Actually, he’s not portrayed that way.
He was selected because he always plea bargains each case.
IMDB
Joanne calls him brilliant. Weinberg says “Caffey is considered the best lawyer in the office” (Or something like that). His father was supposedly one of the best trial lawyers in the country.
Caffey was clearly portrayed as lazy and slick, but I always viewed that as his not taking the Navy seriously, not an indictment of his legal skills.
Of course, as always, my memory may be faulty.
Sure there was. Kaffee asks Kendrick: “Did you order Dawson and Downey to give Willy Santiago a Code Red?” Kendrick, under oath, replies: “No, I did not.”
Ross – and Kendrick – should’ve been able to deduce exactly what story Downey would later tell on the stand: Kendrick Ordered Us To Give Santiago A Code Red.
Kaffee also told Ross about the order pre-trial, which was what led to the plea offering of two years, home in six months (It’s nothing Harold. It’s a hockey season!). Seems reasonable that in preparing Kendrick, Kendrick would have pointed out (without admitting to the order) that Downey wasn’t even at the company meeting that day.
That was my original point, though. Why put Downey on the stand at all? Put Dawson on the stand, not Downey, and you don’t have this problem.
And, you made me think of something I hadn’t thought of before. If the question to Kendrick was “Did you order Dawson and Downey to give Willy Santiago a Code Red?” and Kendrick said “No, I did not.”, then how is that perjury? He told the truth. He did NOT tell Dawson and Downey. He told Dawson only.
Doesn’t matter. Kaffee also asked if he knew what a Code Red was (“Yes, I do”), and followed up by asking if he’d ever ordered one: “No, I have not.”
Haven’t seen this in awhile, and, dammit, now I’m going to have to rent it, but ISTR he was reluctant to enter the arena where his father had been a star. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t really good at pleading his clients out and getting them sweet deals. TPTB were fine with that because they just wanted it to go away unnoticed.
No, Ross asked Kendrick if he had ordered Dawson and Downey to give Santiago the Code Red. This was after Kaffee had been asking him multiple questions about Code Reds - he asked Kendrick if he had ever ordered a code red (which he denied), he asked if he had ordered Dawson & Downey to give a Code Red would they have done so (which was objected to and he did not answer), but Kaffee never asked that specific question. Presumably he was saving it until after he had Dawson and Downey testify that Kendrick had ordered it.
But that doesn’t invalidate your conclusion - Kaffee was tipping his hand that he was going to accuse Kendrick of ordering the Code Red. But it’s tough to accuse him of not knowing Downey couldn’t have been present when he said he was. The “switch log” said he was at Post 39 until 1600, which is a 10-15 drive by jeep back to the base. So he could have been in the barracks meeting at 1620, if he had been driven. But the blowout would have been logged in the motor pool maintenance logs or something like that - which there would have been no reason to look at with both his clients telling him Downey and Dawson were both present in their room when Kendrick ordered the Code Red.
Dangit, that’s what I get for assuming about the quote. I feel like Kaffee!
Hey, if anything it makes my conclusion stronger: I thought it was reasonable to figure Ross would deduce that Kaffee was going to claim Kendrick gave an order to Dawson and Downey; we now know Ross had deduced that Kaffee was going to claim Kendrick gave an order to Dawson and Downey.
Again, he didn’t need to deduce it, Kaffee had already told him. It was more or less the whole point of going to trial.
Yes, in fact Ross warned Kaffee “as a friend” that if he accused Kendrick and Jessup of ordering the Code Red without evidence, he’d get cited for professional misconduct. Which gets back to Robot Arm’s question above - how can a soldier ever defend himself on the grounds that he was “following orders”, if his lawyer can’t say in court that he was given such an order? I get that accusing Jessup out of the blue would be a problem, since he didn’t have any evidence at that point (Markinson being dead), but if Dawson & Downey say that Kendrick ordered the Code Red (before the flat tire screw up), you’d certainly expect Kaffee to use that in their defense, and leave it up to the jury to decide whether they believed it or not.
Under IMDb’s “Goofs”, they list this as one of 'em: saying it’s not only preposterous to think a military attorney would be punished for making that claim as an element of the defense, but that what could get him punished would be failing to do so given a good-faith belief that it’s true and useful to the accused.
I realize IMDb ain’t infallible, but it sure seemed worth mentioning.
I think the deal is that he can more or less accuse Kendrick of ordering the Code Red; he actually has at least some evidence of that, even if it’s just the defendants’ testimony. He doesn’t directly ask Kendrick because he knows Kendrick will just say no. The problem is accusing Jessup of ordering the Code Red; he has no evidence of that at all (at least not admissible evidence; Markinson’s dead).
