Seizing an Opportunity... and Outrage!

I never thought that I'd be writing a piece calling for the U.S. to engage in armed conflict, but if I were President Obama, I'd jump on this opportunity to kick some Somali ass -- I'd be on them like a pit bull on a soup bone. Take an American sea captain hostage, and then threaten revenge when he's rescued? I'd stomp a mud hole in their collective ass, otherwise they’re going to attempt to make good on their threat.

Here's why I would order an attack: One, they deserve it; two, the pirates are not going to stop until someone stops them; and three, by doing so, Obama goes a long way in forever silencing his conservative critics who are waiting to characterize him as weak. This would cut their legs out from under them.

I’d go in with an overwhelming (and I do mean “overwhelming”) force of U.S. Marines and clean out the nest of pirates, under the battle cry of “Remember Black Hawk Down” and then ask the international community for help in establishing a functional, stable government. Finally, a “good” war, and the president should take full advantage of it.

Outrage!

“And I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it...” -- Bob Dylan “A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall” 1963

With many county officials under virtual siege by the FBI, with the former highest law enforcement officer in the county — Gerald McFaul — hiding under his bed in Florida, praying the feds don’t drag him out by his heels to face the same Bar of Justice he was sworn to protect and serve (but now, by all appearances, he financially raped), and the entire county criminal justice system about to be reviewed by a national, independent research group to determine if fairness toward minorities has prevailed over the years — it doesn’t take a crystal ball to figure out how this review will turn out — one would think that other players in this charade we call a fair legal system would by now get the message and begin to clean up their act just a bit, but obviously they’re still tone deaf; when you’ve had your way for so long you evidently begin to feel that you’re impervious — to criticism, correction or censure.

The Zeitgeist is changing, yet the folks who run our county criminal justice system remain stuck in the past. The Presiding Judge is about to make a horrible appointment, and no one is willing to speak out. (See my column of last week in the archives,)

Only outrage, and enough of it, will bring about positive change. And right now I feel like a voice, all alone, crying in the wilderness …. But I’m not going to stop, I simply can’t — lives, families and tax dollars are at stake here. This is a hill I’m willing to die on.

I could certainly use some help, but, at least at this juncture, I don’t see any on the horizon. Rarely do criminal defense attorneys speak out en masse against unfair treatment by the Court; however, the crack pipe laws in Cleveland where changed when a group of them (along with a few retired judges and other citizens) challenged the fairness of them. They were also aided by media attention to the issue. But far too often lawyers have remained mute as Lady Justice is turned into a slut and whore by county prosecutors and judges on the Common Pleas bench and their tradition of silence is something they perhaps need to reexamine.

Insiders know that churning “frequent flyers” (as repeat drug offenders are known around the Justice Center) back through the system again and again pays for college tuition for these lawyers’ kids, but does damn little to actually solve the problem … a problem that is driving some states to the brink of insolvency. And the taxpayer always — always — gets stuck in the end.

The problem is this: If you suddenly have a heart attack and the paramedics rush to the scene and begin treating you for a broken leg, you’re probably going to die. Yet we, as a society, treat people with the medical problem of addiction, with the legal remedy of incarceration … and then wonder why, almost 40 years in, we still have not won one battle, let alone the entire “War on Drugs”? Isn’t one of the definitions of insanity the persistent repeating of a failed solution over and over and expecting a different result?

However, former Muny Judge Larry Jones (again, sorry if I’m repeating myself from last week) made a difference with the Drug Court he ran so successfully for over a decade. His success rate was something like 75 percent. So there are real answers for many addicts who need help.

The Muny Drug Court was initiated because the County Common Pleas Judges (for some strange reason) didn’t want to be bothered, in spite of the fact that Drug Courts were proven successes in other parts of the country. It very well could be that here in Cuyahoga County judges feel that the best way to win reelection is to posture as “tough on crime” rather than being “smart on crime.”

But now the Common Pleas bench — albeit belatedly and probably kicking and screaming all the way — is finally forming a Drug Court. However, one has to wonder if they want it to fail, so they can collectively say “See, we were right all along, this kind of crap doesn’t work, all these animals understand is a swift kick in the ass, all the way to prison.” Why else would Presiding Judge Nancy McDonnell named her pal, David T. Matia (the worst possible judge in the county for this position) to head the Drug Court?

The reason could be ambition. It’s no secret that Matia wants to eventually run for a seat on the Ohio Supreme Court, and serving as judge on a Drug Court will look good on his résumé … no matter how badly he performs his duties. After all, it’s just a bunch of Blacks, Hispanics and lower-class Whites whose lives could be ruined by his heavy-handed, ill-tempered treatment, right? Wrong.

Drug addiction knows no color or class; it’s an equal opportunity destroyer of lives. Virtually every family in the county has been impacted by a loved one becoming addicted, and it takes a jurist with unusual compassion to help sick people get well. And, while I’ve never personally met His Honor, nor do I have a bone to pick with him, any lawyer who practices at the Justice Center will tell you in private that compassion is not Matia’s strong suit. He’s more of the “Lock ‘um up and throw away the key” type of judge.

In a recent case, Matia berated a man he was sentencing so severely — calling him a “punk” and an “idiot” — that Attorney Bob Ferreri challenged the judge in open court for his intemperate remarks. Another attorney, Russell Tye, who was representing another defendant in the same case, petitioned the Ohio Supreme Court to remove Matia from his case, accusing him of bias. He stepped aside. Similar stories regarding this jurist’s ill temper have abounded over his years on the years bench.

Lives, futures and public dollars are at stake here, and a judge with the right judicial temperament can make a huge difference; just look at what Judge Jones did in Muny Court. A compassionate, understanding judge like Joan Syneberg is best suited for this Common Pleas position, but, alas, she is a Republican, so she hasn’t got a ghost of a chance of being named to the Drug Court.

Huh? Wait a minute … rewind that. Lives, families, futures and tax dollars are at stake … and petty partisan politics is all our elected officials can think of? And there is no outrage? Citizens, lead by lawyers, should be forming a picket line around the Justice Center to protest. The tax dollars spent by a Drug Court are going to be totally wasted, and like sheep, we will say or do nothing.

The underclass has been receiving such a royal fucking for so long in Cuyahoga County that everyone connected to the justice system, from the cop in the squad car to the judge that eventually does the sentencing, sincerely believes that’s the way things are supposed to go down. Justice is two-tiered along the banks of the Cuyahoga. And there ain’t no shame in their game. Well, their ain’t no shame in my game either. I on a crusade; I’m going to try to prick the consciences of local lawyers, judges, court administrators, the average citizen, and anyone in a position of power to influence getting the right judge named to this extremely important Court.

I going to fight tooth and nail to right this wrong that is about to be done to powerless people … mainly people of color. I’m in for the long haul; I’m going to keep hammering away at this issue, week, after week, after week. I’m going to see if my pen is any match for the rusty, dull and bloody sword they use in Common Pleas Court, all the while calling it “justice.” As Shakespeare wrote in “Macbeth”: “Lay on … and damned be he who first cries ‘Hold, enough!’”

From Cool Cleveland contributor Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com
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