To Anna Kratky, a young assistant St. Louis circuit attorney, it was a case of a man who violently lost control on a cold January night.
The police had received a 911 call that a man was beating a woman outside a South St. Louis two-family house. As two officers arrived, they found a woman sitting on the stoop, crying. She had a cut on her nose and was stripped to her waist, wearing only a bra, holding a torn shirt in her hand. She was with her teenage son. He had placed the 911 call.
She told the officers that her boyfriend had slapped and punched her in the face. She said he ripped the shirt from her back, grabbed their 18-month old son from her lap and retreated with the child into the apartment — locking her out.
He emerged from the apartment as the officers arrived. Holding the child in one arm, he ordered the officers off the property. They told him he was under arrest for domestic assault.
He smelled of alcohol. He was belligerent. He clutched the child as a shield and began to throw punches.
The officers radioed for help. It took some force to subdue the man. He was taken to jail, charged with domestic assault, endangering the welfare of a child, resisting arrest and assaulting two law enforcement officers.
To Lynne Perkins, a plain-spoken defense lawyer, the story was different. The victim and defendant were now married. There had been no argument between them that evening. There had been no assault. The teenage son had placed a false 911 call.
The officers never spoke to the wife when they arrived on the scene. They immediately began exchanging words with the defendant. Then they beat him and carted him off to jail.
There was one more crucial fact in the defense case: The defendant is blind and could hardly have acted as the police claimed he did.
That’s how the evidence came in. The police told one story. The defendant’s wife and her teenage son told another. The defendant appeared in court wearing sunglasses and using a white cane.
Both sides couldn’t be right.
Then came a neighbor lady. She knew the defendant and his wife — not as social friends, but as neighbors.
She was surprised to hear the defendant was blind. She had seen him drive a car many times.
She heard a woman cry for help that night, soon before the police arrived. The following morning, the defendant’s wife had asked her if she could see bruises on her face.
It was up to the jury to decide whose story it believed. I was a member of that jury, serving as its foreman.
The case was tried earlier this month. The importance of our work had been impressed on us continuously from the moment we reported for service — mainly by the consistent example of respect and good order set by the judge, the lawyers and court personnel.
It wasn’t a high-profile case, or even a big case, except for the defendant and his family, but it was part of something very important: The American system of justice works only when citizens do their duty.
We sorted through the evidence. We focused on the judge’s instructions. Everyone spoke in turn and listened carefully as views were shared around the table. We were there as citizens but related to one another as neighbors from all parts of the city.
We recognized the solemn nature of our task. We could hear the defendant’s son, now 2 years old, playing down the corridor from the jury room.
We had taken an oath to decide the case based on the evidence and according to the law. We found the defendant guilty on all five counts.
Eddie Roth writes about education, social justice, public safety, transportation, legal affairs and historic preservation. He joined the Post-Dispatch editorial page in 2008 after six years as an editorial writer with the Dayton Daily News. But he is not new to St. Louis. Eddie grew up in Webster Groves and south St. Louis County. He's a lawyer who for many years practiced with a downtown firm, and was active in civic affairs, including serving a term on the St. Louis Police Board. He and his wife, Jeanne, and their three daughters, Emily, Julia and Alice, live in the Shaw Neighborhood.
When it comes to community organizing, he endorses Quentin Crisp's advice: Rather than keeping up with the Joneses, it's better to pull them down to your level. 
On a somewhat related subject, you Dims need to look in the mirror at how you are corrupting our legal system. Ideological bedfellows, like Chrid Dodd (corruption), Charlie Rangel (tax evasion) and Timothy Geitner (tax eveasion) all seem to get a pass. Would anyone from the opposite side of the fence be treated so generously? I doubt it. Once again, more evidence that you and your party run the risk of turning into petty tyrants along the lines of Chavez, whom you admire so profusely.
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“They told him he was under arrest him for domestic assault.”
Same mistake in mothership edition.
No editors any more to catch typos? Proofreading outloud would normally catch it; backwards even better even.
* * *
Thank you for pointing out the error. I have corrected it above. — Eddie Roth.
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Ed – I’ll won’t hesitate to rip on you on your views. But, KUDOS to you for doing Jury Duty. I’ve never been called and lived her all of my life. But always looked at it as “would I want the 12 people judging me to be the 12 that were to dumb to get out of Jury Duty?”. I know several people that did really questionable things in order to avoid jury duty. That’s just plain wrong. Good Job.
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The lawyering in the case was exceptionally good — hard fought but highly professional.
The defendant’s wife testified that the defendant had one prosthetic eye and otherwise could only discern shapes. The defendant’s brother testified that he didn’t think that his brother had driven for about five years. The prosecution entered the defendant’s driving record into evidence. It showed that his driver’s license had lapsed in 2007, but that he had been cited for speeding in Kentucky in 2006 or thereabouts. No medical evidence was presented on the issue.
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Is there any penalty for the defence attorney presenting what appears to have been a fabrication of defendant blindness? No one would fault her for doing everything possible to present her case in the best possible light, but this smells of falsehood.
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Eddie, glad to hear you had a positive experience on jury duty. I’ve been interviewing former jurors to get their impressions of jury service in the city and I’m hearing the same kinds of things you mention. The WiFi especially seems to be a big, big plus these days. Thanks for taking time to write about your experience at the courthouse. -Matt Murphy, St. Louis Circuit Court Public Information Officer.
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The summons commanded that I appear on Monday morning but I was not called for voir dire in the case until Tuesay afternoon. I mostly read to fill the time. I was able to walk back to the paper at lunch time.
The main jury assembly room at the Civil Courts building is very nice. In fact, the restored building is one St. Louis’ jewels. It has WiFi, too.
And, yes, I did see and visit several people I knew. Even a city St. Louis size is reduced to a village.
The experience was terrific from beginning to end. Everybody was polite. Everything was well managed. As I told my colleagues, it was the antithesis of a town hall meeting. Plus they pay you $18 a day ($12 if you don’t get on a jury).
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I would have liked to have read more details of what it’s like to report for jury duty, how you spent your time waiting for your number to be called. Did you see anyone you knew? Where did you park? What did you do during the long lunch break? The story is good, but could have been better by filling in some of those details. As we all know, jury duty is mostly waiting.
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