Infinite Hope by Anthony Graves

Author:Anthony Graves [Graves, Anthony]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780807062548
Publisher: Beacon Press
Published: 2017-12-01T05:00:00+00:00

OCTOBER 27–NOVEMBER 1, 1994:

THE JURY MAKES A DECISION

THE WAITING IS THE WORST. An officer walked me back to the adjacent jail. There, I ate a sandwich and listened as two officers discussed my case like fans chewing over the first half of a football game.

“What do you think, man?” one of them said.

“I don’t know,” the other responded. “They didn’t prove anything to me.”

I agreed, of course, but they didn’t seem to care much what I thought.

My imagination churned as the jury went about its business in an adjacent room. I could hear them moving around every so often, the bottoms of their chairs scraping the hard floor. I heard the toilet flush as they took their bathroom breaks. Occasionally they raised their voices. Sometimes they’d be very quiet. It struck me that a raised voice meant someone was yelling about me, about my life. I wondered what the quiet meant. Had they decided my fate? My confidence slowly eroded over the course of nine hours. I prepared for the worst. I wanted to believe in them, but I had heard too much during the selection process. For days, eleven white jurors had listened to a white prosecutor point the finger at a black man they didn’t know. I’d been dehumanized, made into the bogeyman they needed to fear. It was going to be hard for this jury in this town to return a not-guilty verdict. I figured they couldn’t do it, and even if they could, they wouldn’t. The hours ticked, and I watched the clock. It was like when I was a kid, waiting for Momma to get home after I’d done something wrong. You just knew she’d make you pick out your own switch.

Finally, the jury buzzed the bailiff to let the court know that they’d reached a verdict. Officers escorted me back to the defense table where I had spent the last week. I watched closely as the jurors entered the room. Several of the women were crying, their faces weathered from the preceding task. Maybe it had been harder on them than I thought. Calvin must have seen the same thing. He leaned over to speak.

“What do you think, Anthony? How do they look to you?”

“You’ve seen how they talked about folks who look like us,” I said. “They determined my fate a long time ago.” There was no doubt in my mind that they had come back with a guilty verdict. I was mentally exhausted and just wanted to get this part over with.

The foreman informed the judge that the jury had indeed reached its verdict. The bailiff approached the foreman and took possession of the piece of paper that held my fate. They all pretended the outcome was some great mystery. The judge shot the paper a passing glance.

“Mr. Garvie, will you and your client please stand?” the judge asked. I wasn’t afraid. An unlikely peace shrouded me. I had told the truth, and that was all I could do. My lawyers were green, but they’d worked hard and believed in me.

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