In Search of Justice

When has justice been served? I think justice is pretty subjective. Some people are fairly cruel in what they consider justice, while others are too soft. I don’t know what truly constitutes justice, but it is clear to me when an injustice has occurred. Let’s say that a person commits a horrible crime but the police can’t prove a crime was committed. Is it fair to harass that person’s friends and family? They didn’t do anything, so why should they be dragged in to the fight?

I’m thinking about this because I saw Tyra today. I had seen the story before on one of the investigative shows. I think it was either Dateline or 48 Hours. Anyway, a woman believed that a man killed her daughter, so she made it her business to make his life a living hell. She constantly put up fliers near his house and his parent’s house and the houses of his other relatives and friends and she even went to his job and handed out fliers. The fliers were looking for her daughter and named the man as a person of interest. Police searched the man’s house I think three times or something like that and found blood but didn’t have enough to prosecute the man. A year ago, the man killed himself and his family blames the woman’s mother for driving the man to it.

Do I know what happened? Obviously I don’t. Do I think he did it? Well, the mother did present a pretty convincing case, but she seems to forget that this is America and people are innocent until proven guilty, but even if a person is guilty, is it fair to punish their family and friends? Do the people in their close circle have to be guilty by association? The man’s ex-wife was on the show and she described the effect her ex-husband’s suicide had on their children. She talked about how her son had a really hard time dealing with it and how he had to be medicated and how one day he finally felt good enough to leave the house. He went for a bike ride past his father’s old home and came back with about 50 fliers that the lady had put up, naming his father as a person of interest. I mean come on. The man was dead. Was it really necessary to continue to put his face and his name on the fliers? The only people left to deal with it were his friends and family, and I don’t care what he did, his eleven year-old son should not have to deal with those fliers on top of losing his father.

I understand that the woman wants to find her daughter’s body and I have no problem with that but I think her behavior has to be addressed. How far should one go when looking for justice? If I believe with all of my heart that someone has committed a crime, am I justified in doing whatever necessary to make that person’s life a living hell until they are brought to justice? And what if the person dies before I feel that justice was carried out, do I have the right to continue to drag their name through the mud?

I can empathize with both sides. If I lost my child, I would want justice for them, but on the other side, if my child was accused of something that they kept telling me they didn’t do, I wouldn’t want someone harassing them either.

Status: Noticing that battle lines look different when you’re on opposing sides.