Who will pay?

By Bert Samuels, Contributor

MR. SAMUELS what can we do about the killing?" was the question posed to me by my client, a man in his early 50s with a long criminal record, all committed whilst he was in his 20s and 30s. This survivor - former criminal turn businessman, was serious and with a breath of desperation, genuinely tried to get an answer from a criminal lawyer of 21 years standing.

His question excited me, as I felt that being a man of the streets and a former 'criminal', he would have been able to assist the very person from whom he was seeking answers. Naturally, I put the very same question for which I had no answers, right back at him. He toyed with the idea that if all the dons were called in by the 'authorities' with the threat that, should one more shot be fired, they would detain the don from the area which had breached the cease-fire.

The layman's views are always filled with practical and genuine common sense. We lawyers, are naturally preoccupied with the preservation of the liberty of the subject. These liberties are, however, suspended or at least curtailed during wartime. A body count of 40 slain in 11 days is warfare. In warfare the General is accountable for the actions of his troops. Our dons are the generals in this warfare and from time to time they come together to negotiate peace (sic). The flip side of this 'peace' is that they should be held accountable for the deeds of their foot-soldiers once that treaty is broken; for the slaughter of civilians particularly, the senseless killings of women and children during their battles.

However, the coin never flips for them and they continue to live - and live quite comfortably, in contrast to the subhuman squalor, otherwise called ghettoes, in which the majority of their subjects survive, under their iron rule.

At the end of our discussion, the reformed armed robber and I had no workable solutions because we endeavoured to work them alongside our treasured democracy. He could not fathom behaviour where gunmen 'take no prisoners'. If they go for John Brown, they will slay his mother, sister and baby; whether John is present or not. In his time this was against the 'rules' and he cannot rationalise this conduct. If he can't, the rest of us will never, I pondered to myself. Is it the recent advent of cocaine? Is it some new monster that is now unleashed on us? One that we have unwittingly nurtured as we build an increasingly impassionate, materialistic and uncaring society?

We ended our reasoning with a word of hope and chastisement from him as he departed my office saying:

"Someone will have to pay, for all the innocent blood they shed every day".

Bert Samuels is an attorney-at-law.

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