October 12, 2007
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NOT GUILTY
After 90 minutes of deliberation, the jury came back with 8 not guiltys for the defendants in the Martin Lee Anderson case. Otherwise known as the Boot Camp Death Trial on Court TV.
This was a jury I am really thankful that I wasn’t on. Martin was on his second day at the boot camp. He went there because he had stolen his grandmother’s car. He wasn’t a bad criminal but had come from a broken home and was perhaps heading down a bad road. His mother took him to the boot camp and checked him in, I’m sure with the hopes that they would take her son and turn him around. Never in her wildest nightmares would she have ever guessed the outcome.
Most everyone has seen the video. It looked to me like the guards were ganging up on this 14 year old child. At one point it looked like one of the guards was either kicking him or kneeing him in the groin area. I was horrified.
The defense basically said that the guards treated Martin just like every other kid at that camp. Unfortunately he had Sickle Cell trait and because of that, when he got overly tired, he got very sick very fast. The guards had no idea and thought he was just trying to get out of the exercises they were doing. The nurse said that there wasn’t anything in the way Martin was acting to show that he was in trouble.
The prosecution said the guards used improper force, then that they suffocated him and finally said that it was “a fatal failure to act on the part of the defendents”.
Supposedly this shifting of theories by the prosecution is what lost them the case. I’m sure the jurors will be interviewed by Court TV at some point and everyone will know what was in their minds when they made their decision.
I do know that there was a lot of prayer from both sides asking for God’s will to be done. And His will is not always our will, nor will it make everyone happy.
I hope that the prayers now will be for Martin’s family to find peace, because of all the people involved in this whole thing, they are the ones that really lost, regardless of the verdict.
Comments (4)
I cannot fathom what the jury was thinking, to render a decision so quickly. But they saw all the evidence, and capable attorneys on both side did their best, I am sure.
But I don’t see a plethora of theories here. The guards used undue force, young Marvin suffocated, and then the guards and the so-called nurse “fatally” failed to act, and the boy died. A sequence of events, not separate theories, is at work here.
At least this boot camp is closed, and the whole “tough love” treatment has been called into question. Most of these kids have been mistreated all their lives. Yelled at, beaten, left to fend for themselves by alcoholic and drug-addicted parents. They need good old-fashioned love, not more of the same. Firmness? Yes. Consequences? For sure. Even forceful physical action in extreme cases of misbehavior, but not a daily diet of screaming and shoving. I have seen the results of that; it is usually a stronger and angrier adult rather than a better, well-adjusted citizen.
I couldn’t agree more. I remember when Holley was in elementary school. This was probably first or second grade. There was a boy in her class that was a real problem child. Holley would tell me that he was always being sent to the principal. One day while I was talking to the principal, the subject of the kid came up and she told me that he was living in a really bad home. I don’t remember what all she said was going on, just that he was being abused. And then she said that all those times the teacher sent him to the office for discipline, she gave him all the hugs and love she could, knowing that would do him more good than anything else.
I wonder about that child every now and then. I have no way of knowing how he turned out, but if his life is good now, I hope he remembers the principal who recognized his desperate need for love, rather than discipline.
If nothing else, there should have been at LEAST one negligence verdict- the nurse. If she cannot see the signs of a human being descending into distress, then what good is she?
The kid may have been a foul-mouthed punk, or a future thug, but he should not be dead.
I agree in part. I thought they would have ALL been found guilty of at least the lessor offense. But again, I wasn’t there and I didn’t hear all of the testimony, so I don’t know the whole story.
I didn’t realize it until this morning (I didn’t follow the trial as closely as I could have) but there were 4 charges they could have been found guilty of. Aggrivated manslaughter of a child, manslaughter, child neglect, or misdemeanor culpanle negligence. I was under the impression that the jury only had one option.
As for the kid being a foul-mouthed punk, I’m not so sure that was established, either. But then, your personal experiences as a young, foul mouthed punk probably leads you to that conclusion.