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Bad Timing. In part, Tyson lost because the evidence, as presented to the jury, was against him. Garrison, while happy to sunbathe in the limelight, insists that the case won itself: "There's nothing like being right to make it winning." But it's also plausible that Tyson was standing trial -- if not in the jurors' minds, then in the docket of public opinion -- for crimes other than his. Crimes racial, judicial and sexual. To some, Tyson was the black street creep who holds urban civility at knife point. To others, he was the last chance for society to atone for its dismissal of the charges against powerful men like Clarence Thomas and William Kennedy Smith.
To still others, Tyson was every celebrity athlete, pro or amateur, who has misused his stardom by abusing women. Just last week a lacrosse player at St. John's University in New York City pleaded guilty to forcing alcohol on a fellow student and then sexually assaulting her. Two of the player's teammates had pleaded guilty to lesser charges; three others were acquitted when the jury could not decide whether the woman had given consent -- though she could not have consented, legally, since she had been made drunk. (The players were white, the victim black.)
So the Tyson verdict is not only a surprise but a desperately needed balm to those who have suffered an athlete's educated hands. Says Barbara Otto, a director of the 9 to 5, National Association of Working Women: "Tyson's conviction sends a message to athletes that it's not acceptable to abuse the rights of women who work with them."
Before sentencing, scheduled for March 27, Tyson will undergo examination, and both sides will offer depositions. Garrison deflects the tantalizing rumors that Washington will appear at the hearing to plead that Tyson has already suffered enough. He expects "probably not a demand for much of anything. Except that she wants Tyson to get help." Garrison seems certain of one thing: "He will go to jail."
And when he comes out, he will be allowed to fight again. "If," Sugar says, "he gets out alive. There's never the guarantee that somebody in the Michigan City, Ind., prison who's in on four 99-year terms without the chance of parole won't want to prove that he, and not Mike Tyson, is the baddest man on the planet."
Some will take ironic satisfaction in the thought that behind iron bars, Iron Mike may finally discover that bad is not beautiful.