Today we take note of a new blawg on the block, Malum in Se,  It’s fascinating to watch as a public defender rediscovers the frustrations of dealing with humanity, and recognizes that it indeed has its stupid side.  It’s like reliving my youth.  We all go through these times.  Some of us come out the other end.  Others can’t manage to make it.

Here, our protagonist learns how defendants (not always the best and brightest) eschew those defenses that have a snowballs chance in hell of success in favor of their own really bright ideas.  At first, these defendant reactions are simply frustrating.  They don’t get it.  Even though it makes sense to them, they are transparently ridiculous and functionally useless.  The best part is that the defendants not only come up with these ideas on their own, but then tell the cops all about them before they lawyer up.  So by the time they reach a PD, the defendant has effectively killed any chance he may have had of getting a decent plea offer, no less winning.

Over time, you’ve seen and heard it all.  The trick is, as noted in the piece, not to allow yourself to become so jaded that you can’t distinguish between the one defendant who is telling the truth from the 100 who have devised their very own strategy of death. 

Everyone who survives in this business develops their own methods of persuading their clients to calm down, cut the crap and talk straight to us.  It’s harder when you’re a public defender, because clients don’t choose you and hence don’t have a vested interest in putting their trust in you.  For all the good you do, and all the passion you bring to your work, many defendants will view you as second rate and think that they are smarter.  Watch out for this, because you may come to disdain your clients in response to their disdain for you.  But always remember, it’s not personal.  It’s ignorance.  They are not the best and the brightest.  They are people who need help, and they need it really badly.

When I was in college, every girl I knew had a poster in her dorm room that shows a kitten hanging on to a bar.  The caption read, “Hang in there, baby.”  Keep the faith.  These are the people who need you the most.  They just don’t know it yet.  And welcome to the blawgosphere.  It’s a great place to vent those frustrations, and then you can return to the trenches the next day and prove to the world that you have a reason to exist.