Dear Ms. Tretheway,
I just read an article about you in the AJC and I am so proud of you and all of your success. Being named the Poet Laureate of the United States is an incredible honor. I have followed your successful career over the years and I have admired your courage and strength.
I have spent the last 31 years agonizing over a poor decision. I was 22 years old and serving on my first jury duty at the Decatur Court house. Your former step father was on trial, ( for the rest of this blog I will refer to him as YMSH- your mother's second husband) for perjury in his first trial. I had a very bad feeling about this man. He had a very scary stare and seemed to be heavily medicated. The prosecution tried a few times to bring up his original sentencing. She would speak about a gun and was immediately shut down by the defence team. The main focus of the trial was that he had lied about ever being in legal trouble and therefore had committed perjury in his original trial.
The defense argued that being charged with a crime while in the Army was not really the same as being charged with a crime in civilian life. ( by the way he was a pimp in Vietnam during the war) They also said that being charged with neglect for not paying child support was not technically a considered a crime. We listened to testimony for two and a half days and then went into the jury room. I was one of two people in that room that believed that he was guilty of perjury.
We all realized that a trial for perjury wasn't the real crime. We were not allowed to know why he was currently in prison. We were also told that he was medicated because he had PTSD from being involved in the Vietnamese war.
I held our for a few hours and then the other girl changed her mind. The jury foreman was a professor at Spelman college and he accused me of being prejudice. "what does a little white girl from the beach in New Jersey know of the plight of a black soldier in Atlanta?" I cried and I tried for a couple more hours to hold my ground and then I gave in. I have never forgotten that I gave in. I cried when the verdict was read. I knew it was wrong, and that I wasn't strong enough in my convictions.
About a month later I was watching the evening news and the top story was that YMSH had been released from prison and directly gone straight to your mother's house, shot and killed her. I realized that the point of the trial that I had been assigned to as a juror was to get him a couple of extra years of prison. He had been writing threatening letters to your mother from prison. He also had been charged with aggravated assault with a weapon against your mother in the first trial. We were never allowed to hear about the particulars of why he was in jail. I think that would have defiantly swayed more of the jurors over to a guilty verdict.
I am so sorry that I didn't hold on in that jury room. I really wish that I had been stronger then. I also found out after seeing the TV news coverage that you were a student a year before at the same high school I was working. You were a cheerleader and I had known of you. I was a first year teacher and I was teaching the "subbies". ( the 8th graders that were below the freshmen- subbies).
I know this is just a blog, basically it is a diary I have created that my daughter may be able to read and get a few laughs from when I go. I have no interest in Tweeting or Face book. You will probably never see this. It does help me to write it all down. I have keep this in for a long time.
I wish you a long life of success and happiness. I am so sorry for the tragedy with your mother and I hope that you can forgive me. I know in my heart that I was young and weak. I have forgiven myself for my poor decision. I wish the 54 year old me could have been there in that jury room. I think that things might have turned out a little differently. Again I am sincerely sorry Natasha.
Momma T
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