been wronged by society or humanity in some way that led them to the court in handcuffs.
In my experiences of the court system in America--none of which was personal to me-- I've found few things that resemble justice. In my experience at URI, I've become more pessimistic about American law than I ever was. Immigration law is horribly unjust. I find myself questioning if the people executing "justice" even reflect on the justness of what they do. DO they consider for themselves the meaning of justice? Or are they just robots preforming over and over again the routines they practiced for years?
Great post Lauren! I love your creativity. As you point out, there is a jarring disconnect between the words and the actual happenings in the courts. "People are the foundation of power" closely resembles the spirit of the preamble “we the people” in the Constitution, but these founding credos were not drawn up to encompass every single person; certainly not men of color and all women in general. In those days, these words only applied to the white men with property and what is so striking to me is that even today, it applies to the same group of people to a large extent.
Those most impacted by the justice system by and large have no seat at the policy table when the laws that impact them are made. Like Professor Waterston mentioned in last week’s blog post, that for the most part, "those individuals do not create the options from which they make choices".
What Thomas said struck me as especially relevant, was for policy makers to always imagine that there was going to be a human being at the start and end of a policy, and you mention Lauren, to ask the decision makers if they were comfortable with these policies for their loved ones for instance. (Filmmaker Michael Moore tapped on this idea in Fahrenheit 911 when he personally went up to Congressmen and asked them if they were willing to ship their own sons and daughters to the Iraq & Afghanistan wars).
I think the core idea to consider is empathy. How much do the people who hold the power to make decisions empathize with those who are going to be impacted by them? (This was an implicit question in our Culture of Poverty role playing exercise). Is it easier to put people in cages (to be cage-friendly, to use Thomas’ term) when you do not know what cages are like? When Herb Sturz visited such a ‘cage’ for juveniles, he was appalled at the downright miserable conditions young boys were subjected to.
Should it be mandatory then for policy makers and prosecutors to experience life in the cages since they’re going to be sending people there? Would they still accept these conditions if their loved ones were sent there? This isn’t such a wild idea after all; a few months ago, the Secretary of New Mexico’s Department of Corrections went undercover to spend time in solitary confinement to get a real sense of what the conditions are and after his visit, he vowed to make the necessary changes.
To answer your question Lauren, justice to me means empathy; the ability to step outside of our selves and walk a mile in the shoes of others, and see what they see, feel what they feel and experience what they experience, before then making binding decisions that determine their fates.
When I started this class I thought I knew what justice meant. I knew that there were serious problems with the justice system, but I thought it really boiled down to police procedures and outdated views. However, I see now that the problems are much deeper rooted than that. I thought that those who actually committed heinous crimes were being treated fairly it was everyone else that was mistreated, but in reality everyone going through the system is treated unjustly.
My placement is giving me no insight into the criminal justices system. I am seeing a lot of problems in social, educational and health care systems, but only on the surface.
On our tour, I tried to be very conscious of what was going on outside of our conversation. I wanted to see what the average persons experience was coming into that building. I noticed that many of us (Verons) set off the alarms coming into the building, but we were just passively waved down with the meal detector wand. Others coming into the building who set of the alarm were not so passively searched, especially minority males. They were much more thoroughly searched with the wand, asked pull there pant legs up, and even patted down. As much as I may understand security is needed, I also saw racial profiling used to estimate who may be dangerous. Men, especially white men, in suits were not asked to pull there pant legs up, interesting since white men are more likely to be mass shooters.
Like I said, I used to think I knew what justice meant, but now I'm not event sure what it is supposed to mean!
Throughout the whole tour, I was listening to Thomas’s ideas about unfair justice and discrimination. I felt bad. I still feel bad for expressing my opinion. However, these ideas of mechanical approach to criminal justice system seems normal for me. In particular, I do understand why this people are being “processed” in court. There is no other way. American government can not afford to have so many judges, public defenders, prosecutors in order to give a personal approach to each client in any court. Imagine yourself being at work, which deals with people. On your first day, each of us will be carrying about our customers/clients/patients. However, when a person sees all these faces every single day, it is just not enough time and mental capacity for he/she do dedicate a lot of time to them. When one person tries to help other people, he/she takes a piece of his/her heart and give it to another person. How long one person can care about other people?
Additionally, I would say that not many people actually go to court. Of course, the majority of people in court are African-Americans and Latino. These families are usually not able to afford a good lawyer. BUT!!! I prefer to see it from another perspective. Imagine the scope of people who committed crime yesterday in Manhattan! Imagine everyone, not just those people who were taken in jail. Americans, Italians, African-Americans, Latinos, Russians, Chinese, Uzbeks….. all of them. My question is WHY?????
