The claim was made that rich people fare no better and that no evidence was provided to back the assertion that the poor are at a disadvantage.
I provided a cite that said the PDs get 3% of the judicial budget to defend their clients and that the majority of clients in the legal system depend on Public Defenders.
So, 97% of the money is available to the prosecution side of the ledger including expert witnesses, laboratories and all that…3% is left to the defendants.
Seems to me the poor (which in the legal system and cost of attorneys is most people who find themselves there) are at a distinct disadvantage.
All that may or may not be true. Not gonna argue about it. It does, however, miss my point. Forgive me, perhaps I was unclear. Here’s what I’m saying.
The OP was about how some people are anti-lawyer only because they misunderstand how the law works, or what the role of lawyers is in society. The Second Stone responded, in post #10, with a complaint about the Law itself. This is irrelevant to the OP. Even if the Law were incredibly unjust, people would still be stupid if they hated lawyers for the sole reason that those people didn’t understand how the Law works. And even if you believe the Law is unjust, it is still unfair to disdain lawyers generally, because not all lawyers participated in the creation of the Law.
Clearly, the thread has veered into a discussion of the Law itself, which is fine. I was just saying that post #10 is pretty early to be throwing in a complaint tangential to the OP.
In the email & spam example I gave in a previous post, some inherent flaws in the email system are allowing spammers to flourish using the rules of the system.
People are upset both at the system that is built in such a way as to allow assholes to spam, and are also upset at the assholes who exploit the rules in order to spam millions of people.
The same can be said in the case of the legal system. The legal system has some inherent flaws that are allowing some unsavory lawyers to flourish using the rules of the system.
People are upset both at the system that is built in such a way as to allow assholes to exploit the laws to their advantage, and are also upset at the assholes who exploit the rules in order to get an unfair ruling.
ETA: Of course, just as not all people who send email are spammers, not all lawyers are scum who exploit the system.
How can it not veer into a discussion about the law itself?
The OP was railing against people who dislike lawyers and made its case for it.
But who makes the laws? Who sets the system it operates under?
Lawyers!
Polerius notes asshole lawyers but in this case I think you can lump most of them together. I’d say only some very few really work to change the system for the better. Most are quite content to let the status quo remain.
How can I say that? Because if a majority of lawyers felt a change was needed then change we’d get (remember who most are who write our laws…remember what agency representing lawyers advocates for this or that change in the system…the American Bar Association).
There are systemic flaws in the system. Lawyers, in general, are content to let it remain. Why? Because it is in THEIR best interests to leave it as it is!
Now, some may say this is true of any industry. They naturally advocate for things that suit them. I get that and am, in some sense, ok with that.
However, generally we have checks and balances in any system. Unfortunately in the legal system there really is no check. By and large they write the rules for themselves.
I cited up thread the likes of Jack Thompson. Yes he got disbarred but look what he had to do to get there. Consider the rate of disbarment as a national average, it is a relatively (note “relatively”) rare thing. Note the cite for Burris forcing a DEATH PENALTY case through that was so bogus his own prosecutor resigned her job in protest (not to mention all the other hue-and-cry over it).
I ask you where is the justice in this?
Add in the horror show that are plea bargains. Add in harassment law suits that are rampant in the US.
Lawyers are absolutely necessary in a society. Ours however clearly do not police themselves with any vigor. We have seen the financial industry that was left to “police itself” implode. People, by their very nature, tend to work in their best interests and not society’s best interests.
So why despise lawyers? Because they hold a special place in our society. They are entrusted with our most basic of rights. I do not have to invest with AIG but I may very well face our justice system even doing nothing. The first is my choice. The second may be a choice thrust upon me.
We hold justice very dear in our culture. Yet the LAST thing you see in our justice system is justice (well, occasionally it happens but more by accident than design).
A guy with caught with an ounce of pot may end up in state ass-pound prison. Bernie Madoff will likely end up in Club Fed (yeah…still a prison but hardly Attica). Which of those two caused more damage?
