713-224-1747
Recent Blog Posts
Friedman, Freedom, and Temporary Safety
I worry about [another 9/11] even more, not because I don't care about civil liberties, but because what I cherish most about America is our open society, and I believe that if there is one more 9/11 - or worse, an attack involving nuclear material - it could lead to the end of the open society as we know it. If there were another 9/11, I fear that 99 percent of Americans would tell their members of Congress: "Do whatever you need to do to, privacy be damned, just make sure this does not happen again." That is what I fear most.
Privacy is freedom. I'm not sure whether this is self-evident, so I may flesh it out later. Until then: What is it that Big Brother is doing?
Friedman's logic is this: we have to give up some freedom now so that we remain safe.
Ben Franklin had something to say about that.
Friedman knows that his position is contrary to the principles on which this nation were founded. So he protests that he "reluctantly, very reluctantly" gives up essential freedom, and rationalizes the surrender: We must remain safe not for safety's own sake, but because otherwise we hand the state an excuse to take away more of our freedom. Friedman is willing to give up freedom to fight the last war-to prevent the next 9/11-not because he's a simpering statist but because he cares so deeply about our freedom.
Prosecutor Gives Good Advice; is Fired.
From MySanAntonio.com:
A Bexar County assistant district attorney has been fired following an incident in which she was mentioned in a friend's driving while intoxicated arrest report for advising him not to submit to a breath test.
She's also accused of badging the arresting officer. And "P then told (him) to take a personal recognizance bond that she had in the wallet that contained her identification and badge." (Wait, what? Prosecutors get to carry get-out-of-jail-free cards? To share with their friends?)
But it's apparently the good legal advice she gave that got her canned:
As for advising her friend, it was a mistake that she has paid for with her job, she said.
This prosecutor must be punished. Because imagine what would happen if people learned that even prosecutors advised their friends not to blow.
What Was Roger Thinking? Five Hypotheses
Chris Green, chosen to be a juror in a non-death capital murder case in the 338th District Court of Harris County, Texas, googled "capital murder" before opening statements began, and didn't like what he found. He decided that there was a "very real danger of retribution" if the jury convicted Amezquita of capital murder and he got the automatic life sentence that is mandatory when the State is not seeking death.
Never mind that the danger of retribution is not "very real," but rather entirely imaginary. I don't know when there was last retribution against someone for his jury verdict in Harris County. It may have happened somewhere sometime, but that doesn't make the danger real. (The prosecutor appears to have had no concerns, and the defendant is accused of murdering his business partner, so there's no organized-crime angle.)
I see Green as a typical twenty-first century American, hooked by television on drama and fear, and looking for his fix. After scaring himself, Green reached out to Roger Bridgwater, a former prosecutor, former judge, and former (?) defense lawyer, for advice. Then he wrote a letter to Judge Maria Jackson asking that the jurors' identities be concealed, and got the other eleven jurors and the alternate to sign it.
Andrew DeLuca's Delusion
Here's baby lawyer Andrew DeLuca's pitch:
It is these people that have grown tired of your esoteric legal posts, that we as attorneys represent. How do you represent someone effectively when you can not connect with them? The type of perspective that is only learned by life experience or lifetimes of experience and allows us to connect with our clients fears, their hopes and their outlook on life that has been shaped by the influences and opportunities, or lack thereof, that they had growing up in much different place than you or Leo. It is my humble opinion, in the practice of criminal law or law for that matter, that it is essential to understand your client. It is only through this understanding that we will be able to effectively connect with our audience in order to advocate on our clients behalf.
It is essential to understand your client; without understanding your client you cannot tell your client's story. There is nothing in this that is new or controversial. Lawyers have been seeking to understand their clients better to better tell their stories for as long as there have been lawyers. You don't start approaching controversial until you tell lawyers that they should seek to empathize with everyone.
SB187: Panic in Austin
(tl;dr version: Texas prosecutors think that only they know justice; they want to take power out of the hands of the community; they intend to pass an unconstitutional law and apply it unconstitutionally ex post facto to do so; and they don't care what lies must be told to get it done.)
Texas's capital-murder sentencing scheme provides for a choice between death and life without parole for all defendants. In the 2005 case of Roper v. Simmons the U.S. Supreme Court took the death penalty off the table for murderers who committed their crimes before age eighteen, leaving Texas with life without parole as the only punishment for someone convicted of capital murder in adult court between age ten and age seventeen.
