I’m more worried about Cory Maye than Casey Anthony

By David McElroy · July 6, 2011

When the news came Tuesday that Casey Anthony had been found not guilty in the murder of her daughter, much of the country screamed in outrage that a woman might be getting away with murder. I wish at least half of that outrage could be mustered for the innocent people sitting in prisons today.

I grew up believing that police officers were our friends and that the legal system protected the rights of the innocent. I’ve lost a lot of faith in both of those beliefs. Things I’ve seen and read lead me to believe the an arrogant, out-of-control police culture has taken root — and that an overburdened, inadequate and cynical legal system has lost the ability to protect those who are innocent.

I’m much, much more worried about these issues than I am in the possibility that one cold, remorseless and lying woman might have gotten away with causing her child’s death.

Have you heard of Cory Maye? If it hadn’t been for the tireless work of Radley Balko while he was at Reason magazine, I’d have never heard of him. (Click here to watch an excellent 24-minute video produced by Reason.TV about the case. And click here for the archives of stories about Maye at Balko’s blog, The Agitator, which is on my personal list of sites to check ever day.) And if Balko and some other people hadn’t brought serious legal talent to bear, Maye would still be sitting on death row in a Mississippi prison for murder when he was clearly only guilty of trying to protect his daughter from unidentified men with guns when police raided his home by mistake. Instead, he’s now awaiting release after paperwork is processed. In a plea deal with prosecutors, he pleaded guilty to manslaughter to avoid another trial — because he can get out of prison now because of the time he’s already served.

The simple truth is that many, many people in this country are sitting in prison for crimes they didn’t commit. Many prosecutors don’t care, because their jobs are based on convicting people, not on whether justice is served. Many in the public (probably most) don’t care, because they truly believe that if police charge someone, he’s probably guilty. Further, they believe that if a jury has convicted a person, he’s almost certainly guilty. And if a few innocent people go to prison along the way, well, that’s the price to be paid for “law and order.”

It would be hard to accuse a U.S. Founding Father of being “soft on crime,” but John Adams was more worried about protecting the innocent than punishing the guilty. He said:

“It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, ‘whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,’ and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.”

Casey Anthony was probably guilty of something. From what I know — and that’s not a lot — it seems that she’s cold, remorseless and dishonest. (The jury convicted her of lying to police.) But there’s no proof that she killed her daughter. To convict her of murder because we don’t like her — or because we simply have the gut feeling that she must have killed Caylee — isn’t justice. It’s forming a lynch mob.

A guilty woman might walk out of prison Wednesday, but many, many innocent men and women are sitting in U.S. prisons today. I’m far more outraged by their false imprisonment than by this one woman possibly getting away with a crime. Don’t let your emotional need for vengeance outweigh your eagerness to pursue justice for the innocent.

Note: After this story was written, Radley Balko posted a new story explaining the details of the plea agreement that allowed Cory Maye to go free.

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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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