I've taken some criticism for my belief that Harris County Prosecutors (and judges) are typically deficient in the real-world experience that leads to perspective and empathy. Quoth AHCL: But as to Mark's argument about "real world experience" outside of the prosecutor's office being a bonus to being a criminal District Court Judge, I do actually disagree. The only exception to that is that I do think that

Critics of the federal government like to ascribe its ballooning power in criminal cases to the fear-driven actions of recent Republican administrations. A longer view, however, reveals that the government's actions that breed discontent in 2008 were made possible by the overreaching of a Democratic administration more than seventy years ago. Like today, we had a president in 1937 who was eager to expand the power of

New York criminal-defense lawyer Scott Greenfield writes that he feels taken advantage of by people who use his free consultations to get free legal advice; he's begun charging for consultations. Rarely having a problem with people meeting with me on pretexts, I hadn't seriously considered charging for consultations, but right up until Scott's last paragraph, I was thinking, "that's a good idea. Maybe I ought to do

Kevin McHenry has called nine times to try to sell me something. Unfortunately for him, he doesn't have my office number; he keeps calling directly to my answering service number. Here's his first message: 3/14/08 11:47A “to”::MR. BENNETT “first;::KEVIN “last”::MCHENRY “phone”::800-333-0401 EX 1121 “re”: INFO ON PERSONAL INJURY CASES 3/14/08 11:47A Okay: I'm a criminal-defense lawyer. I don't want “info on personal injury cases”, and nothing could

I've written before, here, here, and here, as well as here, about former prosecutors taking criminal cases. So when I read Rick Casey's column in this morning's Chronicle, Who I'll Hire if I'm Caught, in which he explained why he would hire Kelly Siegler to defend him against criminal charges -- because "if she can convict an innocent man, she can keep me out of trouble" --

The last time I had an ID on a lanyard was the summer of 1988, when I was working at CIA's Office of Technical Services and had a green badge that had to be exposed at all times at work. For reasons that are perhaps obvious, I would remove the badge and lanyard when I departed Headquarters in the evening. Back then, ordinary everyday people didn't have

Communicating With Juries with Josh Karton Sponsored by TCDLA and HCCLA May 8, 2008 - | Houston, Texas | Hyatt Regency | CDLP | TBD cle Click Here for a Registration Form Overview“APPEARING, LIVE, IN THIS COURTROOM!” WORKSHOPS IN COURTROOM COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUES Whether you are addressing the jurors or judge directly, or reaching them through dialogue with a witness, your power of persuasion in the courtroom depends

Well we’ve obviously had this political mantra over the last 30 years about “getting tough on crime.” And I think too often, buried in that mantra is the implication that there’s no room for fair justice. We’ve stripped away protections for the accused. And as a result, I think many prosecutors went into a case with blinders on—like everyone was guilty. The more convictions you won, the

I'm feeling uninspired. Here are some of the posts I've thought of in the last few months, titled, and then not written: Josh Karton in Houston The Commerce Clause The Problem of the Working Poor Lanyard Nation Of Course It's Not an Individual Right! Here's the deal: pick a title and suggest three or four words or phrases (PG or G rated, please) for me to use

(I write blog posts offline in Ecto. When I have a new idea for a post, I create a new post and title it, then set it aside until I feel like writing it. This one's been brewing for a while, so I wanted to get a couple of thoughts down in bits and bytes even though they're far from complete or even well-developed.) Criminal defense, which