Officer Alex explains the concept of presumptive innocence

“Excuse me, you’re a police officer, right?” the conservatively dressed brunette of age 45 or so asked with amplified politeness. I was sitting alone in a Chili’s reading a newspaper…in uniform.

I mentally pictured myself closing my eyes and taking a deep breath since these were not options at the moment, but even with such anti-IAD-complaint foresight I couldn’t help but glance down at my badge and respond with an equally polite “Why yes! Yes, I am.”

“I’m sorry to bother you, but about this Judge Kavanaugh thing. Can I ask your opinion?”

My right eye blinked reflexively and my grip tightened on the newspaper that had been left behind by a previous patron, but she didn’t notice so this time I did take a breath, and responded with a “Sure!”

“They say they can’t investigate this crime, but how can that be true? Clearly he needs to prove his innocence right?”

I smiled.

“Actually, no. He doesn’t. Thanks to the Bill of Rights our justice system is actually based on a presumption of innocence until proven guilty, so the accuser is actually the one that needs to flesh this out a little bit, but it could still be investigated.”

Her smile flattened for a second, but resumed almost immediately. “Well how would you do that?”

I squinted and glanced away as if in deep thought, pretending this wasn’t something every cop and judge in the country hadn’t gone over a dozen times already in their heads from the second day of the media blitz that was the character assassination of Brent Kavanaugh, the apparent Robert Bork of this generation.

“Well, I’d start at the beginning. When did it happen? This is difficult because the accuser can only narrow it down to ‘36 years ago or so,’ which is kind of broad in the scheme of things.” I paused to sip my coffee.

“So next, I’d go to where it occurred, naturally,” raising my eyebrows for effect. “This is also complicated because the accuser doesn’t actually know where it took place. Not much for the boys at the lab to work with, you know?” I said with a smile, to keep it light.

“So then I’m left with interviewing witnesses. Which again is complicated, because there are none. The two folks I recall she named specifically denied this occurring, who were also juveniles at the time, so again…not a lot to work with. Then of course, was this reported to the police or her parents? No. So…”

I hoped she would connect the dots at this point, but like the reboot of the Predator movie, I was left disappointed.

“Well surely there’s something you could come up with to corroborate her story? I mean he can’t just get away with it can he?” She no longer felt the need to maintain the fake smile again.

“I have to ask, get away with what exactly? Being accused? This nice lady can’t say when it happened, where it happened, she has no witnesses, and it wasn’t reported. Asking this Judge to disprove what the accuser cannot prove in the first place even goes against the Bill of Rights, never mind basic police investigation.”

She was glaring at me now, so I decided to smooth things over. Glancing at her wedding band, I asked “Do you still beat your husband? It’s the same basic principal since you’re set up to fail no matter how you answer or don’t answer.

“That was completely uncalled for!” she said in a raised voice. “What’s your name and badge number?!” I glanced at my brass nametag and badge, then slid the waitress’s pen towards her to jot them down since I hadn’t been able to use the pen to pay up to this point anyway.

“Case in point!” I said, and she furrowed her eyebrows in confusion as she left, no longer sure what to do.

“And that, ladies and gentlemen,” I said to those at the bar who had been eavesdropping, “is how you lose an argument in the year 2018.”

I left the store and paused to take a deep breath, looking for something else to smooth over.

When officer Alexander D. Teach is not patrolling our fair city on the heels of the criminal element, he spends his spare time volunteering for the Boehm Birth Defects Center.