In the 2012 case of Miller v. Alabama the U.S. Supreme Court also invalidate life without parole, leaving Texas with no permissible punishment for a seventeen-year-old (or younger) convicted of capital murder. So people who committed capital murders when they were under eighteen in Texas could only be prosecuted for murder.
Lerner and Immunity: Dershowitz is Wrong
Alan Dershowitz says that Lois Lerner can be held in contempt for taking the Fifth in response to questions asked by Congress after making prefatory comments about the same subject matter:
"You can't simply make statements about a subject and then plead the Fifth in response to questions about the very same subject," the renowned Harvard Law professor said."Once you open the door to an area of inquiry, you have waived your Fifth Amendment right... you've waived your self-incrimination right on that subject matter."
Scott Greenfield says he reluctantly agrees with Dershowitz.
Much as I am of the view that the sweep of the Fifth should be broad in order to fulfill its purpose, I am also of the view that once a witness offers denials to particulars, she opens herself to being questioned on what particulars she's denying. Which rules and regs is she referring to? What about this statement? What about that? Isn't it true that you said.... Well, that's how examination happens sometimes.
Math is Hard: Fear is Not Danger
A recent Gallup poll names the Houston, Sugar Land, and Baytown region among the least safe U.S. metro areas, according to resident confidence in the safety of where they live.Only 63 percent of those polled in the Houston area responded that they felt safe walking alone at night in the area they reside.* * * * *Compare that to the 80 percent in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area who feel totally secure walking after dark. Texans might scoff that with frigid Minnesota temperatures, criminals would be stymied to commit violent acts in five layers of clothing. Houston must have crime-friendly weather, for the most part.
Maybe. Or Minneapolitans might more realistically scoff that Houstonians are more frightened than their crime rate merits.
The headline on the Chronicle article is Poll of residents puts Houston on list of least-safe U.S. cities. "Most-frightened" would have been more accurate: there is no strong correlation between violent-crime rates and residents' fear.
Book Review and Giveaway: Mistrial
When I got a copy of Mark Geragos and Pat Harris's Mistrial: An Inside Look at How the Criminal Justice System Works... and Sometimes Doesn't in the mail, I was primed to be either outraged or bored.
I've expressed my view of L.A. legal culture and lawyers who rep celebrities qua celebrities before and clients who hire lawyers who rep celebrities, and I was prepared to be bored, when reading Mistrial, by Mark Geragos and Pat Harris, by a self-adulatory story book about the criminal-justice system for the TMZ set. The publisher sent me the book for free; I resolved to read at least fifty pages of it, no matter how atrociously celebrity-worshipping.
Pat Harris's intro-in which the fomer Tennessee PD describes meeting Mark Geragos accidentally while looking for a high-profile lawyer to take his girlfriend Susan McDougal's case for the media coverage, challenged my resolve to read at least fifty pages. A former public defender, of all people, should recognize that some of the best lawyers get the least publicity, and that "for the publicity" is a lousy reason for a lawyer to take a case (on that point, if publicity is the only currency you have, that's the currency you spend). A former public defender, of all people, should not shy away from taking an unpopular case, as Harris later describes doing with the Scott Peterson case.
Texas SB 834: The Star Chamber Bill
One of the few great virtues of American criminal justice is that it is committed in the light of day. Courts are open to the public, and generally-not always; anonymous juries are becoming more common, which ironically means that the terrorists have won-the accused gets to know who is judging him. In any case, he gets some say, through the process of jury selection, in who judges him.
He doesn't get any say in who makes the accusation against him, but in Texas, where there is a constitutional right to be tried on a grand-jury indictment, he can at least know who the grand jurors were.
Article 19.08 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure lists the qualifications for a grand juror:
1. The person must be a citizen of the state, and of the county in which the person is to serve, and be qualified under the Constitution and laws to vote in said county, provided that the person's failure to register to vote shall not be held to disqualify the person in this instance;2. The person must be of sound mind and good moral character;3. The person must be able to read and write;4. The person must not have been convicted of misdemeanor theft or a felony;5. The person must not be under indictment or other legal accusation for misdemeanor theft or a felony;6. The person must not be related within the third degree of consanguinity or second degree of affinity, as determined under Chapter 573, Government Code, to any person selected to serve or serving on the same grand jury;7. The person must not have served as grand juror or jury commissioner in the year before the date on which the term of court for which the person has been selected as grand juror begins;8. The person must not be a complainant in any matter to be heard by the grand jury during the term of court for which the person has been selected as a grand juror.
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
