… back on March 20th, Chief had to go to court for a preliminary hearing. At that time, his lawyer told him that the could get him in the ARD program :: Accelerated something-or-other ::, probabtion, community service and some fines but nothing that would stick to his permanent record.
Chief’s response was that he didn’t care about his records .. that he had his own business.. but the lawyer said that he should care because it could following in a negative way if Chief needed to get a business loan or something like that.
The lawyer said that Chief had to make a decision.. either do what needs to be done to end everything and get on with our lives, or keep fighting and spending 1000.00 everytime the lawyer faced a judge.
He said it was harsh to hear but you can’t play fair with an unfair system and it was ultimately up to Chief to decide.
I could feel my eyes welling up with tears and the anger inside of me was unbelievable. I felt like everything I thought to be true about democracy, about our justice system, about police officers was trashed.
Chief did nothing… ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.. but because we can’t afford attorney fees he was going to have to plead to something he didn’t do?
We didn’t even really discuss it.. Chief just went ahead and signed the paper work for the ARD program and waive his rights to a preliminary hearing in the borough so that it would be moved to the county seat.
My stomach hurt.. I felt like throwing up.. but what choice did we really have?
I started thinking about how many other people were in prison because of the same situation.. because they couldn’t afford a lawyer or maybe because their family had already been through enough. It was really too hard to think about and too taxing to come to terms with the fact that this was the way it was going to be .. especially because Weed, the bastard, was still walking the streets dealing pills and pot.
Initially, Chief was told that the new arraignment would be today but that he wouldn’t have to go the arraignment in the county seat.. that the lawyer was going to go. But Sunday when we stopped at the shop, the lawyer had put his business card in the door with a note to call him and that it wasn’t an emergency.
I called and the lawyer said that due to an emergency, he was going to be out of town today and that Chief was going to have to go to court and plead “Not Guilty” himself. He gave the time and other instructions and then he said that he had bad news.
He said that because of a previous gun charge, Chief would not be eligible for the ARD program.
NOTE: He was never convicted of a gun charge. Back when he was 17, his older brother got into a fight or something and there was a gun involved. Nobody was shot or hurt or anything, but because his brother was over 18 at the time and would have really fucked up his life with a gun charge, Chief took the wrap. Nothing ever became of it except a dusty blurb in his record of youthful mischief.
The lawyer went on to say that he didn’t know there was a gun charge and I told him that it was in the original warrant. He mumbled something but it pissed me off because OBVIOUSLY this jerk off didn’t even READ the warrant.
Chief said that he was glad he wasn’t able to get ARD because now he could just do what he wanted and fight the charges and we would do whatever needed to be done to see this thing through… even hire another lawyer because OBVIOUSLY we’re having serious second thoughts on this one!
So today he went up to the court house and was formally arraigned. He was back in about 2 hours :: they take people without lawyers with them first :: and now the pre-trial hearing is set for May 20th (I think).
Chief explained that the pre-trial is when they would probably try to hash a deal leaving him with nothing but a posession charge and a fine.
Hopefully that’s the way it will work but it still turns my stomache.
Oh.. and one other thing…
The Annonymous Informer? The one that we’re almost 100% sure was involved and haven’t seen since this all happened?
Yea.. well.. he came into the shop yesterday. I was there and Chief told me to hold my tongue.
Apparently, he had been in earlier and started asking Chief questions about the case and something about Chief fucking up whoever went to the cops or some bullshit like that.
Chief was really calm and said that there was nothing to talk about because he had nothing to worry about and let it go at that.
He explained was ironic that this dude happened to show up the day before his arraignment and that there was every possibility that he was wired to see if Chief would say anything .. or it could just be that the dude knows how Chief is and wanted to find out if Chief knew he was involved. He also said that if he was the informant and was called to appear, that there would be no way in hell that he would show his face.
This whole thing just makes me head spin.
LIVING ME 101 