Ms. Banks from our downtown competitor has a nice column today. She revisits the Monica Thomas-Harris murder by taking a walk around the courthouse to see how people take a legal stand against abuse through temporary restraining orders. As both the Thomas-Harris and our own Paul Wesley Baker cases illustrate, these TROs don't always mean much, but they're often enough to fend off unwanted attention.

And, since there's not enough Spears coverage out there, Ms. Banks ran into the Britney scene upstairs. Britney didn't show, but the tabloid hounds did. Banks cut through all the nonsense and picked up on the real story, about a woman named Consuelo who was trying to keep her boyfriend away from her kids. It's a nice piece.

I thought about what it took for Consuelo to make it into that courtroom alone -- without security, an attorney, a driver or bodyguard -- and to stand up to an angry man who accused her of lying.

I realized that on this morning at least, what I saw on the second floor didn't merit an onslaught of paparazzi. And it wasn't so much about stopping bullets, but about standing up with courage against abuse.