Ed. Note: On July 21, 2025, Roy Black passed away at the age of 80. Roy was a legend in the criminal defense world, and subscriber and occasional commenter at SJ. Roy Black’s work had a particularly significant on Mario Machado, who remembers him here.

For me, there’s one quote that always stuck out:

I’m going to do whatever I can to see justice is done in the courtroom. If the town burns down because of it, so be it.

That’s from when Roy Black defended Miami Police Officer Luis Alvarez, the 1982 case that had the city in perpetual fear because of the Miami Riot Syndrome. Having done my damn best to study Roy’s approach to everything, that line sticks out because it’s the complete opposite to what I see and read about today’s defense lawyers: the majority casually going along to get along, terrified of superseding indictments and pleading out cases in perpetuity, lest they upset anything about the status quo.

If you didn’t get it, Roy made sure you understood your role as a criminal defense lawyer. You had a solemn duty to overprepare, to rise to the occasion, to put aside your own silly comforts so that you could zealously defend your client, and to make sure that the jury heard your arguments as a call to action.

Every criminal defense lawyer with half a pulse knows all about his near-impossible victory for Sal Magluta, when he ran the board on the government and got a NG on all 16 counts. That case was made immortal by the Cocaine Cowboys series, which if you have a bit more than a CDL pulse, you’d hope to someday be involved with such a case.

His blog was great also, in the days when very few gunslingers could be bothered to write. Roy’s post about the sympathetic yet deadly government witness is a favorite, as is this one about using books written for businessmen on the methods of persuasion. He taught you to embrace that you are a salesman, and that great achievement comes with a great price, a price most people are unwilling to pay. You’re retail, not wholesale. If you care to watch, his closing argument for the Helio Castroneves trial is a blueprint for capturing the jury’s attention, and for emphasizing the inherent unfairness that comes with any federal prosecution. A call to arms.

If there was a CLE he was part of, you could bet I was there. I remember seeing him at a CLE in some law school, and it was on a Tuesday close to nighttime. Roy had been working cases all day, and he still took the time and care to show up and teach us all a few things about a good cross.

Roy’s defense of the much-despised John Goodman was also masterful. He got a one-word verdict, but he still earned Goodman a new trial after he exposed one juror’s shenanigans. He was the only one who got an acquittal out of that silly Varsity Blues federal investigation, where 54 others plead out, and two went to trial and lost (maybe the feds wouldn’t have such a high success rate if so many hadn’t plead out?). I stole a ton out of that closing argument presentation. Same goes for his cross of one of the state’s star witnesses in William Kennedy Smith’s rape trial in Palm Beach.

Hell, I guarantee you that I’ve looked up transcripts, videos, anything and everything about those cases that I mentioned, and many others. Fortunate enough to be a Miami CDL, I went over to the Ferguson building any chance I could to watch the master. The last time I got to do that was when he was defending Philip Esformes. I hazard to ever call myself a “fan” of anything or anyone because of the etymology of the word – one might as well use “votary” – but this time, it fits.

I was never lucky enough to try a case with Roy – even with all those health care fraud cases where close to everyone and their cousin in the SDFL was indicted – or to get to know him, but the stuff I learned will be there for the rest of my life.

I saw him about a year back while he had dinner with his family at the Mayfair in the Grove. As I walked by, it was lame and fan-like to stop by and say hello, but I felt I had to. I felt…grateful. I didn’t say thanks, only a cordial hello, and Roy just waved at me and said “Yeah, I know you, thanks.” By then, I figured it was prudent to let him finish his meal in peace.

Roy taught us defense lawyers about the spur to do better, to persevere, and to honor the privilege that comes with defending the accused. Here’s how he remembered defending William Lozano:

A new judge ordered a change of venue to Orlando, 225 miles from Miami. Finally things were looking good until disaster struck again. On April 29, 1992, the police officers in the Rodney King case were acquitted. In the ensuing riots 53 people died, thousands more were injured, with property damages of roughly $1 billion. In a knee-jerk response, our judge immediately changed the venue to Tallahassee because it had a larger population of African Americans. The reason was fairly obvious. We challenged that several times, finally getting the trial sent back to Orlando, the bucolic home of Disney World, with the only threat coming from the Pirates of the Caribbean. After three weeks, on May 29, 1993, four and a half years after the shooting, Lozano was finally acquitted.

What is it that Nietzsche said – if it doesn’t kill you it makes you stronger? Well, it almost killed me. I know it is a cliche; but there is truth in it.

Thanks, Roy.