Who said that it is pedantic beyond words?
There are days when an observer leaves court with the overwhelming urge to vomit. Such was the case, often, during the 2002 jury trial in the death of 7-year-old Randal Dooley. And such, also, was the case yesterday – seven years later – as arguments began in the appeal applications brought by the child’s father and stepmother, both convicted of second-degree murder for beating the boy to death. Neither Tony nor Marcia Dooley testified in the original joint trial; each had blamed the other in statements made to police. Let us remember Randal on the autopsy table: 13 cracked ribs, a broken elbow, lacerated liver, four brain injuries, a tooth in his stomach, more than a hundred bruises and lacerations. The emaciated little thing weighed 42 pounds. He’d had pneumonia to boot, gurgling in his lungs as he dragged himself up the stairs in a household where no adult ever offered a hand – unless to strike him. On the last night of Randal’s miserable life, his older brother Tego, only 8, lifted
It is not possible to be dispassionate about such things – for all that objectivity is required in a jury. Jurors must weigh the evidence fairly, but to pretend that the evidence is not itself heart-wrenching, or the victim heartbreaking, is to deny our humanity. This is pedantic beyond words, though pedantry is beloved of lawyers, especially in the word-parsing venue of an appeals court. “It has to do with the tendencies of juries in a case like this,” Ruby told reporters afterwards, explaining his objections to Ewaschuk’s language. “You want to hate these people who are the only ones before you. It’s important that the judge caution them to be dispassionate. But when the time came, he kept on using the repetitive language: Poor, pitiful Randal.” Ruby was particularly annoyed by the alliteration, hearing even in that a kind of trance-inducing nuance. “That alliteration had the effect of inflaming that jury. In a jury address, the repeated alliteration of that phrase takes on a tone th
It is not possible to be dispassionate about such things – for all that objectivity is required in a jury. Jurors must weigh the evidence fairly, but to pretend that the evidence is not itself heart-wrenching, or the victim heartbreaking, is to deny our humanity. This is pedantic beyond words, though pedantry is beloved of lawyers, especially in the word-parsing venue of an appeals court. “It has to do with the tendencies of juries in a case like this,” Ruby told reporters afterwards, explaining his objections to Ewaschuk’s language. “You want to hate these people who are the only ones before you. It’s important that the judge caution them to be dispassionate. But when the time came, he kept on using the repetitive language: Poor, pitiful Randal.” Ruby was particularly annoyed by the alliteration, hearing even in that a kind of trance-inducing nuance. “That alliteration had the effect of inflaming that jury. In a jury address, the repeated alliteration of that phrase takes on a tone th
This is pedantic beyond words, though pedantry is beloved of lawyers, especially in the word-parsing venue of an appeals court. … Sources: http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&ct2=us%2F0_0_s_2_0_t&usg=AFQjCNFHAnJlyZk8suSecLUid8HljJG6Cw&sig2=Cl845Grhjqw3wUK_GE9UTQ&cid=1316606911&ei=Ir-4SoCRJImm8wTbhor_AQ&rt=SEARCH&vm=STANDARD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thestar.