It IS the lawyers who need to address this and it IS the lawyers who are content to rape the country. They sleep at night comfortable in the knowledge that, “Hey, it’s just the system and I just work there!”
That is NOT an acceptable out and this is why I despise lawyers as a profession in general. They are not the solution, they are the problem. Unfortunately it is all arranged so we need them but that is more like an addict “needs” heroin. Can’t live without it once hooked but destructive to keep with it.
This was posted in the torture thread currently running but thought it was appropriate here too. Nice to see the law is actually so malleable. (sarcasm alert)
I post this in reply to the OP of why lawyers are worthy of disdain. When any American can do shit like this, pervert the law and still call it law…well, decide for yourself if the profession is worthy of respect.
Lawyers can’t make money unless they’re willing to be on the morally wrong side about 50% of the time. No matter how much you try to wiggle around that fact, you keep coming back to square one. Lawyers can’t make money turning down fucked-up lawsuits. Lawyers can’t make money walking away from a divorce proceeding (doesn’t matter which side they’re on, they’ll pour their heart and soul into it). Lawyers can’t make money by turning down an offer to represent rich people who made unsafe products. Lawyers can’t make money by resigning from a company that scammed a hundred million people when the investigators start knocking.
Anyone who can argue either side of every non-trivial issue, in real life, when there are real consequences involved, and people’s fate is determined by the outcome, is necessarily evil. Whether we “need” you or not to make our society function is irrelevant. I still strongly dislike you. Most people make bad lawyers, because most people are uncomfortable doing what they know is wrong.
Those bastards, doing their professional duty. It’s unconscionable!
No, wait, that’s fucking stupid. As is your preposterous underlying assumption that in every legal case, be it civil or criminal, there is one Ultimate Good side and one of Ultimate Evil, that it’s obvious to everyone beforehand which is which, and that all that remains is to pick sides.
The level of casual misinterpretation of what an adversarial legal system actually entails is just mindboggling.
Actually, this is far less of a problem than you might think.
First, most jurisdictions have a special court, usually called “small claims court,” with relaxed rules of evidence, set up so that individuals can go in without a lawyer. Where I work, the limit for small claims court happens to be $5000.
Second, in many of the situations where an individual is owed $5000, there is an administrative agency he or she can go to, again without a lawyer. For example, if the boss owed you $5000 in wages, you can usually complain to the local Department of Labor. If there is a $5000 problem with the new car you bought, you can often complain to the local consumer affairs agency.
Finally, most of the statutes designed to protect the little guy have attorney fee shifting provisions. For example, if you are owed $5000 in unpaid overtime, it’s relatively easy to find an attorney because the overtime law says that a prevailing claimant is entitled to an attorney fee award.
I won’t go so far as to say you have no idea what you are talking about, but the reality is that legistlature (and the legal profession) are well aware of this problem and have tried to solve it. Certainly it’s not a perfect solution, but still, they’ve done enough so that they should not be despised over this.
Of course, I have little doubt that there are people out there who lament all of the overtime and lemon law claims out there which are clogging up the legal system and despise the lawyers who bring these claims.
because PDs could have other sources of funding besides the counties’ law enforcement budgets. I know that in many states the PD is funded through the interest on IOLTA accounts (i.e., accounts in which lawyers deposit their clients’ money held in trust during a representation).
I will never forget the time Judge Mathis looked right in the camera and said something like,“Folks… please listen to me… if anyone asks to borrow money and will pay you back when they get their tax return…they’re not going to pay you back!”
I agree with the OP’s sentiment, personally I find everyone hates lawyers until they actually need one!
I haven’t been in the legal field for very long, but I’ve been in it long enough to have a client (who really needed legal help) say to me, “I hate lawyers in general, but you’re okay.” I took it as a compliment.
Are you suggesting other sources of money for a person’s defense come remotely near to balancing the ledger between the resources the prosecution has versus the resources the defense has (if using a PD)?
Again, that’s more of a problem with the system than with lawyers. It’s unreasonable to despise people for not giving away enough of their services for free.
