On November 19th, the Rule 37 hearings for Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley resumed in Jonesboro after being continued from September. Believing that this would be my last chance to see Jason, Jessie, Dan Stidham, Judge Burnett, and Brent Davis all together in the same courtroom, I found the best deal I could - which wasn’t as good as I thought it should be, given the state of the economy - and hopped on an Air Tran 717 to Memphis. I hadn’t seen Mark and Jacki in two years, and was anxious to catch up with them. During the three days of the hearings - now continued until January 28^th - I heard much that I already knew, but also things I didn’t. I was as fascinated as everybody else by the playing of the Wilkins video, and riveted by the playing of the audio tape - a tape made by Dan Stidham which most of us didn’t know existed - of the now famous "bible" confession taken at Pine Bluff on February 8^th, 1994, only a few days after Jessie’s conviction. Most of the details of what went on in court have been reported elsewhere by now, and there isn’t a need to rehash them here just to fill up space. I don’t have any new perspectives to offer on anything that was revealed. Like everybody else I just want to see three innocent young men, robbed of time they can never get back, set free to see and feel bright sunshine, breathe fresh air, and be able to walk the streets without looking over their shoulders. Sometimes it seems like too much to ask.

I sat with Mark and noted his reaction to different parts of the hearings. I watched him mill around during the breaks greeting people, pumping hands, sharing stories. I could see his face tighten when Brent Davis would ask Dan Stidham, for what seemed like the millionth time, if he thought he provided Jessie Misskelley with adequate representation in 1994. I saw tears rolling down Mark’s face as Dr. Werner Spitz took the stand late Friday to testify in cold, forensic language to the nature of the injuries received by Christopher, Stevie, and Michael; even after so many years, it never gets easier for him. After court on Thursday, I tagged along as Mark took a group of supporters to a local restaurant for a feast of catfish, crawfish, frog legs, and hush puppies. I listened as he moved around the table telling tales and not sparing the minutiae. I think everyone was enjoying themselves, though maybe feeling a little guilty about it, but I kept wishing that I could hear the thoughts of others, as if they were being spoken aloud. Maybe I’m just over-thinking it, but I can’t help but wonder if anyone was thinking, as I was, about what it really was that brought them to this obscure little southern town, leaving their safety zones at home, to confront this Confederate drama with other like-minded people, who for the most part were only known to them through the internet. Even after all these years, I’m really not sure. I do know one thing, however; everyone’s reason for being there was just a little different.

The "core" was well represented, with Burk Sauls, Grove Pashley, and Lisa Fancher of wm3.org present as they have been for so long, for no other reason than a show of support for two of the three men fighting for new trials, down-home Davids against an inscrutable legal Goliath. There was Mark Byers, who in the not-too-distant past would have probably read the daily updates in the Jonesboro Sun, loudly cursing the men he believed murdered his son (which is almost surely what Todd and Dana Moore actually did. Pam and Terry Hobbs are wild cards, Pam vacillating between the guilt and innocence of the three, and Terry thinking God knows what.) There were those who were drawn, like Mike from Boston, and Stan from Missouri, by some mysterious pull, something akin to that which compelled hundreds of pilgrims making the trek to Devil’s Tower in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The message board faithful were there to offer support and report back to those who couldn’t make the trek. The movement has truly been globalized, and their messages were read daily by supporters in foreign countries, thousands of miles away. There was a high school criminal justice class from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, who had viewed the Paradise Lost films, and traveled over 300 miles to Jonesboro to observe the hearings and talk face-to-face with those whom they had seen on screen in their classroom. I’m not sure that their questions were really answered that day, though they asked plenty of them.

Some came to write about the case, to cover it for the media, maybe get a quote or two. The TV cameras were there, interviews were given, sound bites recorded for the evening news. Still others came to apparently stroke their own egos, pull childish stunts, and taunt the court with blatant disrespect. Apparently, this was their way of showing support. Sticking their faces in front of cameras, bringing food items into the courtroom, littering the area around their seats, filming the proceedings despite a direct court order to the contrary (this is not an original stunt; it was done in September as well, albeit by different people), posting stills and video on the internet. Some even felt free to criticize the movement’s organizers for, among other things, the clothes they were wearing. I guess what they say is true: there’s one - or more - in every crowd.

On Friday afternoon Jessie and Jason were led back to their "homes", Varner Unit for Jessie and Tucker for Jason. Jason looked sad, and for good reason. Aside from his mother and brother being present in court, as they were in September, there was an extremely cute young blond (she reminded me of Kaitlin Olson, "Dee" from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) who arose from her pew to close-talk Jason at every break. At one point, they even held hands. This appeared to me to be some twisted southern hospitality on the part of the court. Let people talk to the guys, buy them lunch, hold hands in a near-canoodle. Then rubber stamp the denials, lock them back up and throw away the key. Smile to their faces, stick it up their asses. People can’t keep squawking from California forever, can they? At the end of Werner Spitz’s testimony on Friday the excitement was over, at least for the time being, but the guys will at least get out of their cells for ten days or so in January when the hearings are scheduled to resume and hopefully conclude.