In the Name of the Law

IT COULD HAVE BEEN a courtroom parody and people would have laughed to see such ignorance. But it was a Boston Municipal criminal court and the drama was real.

The docket for April 3, 1980 listed nearly eleven cases. The eleventh case was that of Emeka Ezera '81, charged with "larceny from the person," arresting officer Pond of the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority (MBTA), and Heins as prosecuting attorney.

By 10 a.m. over 160 students, faculty and interested persons had jammed Judge Harry Elam's courtroom on the fourth floor. The bailiff called out the defendant's name, and one by one the accused approached the defendant's box, either from the courtroom or the jail entrance.

The participants in yesterday's first court session came from a variety of backgrounds. The lawyers lined along the left side of the room sat on a pew next to that of labelled "public officers." The "public officers" wore suits, their uniform or simply shirt and jacket; they wore their guns in holsters wrapped around their waists. They were also all white. On the right side of the courtroom stood the two security officers, one Black and one white. Without a smile they assisted defendants in and out of the jail into the courtroom. Sitting in the front in the judge's chair was Judge Harry P. Elam--a Black judge.

Without a jury, Elam decided on dispositions and cases presented to him yesterday morning. Only three of the 15 or so cases involved whites--the rest were Black males or Chicanos. Shortly after 10 a.m., the bailiff called Ezera's case to insure that both sides were ready. Students continued to stream in. On the second call, confusion occurred. Heins, the scheduled prosecuting attorney and a third-year-law student, had been replaced by another attorney, Edward M. Burns--a member of the Massachusetts bar. He had only minutes before met the plaintiff.

In the meantime, the bailiff had called a young Black man's case. The arresting officer, a plain-clothesman, had charged him with attempted larceny. The officer testified first, saying the man had deliberately bumped his left shoulder and attempted to pick his left pocket. The officer said the man and his friends had separated him and his partner before the incident occurred. He said he grabbed the man, identified himself, and accused the man of trying to fight, "and I told him don't do that or I'll charge you with attempted assault of an officer."

The young man testified. He told the court that after he and his friends saw the officer coming, "We moved back. They looked mad and we knew they were police." The man described the situation, charging that the policeman had bumped his left shoulder and that later, "sensing him come up to me, I turned around." The man said after the officer identified himself, he raised his hands, saying "Wait a minute." He said the officer said he would have to arrest him for attempted assault of a police officer and the man placed his hands behind him in a handcuff position as a sign of submission. "Then they slammed me against the wall and told me I was under arrest. When I got in the car they informed me I was arrested for attempted larceny." The officer's partner never testified, although he sat next to the accused officer during the trial.

"You have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this man is guilty and you haven't done this," Elam told the prosecutor. The bailiff announced the verdict as "innocent" and amidst a burst of applause, mostly from the Ezera supporters, the defendant and his Black lawyer left the courtroom.

Another case came up; this time the defendant entered from the jail entrance. The arresting officer accused the Black defendant of having some altercation with a store owner and "He had a prescription bottle strapped to his leg filled with pentecost or something like that." The prosecution asked him whether the defendant said anything upon his arrest, and the officer said, "Yeah, he said something about his mother had just died." A look at the defendant revealed a man wearing a grieved face, shaking his head.

On the third call, the bailiff announced Ezera's trial as set for the afternoon at 2 p.m.

AT 2 P.M., THE PARODY began. Judge Charles Grabau, a white judge, presided. No one knew what had become of Judge Elam. About half of the people who filled the courtroom that morning remained for the afternoon session. Emeka Ezera stood in the jury box to hear the charge. All of the people who were to testify on behalf of the defense and prosecution stood as the bailiff presented the oath. The judge ordered all witnesses sequestered, with the exception of Joan McGaw, the victim and plaintiff.

Wearing a purple two-piece skirt and top, McGaw nervously stood before the judge in the plaintiff's box. Speaking so softly the judge twice requested that she raise her voice, McGaw told the court of her job with the Boston Water Commission's customer service department. She said she attended night school every Tuesday after work. On March 11, she took her normal route to her Boylston station stop. At approximately 9:40 p.m. someone took her wallet at Park St., prompting her to get off the train at Boylston and return to Park St. to notify police.

