Now it would be in a more important setting. The people of Pierce Point were depending on him. This wasn’t a bunch of arguments over little things; this was a matter of life and death out there.
Everyone wanted to say hi to Grant and Lisa as they pulled into the Grange. People loved having a judge and a doctor out there. They were a symbol to the people in Pierce Point that things just might be OK. They had “normal” things, like a judge and a doctor. They had the tools to do normal things, like having a justice system and medical help. They could take care of themselves. They didn’t need 911, which was an enormous relief since no one was answering 911 anymore.
Rich was at the entrance to the Grange and said, “We have some work for you now. Time to be a judge.”
“Let’s do it,” Grant said.
Then he realized he had no idea what he was doing. For some strange reason, though, he wasn’t nervous. He actually looked forward to the challenge. He was painting on a fresh canvas by creating a system that he knew was fair. How many times in the past had he been in court and been screwed by statist judges and thought, “Here’s how I would do it if I could?” Well, now he could.
Rich explained that the prisoners were waiting for their trial. They were in the makeshift jail a couple of buildings away. The “jail,” an abandoned house, was working surprisingly well. They locked each prisoner in separate rooms in the house and put a door stop wedge of wood on the outside of the door of each room so they couldn’t get out. It was low tech, but worked well.
Josie had fully recovered from the flash-hider puncture wound to the chest and was doing fine, although she was having withdrawals from meth.
Frankie was a mess. He had a broken nose and jaw, both of which were not set by medical staff because he was too violent, even in handcuffs, to allow them to attend to him. So his nose and jaw fused back together crooked. Right after the beating he got during the raid, his face looked like hamburger, but now was about halfway healed. He was missing teeth. His broken ribs also set at an uncomfortable angle and he needed help moving around, which was usually refused. He was having meth withdrawals, too. He was extremely depressed. He would constantly call out for Josie and she would cry back to him. They were terrified of what was coming. The three-week period between their arrest and trial was torturous. That wasn’t Grant’s intention, but he was OK with the results.
Brittany and Ronnie were uninjured, but had meth withdrawals. They hadn’t been using for as long as Josie or Frankie so it wasn’t as bad.
The worst thing for Brittany and Ronnie during the three weeks before trial was the fear. They had no idea what these people at Pierce Point would do to them. This whole jail-in-a-house thing was so different than their previous run-ins with the law. Back then, they were put in a police car, taken to jail, processed, and released in a few hours. They came back to the house, got high and stole some more, and got caught some more, but nothing ever really happened to them.
As the Collapse was building up and the government had less and less money, the authorities were not really enforcing the drug laws. They didn’t have the jail space or prosecutors to deal with drug addicts stealing things, so Brittany and Ronnie were wondering what would happen to them now. They wanted the old system back. It had worked just fine for them.
After getting an update on the condition of the prisoners, Rich said, “So, your honor, how do you want to do this?”
“We’ll need a jury,” Grant said to Ryan. “Go get me fourteen adults. Twelve jurors and two alternates. Try to get people who don’t know the defendants. If they know them a little, that’s OK, but not ideal. Once you get the fourteen, have someone quietly ask around about whether any of them have a grudge against the defendants.” Grant had Ryan do this because he had lived out at Pierce Point and knew some of the people out there.
“Will do,” Ryan said as he went off to get the jury together.
“We’ll need a prosecutor, too,” Grant said. Everyone looked at Rich.
“OK, I’ll do it,” Rich said. He had fully expected that he’d be the prosecutor.
“Don’t worry about the lawyer stuff,” Grant said. “Just ask the obvious questions your curious brain would ask them. You’ll do fine.” Rich nodded.
“The defendants can have someone represent them if they want,” Grant said. “We’ll deal with that if it comes up, which it probably won’t.”
Grant looked around the Grange hall at all the chairs and the podium. It would work for a public trial. It wasn’t a pretty court room with multimedia capabilities for presentations, fancy jurors’ chairs, and a bench for a judge to sit up on, but it would do.
“OK, let’s have a trial,” Grant said.
A crowd started to gather. Snelling and his core followers were not in audience; they were probably boycotting this “illegal” trial. But everyone else wanted to see this. Good. Grant wanted as many people as possible to see what happens to those who steal and—worse yet—hurt kids. He wanted the residents to see that they had an effective police force. He also wanted them to see that it worked fairly and that they followed the Constitution. A practical, effective, and fair justice system was a huge Patriot recruiting tool. It would cement people’s allegiance to the Patriots. It would be an example of how the Patriot approach was just plain better. Showing people a fair trial was much more effective than a thousand speeches about political philosophy.
After about an hour of getting things prepped, Rich said, “We’re ready. We have a jury.”
“Bring the prisoners in,” Grant said like he’d been doing this forever.
He paused and thought back again to college when he and Lisa talked about him being a judge someday. You’re a judge now, he said to himself. Now go do a great job. Be fair and show people that justice can actually be done. Set the example.
Yes. You’ll see why this is important later.
The outside thought gave Grant a chill. He was trying to understand how a trial of some tweakers would be important later. Grant shrugged. The outside thought had been right about everything in the past. So far, it had a 100% track record.
A few minutes later, some guards brought in the prisoners. The crowd gasped when they saw them shuffling by in zip ties. They looked like zombies; half dead. They were horribly thin, heads drooping, and weak. They looked doomed. Frankie looked the worst, with his swollen face. A guard had to help him by holding him up on each side.
When the prisoners were seated, it became very clear that this was a trial. Pierce Point was taking care of things like this on its own. This was a very serious moment.
Grant noticed a very different feeling at the Grange. The feeling at the Grange had gone from the joy and kindness of neighbors sharing food and reading their own neighborhood newspaper to the solemnness of deciding who lives and dies. It was like a funeral, but the people who were dead were sitting right there, still alive, but likely soon to be dead. No one in the Grange hall had ever looked a person in the eye who they knew would be dead soon.
Grant wanted to project confidence that he knew what he was doing, even if he was making this up as he went.
“Would the defendants please identify themselves,” Grant said. They just looked around or, in Josie’s case, sobbed. She was in a borrowed pair of sweat pants and a t-shirt that said “Princess.” It was sad.
Finally, each of the defendants gave their names, except Frankie, who refused to talk. Rich identified Frankie by name.
“Let the record reflect that we have a jury seated and two alternates,” Grant said. There was no “record” to reflect anything since the trail wasn’t being transcribed by a court reporter and wasn’t being recorded, but Grant said “let the record reflect” out of habit.