Procrastination: A Legitimate Pleasure Maximizing Philosophy

As part of my shadow yesterday, I showed up at the Johnson County Courthouse to watch arraignments.

There were several DUI type cases, a domestic abuse case and a possession of marijuana case. The majority of the people there pleaded not guilty.

After they pleaded not guilty, the judge rushed them through a few formalities, most notably, the "do you wish to exercise or waive your right to a speedy trial?" formality.

As far as I could tell, everyone being arraigned responded that they would like to exercise their right to a speedy trial.

Being a life-long procrastinator, I found this peculiar. Why expedite pain and suffering if you could push it off for a few more days?

Sure, there are many out there who subscribe to the "let's get it over with" philosophy. In fact, I know a few people who can't take homework home with them. They prefer to get everything done at school. Which is great. If they find that the most psychologically satisfying method in which to approach their lives, then I commend them for postponing gratification until their work has been completed.

I however, subscribe to the Harry Burns "perpetual anticipation of death" theory. Many of you will remember Harry Burns as Billy Crystal's character in When Harry Met Sally. Harry, you will also remember, used to read the last page of a book first so that, if he died, he knew how it ended. Pretty morbid huh?

This is the kind of philosophy I'd apply to any speedy trial issue I was presented with. Assuming I'm not stuck in jail and couldn't pay bail or whatever, if the county attorney wants to wait a few more days to make his case against me, I've got absolutely no problem with that. In fact, I would probably encourage him to take a couple years. No rush buddy. I'll just spend those next two years not paying fines or serving jail time. No skin off my back.

Why? Because I might be dead in two years. I don't know what the exact chances are (and have no desire to consult the actuarial tables on this), but any chance at all justifies postponing your punishment as long as you can. Let's say for some reason you've been arraigned and it does take two years to begin your trial. Let's say the county attorney is just overworked and every time your case comes to her desk she says, "we'll just pass on that because we've got to get this other case to trial in 6 days or it gets dismissed." So your case sits there for 2 years. That's 730 days that you might mistakenly walk out in front of a truck, or be struck by lightning, or be diagnosed with an incurable disease.

It's the ultimate bet-hedging maneuver. If you want to maximize the amount of earthly pleasure that you experience within the finite amount of days you'll be here on earth, then postponing that trial is the rational thing to do. Sure you don't want to die in the next two years, but if you should die in the next two years, your former self (the one that was alive) will be incredibly happy that he was playing Mario Kart instead of raking lawns for community service.

But let's not get carried away, obviously there are limitations to the effectiveness of this philosophy. One, if you are in jail and can't post bail, you'll probably want the trial to take place as quickly as possible. Two, if you really think that the trial might not happen for whatever reason within the mandated time period, then if you've exercised your right to a speedy trial, the charges will usually be dismissed.

To make the procrastination argument a real argument instead of a jokey reflection (which it undoubtedly is) you would need all sorts of data, for example: the % of defendant's who, having exercised their right to a speedy trial, get a speedy trial; % of defendant's who, having waived their right to a speedy trial, have trials that fall outside the accepted time limit had they exercised their right; the difference in days waited for trial between someone who exercised this right and someone who waived this right in similar jurisdictions for similar offenses; % of time county attorneys will prioritize one case over another based on the speedy trial designation. All sorts of data like that would surely help you decide if you want to use the "Get it over NOW approach," or the "Harry Burns/Procrastination/take your time approach."

Other than that, feel free to keep playing Mario Kart until you get that letter in the mail.

For those interested, here are the basic Iowa rules on speedy trial as far as I could tell in five minutes of internet searching. These are culled from the Iowa Court Rules, and I assume, are not even close to exhaustive:

1. A person arrested for a public offense must be indicted within 45 days or the case will be dismissed (unless good cause to the contrary is shown or the person has waived his right to speedy trial.)

2. A person indicted for a public offense must be brought to trial within 90 days or the charges will be dismissed (unless good cause to the contrary is shown or the person has waived his right to a speedy trial.)

3. A person charged with a criminal offense must be brought to trial within 1 year from that person's initial arraignment (unless good cause to the contrary is shown or the person has waived his right to a speedy trial).

And now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a bunch of awesome stuff to go do. And seeing as I have a .00000000011 % chance of dying within the next one hour, I better get a move on.