Miss Attorney Ma'am

“They were waiting, waiting for a meeting with their Legal Aid lawyers, or for them to return their phone calls; waiting for a hearing; waiting for the DA to stop quibbling about their charges; waiting for the paperwork to arrive; waiting for there to be room on the docket for their case to be heard; waiting for a new judge to be assigned; waiting from one postponement to another, often with months in between; just waiting. ”

“The American justice system: Get arrested, can’t make bail, and you’re as good as convicted as you sit locked up, guilty until proven innocent. Pray it doesn’t happen to you.”

http://www.beaconbroadside.com/broadside/2010/02/david-chura-no-bail-go-to-jail.html

http://kidsinthesystem.wordpress.com/2010/01/05/zero-tolerance-creates-more-problems-than-it-solves/

David Chura, author of I Don’t Wish Nobody to Have a Life Like Mine: Tales of Kids in Adult Lockup. Chura has worked with at-risk teenagers for forty years. His writing has appeared in the New York Times and multiple literary journals and anthologies, and he is a frequent lecturer and advisor on David Chura’s Kids in the System blog http://kidsinthesystem.wordpress.com

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