Judge Gave Drug Dealer a Second Chance. 16 Years Later, He Swore Him In As a Lawyer
The difference between finding justice and following the letter of the law sometimes takes a simple act of compassion. Where others might have seen an incorrigible offender, one judge saw promise—and following a hunch, he acted on his intuition.
At first glance, Edward Martell, a 27-year-old high school dropout with an extensive arrest record might not have seemed a prime candidate for rehabilitation, but when he was facing a 20-year drug conviction, instead of meting out the maximum sentence, presiding judge Bruce Morrow gave Martell probation—and a challenge.
Morrow told Martell the next time he stepped into the courtroom, he expected him to have made something of himself—something big.
“He said, ‘I challenge you to be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company instead of being out here selling drugs,’” Martell told Deadline Detroit. “And I love a challenge.”
“It was kind of in jest,” Morrow recalled in an interview with The Washington Post, “but he understood I believed he could be anything he wanted to be.”
