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April 24, 2004
Justice for All
By Richard
Baldwin/HispanicVista.com
Although I certainly
do not hesitate to give criticism against
the US in its treatment of Mexicans, I
present the following in the spirit of
fairness:
In an article that
appeared in our local press here,
supplied by Associated Press, there is a
story that is worth attention. The author
is Juliana Barbassa, with a dateline of
Merced, California under the headline
"Deaf Mother wants the baby she
nearly killed".
Briefly, this is the
story of a 24-year-old Mexican lady,
Juliana, who is a deaf mute, with
basically no language. She is in the
United States with her father and sister,
and originally is from the state of
Oaxaca, a state of many
"Indians" in México. What is
interesting is that neither family member
speaks Spanish. Only Trique, a language
from pre-Columbian México. This may
surprise you, but we have many indigenous
Mexicans here who cannot speak Spanish.
But Juliana, without
hearing, can only "speak"
through crude signs to her sister who is
without Spanish. Last year, Juliana was
raped and became pregnant. And without
even the most basic understanding as to
what was happening to her, climbed into a
filthy dog pen and gave birth to a
daughter alone.
When she observed
blood in the mouth of the baby, she
crammed tissues into the baby's mouth.
With her limited knowledge, she probably
thought that she was doing the right
thing. Fortunately, the barking of the
dogs alerted neighbors and they found
Juliana in a state of shock and the baby,
propped up like a little doll against a
tree. Both mother and child were taken to
an emergency room, and both the baby and
the mother survived. And by the way, the
baby has good hearing.
In the
circumstances, with probable abandonment
of a new born baby, charges of felony
child endangerment were filed. From the
court's view, this would be reasonable,
but there was a problem: to convict, a
prosecutor would have to prove that
Juliana intended harm to the baby or at
least have reason to believe her actions
could cause harm. And without a language
to work with, there was a big legal
problem.
The court ended up
getting a Trique/Spanish translator.
Juliana communicated with her sister who
spoke to the translator in Trique. The
first translator then spoke with a second
translator to speak to the court in
English. And from the evidence presented,
the court decided there was no basis for
conviction and the charges were dropped.
Juliana would like
to have here baby, and has had a
visitation with the baby named Hope by
the hospital. But here things get murky
as the court must consider how Juliana,
without language and in poverty (a
migrant field worker with her family)
could care for little Hope.
But now, let's
consider what would have happened to
Juliana under the Mexican system.
First, if Juliana
would have been charged in the first
place because our justice system takes
little notice of our indigents. But,
assuming that she had, remember that she
would have been considered guilty and the
burden of proof would have been hers,
regardless of the inability of being able
to pay for legal defense. And note that
not being able to speak Spanish makes no
difference. Any translators would have to
have been provided by her. Her chances of
acquittal would have been less than nil.
And as one of my
friends pointed out, "What makes you
think that any hospital would have
treated here without funds?" Juliana
would have ended up in a dog pen here
after being turned away from medical
service.
I do not know what
the fate of Juliana will be, or whether
she will be able to have Hope, or more
pressing as to whether Juliana and her
family will be permitted to stay in the
US, for they are illegals who are doing
nothing but surviving and providing cheap
labor to make the food in the US more
affordable.
Now to be fair to
México, President Fox, at the beginning
of his term, asked the UN to evaluate the
Mexican legal system. After a two-year
study, they presented our government a
comprehensive report that detailed over a
hundred recommendations. These run from
ending the presumption of guilt, secret
trials, and a complete overhaul of our
creaking legal system. A big job indeed.
President Fox has
presented this UN report to the Congress
and the initial comments have been good.
This reform has become a priority for
government action. But one hopes that
this will not get only lip service only
and be lost in the legislative shuffle .
. . as so many things here do.
Mexicans deserve
better, and most of all, justice for all.
____________________________________________________
Richard N.
Baldwin T., a HispanicVista.com (www.hispanicvista.com)
contributing columnist, lives in
Tlalnepantla, Edo de México E-mail at: R1041643422@aol.com
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