Not technically correct. ralph124c states or strongly implies that defending the allegedly guilty allows monsters to go free. Which would seem to be saying that it is wrong to defend those believed to be guilty.
I said NO SUCH THING.
If you read my posts, I speculate on what a defense lawyer would do IF HE KNOWS his client is guilty.
Please do not misrepresnt this.
It’s actually vanishingly rate that a person who is guilty, knows it, and admits it to you actually goes to trial, much less goes to trial and wins. Now motions, that’s a different story–I’ve filed motions and won them for people who were totally guilty, but the police screwed something up along the way. Often that leads to a dismissal or a better plea bargain offer. But a wholly guilty person going to trial hardly ever happens. There’s either a legal or factual issue to argue about.
Now, if you’re asking how we deal with some of the awful human suffering we see on a daily basis, that’s a bit different. Most of my coworkers cope by using dark humor as a defense mechanism. A coworker of mine is currently defending a true kiddie porn case, and had to watch the videos with the prosecutor (for obvious reasons, we were not allowed a copy in discovery). Both of them talked to me about it, and both of them cracked some pretty terrible jokes. Is that messed up? Probably, but it’s better than going home and drinking until you forget it.
Wow, I can’t believe he’ll be employable as a lawyer for very long. While I completely appreciate and approve of this sentiment, it does not exist in the real world. The legal system is so flawed and is full of such corruption that this kind of sentiment will not be tolerated, or at least not be advanced.
I too, try and “promote and protect the public health” in my job but am constantly stymied not only by people in my institution but by members of the law, members of congress, and of course by lobbyists to the point that I often despair of doing any good at all. The only thing that keeps me going in the face of all this are the little battles I win, and believe me they are little.
If people only knew how corrupt corporations and lawyers are… well, let’s just say I’m dealing with something at work that is going to not serve the public health and will make lots of money for certain corporations and increase health fees for all of us.
I guess I’m just feeling really upset about it now. Don’t ever believe anything you read about Congress doing the people a favor when it comes to public health and the same for most lawyers I come into contact with. My apologies to those lawyers that are out there fighting the good fight.
Utter cynicism can be as blinding as Pollyana-ish good cheer. There are plenty of honest people involved in criminal justice: policing, prosecuting, defending and judging. Look a little deeper. The system is capable of correction and improvement, but not if you just throw your hands up and admit defeat. Do your very best and insist others do the same - lawyers have an ethical duty to try to improve the administration of justice. Never, never, never give up.
This absolutely.
Most institutions have come into their present form because on some level they work. In most cases the best way to improve them is to acknowledge the ideal and strive towards it. Sure there’s plenty wrong and a bunch of people who don’t care or are actively trying to do bad things. You just gotta go fight 'em.
Guys, again, for this thread, I’m not interested in why you do it, but how you deal with it.
Fair enough, but on a certain level why you do it does describe how you do it. If you have a strong enough belief in something, the rest follows without much further explaination.
I prosecute rather than defend, but the same problem of attachment arises.
I remember a case where a girl with William’s Syndrome who was accordingly intellectually impaired had been physically and sexually abused by her father from a young age (she was 21 at the time of the events I dealt with). He essentially treated her as a sexual toy. She didn’t have the capacity to understand what was wrong about this, but she clearly disliked it all. He hated her, and resented the problems she caused in his life.
Some local religious folk saw that the girl was not flourishing (but did not know why) and offered to take her off his hands. He happily agreed. He turned up to deliver her one night. She was covered in bruises and utterly terrified (her normal state of being). She was filthy and terrified of being bathed.
With the new family, she blossomed. She was clean, happy, and loving in a child-like way. And she started to make disclosures about what her father had been doing to her.
One day she was shopping with her new family. Her new mother had to go to the toilet and told the girl to wait, but when she came out, the girl had disappeared. Seems she had tried to walk home, and as she did so, her father came across her coincidentally (this was a smallish town). He grabbed her, bundled her into his van, murdered her, tied her up and dumped her corpse in a river.
Her medical specialist gave evidence of what Williams’ syndrome was, the effects it had and how her particular presentation manifested.
That was a bad day. He was particularly articulate about how she was blooming with her new family, the things she loved doing, her charming ways. I was glad of the adjournment at the end of the day, and close to tears.
