Many people who were not sporting fans many months ago may not have had the faintest idea of who Tony Veitch was… that was before his life and actions became front page news for all the wrong reasons in our little land under the sun.

If you happen to be reading this from any other destination than New Zealand, his name probably means very little.

Let me broad brush a little and provide some illumination.

In the world of sports journalism in our little fish bowl of New Zealand, Veitch had become quite a success.  The son of a successful TV producer, Veitch had made his way from humble sports reporter to presenting a sports based entertainment show, having one of the prime spots of what was New Zealand’s only sports radio stations, to reading the sports report on the News… not too shabby!

Tony Veitch was making his mark in his industry of choice, which was about to be reaffirmed with the pivotal part he would play in the looming Olympic coverage from Beijing.

Things were apparently swimmingly until news of a rather surprising and  shocking incident with a friend who, at that time,  had recently been his  girlfriend, reverberated around the airwaves.

To cut a long story short and refrain from speculating and pontificating, Veitch had physically assaulted the young lady friend, “lashed out” I believe he said, with the result being that he had fractured a couple of vertebrae in her back.

As a result Veitch had, amongst some other costs, agreed to pay the young lady $150,000 in compensation in response to her request.

However, in the fullness of time, what had been “sorted out” behind closed doors was taken to the next level with Veitch being charged, recently pleading guilty and soon to be convicted.

He will not be spending anytime behind prison as a result of a deal, taking into account what has already been compensated, etc.  However, he will be completing three hundred hours of community service.

You can read about some of the latest details here if you really want some more perspective, which describes a fallen Veitch, struggling to keep it together, struggling to find any tunnel, let alone any light.

For both the victim and perpetrator, it has been a costly time, in so many ways.

My purpose in recounting this unfolding reality is not to digress on any “he said she said,” other than pointing out the historical reality, nor to present any kind of apologetic for a given side about what transpired.

What I do want to think through is the outworking of what has transpired, which has afforded me the opportunity to reflect on how justice is best realized in our cultural context, and subsequently, how humanity longs for redemption.

In Search of Justice

The historical occasion that encouraged this present reflection was a discussion in our ethics class in Australia (surprisingly, they do have some in Australia, so they claim).

The context of this discussion, I believe, was in the area of capital punishment.  However, the discussion had been extended to how justice and jurisprudence is generally served in our cultural context, and whether this reflected a biblical, “just” perspective.

The point that was made in class was that when justice is executed, the practical outworking of this seems to have more emphasis on punishing the perpetrator, than on how to complete this transaction by also personally providing some restorative  impact for the victim.

Generally, a direct restorative reality for the victim does not happen, but occurs in a more indirect manner, with the punishment having very little to do with personally impacting the victims of these crimes.  The victim generally receives relief from what negatively happens to the perpetrator in contradistinction to being on the receiving hand of something personally, usually meted out through the auspices of a correctional facility.

Don’t get me wrong, there are good, wise and valid individual and societal reasons for this practice, none-the-least, providing some peace of mind for the victim and society, but still the question remains if it is possible for victims to receive a better, more comprehensive justice, and I am thinking particularly of the more violent crimes, where there is so much personal victimization.

It is interesting to think through some of the ways that God administered justice in Israel under the Mosaic economy.  This may also provide some illumination for our context.

Take one example, the “laws of restitution” recorded in Exodus 21:33-22:14.

When someone was wronged in more mundane, yet important matters (affecting one’s livelihood), such as someone either stealing or killing one’s ox, he shall repay five oxen for an ox.

In other words, where the victim was wronged, he was recompensed.  There was a symmetrical relationship between both acts, but an asymmetrical relationship in regards to the cost involved, with the perpetrator, literally not only paying for his crime, but paying the offended party.

In today’s jurisprudence, it would seem that this philosophy still takes place to a greater or lesser degree through financial restitution in more mundane matters (if I may call them such), and with the practice of giving damages where appropriate.

But how does this relate to when an individual is attacked, assaulted, killed or murdered.

We have, wrongly in my opinion,  given up on capital punishment (it was interesting to here Fruchtenbaum affirm that the removal of capital punishment from our jurisprudence is a breaking of the Noahic covenant.  Often it’s removal is affirmed as just being unbiblical.  I think this perspective takes it to the next level), but let’s take the case of manslaughter.

