Most of us don’t have a murderer living next door.  That’s easily a fact, though unmeasured.  But what if you did?  Have a real life murderer next door I mean.  Washing his car, mowing his lawn, bringing in groceries, maybe even waving to you as you bring in your morning paper.

Creepy right?  Yeah, I think so too.  It can happen though, and it probably happens more than we realize.  People get off all the time for murder.  Well, maybe not all them time, but certainly some of the time.  And usually, when they get off, that hopefully means they really didn’t do it.  That’s due process.  What our justice system is designed to do.  But it doesn’t always work that way.  Our system is made up of people, who by nature, aren’t perfect, though they do the best they can. 

So sometimes murderers get off.  Scott free.  Thanks to their own cleverness, during the committing of the crime itself, and perhaps also the cleverness of their hired gun, or guns, their attorneys, the best their money can by. 

So if you found yourself, happily ensconced in your happy home, and lovely neighborhood, what would you do if suddenly you learned that your new neighbor, the guy with the wife and kids, had been found not guilty a few years back on a murder charge?  What would you do?  How would you feel?

It’s a strange thing to think about.  What a strange new trip you’d find yourself on.  If the guy you’d been waving to, the one handing out candy for trick or treat, the one you thought did a decent job on his yard, was also the one you remember reading about, a few years back, involved in a first degree murder trial, only he got off, and moved into your neighborhood, in the house next door.

Well.  It could happen.  It does happen.  Ordinary people do extraordinary things.  And the rest of us have to live with them.  Shucks.  How is that possible?  Well, people have to live somewhere, don’t they?  Even lucky ones getting away with murder.  It’s not like there’s a neighborhood where people go, who have gotten off of charges, where they can all go live happily ever after.  Rapists, murderers, arsonists, pedophiles.  Where would such a neighborhood exist?  And would they then need their own grocery store, mall, and post office?

Ugh.  It’s a weird thing to think about.  It’s not something I like to give to much brain space to.  But it happens, and if it happened to me, I don’t know what I’d do.  Would I make cookies to stay on his good side?  Would I turn my head if we happened to be outside at the same time?  Murderers don’t just randomly murder, do they?  There has to be motive.  I know I’d do my best not to create one.  I know people who know people who know they have a murderer next door.  And they don’t like it, and neither do I, but there’s nothing they can do.

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