A call came in from a very lovely, but very distraught, woman.  Her husband had been arrested in a federal conspiracy case and she was beside herself because she believed that the lawyer she initially retained within hours of the arrest, at the suggestion of her next door neighbor, was totally incompetent.  After the arraignment, she had time to seek the assistance of more knowledgeable people, and ended up with my telephone number.  She informed me that she desperately needed me and had to get rid of the first lawyer.

Calls like this happen all the time.

After speaking to her calmly, and getting her to take a few deep breathes, I asked her why she thought the lawyer was incompetent.  She then explained that her favorite shows on television were lawyer and cop shows, and she knew things.  She was very sweet, deeply concerned and totally misguided. 

We then went through her impressions of the representation her husband was receiving by the attorney she retained.  While it may not have been exactly what I would have done, it was eminently competent and fully appropriate.  Much of her dismay stemmed from the expectation that within the first five minutes of the case, he should have a fully developed theory of defense and an answer as to whether her husband should win.  The lawyer, to his credit and her disappointment, responded to most of her questions, “I don’t know yet.”

This very lovely woman found this lawyer’s answers wholly unacceptable, enough so that she felt the need to reach out for new counsel.  I suspect that part of the problem was a lack of personal connection, as I doubt that she expressed her dissatisfaction to the lawyer.  Had she, he would have had the opportunity to clarify why his “I don’t know yet” response was honest and accurate.  Perhaps he was preoccupied or callous, which might have exacerbated her discomfort with his answer.  I can’t say and she wouldn’t be able to explain why she was uncomfortable with him.

My first order of business was to explain to my caller that her lawyer’s efforts were appropriate and competent, and that he was doing what should be done at that point in time and under the given circumstances.  I explained to her why he was doing what he was doing, and why it was premature to provide her with answers to her very important questions.  She accepted my explanations, and told me that she felt much more comfortable (with me) because I had explained everything to her so clearly.

But then, there was still a hesitancy in her voice.  I asked her what was wrong. 

Welllllll. . . but he’s the lawyer.  He should know.  I watch TV, so I know.

Know what?  That every case is resolved in an hour?  That every lawyer knows everything there is about a case by the first commercial?  What do you know?

I know that the innocent people like my husband don’t go to prison.  I know that the lawyer always figures it out.  I know.

This was a variation on a theme that permeates the mindset of everyone who becomes involved with the legal system in any capacity.  Between the reality-type shows, where the cops or the FBI or whatever agency is in front of the camera today, only serves truth, justice and the American way, and the dramas, where the heroes, even then tragic, remain heroes.  For criminal defense lawyers, we can’t begin to imagine how this messes with the heads of our own clients, their families, their friends, when we try to represent them.

I explained to my very lovely caller that television shows aren’t real.   Even the reality shows are edited, and they don’t like to show all the arrests gone wrong and mistakes made, because it doesn’t make for good television.  I told her this a couple of different ways, yet I’m quite certain she didn’t believe me.  Ultimately, she held tight to the belief that the lawyer should know what’s going to happen.

“If it was you, you would have known.”

I told her, “No, I would not have known.  Television has given you unrealistic expectations, and you want your lawyer to meet those television expectations.  I could have told you what you wanted to hear, but it would have been a lie.  I would not lie to you, even to make you happy.  Your lawyer wouldn’t lie to you either.  This makes him an honest lawyer, not a bad lawyer.”

What pains me most about this conversation is that I spend so much time and effort admonishing lawyers to be honest with their clients, for better or worse.  And yet, the image of Jack Nicholson screaming, “you can’t handle the truth” keeps flashing before my eyes.  Clients can’t stand the ambiguity that honesty brings, but misinterpret it to be incompetence because their education in the law comes from the screen of a television.

I repeat this conversation here as a reminder to criminal defense lawyers what our clients, and their families, have in their heads as we speak to them.  It’s hard to help people, given the influence of popular media molds their expectations of us and what we do.  Yes, it’s never been easy, and there have always been strange thoughts running through clients’ minds that we’ve had to recognize and address in order to render effective representation.  But it never hurts to repeat the message and remind ourselves that it’s still there and maybe more pervasive than ever.