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Recent Blog Posts
Aggressive Criminal Lawyer? No, Thanks.
Here are the Google results for:
compassionate criminal lawyer: about 124,000
truthful -truth criminal lawyer: about 148,000
tough criminal lawyer: about 315,000
creative criminal lawyer: about 319,000
aggressive criminal lawyer: about 2,290,000
Granted, these are not all lawyer websites, but there's a Michigan lawyer with the domain name AggressiveCriminalAttorney.net, and he's not alone in advertising his aggression. Search for "Houston criminal lawyer," and two of the highest-paying pay-per-click campaigns include "aggressive" in their descriptions. Arguably, lawyers who market themselves as "aggressive" are simply giving the potential clients what they want. Google's keyword tool shows searches for "aggressive attorney" (average 880 searches per month) and "aggressive lawyer" (average 720) but not for "compassionate lawyer" or "compassionate attorney", nor for "creative lawyer" or "creative attorney."
Here Comes the Judge
Ex-Judge Hanger, who went from being a "fuck-the-accused" judge in December to calling herself a criminal-defense lawyer in January, is, along with her partner (also a former judge, but one with a repuation for fairness) "currently developing a new Web site with Findlaw."
The placeholder page says, "work with a lawyer who will aggressively protect your rights and fight to secure a positive resolution for you" (this must refer to Ms. Hanger's partner). Once the website is up, I'll be counting other half-truths, as well as uses of the word "aggressive."
A prosecutor is an advocate; a former prosecutor who spent his prosecutorial career screwing the accused has that fact to fall back on in justification. A judge is not an advocate; a former judge who spent her judicial career as another prosecutor in a black robe needs a change of heart before she is ready to defend the accused.
(In related news, Ms. Hanger's partner has reportedly refused to join HCCLA because I haven't played nice with Ms. Hanger.)
I'll Take the “Over”
(Via Ralph William Shields - email him if you'd like to get his TBI news updates): DoD doctors say that the number of U.S. troops who have suffered wartime brain injuries may be as high as 360,000. This is a substantial jump from the Rand Corporation's 320,000 guesstimate from last year. We'll likely never have an accurate number.
The DoD doctors now estimate that 45,000 to 90,000 troops have suffered "more severe and lasting symptoms" from TBI; this is substantially fewer than the up-to-150,000-suffering estimate given by "neurologists affiliated with the U.S. Military" in 2007.
Why Challenges for Cause Aren't Enough
In response to the blawgospheric discussion of peremptory challenges, Minnesota renaissance man Joel "Jdog" Rosenberg wrote:
As an outsider, I'm finding this discussion more than moderately interesting. I think it's (what passes for) conventional wisdom outside your trade that challenges for cause aren't particularly difficult to get judges to do that okay-thingee on.
In a criminal case in Texas (YMMV in the territories), either side may challenge a juror for cause for any of the following reasons (lifted wholesale from Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 35.16):
That the juror is not a qualified voter in the state and county under the Constitution and laws of the state; provided, however, the failure to register to vote shall not be a disqualification;
On Reasonable Doubt
Welcome, Reasonable Doubt watchers! Please leave a comment.
I'm on with Todd Dupont and Neal Davis.
Watch the show live at hmstv.org.
Peremptories — Love ‘Em or Leave ‘Em?
Prompted by this WSJ article noting that some critics of peremptory challenges in jury selection would like to see peremptories limited to three per side, Walter Olson of Overlawyered (@WalterOlson) and Scott Greenfield of Simple Justice (@ScottGreenfield) have been engaged this morning in a twitter conversation about peremptory challenges (and, not incidentally, clever lawyers). They've been joined by Dennis Elias of JuryVox (@JuryVox) and PopeHat (@PopeHat).
Here's a little (because I expect each of these people, as well as Anne Reed of Deliberations (@AnneReed) to blog on the topic today) of what the players have tweeted:
Applied Ethics
Here's an exchange on the comments to Murray's blog, discussing keeping defendants from learning witnesses' social security numbers (in the post (about the production of copies of offense reports to the defense) to which the comments belong, Murray does his best to think like a criminal-defense lawyer, bless his little heart, but fails miserably); the topic is what should be done to make sure that containing witnesses' private information in copies of offense reports doesn't find its way into the hands of bad people who will use it to do bad things to witnesses:*
1357 (anonymous, purportedly a criminal-defense lawyer) tells how he does it now:
I never give that information and I have been fired for refusing to do so. I never put that information in a file, either. In order to get around it, I simply write names and dates of birth in my file. Then I go to some online database and get the remainder of the info, which I then store on my computer. It never goes in a file.
Reprise: Prosecutors and Judges: How is this Possibly Okay?
I recently discovered a Motion to Hold Without Bond and an order thereon in the prosecutor's file in a case I was handling. Discovered, despite the certificate of service claiming that the motion had been hand delivered to me 13 days before. (The parties involved will remain nameless, but only because I like them personally.)
The order signed by the judge said that "after hearing and considering the evidence presented", bail had been denied. But there had been no hearing and no evidence presented, and the motion contained untrue allegations that would not have held up to even the lightest scrutiny and would not't have justified denial of bail even if they had. (Short version: the motion alleged that the defendant was under indictment in Cause No. N when he committed the offense in Cause No. N, a legal impossibility.) So we know that the judge signed an order without reading it or the attached motion.
According to the Texas Constitution, an accused can't be denied bail without a hearing. A "hearing" in this context means an actual hearing, with notice, actual witnesses, evidence presented under the rules, and confrontation. (Having read that, you now know something about the denial of bail in Texas that 90% of prosecutors, defense lawyers, and judges do not know. Congratulations.)
R.W. Lynch Raises Its Ugly Head Again
Last month I got a call from Terry Fifer (or it maybe Terri Fifer or Terry Phifer or Terri Phifer) at R.W. Lynch claiming that she was calling about "a new case - an injury that I was involved in."
Since then she has become more truthful - "I want to know if you handle personal injury cases", "I will call back" (no doubt), and "regarding personal injury network" - but, true to Kevin McHenry's "too dumb to know when someone is not interested" form, she keeps calling.
I called her back this time, suggested she google her name, pointed out that things would get worse for her and R.W. Lynch if she kept calling, and called her a liar. I wasn't very nice. But I haven't gotten it out of my system yet.
Let's work through this rationally, Ms. Fifer (Phifer?):
You're looking for lawyers who need more business.
You're trying to sell them some R.W. Lynch service that will bring them more business.
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