A day in court

I’ve never had an encounter with the law. At least not one where I was the target of its wrath. I do, however, have ample experience with the upholding of the law: that is to say, with lawyers. Both my parents are lawyers, and I’ve often been included in their long conversations about clients, plaintiffs, motions and all the other jargon lawyers throw around in talking business. I had never actually done anything related to the profession until I started volunteering at the Teen Court of Greater Baton Rouge, a volunteer organization where teens sentence other teens convicted of misdemeanors. Sessions happen every few weeks with several trials per session.

The weekend of my debut as a defense attorney, an email with the defendant’s file popped into my inbox, and quickly the printer was working on a copy. As my eyes scanned the words, my mind was on one thing: the crime she had committed. Possession of schedule III drugs. Xanax at school with some friends. Arrested. Drug tested. Sent to Teen Court.

The image in my head of this person wasn’t complete. The words on the page—the police report, the interview with the girl—didn’t create a normal girl in my mind. What was projected in big, bright letters was not a person, but a criminal. The interview section where she talked about herself wasn’t as important; the part where she talked about how she wanted to be a neonatologist and how she volunteered at her church and how she was an honor student wasn’t as prevalent as the big writing on the top of the page—possession of schedule III drugs. This was what was bouncing around the walls of my mind as I walked into the Teen Court building on the day of the trial. I wasn’t sure what I expected to see. A hardened drug user? Someone who looked like a criminal? I planted myself in a waiting area chair and reviewed my notes.

Finally it was time to meet my client. A girl and her mother walked up, and what I saw didn’t connect with my previous thoughts. As I stood up and shook their hands and walked with them to our meeting area, I thought this is a normal person. She was polite and courteous and altogether not very criminal like. The more we talked, the more personal parts of her file started to connect with the criminal: yes she committed a crime, but she is not a criminal. She was a girl who wanted to be a neonatologist and volunteered at her church and was an honor student. She was a girl who made a mistake with some friends, but a girl was what she was. Not a criminal. The totality of her person finally came into view for me, and when it did, I silently chastised myself for my judgement. She was finally humanized for me.

The new humanity I saw in her was like high grade fuel in my motor. I tried my hardest to win her as light a sentence as humanly possible, and in the end, I succeeded.

The idea of humanization has stuck with me beyond the walls of the Teen Court building. To look out on the world and see human beings with hobbies, interests, hopes, and dreams just like me, my brother, or my friends is a powerful ability. When I walk into a grocery store and see the shoppers, workers, and cashiers, I try to remember that their lives are just as complex as mine. I have by no means mastered this; I still sometimes judge people and don’t always try to see the context when I should. But I won’t stop trying, whether in creative writing, a law career, or something else, to see the world through a lens of compassion, to resist a rush to judgment, to see the world as human.