The DA\u2019s office requested my presence when the owner of the dog that bit me appeared in court.\u00a0 Stepping into General Sessions Court is akin to entering another universe.\u00a0I arrived early to find a mass of cops and people in suits standing at the front of the courtroom.\u00a0 They all seemed to be trying to talk to the seated suits\u2014the District Attorney and her assistants, I assume.\u00a0 Most of the younger suits were sharply dressed men and women.\u00a0 Some of the older guys, though, looked like they were wearing suit jackets twenty years out of style and made to fit someone a hundred pounds lighter.\u00a0Apparently not all law practices are lucrative.<\/p>\n
I sat behind the railing with the defendants, witnesses, and victims.\u00a0 A lot were like folks in my neighborhood such as the dog\u2019s owner, Kathryn, who sat beside me.\u00a0Some seemed nervous, some looked lackadaisical, and others were downright scary looking.<\/p>\n
We stood when the judge entered and then the clerk ran through the docket, naming defendants and stating their charges.\u00a0 I heard lots of probation violations, driving without a license, shoplifting, DUI, drug possession, theft, and, of course, my case:\u00a0 \u201cdog bite.\u201d<\/p>\n
Several attorneys said their clients\u2019 cases were up for discussion with the DA, while others said their clients were in \u201clock up.\u201d\u00a0The case related to me was up for discussion and I was very glad Kathryn, the dog owner, was not in lock up.<\/p>\n
A woman from the DA\u2019s office ushered the victims and witnesses to the lobby, and then called me to a private room to get details about my case.\u00a0 She gave me brochures about victim rights, looked at my medical receipts, and made notes about the attack.<\/p>\n
I\u2019d had enough of dealing with the attack and its aftermath.\u00a0 The pain, the weeks with limited mobility, the doctor visits, the court appearance, and the time stolen from things I would have preferred doing, had worn me out.\u00a0On top of that, I hurt for Kathryn, who lost her dog and was reeling with guilt about my injury.\u00a0 At the same time I was relieved that there were no longer worries about children in the neighborhood being attacked.\u00a0 It was a very mixed bag of feelings.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe dog\u2019s owner is facing jail time or probation,\u201d the DA\u2019s representative finally said.\u00a0 \u201cWhat would you like to see happen to her?\u201d<\/p>\n
That startled me. \u00a0I had not expected to be asked for input, nor had I expected such severe consequences.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t want either of those!\u201d I said.\u00a0\u201cThings like this happen in a neighborhood.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t call the police to get Kathryn punished.\u00a0 I only wanted the dog controlled before it hurt someone else.\u201d<\/p>\n
The victim advocate left to talk with the DA after suggesting I go get some coffee; she would text me when needed.<\/p>\n
Miss out on the drama?\u00a0 No way.\u00a0 I simply sat outside the courtroom to watch the show.<\/p>\n
One woman was wearing a black dress made of thin lace with an unnecessarily large amount of cleavage bursting from her chest.\u00a0It looked like she was wearing a bustier in addition to her five-inch stilettos.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t hear what her charges were.\u00a0 Driving without a license?<\/p>\n
Another woman obviously had on a pushup bra under her shirt.\u00a0 Or maybe she was wearing a bustier, as well.\u00a0 Problem was, it pushed her up so high, she looked abnormal, like someone had hung a shelf on her chest, almost level with her shoulders.\u00a0 Her charges?\u00a0 Criminal impersonation?<\/p>\n
And then there was the heavy girl wearing skin-tight white knit shorts over an obvious thong.\u00a0 Nothing was left to the imagination since the shorts were almost transparent.\u00a0 Tax evasion?<\/p>\n
A few middle-aged people were dressed in their Sunday best, while a frail old man in worn khakis was wearing a very full fanny pack (I wondered what he had stashed in there).\u00a0 There were clean jeans and dirty jeans.\u00a0 Dress shirts and muscle shirts.\u00a0 I saw dreadlocks, purple hair, and baldheads, all races, all ages, all manner of tattoos and piercings, and what appeared to be a wide variety of income levels.<\/p>\n
People were constantly in and out of the courtroom.\u00a0They stepped out with their attorneys when they needed to confer.\u00a0 One lady was being grilled by her public defender about the dates she had, or had not, appeared before her probation officer.\u00a0 The lady\u2019s husband, sitting right beside me, listened to their exchange and as soon as the attorney returned to the courtroom, he angrily spewed to his wife, \u201cThat bitch don\u2019t give a shit \u2018bout cha!\u201d<\/p>\n
Which was my observation, as well.\u00a0 There are good attorneys and bad attorneys. \u00a0I suspect you get what you can afford.<\/p>\n
After a couple hours, the victim advocate called me again to the private room.\u00a0 She advised that they had agreed to shelve Kathryn\u2019s charges for six months–if she had no further violations and made full financial restitution to me during that time, the criminal charges would be dropped.<\/p>\n
Sounded fair to me.<\/p>\n
Thankfully the case was resolved without Kathryn being thrown in jail, but, in spite of being relieved that I was nearing the end of my dog bite drama, I wasn\u2019t quite ready to leave.\u00a0 No telling what excitement might emanate from General Sessions Court.<\/p>\n
Hmm\u2026. maybe I should hang there every day.\u00a0 It would provide great fodder for stories.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The DA\u2019s office requested my presence when the owner of the dog that bit me appeared in court.\u00a0 Stepping into General Sessions Court is akin to entering another universe.\u00a0I arrived early to find a mass of cops and people in suits standing at the front of the courtroom.\u00a0 They all seemed to be trying to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-515","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=515"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":516,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515\/revisions\/516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oldkaren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}