Stories to Ignite our Imagination for New Year’s Resolution
Three recent stories of judicial cases saddened me and fired my imagination for a news resolution.
A Waterville man, Phillip Wilson, 48, admitted that his Toyota Tundra crossed the centerline, careened off a semi-truck, and killed a 62-year-old Oroville driver. Wilson admitted he’d taken prescription medications for chronic back pain. The state’s blood analyst said the combination of drugs in his blood would make a patient drowsy. On December 31st Wilson is scheduled to begin a two years and three months prison sentence.
The sentence does little to alleviate the tragedy. Does it heal the victim’s family? A civil case that might compensate the family requires another trial. Does it rehabilitate Wilson, who was also injured in the crash? Does the community benefit more than it costs to jail him?
Journalist Ron Suskind reports a related case in his book The Way of the World. He interviewed Tom Koenigs, the German-born UN special envoy in Afghanistan, who told a story about one of his young Muslim drivers. The driver nodded off while driving and killed another young man. The driver immediately visited the victim’s father, an old man, and confessed, “We are all Muslims. This is my fault. I fell asleep. I am profoundly sorry. Is there any way we can resolve this?”
The father said, “My son, who you killed, supported our family. Now you will be my son, and you will support our family.”
The driver then reported the incident to Koenigs who had two choices: turn the case over to Afghanistan authorities, or to Sharia jurists, called Ulemas. Ulemas are scholarly specialists in the current rulings and interpretations that are an expansion of Sharia Islamic law.
Koenigs chose the Ulemas who wrote up a binding agreement. Koenigs said, “Sharia law, I’ve learned, is much more victim-oriented, rather than the way it is in modern legal systems, where it’s the state versus the perpetrator in a courtroom, and the victim is nowhere to be seen.”
K. C. Mehaffey recently reported on local Tribal Courts in the Wenatchee World. Tribal Courts on the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation administer justice for minor crimes that warrant punishment for a year or less. When the Colville Tribal Court handles these cases, it’s praised for its focus on healing and rehabilitation. Vicki Hanks, who advocated for battered women in both tribal and state courts said, “They don’t just want to punish, they want to heal, both the perpetrator, and the victim.”
Steve Graham, an attorney from Republic, said, “A lot of judges in state court don’t successfully convince the defendant that they really hope the best for them, but in tribal court, that’s just apparent.”
Our justice system is a model for the world. Yet, we must improve a system that punishes a 48-year-old defendant and his family, ignores healing for the grieving family, and increases costs for our community correctional system. Imagine a New Year’s resolution to infuse our justice system with more compassion. If we summon the determination to select the best components of other judicial systems, our American imagination would generate a judicial system that broadly delivers healing and rehabilitation for victims, defendants, and communities.
A Waterville man, Phillip Wilson, 48, admitted that his Toyota Tundra crossed the centerline, careened off a semi-truck, and killed a 62-year-old Oroville driver. Wilson admitted he’d taken prescription medications for chronic back pain. The state’s blood analyst said the combination of drugs in his blood would make a patient drowsy. On December 31st Wilson is scheduled to begin a two years and three months prison sentence.
The sentence does little to alleviate the tragedy. Does it heal the victim’s family? A civil case that might compensate the family requires another trial. Does it rehabilitate Wilson, who was also injured in the crash? Does the community benefit more than it costs to jail him?
Journalist Ron Suskind reports a related case in his book The Way of the World. He interviewed Tom Koenigs, the German-born UN special envoy in Afghanistan, who told a story about one of his young Muslim drivers. The driver nodded off while driving and killed another young man. The driver immediately visited the victim’s father, an old man, and confessed, “We are all Muslims. This is my fault. I fell asleep. I am profoundly sorry. Is there any way we can resolve this?”
The father said, “My son, who you killed, supported our family. Now you will be my son, and you will support our family.”
The driver then reported the incident to Koenigs who had two choices: turn the case over to Afghanistan authorities, or to Sharia jurists, called Ulemas. Ulemas are scholarly specialists in the current rulings and interpretations that are an expansion of Sharia Islamic law.
Koenigs chose the Ulemas who wrote up a binding agreement. Koenigs said, “Sharia law, I’ve learned, is much more victim-oriented, rather than the way it is in modern legal systems, where it’s the state versus the perpetrator in a courtroom, and the victim is nowhere to be seen.”
K. C. Mehaffey recently reported on local Tribal Courts in the Wenatchee World. Tribal Courts on the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation administer justice for minor crimes that warrant punishment for a year or less. When the Colville Tribal Court handles these cases, it’s praised for its focus on healing and rehabilitation. Vicki Hanks, who advocated for battered women in both tribal and state courts said, “They don’t just want to punish, they want to heal, both the perpetrator, and the victim.”
Steve Graham, an attorney from Republic, said, “A lot of judges in state court don’t successfully convince the defendant that they really hope the best for them, but in tribal court, that’s just apparent.”
Our justice system is a model for the world. Yet, we must improve a system that punishes a 48-year-old defendant and his family, ignores healing for the grieving family, and increases costs for our community correctional system. Imagine a New Year’s resolution to infuse our justice system with more compassion. If we summon the determination to select the best components of other judicial systems, our American imagination would generate a judicial system that broadly delivers healing and rehabilitation for victims, defendants, and communities.
Posted by JSR at 12/31/2009 3:26 AM 
Categories: Common Sense,Compassion,Justice
Tags: Way of the World Waterville Suskind Sharia jurists Tribal Councils
Categories: Common Sense,Compassion,Justice
Tags: Way of the World Waterville Suskind Sharia jurists Tribal Councils
Thanks, Jim
I appreciate your thinking on our punishment system. A good topic for the GOT? It does appear to me that everyone loses with our present system, but it has become an industry. >>>
Reply to this