I honestly thought that last week’s post would serve as a transition to get me past the Boston bombings. But what has transpired here since the blasts simply can’t be ignored. Or, more precisely, I can’t ignore it.

When Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev was in the hospital after his capture, our mayor was asked how Tsarnaev was doing medically. Mennino waved his hand and said, “Who cares?” Everybody laughed; in fact, his response became a joke around town. At the time I didn’t find it particularly funny, but didn’t think much about it. Two weeks later and I’m thinking about it a lot.

For the past week Boston and cities around Massachusetts have refused to provide space to bury Dzhokhar’s brother Tamerlan who died in a shootout with Boston police, the FBI, and ATF.

When I wrote last week’s column I never expected the story to disappear. Did expect a blame game which is, in fact, happening. Expected congressional hearings, expected the bombings would become, as they have, a political football.

What I didn’t expect was the downright ugly about Tamerlan’s burial.

I understand and appreciate the agony and anger of people about these hideous, tragic events. I learned firsthand how a mass murder affects those connected to it when I spent much of a summer investigating the Murrah Building bombing for a consortium of lawyers. Most of that time was spent with people who had lost loved ones or were injured by the blast. They all were injured by wounds that would never heal.

But when a state and its municipalities refuse to allow a burial of an alleged bomber, it makes me sick to my stomach. We’ve had no trouble scattering ashes or burying convicted assassins and mass murderers before. Timothy McVeigh’s ashes were spread in an undisclosed U.S. location. John Wilkes Booth’s body at Green Mount Cemetery, Baltimore, Maryland. Richard Speck cold-bloodedly slaughtered eight nurses and his ashes were spread in the U.S. “Nanny” Hazel Doss, who confessed to killing her four husbands, her mother, her sister, her grandson, her nephew and others, is buried at Oak Hill Memorial Park, McAlester, Oklahoma. Lee Harvey Oswald at the Rose Hill Memorial Burial Park in Fort Worth, Texas. Andrew Kehoe, who murdered 38 elementary school children, six adults, and injured at least 58 other people, was buried at Mount Rest Cemetery, Clinton County, Michigan.

The list is near endless, but I’ll only mention two more. Father John J. Geoghan molested more than 130 children and is buried at Holyhood Cemetery in Brookline, Massachusetts and the good old Boston Strangler, Albert DeSalvo, is buried at Puritan Lawn Memorial Park, Peabody, Massachusetts.  If our state can provide hallowed ground for these criminals…

So why does it matter if a state and municipalities refuse to allow a burial?

My friend Bill often tells me that I rush to defend the worst of our people. He’s not far wrong–though I don’t think he recognizes my compassion for victims. I believe the way a society handles the worst of the worst speaks to the moral fiber of that society. I’m vehemently opposed to state-sanctioned murder (disguised under the benign term capital punishment) for the same reason. It reflects a blood lust for vengeance–something that eats at the decency of our culture.

Earlier I used the word “alleged” to describe the dead Tamerlan. Do I doubt that he colluded to set off those horrific bombs? Not really, but frankly it doesn’t matter. What matters is a cornerstone of the best of our social character. Innocent until proven guilty has, yet again, taken a back seat to the worst of our being. Better to eliminate the protection of rights in the name of hatred and security than to hold those rights up as a beacon to who we are and want to be.

Worse, these eliminations are rapidly becoming the nature of our post 9/11 society. Gitmo, anyone? Islamophobia? Executions? Undeclared Martial Law? Hell, undeclared wars. These aren’t isolated actions, but part of a whole which is successfully shredding what’s left of our ethical and legal fiber. And the greed which permeates our economic life is taking care of the rest.

When I worked for a poor peoples’ criminal defense attorney, or served on juries, I was constantly struck by the number of times judges would remind and remind the jury that the defendant was absolutely presumed innocent, no matter the charge(s). And was always shocked (when on a jury) how often those words fell upon deaf ears.

Furthermore, if Tamerlan was guilty and murdered and hurt all those innocent people who will have to live with their injuries long after he rots in his grave, doesn’t he still deserve to have one? Just as the way a society treats its poor, its criminals, how it treats its dead also shines a bright light upon our humanity.

Only as rich as the poorest of the poor,
Only as free as a padlocked prison door… Phil Ochs