Frank Stare case: An opportunity in vain?

Yesterday I wrote "all's well that ends well," in a tongue-in-cheek essay about the incredible folly surrounding the Frank Stare Hugging Case.

I don't think it ended very well, so it would be a shame had that been the last public comment. It is a serious matter and the least that should come of it is for citizens of Newark to try to learn from it and ask whether our local justice system needs to be improved.

All this not for revenge, not for injustice to Frank Stare, but for our own welfare, since any citizen who lives in Newark could be next.

There probably have been thousands of cases drug through the Newark legal system in which "justice" lost sight of logic and fairness, but not many with this much public attention. I had hoped the case would end with a clearing of the air during which each participant in the decisions leading up to the charges brought against Frank would be fully aired on witness stand under oath.

As I understood the news reports, that was about to happen next and would have if there had not been a plea deal arranged in which Frank had the chance to duck out for the price of $50 with a plea of guilty to a charge of "annoying" someone, which is on about the same level as running a red light.

I have mixed feelings about his decision to do that. I don't know everything that had to be considered, and I don't blame him for wanting to get all this behind him, but by stopping before the finale there seems to have been a missed opportunity to improve our local system of justice, our community, and our own individual freedoms and security.

As it stands there has not been a determination of what, if anything, party politics had to do with this. The perception is, though, had it not been for political influence, the complaint against Frank would have been treated like any other complaint of this ilk, meaning, I guess, that it would have died an early and quiet death among lots of other dying minor complaints.

Someone who knows local politics asked (off the record) "why were the charges brought six days prior to the election?" "how many similar cases have been ignored?" "how many third-degree misdemeanor cases have had three detectives assigned to them in the last year?" "why was no special prosecutor appointed (to avoid the political aspects)?"

Well, consider this: If Frank Stare, a Democrat who was running for city council, had won a seat it would have brought the balance of political power to five Republicans and five Democrats. Thus would Council president, a Democrat, become the tie-breaking voter. As it turned out, Frank didn't even come close to winning.

Maybe all this is mere coincidence. Maybe not, and if not it is an opportunity for improvement of our system that appears, at this point, to have been in vain.