Courtroom Drama!

Since all of the experience I have had with a courtroom comes from watching a whole lot of Law and Order and The Practice, and even for a while, Boston Legal, I had NO idea what to expect this morning. I had a picture in my head - the oak paneled room, a bored looking jury in the jury box, fans blowing (because suddenly it has turned into a courtroom in the Old South, with no ventilation, and everyone in the room is fanning themselves), and Sam Watterston's Jack McCoy pacing the floor firing off questions at the cowering witness, while a no-nonsense, berobed and bearded white haired judge presides, gavel in hand. Occasionally, the other lawyer, played here by creepy Bill Smitrovich of Life Goes On and The Practice fame jumps to his feet and yells "Objection!"

So, yeah. This is what I am thinking, so it's not really a surprise that when I actually get to court, it's nothing like I expect. I'd expected the place to look like a federal building, marble floors, maybe a rotunda... But it looked like a school building. Very institutional. Went through the metal detectors without incident, and found my courtroom, again, without incident. My parents had come with me, and we kind of wandered around. I honestly would rather have been just about anywhere else. It's not like I wanted this other driver to get off, but I was really not looking forward to doing this. We got let in - the courtroom, again, was not what I was expecting. No oak paneling, or jury in the box, and it was cold in there, so there were no fans. Instead, it was a smallish room, lined with what looked like pews in a church, filled with vaguely delinquent-looking type people. There were cops, but nobody had guns. The judge was even not what I was expecting. It was a lady judge, and she had long blond hair and I don't remember seeing a gavel. Oh, my shattered illusions...

Court was in session at 10:30 and the names were called fast. Many of the people in front of me had their tickets dismissed. One lady had that happen and we could hear her whooping with joy after the event. The Other Driver's name was called and we went up there. They asked how she pleaded and she said "Not Guilty."

Excuse me? I object!

Now the fun starts. We had to swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and anything but the truth, so help us Gawd. We raised our right hands and swore on the air. (No Bible, either. There's another mental courtroom mainstay just tossed aside). I recounted what happened, and then The Other Driver (TOD, that's almost TOAD, hahaha) said that she had not seen the light because of a tree. That was her whole defense. She had pictures of the intersection and everything (and I happened to see one of them, and the light was perfectly visible in it....)

Well, the judge didn't buy it, either, and made the TOAD pay her tickets. $50 for each of them, hardly seems like enough, does it? You can run a red light and drive at excessive speeds, hit somebody and all but total her car, and just walk away paying $100?

So that was my court experience. I went right to the office afterwards, by way of Starbucks where I got a celebratory marble mocha macchiato (chocolate coffee? these people are geniuses!)

Now I can get on with my life and start focusing on the fun stuff:
Renee's concert in just about a week, and Gypsy in 2 weeks!