Dear Mr. Gonzalez:

Thank you for sending your resume for a position with my firm.  I applaud your many accomplishments, which reflect well upon your work ethic and ability to get along with your superiors.  These are both important to one’s success in the law, as well as many other endeavors.

Your interest in joining the ranks of attorneys representing criminal defendants after many years working for the government is curious.  While it is clear that you have a great depth of experience, and your ethnicity would be appealing to many of the accused who would feel comfortable with someone sharing the same cultural background, there is no indication that you have gained any insight into the world of defending individuals prosecuted by the government.  Without such an epiphany, your dedication to the service of criminal defendants is suspect.

Even if I was to assume that your interest in changing sides was sincere, few of the skills you gained in your career to this point will transfer well to the defense.  We do not tend to write many memos on the subject of authorizing conduct in which our clients might wish to engage.  When such questions are posed by our clients, they often seek a means of engaging in unlawful conduct.  We do not assist them in such things.  It would be illegal, and we would be culpable for our conduct.

The work of a criminal defense lawyer is often unpleasant and frustrating, making it a marked change from the experience that you have enjoyed to this point.  We rarely find that courts assist us or are sympathetic to our goals.  Frequently, we find that our clients are undeservedly vilified by our own government.  But you are likely aware of this already. 

We are also frustrated by the lack of resources available to the defense in our litigation.  As you may know, the government has many special agents, experts, laboratories and the ability to gather information from sources about which we are as yet unaware.  The defense, on the other hand, has few resources at its disposal, and those that are available are often beyond our clients’ means.  This shifts the burden of representation onto the lawyer alone, and will likely be far less satisfying than your experience with the government.  After all, if the government needs more resources, it need only raise the spectacle of fear and then tax at will.

But most significantly, we are facing an economy that imperils the ability of individuals to mount a defense based upon the costs involved.  Between lost jobs, the devalued dollar and rising basic costs, few defendants are able to afford private criminal defense counsel.  This, of course, means that our need for additional staff is limited.

I’m sure that a person with your background, as a former Attorney General of the United States of America, will have little difficulty finding a suitable position.  After all, name recognition alone should serve to make you a very desirable new hire for those law firms who wish to assert greater influence amongst a select group of individuals in our nation’s capital.  You must certainly have some valuable information of interest to very important people, though these are unlikely to be the type of people that would be of interest to my clientèle. 

I wish you the best of luck with your search for a job, but I am sorry to inform you that there is no place for you with my firm.

Sincerely,

/s/

From the Times.