#The Fate of Vannois

[young-vannois]

“I want to see the Vault,” Umbris demands of her sister, orange robes rumpled as of she had slept in them. In one hand is clutched a scroll yellowed and crumpled with age, its edges torn and chipped.

But Cecille only tilts her head, the skull mask looking back at Umbris impassively as faint blue lights dance around her head.

“No.”

“Why not?!”

“I know you have read the scrolls, I am not oblivious.”

“I know you have read the scrolls, I am not oblivious.”

“Cecille, we are dying! Our clan has been reduced to nothing! How much longer must we wait? How much longer CAN we wait?!”

“Much more than our sleeping ancestors lay in wait in the Vault dear sister. Creatures who must be held at bay with spells and technology. It is not safe for you to enter the Vault, much less with the intent to wake our elder brethren.”

Cecille gently takes the scroll from Umbris’ hands and tucks it beneath her shroud before turning to disappear around the corner and out of sight before Umbris can argue further.  

“You must have Faith sister. They will awaken when they are needed.”

~~

Umbris alights upon her outer balcony and slams the veranda door behind her with an agitated sigh, her hands still clenched tight and her head feathers in disarray. The room is cool despite the midday heat and sun shining through her carved windows. One of the perks of living in the Crystalspine Reaches: their homes were carved into the sides of the spires themselves and retained better consistent temperatures.

But it did little to ease Umbris’ rage in the moment. Not even the softness of her bed could quell the indignity rising in her chest. Cecille had treated her like a child and brushed off her concerns like nothing.

“Faith? Faith isn’t going to put food in our stores, coin in the coffers, or protect our already weak borders! Faith- pah!” 

“Oh man, am I interrupting another golden rant session?”

Umbris only twitches as she turns to level a steely glare at Lios, who had slithered into her chambers (or had been waiting already) and was grinning at her from the ceiling. He dropped down with a graceful twist and stood up, raking claws through his wild crest.

“Cecille keeps brushing me off about the Vault- AGAIN. It’s taken months just to find the scrolls about them and they hardly contain anything useful! And then when I ask, she starts going on about ‘faith’ and dark secrets. I know there are monsters there but I don’t care about them. We NEED to awaken the Forebears before our clan turns to nothing but a memory!”

Umbris has to slump against her rattan chair as she finishes, suddenly exhausted from her outpouring of frustration.

“Only she and Cataracta know where the Vault is and how to access it. Why won’t they listen to me? We’re on the brink of disappearing.”

She suddenly can’t help the sob that wracks her, forcing her into a curled up ball in her chair. What would happen when there was no more people to bring food? When no more warriors were left to patrol their already weak borders? The schools and nurseries had been closed for over 20 years now, the markets more quiet than not. What stalls were left were often shuttered closed and the streets empty. They were at the mercy of their neighbors and merely one generation away from fading away.

Lios’ hand grasps her shoulder as he kneels next to her, squeezing gently as his deep blue eyes look at her.

“Don’t give up now. We’re so close, I can feel it. You’ve worked so hard and I won’t let your work go to waste. Just tell me what to do,” he says softly.

Umbris drags in a ragged breath, wiping the dampness from her cheeks as she looks down at Lios. He had backed her since the beginning, when the merchants stopped coming more than once every three months. He had been with her when the nursery had closed and the caregivers had left. He was there when the last of their students had graduated in a mere class of five. He would be there no matter what.

“We need to find the Vault ourselves.”

“I’m a good tracker but Cecille and Cataracta use some sort of magic to travel there and mask their trails.”

“Then we don’t need them. We need someone else who came from the Vault.”

Lios’ eyes go wide at her suggestion and he sucks in a quick breath.

“You mean...”

“We need to find the Quiet Prince.”

[alabamaprelawland-blog]

Retroactively Rectifying a Split Jury

By Christopher Alhorn, The University of Alabama in Huntsville Class of 2021

November 17, 2020

In 2006, Thedrick Edwards was facing trial in a Louisiana court for robbery, kidnapping, and rape [1]. The State of Louisiana had accused Edwards of breaking state law in nine different ways. Edwards waited as the twelve-member jury deliberated the verdict. If Edwards won, he was a free man. If he lost, Edwards would easily go to jail for decades. What Edwards couldn’t know as he awaited the verdict was the jury could not come to a unanimous decision. Most of the jury was convinced Edwards was guilty. One of the jurors was not. In an act some characterized as discriminatory, the prosecution had used its ability to challenge jurors to exclude all but one African American from the jury. Interestingly, the one African American left on the jury was not willing to convict Edwards of the charges he faced [1]. When the jurors finally returned to an anxious court, Edwards and the prosecutors heard the verdict: guilty on all charges. After hearing the verdict, the judge sentenced Edwards to life imprisonment. Furthermore, Edwards would never be eligible for parole. With the verdict, Edwards would go to jail for the rest of his life with no chance of leaving prison.

