by John Pope

Created on: December 30, 2006   Last Updated: April 19, 2007

We live in a society that does not embrace the pure idea of justice. We live in a society that is governed by laws and regulations designed to control and mediate situations according to a definition of justice, not dispense actual justice.

Let's look at the famous statue that is used to personify justice. You have a woman, bound and blind folded. She is holding a set of scales. She does not see what is on on the scales. The idea is that she makes a decision based on the weight of the each scale, nothing more. She does not have the luxury of seeing which scale contains lead or which contains gold. She cannot tell the the difference between diamonds and rocks. A decision based solely on the weight contained in each scale, pure justice.

In today's society, we are all too familiar with the skewed concept of criminal justice. Designed to be fair and impartial, most people would think that the criminal justice system is designed to protect criminals and make sure that they are afforded every opportunity to escape justice (if you have enough money that is). An if you don't have enough money, there is still ample opportunity to go free since most county governments employ highly competent public defenders to assist you legally.

Today's law enforcement professionals are tasked with the duty to enforce laws interpreted by legislature (most whom don't have the slightest idea what these professionals deal with on a daily basis), make arrests based on these interpretations, and then leave the fate of the incarcerated in the hands of a judicial system that is not based on dispensing justice. Is the system flawed or is it our concept of justice? When a rapist is set free because of a legal technicality is that an acceptable example of justice? When a child molester gets to be housed in a segregated section of a correctional facility because his life will be in danger if placed in general population, is this an acceptable concept of justice? I'd like to see a victim of any crime say, "Well, I guess that's just the way it goes. Justice was served here today."

In order for our criminal justice system to work, justice has to be blind, not to the concept but to the purpose. We have adopted a concept of justice based on standards of law, procedure and administration. In it's purest form, it has no function in our society; that is one of the freedoms we give up when we decide we want to be contributing members of a civilized society. We accept that justice will always escape situations where it is needed most and we willingly embrace the pain and suffering that accompany our acceptance. We accept the justice that the the likes of Simpson and Manson are afforded, the anger that we feel for such actions, and suffering of victims in all crimes of violence and questionable moral turpitude.

Justice is an idea we harbor in the back of our minds, in the deepest, darkest bowels of our psyches, hoping in secret that all get the justice they deserve when the bell tolls.

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