The Vermont Select Board Un-Candidate #3

     After not attending the opiod discussion group, I tried to redeem myself by writing this letter-to-the-editor to the Brattleboro Reformer: " I am worried about the damage and suffering inflicted upon innocent college teenagers and young men by the on-campus Salem Witch Trials in which due process is immaturely ignored, and everything almost possible is done to convict these university males and to minimize the paper trail that would incriminate the Title IX coordinators, the college administrators, and the college as a whole. The wholly appropriate charge for these bad actors would be the civil rights abuse of the charged male student. This is not futuristic thinking; numerous universities have been so charged, and the plaintiffs have won or settled for money. The problem is that we, the people, cannot afford the tens of thousands of dollars it would take to protect our sons if we ascertained that he was not guilty of sexual assault. Because of the costs of lawyers, the justice system in general is not available to we, the people, except in the most rudimentary ways that have little to do with receiving justice, such as a court-appointed lawyer, or asking for abbreviated services from a lawyer such a seeking deferred prosecution or a plea-bargain.
     Not having the justice system available to us because we can't afford a $250 an hour lawyer is intolerable. The legal case is our case, not the lawyer's, not the judge's, or anyone else's. We have a perfect moral right to have anyone we want to represent us in court. It is far, far better than no one. It is time that we, the people, and we, the government, decided that the monopoly that bar-passed attorneys have is wrong and cruel. It denies us access to the courts. I urge you to reform this elitist law. In the meantime, if you have a son at college, particularly the ivy league colleges, I urge you to save money for a lawyer. Innocent teenage boys and young men are getting found guilty of sexual abuse with almost no due process by male-hating Title IX coordinators and college administrators who cravenly turn their backs on them. Witches not Pilgrims are running the Salem Witch Trials now.
    This version of the email I sent to the Brattleboro Reformer was elaborated just a bit. After I sent the email in, I went to the gym where I worried about the consequences as this is a very inflammatory, emotional issue not readily open reason, logic, evidence, or friction (contrasting thoughts). It is sooo immature!
As a lifted weights, I feared that a flash mob from the Middlebury College Nazis might appear in a little bubble of love -Brattleboro, that is- and attack me. I thought about how I would fight.
peternickerson12@yahoo  352-359-0850  Philosophy Major, "68