Edwards appealed his case in hope a higher court would reverse the verdict. Edwards had no luck with his repeated appeals. The First Louisiana Circuit Court of Appeal refused to rehear the case, and the Louisiana Supreme Court rejected Edward’s appeal. With every appeal in Louisiana used, Edwards appeared doomed to prison for the rest of life.

In 2019, a surprise Supreme Court ruling gave new hope to Edwards case. Another man from Louisiana, Evangelisto Ramos, asked the Supreme Court to overturn his sentence to life in prison, based on the fact the jury had found him guilty by a 10-2 vote [2]. The vast majority of states require a unanimous jury decision, Louisiana is one of only two states (the other being Oregon) which allows for a guilty verdict if at least ten members of the jury believe the defendant is guilty. Louisiana and Oregon’s laws allowing for nonunanimous jury verdicts were passed during the Jim Crow era as an attempt to sideline African-American voices on juries. Despite the origin of the law, Louisiana had decided to keep the law on the books.  In Ramos v. Louisiana, the Supreme Court said the right to trial by jury found in the Sixth Amendment requires all jury decisions for major crimes be unanimous. The 6-3 decision voided Louisiana and Oregon’s nonunanimous jury laws [2]. In an appeal to the Supreme Court, Edwards asked the court to throw out his guilty verdict because one member of the jury had found him not guilty. Edwards argued that the crimes he had been accused of were clearly serious crimes, and therefore, he could not be convicted of the crimes without a unanimous jury. On May 4, 2020, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case [3].

Attempting to keep Edwards in jail, the State of Louisiana argued the Supreme Court’s decision in Ramos v. Louisiana cannot apply retroactively. The state has pointed out Edwards was convicted of nine crimes in 2006. The Supreme Court’s voidance of the state law occurred in 2019. Edwards has argued he is entitled to the same treatment as Ramos. Both were convicted of crimes which carried a life sentence by nonunanimous jury decisions in the same state, so, if one is freed, both should be freed. The key question in the case is whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Ramos v. Louisiana can apply retroactively. If the answer is yes, all prisoners convicted by nonunanimous juries for serious crimes will have to be freed or tried again for the same crimes they were originally convicted of. If not, they will all remain in jail until they serve their sentence or are paroled if the prisoners are eligible for parole. Louisiana is receiving help in the form of an amicus brief from the state of Oregon, which is concerned if Edwards wins, then it will have to prosecute hundreds of cases again [4].For Edwards, the outcome of his case at the Supreme Court is an all or nothing proposition, at least in the short term. If he wins, he goes free. If he loses, he stays in jail for the rest of his life. The State of Louisiana may attempt to retry Edwards if they lose at the Supreme Court, but there is no guarantee the state would gain another guilty verdict. Oral arguments on the case will commence on November 30, 2020 [3].. With a nonunanimous jury decision before the Supreme Court, the court will soon be able to decide if it will retroactively rectify Edward’s trial or if the jury’s decision will stand and Edwards will remain imprisoned. Either way, both sides will be anxious to hear the court’s verdict while the fate of hundreds of prisoners will be determined in the momentous decision.

________________________________________________________________

1. Edwards v. Vannoy. (n.d.). Oyez. Retrieved November 14, 2020, from https://www.oyez.org/cases/2020/19-5807

2. Ramos v. Louisiana. (n.d.). Oyez. Retrieved November 15, 2020, from https://www.oyez.org/cases/2019/18-5924

3.Edwards v. Vannoy. SCOTUSblog. Retrieved November 16, 2020, from https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/edwards-v-vannoy/

4. Rosenblum, E. F. Gutman, B. Petrina, D. M. Perdue, C. A. (n.d.) Brief of amicus curiae in State of Oregon in support of respondent. https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/19/19-5807/156862/20201005160248123_19-5807%20bsac%20State%20Of%20Oregon.pdf