"As I was getting on board, a man behind me with a garment bag had hooked into my clothes. I was carrying my bag under my arm," she said. Describing her actions as "being polite," she said she tried to help the man get it out of her clothes. After she had helped him, "He stepped off Park St. and the door shut." McGaw said she only saw him for "about 30 seconds." Her purse was gone.

The description she gave the inspector at the Park St. station was that of a black man, "Five-foot-nine, wearing a black knitted cap, and that's about all that I had said." The description offered no discussion of his build.

She went on. The next day while waiting at Park St. for a train, she said, she saw the same person, also waiting for a train. She said she went to the information booth and told the MBTA officer she thought it was the same person. "He took me down and said, 'Is this the same person?" He asked me twice, and I told him I was certain." McGaw said she saw him again in a little office at the subway stop and identified him again. "I saw him again in the hallway the day of the arraignment."

"Did you see him today?" Burns, the prosecutor, asked.

"Yes. I saw him today before the lunch recess."

"Do you see that person now?"

Glancing nervously about the room, McGaw wiped her forehead, pushing her bangs to the side. "I saw him earlier today," she answered. A hush swept over the courtroom as the judge asked her to look again. Prosecutor Burns informed the judge that the courtroom held an "excess of 70 people, 60 per cent Black and 40 per cent white."

With the court's permission, the woman and the bailiff proceeded down the main aisle of the courtroom, looking for the man who stole $11.50 from her purse two weeks ago. Most of the Black males in the courtroom either shook their head in disgust or stared at the woman accusingly. She could pick anyone.

Returning to the box, the judge asked her if she felt satisfied at having looked at every single face in the courtroom. "Even the ones behind you?" he asked, referring to the "Public Officers" bench. She didn't look, and a few faces there smiled. She replied no. The judge repeated his question; she answered yes, she had seen them all.

"Did you see the person who took your wallet in the courtroom?," Burns asked.

After a long pause and yet another searching expression, she replied, "No." A chorus of murmurs and chuckles swept the court, to which the judge and bailiff responded with a warning. Burns turned to Ezera and asked him to stand.

"Is that the person who took your wallet?," he asked.

"I'm not sure." The judge asked her to step down.

The arresting officer testified that he heard the call over his radio and according to the description, asked two men to step off the train at the Arborway stop. "He was neatly attired, carrying a garment bag and a small athletic bag," the officer added. After talking with the woman, she identified Ezera.

"I asked her if she was absolutely certain. I asked her if there was any shadow of a doubt and she said 'no.'" he said. He said he then followed normal police procedure and called in to request information of the alleged theft.

"We attempted to ascertain who he was and met with some unresponsiveness on his part," the officer testified, referring to him and his black partner. Further questioning revealed that Ezera did not "out and out refuse to identify himself. He produced something from his wallet with a name and something with Harvard written on it--I don't recall what." Burns charged that he did not believe that Ezera was actually the man arrested. The judge asked that the lawyers approach the bench. Following a brief discussion the judge declared Ezera not guilty. With clenched fist Ezera walked out of the courtroom and friends and supporters cheered.

END OF THE PLAY. The trial of Emeka Ezera was meant for the stage. Ezera's mother, Onuma Ezera, stood slowly and with tear-stained eyes said, "I don't understand, I don't believe it. I don't believe it."

Ezera's case as first publicized was shocking. How could this happen to a Harvard student? Ezera told a crowd of supporters at a pretrial rally Wednesday night, "I felt sure that when I flashed my Harvard ID, that would be it. When they handcuffed me, I realized this was serious."

But Ezera was wrong. He now distrusts a system he once believed in--the system of American law enforcement. He now believes the only thing that could have kept him out of court would have been a different skin color. When Blacks attend Harvard, the school becomes a protector and the student becomes wrapped in a Harvard mystique--an air of arrogant complacency. Harvard offers a different view of the world, but it cannot change what the world outside actually looks like. Blacks may graduate and leave for the Law School, Business School or the corporate outside world, with their attire and their degree a sign of Harvard training. But as Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint, associate professor of Psychiatry at the Medical School, said last night, for the Black student. "A three-piece suit is no protection."