of one charge, guilty of the other. So I'm claiming a victory. A very sweet victory considering that the defendant blatantly lied on the stand, told a bullshit story (which amounted to "the cop is lying"), constantly wrote me notes during trial says "That a lie" "He's a liar" ect. large enough that I'm pretty sure the jury could see, visible reacted to the police officers testimony constantly and was just a general pain the ass. He got sentenced to the amount of time he has already served and the mandatory minimum fine. He's going to appeal, he's going to lose and the court is going to impose costs on him.
My voir dire was pretty bad, my opening was ok, my cross of the police officer was pretty good, my direct sucked (not my fault my client was a moron) and I think my closing was pretty solid. I learned that I'm not very good at voir dire, cross comes naturally to me and jurors who give me the evil eye during closing worry me. Yeah I'm talking about your juror #3 I should have used a peremptory on you.
If only he would have accepted my subtle hints at how his testimony should be. Hey you thickheaded moron when I say "if you were X then I could argue Y", that is your cue to change your story to X. Don't continue to give me Z, I know Z is bullshit, so if you insist on giving me bullshit please give me the bullshit that I can work with. The last story you tell me is the story I will believe. There is a reason we go over the elements of the crime and the possible defenses before we ask for your version of events. Wink wink nudge nudge.
I can't get over how shocked the defendant was when the guilty verdict was read. His entire defense to the charge was that the cop was lying. I told him, my supervisor told him and another attorney told him that it was an uphill battle and that his chances were not good.
To recap, first trial and I can claim victory. I never really thought I had a realistic chance with the first charge and I'm happy I won the second charge. Next time Not Guilty on all charges. Next time a defendant who isn't a complete tool.
4 comments:
Good job on the verdict! And uh...don't hold your breath for less thickheaded defendants. I love my work and I love helping people but a good chunk of the clients are not the brightest bulbs.
Wink, wink, nudge, nudge? You are coaching your client to lie, an ethical breach of your duties as an officer of the court. I understand the pressure you must be feeling as a new trial attorney, but what you did is just wrong. I'm sure this is not why you became a lawyer.
I'd be curious to know if this is something openly (or with a wink and nudge of their own) condoned by your supervisors, or if this is something you did on your own.
I didn't wink wink or nudge nudge. Nor did I advise him to lie. I can see how my post kind of came across like that. To clarify I only asked him if his story was in fact more like the story in the police report. When I said "if you were X" I was refering to what was said in the police report, I didn't suggest a wild new story that came out of nowhere.
I wanted to make sure he wasn't lying to me to make me think he was innocent so I explained that even if things were like they read in the police report we could still mount an effective defense.
I didn't advise him to lie. I informed him that he didn't need to tell me a better story than the one contained in the police report. I really think he thought that his story needed to be about complete innocence. My questions to him were to explain that even if what he said didn't paint him as 100% angel we could still mount a defense.
Post a Comment