Quite often a guilty subject will invoke such expressions as, "I swear to God I'm telling the truth," "I hope my mother drops dead if I'm lying," "I'll swear on a stack of Bibles," etc. Although expressions of this type cannot be considered as symptoms of deception, they frequently are used by guilty subjects in an effort to lend forcefulness or conviction to their assertions of innocence.Inbau

. . . Houston criminal-defense lawyer Cole Brooks's new blog. I'm glad to see another Houston criminal-defense lawyer jump into the practical blawgosphere (even if he isn't a member of HCCLA . . . hint, hint), and Cole's blog isn't blatant "I'm great! hire me!" marketing, but so far it's heavy on explications of Texas law and "what to do if you're arrested for DWI." This is

Houston DWI defense lawyer Todd Overstreet got the State to agree to a motion for new trial for a client who had pleaded guilty on September 14th to two counts of criminally negligent homicide (a class A misdemeanor State Jail Felony—thanks, TY) for deaths of a Houston couple in a traffic accident. Todd is being coy about the details, but First Assistant DA Jim Leitner wrote: "as

A couple of years ago (!) I wrote about mapping the blogosphere as a metaphorical space, with proximity measured by commonality of interest as represented by mutual links. Today New York criminal-defense lawyer Scott Greenfield has a nice profile today of one of our virtual neighbors, Minneapolis renaissance man Joel "Jdog" Rosenberg. Not a lawyer, Joel is a well-informed amateur with an excellent sense of fair play

I got to deal with Channel 2, Channel 11, Channel 13, The Houston Chronicle, and Channel 26 this week.One one case, I gave the first four the choice of getting video of my client and me walking to or from court, or getting a statement from me. They chose the pictures. I can't really blame them. We can manage to do our respective jobs (theirs: putting together

Boy, is this guy a lousy liar: (h/t Legal Satyricon.)

Cameron Todd Willingham’s trial lawyer, David Martin, on Anderson Cooper yesterday. Awfully defensive for a guy who thinks he is right. Repeated highlights: “You pour lighter fluid on a carpet and set it on fire, it looks just like those pictures.” (We’re not much on the scientific method here in Texas.) “I have been a trial lawyer for 25 years.” (Meaning that in 1992 he’d been a

Texas Governor Rick "Goodhair" Perry says that Cameron Todd Willingham is a "monster" and a "bad man" who murdered his children (Houston Chronicle). He is convinced that Willingham was guilty of his crime.That's good enough for me. If the Governor of Texas says someone is a monster, then dadgummit he's a monster. Why is he convinced that he's a monster?Because "he murdered his three children [and] tried

From the comments to my post on Waiving Conflict of Interest:Of course, sometimes it’s a prisoner’s dilemma.Both clients have a good chance of winning if neither cooperates.If one cooperates against the other, both clients will certainly lose — one more than the other.The government plays divide and conquer, trying to intimidate one into losing only a little so that the other one loses big, and the government

Recurring newbie lawyer question on criminal defense listservs:”Does anyone have a conflict of interest waiver form they can share?”(A little background for the nonlawyers: a lawyer is to represent her client’s best interests. Each client has his own best interests. A lawyer can’t choose between one client’s interests and another’s; she must serve both. Sometimes this is impossible: when it is in client A’s best interests to