Every weekend, Dan Hull changes the title of his blawg, What about Clients?, to What about Paris?.  Dan is very international.  I want to be international too.

When I read about some Biglaw firm opening an office in some exotic locale, I become depressed.  I want to practice law on the continent.  I love Paris.  I love London.  Madrid, not so much, though Fuengirola is fun.  But I’m stuck here.  Criminal defense doesn’t seem to translate well into romance languages.  Go figure.

I’ve mused with the notion of opening up an office in Paris, either atop or next door to a patisserie.  No, I don’t speak French, but then I don’t speak Spanish well either, and it hasn’t hurt me with my clients from the south.  This would prevent me from appearing at the Palais de Justice, conveniently located on the Île de la Cité in central Paris.  It’s where French justice is bought and sold.

But what of all those Parisians who come to the United States and find themselves inadvertently engaged in the American legal system?  Don’t they deserve representation?  I would be there for them, to guide them through the Byzantine system that has brought down so many of the unwary. 

While corporate work flourishes across the pond, criminal defense has yet to make much headway (aside from Joe Tacopina’s Milan office, conveniently located in his grandmother’s basement).  I don’t know of any criminal defense lawyer who has found a home in Europe.  Sure, there’s the Hague and the International Criminal Court, which pays slightly less than a court appointed attorney in Mississippi New York and isn’t recognized by the Bush White House.  In case you haven’t notice, the Euro keeps going up, and I would still have to pay for my eclair.

Why should corporate law wonks get to have all the fun?  And you wonder why the French hate Americans.

But as I’ve served my time in New York, and harbor the secret dream of retiring to Aix-en-Provence someday, I’m ready to pack my bags.  So if anybody needs a New York criminal defense lawyer to fill that glaring legal gap in their Paris office, give me a call.