Published on: Wednesday, April 14, 2010

By Brian J. Karem

Gilbert Arenas is in a halfway house in Montgomery County.

The Washington Wizards player, caught with loaded guns in his possession served all of two days in jail and will now spend 30 days living in a halfway house. He also got a $5,000 fine and will have to perform 400 hours of community service that can't be performed at basketball clinics.

Let me tell you about two other people a little less fortunate than Arenas.

Esai Lopez is dead. His killer ran him down in the middle of Redland Road near the intersection of Muncaster Mill road two years ago.

Witnesses testified the man had been drinking. After he hit Esai, the man apparently stopped, then took off in his car after he saw what happened, conspired to hide the evidence and only came forward many days later.

He got six days in jail before being released.

I won't mention the man's name anymore in this newspaper because it sickens me to this day to think that a kid I knew very well, and whose brother played basketball for me, died in such a dishonorable fashion and justice was denied to his relatives.

My prayer for the man who did this is that he lives his life volunteering to help children and so will find his way out of the Hell he - if he has any conscience - is living for knowing that he ended an innocent life.

Then there is the curious case of Anthony Upton.

Anthony is spending a year in jail.

His crime must be really bad since a man who carried several loaded guns into his work place only got two days in jail and a man who killed an innocent teenager merely did six days inside.

Anthony's crime? He sold a dime bag of marijuana to a friend who was later pulled over by police. The police of course found out who sold the young man a dime bag and Anthony ended up in police custody.

When police, according to Anthony, offered him a deal if he would turn in three of his friends who also were in possession of marijuana, Anthony balked.

He ended up with a plea deal for a misdemeanor and a year inside.

Now the non-violent offender is sharing jail space with at least one convicted murderer and heaven only knows whom else.

I've known Anthony since he was four-years-old and played soccer on my son's very first soccer team. Anthony as a child had his ups and downs.

I remember him once wanting to bury a dead squirrel he found in the neighborhood. He was in tears for an animal he’d had no relationship with other than finding dead.

In short, he’s always had a big heart.

I also remember him once believing an older girl had a crush him who didn't even know he existed - but that's another story.

The story here is about justice - that blind lady with the balance scales who apparently has left Montgomery County for parts unknown.

Anthony's real crime is that he's 21-years-old, trying to go to a community college and neither has the fame and money of Gilbert Arenas nor the clout of the man who left the scene of an automobile accident and left a teenage boy dead.

Richard Pryor used to say when he got to jail he learned about justice. "Just us," he said in reference to the overwhelming number of poor, black men in prison.

Now "Just us," refers to anyone who doesn't have the money to pull the levers of the pay-as-you-go justice system.

For what else can it be that a non-violent offender who dealt what amounts to about three marijuana cigarettes can spend a year in jail when Arenas spends just two days in the can for bringing loaded weapons to work?

If he were a postal worker he'd never see the light of day with that charge.

What about the white, upper-middle class man who ran down Esai Lopez? With the money to hire an expensive lawyer and the good sense, apparently, to listen to him, this middle-aged man was literally able to get away with ending a child's life.

And Anthony sits behind bars for marijuana.

I ask the judge to reconsider this travesty. If Gilbert Arenas can get community service, Anthony Upton should also.

At the very least Anthony Upton deserves better than the man who ran over Esai Lopez.

Doesn’t he?