Bonfire of the Vanities. Tom Wolfe.

The Bonfire of the Vanities.
Tom Wolfe.
New York: Bantam Books, 1988.

Theme of the Justice System: Don't do what's right; do what is going to make you look good in the media.

Sherman McCoy, affluent stock broker, is not guilty of a hit-and-run accident in which a black boy is killed. He is having an affair and he is out with his girl friend (although he is married). A thug, who is black and his unwilling accomplice who is also black try to take his car when he exits the car to remove a tire that they have thrown in front of his car in the roadway. His girl friend who is driving speeds off and and he leaps into the passenger seat, but in order to avoid hitting the thug, she backs up and hits the unwilling accomplice. He goes to the hospital and later dies of head injuries.

Sherman McCoy is not guilty, but everything conspires to convict him--a district attorney who needs a high-profile case to win reelection, an assistant district attorney who loves to see himself in the media, a newspaper writer who uses the story to break away from being a mediocre hack, a girl friend who lies to save her own skin, a black activist minister who spouts racist bromides about the white establishment and its cronies, the media.

I'm reminded of the short story in which three middle-class young men go into a drugstore and, just for the hell of it, decide to shoplift. One of them is caught and his life is ruined. As in The Bonfire of the Vanities, his road to degradation is inevitable. I'm also reminded of The Great Gatsby in which Daisy hits her husband's lover and Gatsby takes the rap because she was driving his car. I also think about the District Attorney in the Duke lacrosse alleged rape scandal who did everything he could to convict the three suspects in the press while suppressing favorable evidence as part of the legal proceedings.

Why didn't McCoy report the incident to the police? Because he was cheating on his wife, who did not know it. Why didn't the unwilling accomplice admit he was part of an attempted car-jacking when he went to the hospital? Why would he?

Contrast between McCoy's affluent life style and his life after being fingered as the hit-and-run driver who killed a promising young black boy. Everything conspires against him. And the people who get him are motivated by vanity and pride and power, not by the desire to achieve justice.

Now I know why Dad wanted nothing to do with criminal law. A grand jury will "indict a ham sandwich" if the prosecutors want them to.