Man extinguishing the image of God in man is such a serious reality that, even when this is done unintentionally, there was a life-price that was justifiable, with only the Creator having such copy-rights!

Because of the unintentional nature of this act, God introduced the concept of “cities of refuge” in Numbers 35:9-34 where the guilty party was to flee in such instances.  Read how Numbers 35:12 describes this.

Note the description of the “avenger” as the source of justice for the victim.

Read how Gordon Wenham describes this process.

The Israelite system of justice involved the injured party seeking relief in court from the aggressor.  In the case of homicide, the male relative closest to the murder victim was expected to exact retribution (emphasis mine).

In such cases, the concept of justice reached full circle, with the perpetrator being reduced to the victim, with the outworking of this involving the initial victim receiving recompense through their family line (through the seminal relationship).

Now, I am not attempting to make a direct correlation between these previous comments and the Veitch case, however, I do believe that putting the implications into applications, we are given a much better recourse of justice for the victim.

Given this reality and what has transpired with Veitch, I am thinking that in paying the young lady some $150,000 in compensation (plus other costs), with Veitch also being on the receiving end of public and societal shame, the young lady has received a much better, a much more personal and a much more complete form of  justice than if  this case had simply gone to court in its inception and Veitch had only spent time in a correctional facility.

I also think this is conceptually much closer to the general perspective of justice under the Mosaic economy, where to make sure that when someone was wronged, the victim personally received requisite recompense, retribution even.

Not that I have machinations of being assaulted, and while I would want to make sure that I (and society) was protected from the individual, if I was to receive such a payment, there would be a tangible sense that I was personally receiving some sort of just recompense for what I have suffered.

Whether such a system as exemplified in the Veitch case could be a practical reality in our cultural context I doubt (that is putting good spin on it), but the application of what has transpired seems to me to be a fuller and more complete representation of a system of justice that both deals with the perpetrator and plays a proper restorative role for the victim.

It seems that in asking how do we get justice, we try and answer the first part, which is how to deal with the perpetrator, but we do not do so well in asking how does this or how should this intersect with the victim.

In light of what I have said about justice being served, may I also make a personal comment.

Let me not be misunderstood, what Tony Veitch is guilty of was and is sinful and wrong…  and from his own mouth, he is guilty.  He has literally payed for this crime, and will continue with three hundred hours of community service, etc (at this stage, anyway).  Not to mention the other costs involved.

While it is true that sin is a corrosive destroyer of life and liberty, the extent of the  subsequent public destruction and humiliation of the man, in my opinion, goes from a legitimate sense of shame-based communal retributive justice to a media-induced madi-gras at the expense of the man’s future.

If there is anyone I have seen lately whose life exhibits more explicitly the need for redemption, it is this man!

In Search of Redemption

I know that the circumstances that surrounds the crime that Tony Veitch has committed are not pleasant, and it is very easy for compassion for the man to be falsely construed as proxy justification for what he has been involved in (which it is not).

I reject such a notion as this and admit that I do feel a deep sense of compassion for the man.  When I have looked at him on TV and read about the three occasions that he has sought to take his life, I empathize with the sense of hope that is lost and can not be found.

I have a tangible understanding of what it is like to have life go in a very different direction than what one was planning, and the challenges that this can entail.

However, what Veitch does not realize is that the challenge his life has become exemplifies how man, in his folly, ventures out on his self-salvation project, seeking to redeem his existence through his pursuits under the sun, which is fine as long as life follows according to his plan.

When our salvation plan, which can involves things like a career are taken away, and we are broken beyond all recognition, it becomes clear where our salvation, “functional” or otherwise resides, and we fall apart, we become lost.

Existentially we are all looking for redemption.

Often we do not realize that we are on our own self-salvation project until the things that have “saved” us are taken away, which affirms, if we ever needed it that these things can not save us and we can not save ourselves.

However, we can easily delude ourselves each and every day as we continue to place our hope, temporal or eternal, in things that are both beyond our ultimate control and beyond the needs of our situation.

We need a Redeemer!

Tony Veitch, you may feel like your life is a mess, beyond repair, and ultimately it is, if it is left up to you.

However, the Redeemer did not come to call the righteous, but sinners like you and me.

He alone can redeem you.

He alone can give you what you have been searching for.

I encourage you to pray for grace of God to be evident in this man’s quest for redemption!

Until Next Time

I am Jonny King