I truly and honestly believe that if American government would spend more money on crime prevention but not on incarceration and court “processing” in would save hundreds of people every year of any nation. When we were discussing all these issues, I was thinking about only one question: “Why these people commit crime?”, “Why people are becoming criminals?” All of them know that they are going to be caught on one day or another.
Maybe, it is time for American government to see examples from other countries and implement different approach on crime prevention.
Thank you for your post, Lauren, which is generating such thoughtful responses. I'm going to stay quiet (at least for awhile!!), and follow--and learn from--this great and important conversation.
RWe've been talking about "helping". I want to invoke a quote we've mentioned before "If you have come here to help me, you are wasting our time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together." This idea of helping insinuates that these individuals don't have agency and/or that they "need" us to save them. This is really arrogant. We need to realize that gender and race affects every single one of us. gender and racial justice or social justice in general will benefit all society not only colonized men and women of color. This includes in dealing with the criminal justice system.
We need to stop obsessing over cost benefits and more for less and start analyzing the cost of decisions and actions on these human lives.
If we focused on prevention instead of "rehabilitation" or punishment then maybe things would be different. Maybe we wouldn't have jails and so much stigmatization.
Thank you for writing such an interesting post. Before getting deeply into the discussion, I would like first to thank our professor for providing us with such a great experience. Although we did not get a chance to see a full arraignment, the little that we saw was much enough to give us another perspective of the justice system.
I find the quotes kind of contradictory, I am not sure what message they intend on sending but in my opinion they are the symbols of injustice. The first quote reads, “Only the just man enjoys peace of mind” and the second states “equal and exact justice to all men of whatever state or persuasion.” If indeed justice should be given to all men regardless of their state or persuasion, then why is it that only the so-called “just man” get to enjoy the peace of mind? And who are the just men?
My experience at the courthouse made me think of the justice system as a shoe factory with high demand. By this I am intending to say that, quality is not the most important factor, but getting through the cases as fast as possible. I am clearly aware that there are several other factors that cause the system to work this way. But I am speaking in terms of what I observed that ay at the courtroom. The defendant had barely the time to express himself. The judge was focused on reading what was written on the papers, instead of interacting with the defendant. I am also concerned how much did the defendant understand from what was going on inside the courtroom at that moment. One might argue that his lawyer was present, but I am also wondering why wasn’t there any family members at the arraignment? I am sure that the lawyer was there just as a public defendant.
In regards to my agency, at Common Justice we understand that the adversarial system is a tradition that has been in place for a long period of time and one way to change this system is by implementing a different alternative to violent crimes. We abstain ourselves from the culture that believes justice is obtained by through incarceration. Instead, we believe that justice is attained when society creates a platform where both parties, the harmed party ad the responsible party are able to sit around one table and find a solution as the members of one community. This does not only maintain equity, but it also reinforces the bonds that hold us together as a society.
Out of all the comments that Thomas made about justice, the one that still resonates with is the one where he mentioned the black mother. The black mother for more than a hundred years has been losing her children to the oppressive system that has been in place, whether it is to slave masters or to the criminal justice system. These are powerful words.
These words point out the importance of the structural change. After more than a hundred years, after receiving the right to vote, after being recognized as a human being, after electing the first African American president, the system of oppression is still massively criminalizing and dehumanizing the man of color. Can we truly identify what justice is having been systematically raised to think a certain way? Who is to say what justice truly is? In order to create effective change we must first find a common ground as to what the change should be. My question is, is it possible to achieve having known nothing but the structure in which we are in? We can argue of course that this exactly how we know what justice is—the opposite of what we are currently in, but when it comes to creating the actual change, will it be possible? We have made advances throughout the decades. We have affirmative action, more black young men graduating high school and college, more educated minorities, more women taking big positions, but the structure remains the same. The structure itself remains oppressive.
If we change the adversarial justice system, that’s not say the system of oppression has ended, but rather that one of its tool has been altered. I would like to look at this issue more abstractly. If we are merely changing tools, moving a few nails, creating new walls in this big structural building that still in the 21st century, keeps the white man in a position of privilege, aren’t we just tricking ourselves into the illusion that we are creating change? Isn’t then our concept of justice an illusion?
It was really inspiring to hear from someone with so many years of experience with the NY Court System.
Brenda, thank you for sharing your personal experience. At CEO, we do something similar when it come to holding participants accountable. These programs are characterized by tight budgets and it is essential that they use whatever resources they have to help the participants to secure jobs. When participants don’t show up to meetings or to work sites job coaches try to find out why. They try to make sure participants have the resources they need to be in the program. By the second time they miss their appointment without notifying, their job coaches would discharge them from the program. It is important that participants understand their responsibilities as part of the program. I have also wondered whether it is the best Idea to simply discharge a participant. To what extend can staff be flexible with the participants.
