Justice?
2006-05-11

There still is a lot of grief in this little state over the nightclub fire now three years ago that took the lives of 100 people and injured 200 more. Feelings run strong in this area about almost everything and this is no exception.
It happened less than two miles from the house. To this day, when I think of it, I can still smell the smoke drifting through the yard the morning after and wondering what it was from. It was a beautiful sunny crisp day. The first reports of the fire said 25 dead, then it seemed to explode by the hour until it reached in the 90's. It didn't reach the hundred mark until a few days, when the worst of the semi-living just couldn't hang on any more. 100 people dead in just a few minutes, in a place we all knew. It didn't seem real and yet it was.
I wondered of the ex was there. She hung out there a lot. She wasn't. On this night she had other plans. Luck of the draw. I didn't find out for three days she was still alive. I wondered how many other families were in the same boat, wondering...
Yesterday the band manager who set off the fireworks that started the fire plead guilty to 100 counts of manslaughter (why can't I ever look at that word without thinking mans laughter, damn you MP). He was sentenced to 4 years in jail.
No let me admit that I didn't lose anybody in the fire. Sure I know people who have and maybe I'd have thought differently if I did, but... Here was a guy making just above minimum wage doing his job like he did a thousand nights before and on this one night because of greedy owners and incompetent fire inspectors now has the weight of 100 deaths on his shoulders. I don't know how you come back from that and I'm not sure how jail helps.
Some of the families understood. Some didn't. One lady screamed at the guys mother after the sentance that now she could suffer like they were. I'd like to excuse that behavior by saying she was over come with grief, but that excuse rings hollow. Here in our little piece of earth we have classless people here too, maybe more than our share. It's sad.
The manager was there that night. He lost friends too. He saw the horror and smelled the death up close and personal and yes it started with something he did, but he didn't mean any harm. He doesn't need rehabilitation. He isn't a threat to society. His punishement only serves as a salve the families of the dead and lots of them don't think it was enough. I think for some, burning at the stake wouldn't be enough. They lost a loved one and somebody has to pay, but was this the right guy? He didn't install what some has called solid gasoline on the walls and he didn't screw up the exit doors. He didn't let way more people in the door than should have been there. All he did was start the show like he did countles times before and when he did, people died. Lots of them and that fact alone will weigh on his mind until he dies.
He wrote a hundred letters of appology, one to to each of the families that lost somebody. He wasn't ordered too, it was just something he felt he had to do. He pled guilty dispite the recommendations and pleas of his lawyer. He might have gotten off if it went to trial. He broke down and cried and cried and cried in the court for those who were hurt that night. Yeah I was touched. How could you not be? And now he's off to prison where he'll have way too much time to think about the things he saw and heard and smelled that night. How do you ever get on with a normal life after that? I don't think you can but I hope he finds a way even though I doubt he ever will. I hope some of the prayers that are said for the victims come your way guy. I'm afraid you're going to need all the help you can get.

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