P.S.: thanks for treating me fairly

Do you ever just look around and feel frustrated with the state of the world?

Working in the news business, it would be easy for me to be pessimistic, but, truthfully, I would consider myself quite optimistic. Or, at the very least, a “the glass may be half empty, but it’s refillable” type of person.

I think that’s why a random email on a Sunday evening stuck with me.

It arrived in my inbox the weekend after we published a story about charges being dropped for a very serious allegation. The contents of the email were fairly routine — a business representative needed to run a public notice in the newspaper. They sent the wording and included the requested run dates — it seemed easy enough.

It was the last line that stuck with me through the week: “P.S.: thanks for treating me fairly.”

At first, I was confused. “Why would this person whom I’ve never spoken to before thank me for being fair?” “How have I even treated them fairly when they’ve never reached out before?” Then, I saw the full name of the sender of the email — the person whose charges had been dropped and expunged. Immediately, I knew exactly what he was referring to.

The story  I speak of was sent to multiple news outlets in the area. To my knowledge, in addition to the Hays Free Press/News-Dispatch, only one of those that covered the original story has published the update.

In the United States, citizens are legally considered innocent until proven guilty. However, in the public eye, we are far from it. In fact, I would argue that the general public treats people the exact opposite: guilty until proven innocent.

It is terrifying to me that one day, myself or someone I care about could be in that exact position. In an instant, any one of us could lose it all — career, livelihood, reputation, friends, family and more.

It frustrates me more than I can adequately explain that anyone would feel the need to thank me, or anyone else, for treating them in a way that, in my opinion, is the bare minimum of how someone should be treated.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of people who I believe deserve to be punished to the full extent of the law for the crimes for which they have been convicted. There are likely some that I think should be punished more harshly than the law allows. But that is not what I am talking about here. What I am talking about here is a legally innocent person being treated as such.

Wouldn’t you want to be treated like everyone else if you were innocent? What if it was your loved one? Just like every time it conveniences you, I urge you to let the court do its job and trust the law. Then, in all cases, treat people the way you would want to be treated.