Except Ross told Kaffee if he accused Kendrick or Jessup without evidence, he’d be in trouble. This is after Kaffee told Ross that Dawson & Downey said they were ordered to do the Code Red by Kendrick. So yes, the movie was saying accusing a superior of misconduct solely on the testimony of those receiving the order was somehow improper.
I’ll have to watch it again, but as I recall:
First, after Dawson tells Danny that Kendrick ordered the Code Red, Danny tells Jack (Jack’s playing basketball), and Jack offers the two years. I don’t remember him saying anything about getting in trouble at that point.
Later, after Markinson shows up in Danny’s car, he meets Jack in a bar, tells him about Markinson, and Jessup ordering the Code Red, which is when Jack warns him about accusing an officer of a crime without evidence, and professional misconduct (Markinson’s not gonna hold up in court. He’s a crazy man!).
Sorry I was unclear, I meant “after” as in “some undetermined time later”. My point was that Ross knew that D&D had told Kaffee that Kendrick ordered the Code Red before he warned him about accusing Kendrick without proof - implying that the testimony of the accused, and a third corroborating witness, wasn’t sufficient to even protect their own lawyer from getting in trouble for misconduct.
So reading the script, Ross does indeed say “if you accuse Kendrick or Jessup of a crime without evidence…”
But he never accuses Kendrick of anything. He plays his little “IF you ordered him to give Santiago a Code Red, do you really think he would have disobeyed” game (objection, withdrawn), then plans to let Dawson and Downey give their testimony, then put Markinson on the stand. Which doesn’t go so well…
What? No. Downey did not lie. The movie makes that blatant.
I just watched the linked scene again to make sure. The whole point of that scene is that he doesn’t lie. He’s just asked who gave the order. not where he heard it. And, as Galloway says at 3:00 into the clip given upthread, “As far as Downey is concerned, it was an order from Kendrick. It didn’t matter that he didn’t hear it firsthand; he didn’t distinguish between the two.”
So it was blatantly spelled out in the movie that Downey did not lie. And the fact that Dawson didn’t seem to react to the early questions makes me think he hadn’t even thought about it either. There was no “Oh shit” moment.
I definitely consider it a failure on Kaffee’s part. Part of his job is to anticipate challenges to his witnesses’ testimonies. He should have checked all the logs he could on his clients, to make sure any part of their story couldn’t be challenged.
I believe that’s the point: he’d never actually handled a court trial before.
I can’t find it on youtube, but there’s an earlier scene where it’s more explicit. Specifically, Galloway is prepping Downey for his testimony, and he says he was in his room with Dawson, and heard Kendrick give the order. So even if they didn’t use that testimony in court, he and Dawson told their lawyers that Downey was there when Kendrick gave the order.
Here’s a script of the movie. It’s not 100% accurate, but here are lines from the relevant scenes:
Kaffee asks Dawson and Downey if Kendrick ordered the Code Red:
JO
Alright. Let's sort this out. There
was a platoon meeting on August 6th
at four in the afternoon. And Lt.
Kendrick, he gave strict instructions
that nothing was to happen to
Santiago. Now is that true? I want
you to speak freely.
DAWSON
Ma'am, that's correct. But then he
dismissed the platoon and we all
went to our rooms.
JO
And what happened then?
DAWSON
Lt. Kendrick came to our room, ma'am.
KAFFEE
When?
DAWSON
About five minutes after the meeting
broke, sir. About 16:20.
KAFFEE
(continuing)
And what happened then?
DAWSON
Lt. Kendrick ordered us to give
Santiago a Code Red.
And later, when Jo is prepping Downey for testimony:
A HOLDING ROOM where DAWSON and DOWNEY are being put through
their paces.
JO
And what happened after Kendrick
came into your room?
DOWNEY
(beat)
He ordered me and Corporal Dawson to
give Willy a Code Red.
Clearly, the only interpretation that Kaffee and Galloway could put on those statements was that they were both there when Kendrick gave the order. Dawson, at least, was smart enough to realize that. So yeah, maybe Downey was just doing what he thought Dawson wanted him to do, but there’s no way Dawson didn’t know exactly what was going on, and that he was perfectly happy letting both lawyers believe that Downey was in the room too.
Hell, if Downey had told them ahead of time he never heard the order from Kendrick, but just from Dawson, Galloway’s best move may have been to get separate trials and throw Dawson under the bus to save Downey.