Beka, Thank you for sharing that video with us. There are people in the United States that would like to live in those prisoners’ conditions. What is true is that this is an example of a country that doesn’t have either dead penalty or life sentence as punishment. In fact, the highest sentence is 21 years. The question then become whether is the Norway’s criminal justice system more efficient than the US system? I don’t believe there are enough resources to build prisons like the one on Norway here in the US. However, I believe we have enough resources to create alternative to incarceration.
To bounce of Danyeli's point, that statement almost made me cry. It is really terrifying how much we dehumanize and devalue men of color as a society. It is really depressing to see not only micro but macro aggression towards men of color. It's heartbreaking to know that statistics say a man of color dies every 28 hours at the hand of a cop. Police brutality and the devaluation and dehumanization of men of color go hand in hand. The reality of injustice within our institutional/legitimate systems is perpetuated by the main stream societal belief about black and brown men & of course in turn the injustices within the system perpetuate the main stream belief. This is scary. As to what's needed to change, I agree with the idea that Danyeli began to hint at. I don't think reform is enough, I don't think changing laws and government policies is enough. There will never be justice if we can't bring forth real and substantial social change.
That would almost be like saying "we're post racial because we have a black president." ... no... we're not. This is like saying that access to institutions and laws against women are enough. No there's a much bigger gender problem. The same way there's a much bigger racial problem.
I believe while considering the alternatives to incarceration, it is very important to determine the line where the person must go to prison. How we draw these line? How do we determine which offender should be penalized harshly? Coming back to Arturo's point, I do not think that all people actually deserve to get a second chance. Yes, some people are struggling from poverty and racial discrimination. However, there are many people who choose this life! Do they deserve the second chance? I do not think so.
I invite everyone to read this article
It's really relevant to our visit to court last week
Today’s criminal justice system is based on the assembly line model of justice, which privileges expediency over due process rights. As Thomas mentioned, plea bargaining is prevalent and the system ends up exploiting those who lack financial resources or access to legal representation.
But how did this come about? We need to revisit the socio-political context of the 70’s and 80’s where fears of crime were disproportionately high and being anything less than “tough-on-crime” was political suicide. In this climate, the War on Drugs was born, harsher, longer sentences were enacted, and the use of plea bargaining was amped up.
All these tools were products of the racist, punitive and more importantly, fearful mindset of the public, who was reacting in part, to the historic victory of civil liberties for blacks and women in the preceding decade.
The overburdened system we have privileges speedy case processing instead of lengthy trials for defendants to prove their innocence. Is it a coincidence that the majority of defendants who come through the system are largely poor, uneducated, people of color? But this is hardly true of the trials of celebrities and white-collar individuals; just compare the trial of the Central Park Five to that of any wealthy, white collar individual.
So how might we begin to reverse all this damage? We certainly need to enact more humane laws but where would the political will to do the above come from? How do we get the public to be more merciful and less punitive? How can we get people to empathize with the plights of people whose lives they are blind to? I think the media to a large extent has been responsible for unnecessarily spreading fear and sustaining these attitudes.
As usual, your blog comments raise more questions than they answer. Thomas's court tour is always sobering; we often take a while in the seminar to recover a sense of hope, of the possibilities for meaningful change, after our visit to 100 Centre Street. But to this end, I would ask you to think, when we visit Vera main this week, about how the Vera Institute of Justice & its spinoff agencies (and its commitment to demonstration projects and spinning them off) work to address the questions you all raise. This is less a question about "the band-aid" of social services than a question about what is effective in both the short term and the long term.
Awesome discussion everyone! Both Marina and Monica's responses were particularly interesting. One of the points that Thomas made is also emphasized in Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow.
One of the main functions of the criminal justice system is to mass incarcerate impoverished people of color. Drug policies, for example, specifically target groups of people for incarceration in order to keep jails open, jail guards in jobs. Therefore, there would not be so many people to process, such high case loads if we address the policies that cause mass incarceration AND develop jobs to replace the prison industry. As Thomas said, we, also at John Jay rely on the criminal justice system for our livelihood. In order to make real change we have to envision what we can do to support sustainable supportive social welfare infrastructure like education and healthcare.
I do actually believe cost benefit can work towards this vision- using the master' stools to dismantle the system.... Prisons are finally closing around the country, even in places like Texas because they are so costly. Government is investing in community based alternatives to institutionalization. The closure of youth jails throughout NYS and reinvestment in more family like alternatives close to home is a strong example: http://www.ocfs.state.ny.us/main/rehab/close_to_home/. Family Nurse Partnerships that bring health services to homes to prevent hospitalization is another good example: http://www.nursefamilypartnership.org/locations/New-York.
I'm so excited to see the ways all of you add to this vision.
PS- Bekah I love the article about Scandinavia. Being respectful to people who do harm does not cause mass harm to be caused.
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