The Wheel of Justice Keeps On Turnin'

Court Houses primarily exist to grind people into accepting plea deals.

I said years ago I would never return to 375 S. High Street. Next to The Workhouse, the Franklin County Courtroom is the most depressing building within a city already depressing enough to those paying attention.

I’m sure the prosecutors see themselves as working in “the halls of justice” or whatever. The truth is it’s basically an extortion racket primarily targeting the poor residents from over-policed neighborhoods.

Parking is a complete crapshoot because you never know exactly how long you’ll be inside. Your ticket says 9:00 a.m. but the truth is they’ll call your number whenever the fuck they want to.

You wait around until the lowest level bureaucrat selects your file from the pile of assholes he deals with every day. They’ll take a cursory glance over your fancy looking folder and offer you some sort of plea deal. Usually it involves dropping the frivolous charge in exchange for pleading guilty to the more serious charge. Sometimes a reduced sentence is attached. A fine or some sort of “court costs” is always, always attached.

You realize then that this entire skyscraper was built with the blood and money of people who by and large just needed “access” to proper mental healthcare or a better school growing up.

Most people take the plea deal. It’s a pain in the ass to have to come to court on a Tuesday afternoon. It’s even more of a pain to have to do it three times.

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Yesterday I went to my pre-trial date on trumped-up charges of “failure to use a pedestrian walkway” and “littering.” My understanding was this would be a hearing where the judge would establish if the prosecution had produced enough evidence to proceed to trail.

Seeing as I’m representing myself, I figured this would include some dialogue with the judge. Wrong. Instead a mid-level prosecutor in a suit that costs more than my monthly expenses comes out and offers to drop the pedestrian charge in exchange for pleading guilty to littering and paying a $60 fine (and an untold number of court costs).

Considering the maximum sentence is 60 days in jail, it was probably a good deal. But I just couldn’t cop to a litter charge. I swore off being a litterbug over a decade ago. I’m not having that stain on my record forever.

I could have probably counter-offered to plead guilty to failure to walk on the sidewalk but then I remembered the smug suburban cops that pinched me. Suddenly I wasn’t in the mood to make a deal.

I asked the prosecutor if he had watched the body camera footage from the arrest. He said no. That blew my mind. But the cops had already filed an affidavit of probable cause, so prosecutors can take them at their word and proceed with the case.

Lawyers spend a lot of time talking about “can” and not wondering if they should. Yes, they can take the cop’s word. The problem is cops are notorious liars who are shitty at paperwork.

“I’ll watch the tape. I’ll drop all charges if the charges weren’t warranted. If they were, we will go to trial. I’ll take to the bailiff and get you a new date in the meantime.”

I guess we’ll find out on September 14th, which in a stroke from Satan himself is a day after the Browns’ first game of the season, when we see if Columbus will spend tax dollars to put an ostensible jay-walking litterbug on jury trial in the middle of a raging pandemic.

At least I know what to expect today, when I have to return to the courthouse on charges of “misconduct in an emergency zone” when the cops refused to let me enter the emergency zone because they didn’t think I was the media. Seems like an open and shut case to me considering I do have a newsletter and I covered the protests extensively and have the scar from a wooden bullet and blog posts to prove it.

THOSE WMDs. How running on a treadmill differentiates from running outside… A new Cold War has begun… The science-backed benefits of being a dog owner… The unique U.S. failure to control coronavirus… How should I clean my cloth mask?