Besides, that problem could be easily fixed by massive public funding of lawyers in the same way that we have medicare. Of course, if we did that, the anti-lawyer crowd would complain that lots of money is being wasted on lawyers who are clogging up the court system.
Justice costs money. As a result, it is limited just like everything else. That’s not a legitimate basis to despise lawyers.
You do know that the results of those laboratories, etc are available to both sides and sometimes forensic science tests run by the prosecution ends up clearing the defendant, right?
Are you suggesting there is balance between prosecution resources and PD resources?
Granted evidence can be reviewed by all sides and some may help the defense.
I maintain there is a serious imbalance of resources overall. At least I have run across nothing yet which tries to argue there is anything near parity. If you do find something though please share it.
Okay, clearly you have your mind made up on the greater doctrinal issues. So let me just point out one problem with your general disdain for all lawyers that perhaps you should take into account.
Even if your hatred for lawyers were rational (which I dispute), it would still be overbroad. Every complaint you’ve made about “lawyers” has actually been about problems with litigation. A minority of practicing lawyers are litigators. Many more lawyers work in transactional law and administrative law. Most lawyers never see courtrooms or even have opponents , and instead work with employment, social services, bankruptcy, corporations, immigration, estates, government agencies, small businesses, leases, family planning, accounting, patents, finance, wills, and any number of other matters that never see a courtroom.
You are condemning 70% of the field for the perceived wrongs of 30%.*
*I just made these percentages up. I don’t know the real numbers for sure.
I disagree that lawyers have to be on the morally wrong side about 50% of the time, because that would imply that in 100% of the cases it’s clear who’s in the right and who’s in the wrong.
However, even if only 10% of the cases a lawyers gets involved in have one side which is clearly in the wrong, and if the lawyer’s firm picks cases from both sides equally, then 5% of the cases that lawyer will be involved in will be for defending someone (or some company) which is clearly in the wrong.
5% may not sound like much, but over the lifetime of a lawyer, that comes to a lot of cases in which he/she is defending the “bad guy”.
I have found that the way lawyers sleep at night (at least the ones who care about this sort of thing and aren’t just laughing all the way to the bank) is that they convince themselves that they are working for an adversarial system, and somebody has to defend the “bad guy” in that system for the system to work.
So, even though defending Bob the pedophile (and trying to get him exhonorated and back out on the streets) is icky, morally, they think that they are doing an overall good by playing their part in the adversarial legal system which is a good system and does an overall decent job meting out justice.
There is some point there, but
[ol]
[li]I don’t totally buy the argument[/li][li]I think a lot of people just can’t fathom defending people or companies that have clearly done something odious, so that’s where the disconnect between lawyers and the public comes in[/li][li]In the end, once you convince yourself that you are doing a greater good by doing your part in the adversarial legal system (or by some other way you have to comfort yourself that it’s morally OK to legally defend the morally indefensible), and you become comfortable defending people whom you think are guilty, then you can just take on any number of people whom you think are guilty (even 100% of your clients) and you won’t have any issue whatsoever with it. [/li][/ol]
A small anecdote: I was talking to an acquaintance of mine who is a retired lawyer and we were discussing the benefits to society of the 5th Amendment against self-incrimination.
[ul]
[li]Her: “Oh it is great, I used it a lot to get many of my clients to be acquitted. It’s a very useful tool for the defending attorney”.[/li][li]Me: “Yeah, it’s great when it’s used to help acquit an innocent person, but not so great when it’s used to help acquit a guilty person. So, if the majority of people who are helped by it are innocent, then it’s worth it”[/li][li]Her: “In my opinion, 95% of the people I defended were guilty”[/li][/ul]
So, this lady was, 95% of the time, defending people she believed were guilty, and she was fine with that, and she was fine with using legal tools to get these presumed-by-her-to-be-guilty people back on the streets.
That’s the sort of attitude that makes the public upset at lawyers as a group (cause I would assume many of them would share an attitude similar to the above)
