713-224-1747
Recent Blog Posts
First Blog from TLC
It turns out that Gerry Spence was not the first blogger to blog from the Trial Lawyers College on his ranch in Dubois, Wyoming. Idaho criminal-defense lawyer Chuck Peterson has that distinction (with another LexBlog blog); he wrote on July 15th that TLC Will Change Your Life. Please welcome Chuck to the practical blawgosphere.Now c'mon now Remy!
The Client's Decisions, the Lawyer's, and Chastisement to Insolent Pups
In a criminal case in Texas, the accused has five decisions to make:
Whether to plead guilty or not guilty;
Whether to try the case to judge or jury;
Whether to ask (in the event of conviction) for probation;
Whether to testify or not; and
Whether to have judge or jury (in the event of conviction) assess punishment.
The criminal-defense lawyer's job with regard to these five decisions is to advise the accused so that he understands the decisions and the consequences of either choice, ensuring something like informed consent. The lawyer's job is definitively not to make these decisions for the client, though often the choice is so clear that the lawyer's description of the options leaves the client with only one reasonable option. (Try your case to a judge in Harris County? Almost always a no-no.)
Every other decision - how to negotiate, whether to reveal NLSes, what witnesses to call, how to try the case (once the client has decided to try it) is the lawyer's to make. And making those decisions, more than anything else, is how we earn our pay. It's a matter of knowing where (and when) to tap.
The Scavenging Thread
I like to read about fields other than law (improvisational theatre, comedy, chaos studies, interrogation, acting, survival, hypnosis, the Tao, NLP, aikido, etc.) that I think might be relevant to the practice of criminal trial law. I'm always looking for more suggestions - for example, when Western Justice wrote about Statement Analysis, I ordered the book (which I'm reading now).Please take a few moments to leave a comment and share your own suggestions. If you could give me a few words on how you relate the material to what we do, it'd be most helpful.Thanks.
I Thought I was an Infomaniac...
... but it turns out that I'm just normally infovorous. USC professor Irving Biederman writes:
Gaze at something that leads to a novel interpretation... and that will spur higher levels of associative activity in opioid-dense areas. We are thus thrilled when new insights tap into what we have previously learned. We seek ways to feed our opioid desires; we are willing to endure the line at the movie theater in anticipation of the pleasure within. We pay more for a room with a view or a cup of coffee at a Parisian sidewalk cafe.
That explains the pleasure I find in scavenging other areas of knowledge for ideas that might be applied to criminal defense trial lawyering. (Don't tell anyone, or they'll start passing laws against it.)
“A Marvelous and Precarious Machine”
A civilian blogger, Mark Pilgrim, blogs about his experience with a criminal jury trial:
Everything is slanted towards the defense. Big stuff, little stuff, process stuff, everything. We learned later (during sentencing) that the defendant in our case had several prior convictions, but the DA wasn't allowed to bring them up during the trial. Witnesses were always being cut off in mid-sentence, but the defendant was given a wide berth to tell his version of events. We didn't even know exactly what the charge meant until the defense lawyer made his closing argument. That, in particular, was incredibly frustrating. I made all sorts of notes like "is this important? don't know, check later." The judge said it was to force us to listen to everyone and everything as fairly as possible. It was frustrating on purpose, but it worked.And I remember thinking at the time, "This thing. Right here, this thing. This is what we say America is about." Everyone is innocent until proven guilty, and everybody gets their day in court. We suspected that Hans Reiser killed his wife. What did we give him? A trial. We suspected that Timothy McVeigh blew up a building and killed 168 people. What did we give him? A trial. (BTW, this is why people get so upset over our mishandling of terror suspects. What could possibly be more un-American than saying that some people don't deserve a fair trial?)
Ask the Legal Marketing Guru
Dear Legal Marketing Guru,I have left government service, and am starting my private criminal law practice as a hired-gun prosecutrix. I have already started creating my brand ("Prosecutor for Hire") and negging the competition. I have been hired to try a capital case in Wharton County as a special prosecutor. What should I do next?-Paladina, Houston, Texas
Dear Paladina,
You're probably going to catch some flak (from those who don't appreciate ballsy marketing) for running down the competition. You might want to temper that just a little bit. You can defuse the issue by apologizing for anyone who erroneously thought, when you wrote about "the standard, typical everyday problem that truly exists with prosecutors", that you were talking about standard, typical everyday prosecutors.
Marketing the Hired-Gun Prosecutor
I wrote back in May about Kelly Siegler's future as a Hired-Gun Prosecutor (motto: "I get paid to make people afraid!"). "How to get the business?" I asked, "Word of mouth and the internet, of course."
Then in June she posted to the Women in Crime Ink blog with the tagline "Prosecutor for Hire." The businesspeople among us recognized this as a first step toward creating a brand.
Now it's July, and Kelly has another post up at Women in Crime Ink. This one, "Win at All Costs? Not Really" is a none-too subtle slam of Texas prosecutors:
The real problem is that far too many prosecutors are worried about taking on a difficult case, a case that is not a slam-dunk or a whale ("as easy as harpooning a whale in a barrel," as we say in Harris County, Texas). Too many prosecutors demand that the cases presented to them for the filing of charges come to them with all the questions answered and wrapped in a pretty, little bow. What prosecutors seem to forget is that the question they need to be asking is whether a jury of twelve, ordinary, normal, non-lawyer citizens would convict on the evidence presented to them or evidence easily developed by the prosecutor after the filing of charges.
Must-Watch TV
I'm going to be on Reasonable Doubt tonight at 8:00, along with Todd Dupont and Steven Halpert. Watch. Better yet, call in.
Love in the Air?
The Gruff Marshmallow bringing flowers to his number-three prosecutor for, in her first felony jury trial, convincing a jury to give the defendant a life sentence for DWI?
For something that's so wrong on so many levels, I think it's kinda cute.
[Edit: I'm reliably informed that there were other, less wrong, reasons for the gift of flowers. Still cute, though.]
Would a Group of Lawyers Offering this Service be a “Cover Band”?
I wrote last December about cover, and a problem that arose because the lawyer whom I had asked to cover for me hadn't been diligent. Today I learned (H/T A Public Defender) that in L.A. there's a lawyer, Steve Levy, who offers cover to other lawyers for pay.
I've read "The Lincoln Lawyer", so I understand how in L.A. County, with its proliferation of criminal courthouses, lawyers might need cover more often than in a place like Houston, with one (at least until the next Biblical scourge is visited on 1201 Franklin Street). But every criminal-defense lawyer in Los Angeles would seem to be pretty much in the same boat as all of the others.
Contact Us if You're
Ready for a Better Future
Schedule a consultation today by filling out the form below or calling our office at 713-224-1747. We look forward to representing you.
The use of the Internet or this form for communication with the firm or any individual member of the firm does not establish an attorney-client relationship. Confidential or time-sensitive information should not be sent through this form.
I have read and understand the Disclaimer and Privacy Policy.
From our office in Houston, we represent clients throughout Harris County and across the state of Texas. We assist with criminal cases in Conroe, The Woodlands, Kingwood, Bellaire, Friendswood, Highland Village, West University Place, Cypress, Willis, Austin, Dallas, For Worth, Arlington, San Antonio, Corpus Christi, Beaumont, Tyler, Plano, Spring, New Caney, Porter, Humble, Atascocita, Aldine, Cloverleaf, Pasadena, South Houston, Pearland, Fresno, Missouri City, Sugar Land, Pecan Grove, Richmond, and Katy.
Results listed are not a guarantee or indication of future case results.
917 Franklin Street, Fourth Floor, Houston, TX 77002
713-224-1747
