| 17 May 2006 Prisoners Prisoner Montoya was in the courtroom when fifty prospective jurors filed into Courtroom 600, on the 6th floor of the Albert V. Bryan Federal Courthouse in Alexandria. I was surprised at that. But I confess that I was surprised at just about every step in the process that had brought us together. There were more than seventy of us, all told, assembled to determine the immediate fate of Senor Montoya, national of Mexico. The legion that surrounded him included the two translators, counsel for the defense Alerbert Tianaga, two young Federal prosecutors supported by Special Agent Gomez, the US Marshall who told us to “shush,” and the three young women who sat at the foot of the dais of District Judge Leonie Brinkema. The Judge looked like Santa Claus's wife, a right jolly old judge with her gray hair gathered back and a kindly manner. Her blue eyes glittered, though, in a predatory manner that was more than a little alarming. I did not want to see them closer. There was a knot of others in the courtroom as well, possibly Montoya partisans or activists, and a woman and a baby. I had not seen them before, but that seemed natural enough. I was impressed by the majesty of the judicial process. Yes, it was the courtroom of that Brinkema, the woman who had just conveyed a sentence so scrupulously fair to Zacharias Moussaoui that it surprised even him. He was so surprised that he requested a “do over” when he realized that the process had been fair, far more so than he would ever have been to us The Judge told him at sentencing that he would die with a whimper. This must be her first outing since then, I thought. I think I would have preferred a vacation. Justice is a complex process, which began before dawn. The Court had recommended that I take public transportation to report for duty, and I dutifully complied. I drove to the Yellow line stop at Pentagon City, and caught a train south to Alexandria. When I emerged there, I knew I was going to be painfully early for my rendezvous with Senor Montoya. The courthouse is a new constriction edifice, and it has some nice heroic touches. Above the entrance is a tall sculpture of the Lady of Justice, blindfolded, and she is poised on the backs of a tortoise and a hare. The name of the work is “Justice deferred,” which refers to the old adage that justice deferred is justice denied. It is appropriate that is the motto of the Bran courthouse, since the mission of the Federal District Court of Eastern Virginia is speed. The local legal community calls it the “Rocket Docket,” since this is where cases of pressing national interest are referred for expeditious disposition. I approached the courthouse on foot, minutes before the building open and an hour before the jury assembly process would begin. I stopped at a Korean convenience store to have a bagel and a cup of coffee to wait. I could see a small group of people in front of the building across the street, waiting for admittance. Washington is a funny town. We are prisoners of the traffic, and with the jurisdiction of this court spreading all the way to the Shenandoah River, there were people coming from far away across the sprawl of development and traffic. In my experience, you are either a half hour early, or a half hour late. I was happy to be in the former, and settled down with my coffee to wait. Tomorrow: Montoya Accused Copyright 2006 Vic Socotra |