A Time to Kill - Izzy Lobin

1. Carl Lee Haley’s killing of the two men would not be considered justice in the eye of the law, but may have been considered justice in his mind. Justice is simply the idea that an action does something good, usually in order to counter something bad. It may be seen as a balancing of the scales, like how in the middle ages you would be executed for murder. “Justice” such as this forced the mind to see a usually unjust act of killing someone as ok because it ends the life of someone who had done unjust acts themselves, balancing out the scales. Yet in today’s law, murder is considered illegal in all situations but the death penalty. So there really isn’t a clear cut answer to the question, the idea of justice is too fluid for someone to narrowly define it as much more than one’s opinion of right and wrong, and the law seems to be the only guideline off of which to base right and wrong. So no, Carl Lee’s actions would not be considered “justice” in the eye of the law. But also yes, to him, and probably others who had the same perception of the situation, this was an act of “justice”.
2. Haley committed this crime out of emotional distress. A family member being hurt affects anyone’s mind, but your daughter being beaten, raped, urinated on, and left for dead changes you. Though this would definitely be enough for most people to be pushed over the edge, Carl Lee had even more to deal with: the men who did this to his daughter had a chance of getting cleared of all charges. Even though they had done these things, because of their geographic location in the south, there was a chance they could get out of it all. This made Haley angrier and the situation much more volatile, which eventually led to him to take “justice” into his own hands. So Haley did this because of what happened to his daughter coupled with the fact that the men were almost let free.
3. I think in the eyes of the law, Carl Lee should be imprisoned, but personally I think he should just be institutionalized. Since he did kill two men in cold blood, I think that the law would deem him guilty of murder and at the very least institutionalize him. I personally believe that he could plead temporary insanity, and therefore would be temporarily institutionalized, but not imprisoned.
4. No, the scales of justice are not balanced where the movie takes place. In Mississippi, blacks were not treated justly by the law, while whites were. This is shown because they were willing to give the death penalty to Carl Lee, but also were willing to let the two rapists/attempted murderers of his daughter be cleared. This is an obviously unfair system where the scales of justice are not balanced.
5. No, it should not matter, at least legally speaking, if Tanya is white or black. Justice should be blind, but often times isn’t. Race should not help to determine any legal case in any way, unless that case has to do with hate crimes. The rape and attempted murder of a young child should be treated by its severity, not the victim’s skin color.
6. Carl Lee Haley got due process in every way possible, but due process does not extend to the jury. Because the jury was all-white and completely biased. In one of the earlier scenes, the jury takes an impromptu vote, and only one member said not guilty. This shows that even though he got due process in every legal way, it was still an unfair trial.