I went home. Gave my little 7 yo girl an extra cuddle and kiss on the head. Had a few moments of quiet reflection. Then back into it the next day.
Yes it was emotionally draining, and it has stayed in my memory like lots of such horrors, but such is life.
I dealt with it by getting out of that sort of law – no more criminal defence and no more child protection respondent (defence) work for me. Society needs strong defence lawyers, but my personal career path takes a different direction.
For me, the Rubicon was the more serious cases. Most criminal matters had little effect on me, but a few very serious ones stopped me in my tracks, for it was obvious in those cases that if my clients won, further people would either die or be permanently maimed. Emotionally, I am not willing to work toward that result.
But as Drain Bead and others have said, the “why” can also be the “how”. They’re not missing your question; I think you’re missing their answers.
Dark humor, alcohol, the occassional xanax and over exercise. That is typically how I deal with it. But the stress, IMHO, doesn’t come from any particular situation, but rather the slow build of seeing so much misery on all sides.
Actually, the most frustrating clients and situations really have nothing to do with what any particular client is accused of… One of my favorite and easiest clients to deal with of all time was an admitted child molester.
I represent mostly juveniles, and there is a lot of sadness that I see on a regular basis. That is hard and stressful, and you have to remind yourself constantly that you are dealing with a very small percentage of society. I also coach high school-aged soccer, to remind myself that the large majority of young people don’t have a horrific life, or parents, and are making good decisions.
Like Oak, I do remember cross-examining a 7yo molestation victim. It was during a preliminary hearing, so there was no jury, and it was in a closed court room. We laughed and talked about video games and school… we played with the little “anotomically correct,” dolls… I asked lots of leading questions to see if he would deviate from his story, or exaggerate in an way making his story implausible. He smiled and chattered happily the entire time. He was an excellent witness. My client ended up pleading guilty.
Immediately after the hearing, I went into a side room and cried for a good five minutes. I think mostly because I was so keyed up about the whole thing. But I pulled myself together, and I was was leaving, the little kid waved goodbye to me. In retrospect, it was one of my better learning experiences as an attorney.
The hardest cases to represent zealously, I find, is the guy who has violated his probation 100 times. They are typically the most frustrating clients to deal with. The probation violation docket is the one most often likely to drive me to drink. 
On the flip side of that coin - does it ever happen that you’re prosecuting someone but you aren’t personally convinced they did it? But nevertheless you do your best to ensure they are punished for it?
That all makes a lot more sense to me than just saying that the why equals the how. especially the bit about questioning the little boy.
My only experience of courts is fictional TV, so that’s worth nothing, but there was one episode I watched recently where the defender had to ask questions that were really fucking horrible, but the way he did it was very sensitive and careful; that made me suspect that one of the ways lawyers deal with it is that the way they pose these questions isn’t actually as hostile as it would seem when written down in a line or two in a newspaper article.
I hope other lawyers are as careful as you.
Lawyers generally refrain from overtly hostile questioning of fact (as opposed to expert) witnesses in jury trials because it evokes sympathy for the witness from the jury.
QTF! You have to walk a really fine line in how you are questioning a non-expert witness. IME, juries are extremely perceptive and smart. If you are overly hostile or a douche, they tend to think that you are doing that just to put on a show, because you have nothing else.
There are ways to cross-examine cops to attempt to make them look like liars, or rather, just overworked civil servants who maybe just made a mistake. Which do you think plays better to a jury?
Yes, but it would also surely help the lawyer feel better about what they need to do.
Why would it? Sometimes hostile questioning is necessary, but if it’s not necesaary, then why would I do it?
The witness is vulnerable - he or she is in the box until you let them out, and has to answer the questions you put to them
If I treat someone with disrespect and hostility just because I’m in a position of authority over them and I feel like abusing that authority - well, there’s a name for that: bullying. Why would being a bully make me feel better about what I’m doing?
Fuck that. Society needs people who are willing to empty our trash cans. Or in your case accept to sometimes take upon themselves to fill a highly necessary role.
Nope. There is an ethical difference between what prosecutors do and what defence lawyers do. If, as a prosecutor, you are satisfied of innocence, or even short of that, satisfied that the evidence is insufficient to convict, you pull the pin and stop the prosecution.