DID YOU notice? It took less time to catch, jail, try and convict the Boston Marathon bomber than it took just to start the James Holmes trial whose mass murder in an Aurora, Colorado theater occurred before the Boston Marathon bombing.
Something is wrong here. An abuse of judicial process. It is one thing to afford a fair trial, it is quite something else to delay and obstruct a trial with every imaginable and legally pointless maneuver.
This was captured perfectly last week in an exchange in the Centennial, Colorado courtroom, broadcast over the radio. The psychiatrist for the prosecution stated his opinion that Holmes knew exactly what he was doing.
Needless to say, this is the crux of the trial. Did Holmes know right from wrong? If so, he was legally sane. If not, he was legally insane. The prosecutions psychiatrist stated his view.
Immediately the defense counsel asked the judge to strike the psychiatrists testimony to ask the jury to disallow it and also asked the judge to declare a mistrial.
This is an abuse of process. The prosecutor and his witness were right on point. The defense counsel, for the thousandth time or more, delayed and obstructed the trial. (The judge denied both motions.) If the defense thought that the prosecution witness was off base, it remained (and still is) within the defense prerogative to bring its own witness to the contrary.
But no. Interruption was deemed necessary.
Insane interruption, using the term in its popular, not legal, sense.
This whole trial has become insane. It puts the knife into the victims, or their families, turning it round and round, year after year. Pointless legal motion after pointless legal motion. Its wrong.
And its all unnecessary for Holmes to get a fair trial.
Can you imagine a request to strike testimony that is exactly what this trial is all about? Yet, the defense, shameless and oblivious to the damage this trial does to the reputation of the legal system, continues undeterred.
Perhaps the defense feels that since this is a capital case, it must do everything to save the life of its client. In my view, its antics will decrease, not increase, the chances of acquittal. Bluster is not a crowd pleaser, especially when the crowd is as small as a jury.
Yes, when it takes longer to begin the Holmes trial than it takes to finish the Boston Marathon trial, the public rightly becomes cynical about the legal system.
AT LEAST as important, this trial is damaging to the cause of the mentally ill.
If Holmes is found innocent, what will be the color of the victory? The image of the mentally ill will be of cruelly violent people who cant help themselves. This is just the opposite of how most mentally ill people are. They are gentle, just like most people. They are lost souls, not violent ones.
You might object: The image of the mentally ill is not the goal of a murder trial or of the defense. The goal of the defense is to exonerate the accused by demonstrating that he is legally insane, an innocent man. As to image, let the chips fall where they may.
So the defense might claim.
If only it were so.
The tactics of the defense are clearly designed to highlight the scope of mental illness and to focus the attention of judge, jury and the public on mental illness as associated with, but not legally defined by, unspeakable violence.
That would be perhaps the ultimate phyrric victory. To get one man off, an entire community would be besmirched.
NOT TO mention, the evidence so far clearly suggests that Holmes is guilty. So far as I understand, whether Holmes is or was mentally ill is quite irrelevant to the legal issue, which remains: Did he know he was doing something legally and morally wrong?
His extensive planning and the notes he himself made, including an estimation of how long it would take the police to arrive after he began shooting shows, at a minimum, legal culpability. What does police mean if not what I am planning is wrong?
Another difficulty, though this time not with defense tactics at the Holmes trial but with Colorado law itself: Holmes must be shown to have known not only that his murderous plans were legally wrong, but morally wrong. This last criterion was affirmed as a matter of law over 20 years ago. In the interim, Colorados definition of morality has evolved considerably; indeed, the entire idea of public morality in this state is going out of style. Think gambling and marijuana legalization; think growing sympathy for assisted suicide and same-sex marriage. Is it a bit much nowadays to expect people to be clear about morality?
Even the condemnation of murder is somewhat attenuated. Speaking of the Boston Marathon, the unwillingness in many circles to call out Islamically motivated killings (suicide or otherwise) for what they are doesnt help shore up the idea of moral clarity.
Granted, this may be another topic for another day. But this much is clear: the Holmes trial is an abuse of the sacred principle that everyone deserves a defense. Given the extensive stretching out of the proceedings, there could be unfortunate repercussions in public impatience with the legal process and the mentally ill. Holmes defense attorneys seem not to care.
Hillel Goldberg may be reached at hillel@ijn.com.
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