Let's Make a Deal

I'm talking to my shrink and draped in a mink.

I woke up yesterday thinking it was my time to face my suburban cop accusers in open court. I had been two the courthouse twice already — once to reject their plea deal and another to say I wanted to exercise my right to a jury trial.

I’m walking east on Sullivant Avenue and formulating my defense considering the last letter I got from the court said I have a jury trial in roughly 45 minutes.

By the time I arrive at the Courthouse, I’m feeling like Johnny Cochran. These suburban freak cops followed me home and there’s going to be a reckoning on that.

Shows how much I know. The prosecutor – who, let the record show, I totally respect — comes and says that due to COVID-19 they don’t have the jurors to impanel a jury today. The best we can do is start the process tomorrow, and that process will take at least three days to complete.

Well fuck me. I came ready for war. Not that does me any good. I can’t take the next three days off work. I need those funds to help pay off the medical debt I incurred when I drove my car into a wall like a dipshit.

My only other option is putting myself at a disadvantage by requesting a trial by court, knowing damn well Judge Mingo is a certified Republican. Oh well. I tell the prosecutor to go ahead and summon those suburban freaks who imprisoned me. We’ll fight in the shade.

Last I talked two the top crimefighting duo in Columbus, they said they loved going to court. I suppose I would too if I made 1.5x my already unearned salary to sit in an air conditioned room and lie on people. The prosecutor said I can go lunch, and I gladly take him up on that offer.

I come back to court and the prosecutor says the suburban freak cops have finally arrived. Unfortunately they didn’t bring the body camera footage, which I already predicted they wouldn’t.

I expected something nefarious was afoot but the lawyer who gets paid to defend the cops assured me something like this happens all the time.

Again, it came down to if I wanted to fight today or extend this to tomorrow. I knew the Republican judge would never take my word over the cops. I also knew I could not afford to lose my job to fight this case.

The prosecutor and I had a come to Jesus moment. He admitted that I was right. The system was rigged against minorities and poor people. My first thought was about to ask why in the fuck he acting as an enforcement agent for a system he admits is corrupt. For once I bit my tongue. No doubt he had student loan debt like 98% of my generation.

He wanted me to plead guilty to littering. I said nah. I am no fucking litterbug and would rather do 60 days in county jail than admit in open court to being a litterbug. He said his witnesses, the suburban cops, had agreed to let me plead to jaywalking and let the littering case get dismissed.

I said that works in principle. But I had been booked on littering charges — the prosecutor admitted he had never heard of someone being processed downtown on littering charges — and as such I didn’t feel like I should have to pay any fines or court costs attached to the jaywalking charge.

I said you gotta see it from my perspective. Two weeks prior to this incident, the CDP permanently scarred me with a wooden bullet for standing on a sidewalk and minding my own business. Two days later the National Guard teargassed me two hours before curfew. Hating cops is a natural reaction for someone in my shoes.

He said you gotta see it from my perspective. You told these cops to drop their badge and come around the corner to your house to have it out with them. Do you really think you can convince a room full of people that you were in the right?

I’m thinking I don’t need a room full of people to agree with me. I just need one. But then I remember I live in the most Satanic country in the world and as such a majority of Americans love cops. I also can’t come to court tomorrow without losing my job.

The prosecutor says plead guilty to the jaywalking charge and he’ll dismiss the littering charge. I say the best I can do is “no contest” on the jaywalking charge contingent on paying no fines or court costs. He agrees if for no other reason than he wants to return to a world where he’s not thinking about me.

We go into the courtroom of Judge Stephanie Mingo. Back in the day I used to say the only time I would wear a tie is if somebody died or I was appearing in front of someone with the power to throw me in jail.

Not yesterday. I’m done pretending to be someone I’m not. I came to win over a single juror, not impress a judge. I wore my finest Hawaiian shirt and tropical shorts to court. Fuck it. This is who I am.

Judge Mingo asks me if I’m a U.S. Citizen. For some reason I think she asked if I’m “a good citizen.” I’m like, “Uhhh, yeah.” Not sarcastically. Just matter-of-factly. This is how my lizard brain processes questions.

I quickly learned Judge Mingo is the type of the judge that thinks she’s the queen of the world because she wears a robe to work. She tees off on my sorry ass. Talking about how I chose the wrong day to bring sarcasm to her court and if I try it again I will be charged with contempt.

She goes on to stress that whatever deal the prosecutor and I struck, none of that matters to her. Do I want to proceed?

Well, I needed a minute to think about it. Last thing I was trying to do is plead “No Contest” and get stroked into Hell by a vindictive judge.

But once again, I couldn’t ask my coworkers to cover for me. So yes, fuck it, that’s my final answer judge.

Thankfully she accepted the dismissal of the littering charge. As for the jaywalking, she wouldn’t levy a fine. She decided to cite me $98 for court costs which I won’t pay on principle.

Big shoutout to the Franklin Democratic Party Electoral Machine for proving more effective at disenfranchising local progressives than ousting a hobgoblin like Judge Mingo at the Ballot Box in 2019. At least I’ll never be in her court again unless I’m in a body bag.

I am satisfied with the outcome. Especially considered I negotiated the deal myself rather than relying on “the best deal possible” that was negotiated by a public defender who is best friends with the prosecutor and has a shared interest in adjudicating as many cases as smoothly as possible.

Regardless, it’s valuable experience for my Oct. 1st trial on the egregious charges of “Misconduct in an Emergency Zone.” The last time I talked to a the prosecutor, he told me he needed time to run this case up the flagpole to his bosses on account of me being a credentialed member of the media (thank you, Industrial Workers of the World!) who cannot be kept out of an emergency zone.

I’m wise to their tricks. I assume they’ll try a similar hustle where they say, oh, yes, you turned up at the court house expecting a jury trial. Unfortunately we can’t accommodate that today and instead we’ll have to drag it over the course of three days.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I wasn’t arrested for looting or punching a cop. If I don’t hear that beautiful word, “dismissal,” then I will already have my coworkers aligned to cover my shifts.

Maybe I’m right. Maybe I’m wrong. But at least when that fateful day comes, I can stand in front of God and say I played no part in the soul-crushing justice system that backs cops and rolls over poor and minority people. Not that I would expect any self-righteous person to understand that simple notion.

THOSE WMDs. Morrow County Jail: Two jailbreaks, one suicide and 100% COVID infection rate… How Trump could win… New York’s invisible island of the dead… How a massive bomb came together in Beiruit’s port… The dirty history of soap.