Let’s make it clear up front that Arizona has become the odd state out of the Union lately, fighting furiously for its independence from the rest of the nation to free it to be as bizarre a banana republic as possible.  From Crazy Joe Arpaio in Maricopa County to its hatred of people whose names end in a vowel, Arizona has become special.

Yet, even a clock thats stopped is right twice a day.  Could this be Arizona’s moment?

Jeff Gamso writes about proposed SB 1433, Arizona Senate, First Regular Session 2011, which proposes to fix the relative rights and powers between the federal government and the sovereign state of Arizona as of 1912, the year it was admitted to the Union.

For example, check out section 2 of the bill:

It’s too horrible.  You won’t be able to handle it.  Don’t watch. 

That’s what the federal Judge Ewing Werlein Jr. District Attorney Pat Lykos and Houston Mayor Annise Parker contend, that this video shouldn’t be released as it’s too “shocking and sickening” for our delicate sensibilities.

Whether your stomach can take it is up to you.  I warned you.

The young man in the year old video, Chad Holley, was convicted of burglary and sentenced to probation.  Given Texas law, he’s lucky he wasn’t shot to death by a neighbor.  They get a bit sensitive about intrusions into their castles in Harris County.

But the Houston police, for reasons that remain unclear, took a special interest in Holley.  Unfortunately, it appears to have been “feet only” day on the Houston streets, explaining why officer after officer felt compelled to kick this kid from head to groin, over and over, despite his lying prostrate, hands in plain view, unarmed and non-threatening.  What better time for the cops to kick the crap out of a kid?

There are questions as to why the police on this video were not charged with misdemeanor assault  rather than the lesser offense of official oppression.  The police chief fired the four charged officers, together with three others, and plans to keep them fired until they are reinstated with back pay at an arbitrator’s whim.

More importantly, what does this video say about the culture of police in Houston?

Disbelief that our paid professional police force includes groups of officers capable of such actions against a prone, unarmed youth. And shame that it took an inadvertent video-camera tape from a self-service storage company to expose their actions. How many other similar incidents have gone unreported because they occurred outside the view of witnesses and camera lenses?

This  Houston Chronicle editorial asks an interesting question, but one that should have been asked long ago.  It’s not as if this is the  first video of cops beating someone.  Did they forget about others? 

What is most striking about this attack is how these fine, upstanding police officers kick Holley, over and over, one after another.  What a fabulous show of force, manly men all.

After watching the video, I’m constrained to agree with the judge, the district attorney and the mayor.  This is a video that no one should ever see.  Not because it shows Houston police engaged in shocking and disgusting conduct, something that everyone ought to be aware of and recognize to be the sad reality on the streets, but because the police in Houston, as opposed to elsewhere where the cops, when compelled to give a perp a damn good beating, do it like men.

There’s plenty of machismo in the drinking water of Harris County, as well as the rest of Texas, where no one hesitates to pull the trigger of a 12-gauge when they spot some kids crushing the neighbor’s blades of grass or walking too close to the garden gnomes for comfort.  They’re a tough bunch of hombres.

But the Houston police behaves like sissies, kicking a man down.  Not even man enough to throw punches, save one, empowering his brother cop to step behind Holley and give a few more kicks to his crotch.  How masculine.  How powerful. How macho.

No, this isn’t the way Houston should see their police.  It’s one thing for them to watch a video where the police beat Chad Holley for no reason whatsoever after he’s prone on the ground, and that’s the sort of thing any manly Texan can appreciate.  But to do so like such sissies is too much for any good Texan to stand. 

If it’s not too late, avert your eyes.  No one needs to see this humiliation of Texan manhood.

There are places in the human body where things can be secreted.  Anyone who’s read Papillon knows, as does anyone familiar with some of the tricks of the drug mule.  Yet, the physical integrity of a person isn’t, by definition, the playground of the police should they decide, for whatever reason, that they wish to determine whether there’s anything lurking in a fellow’s anus.

Enter the professional. 

When it came to the extraordinary move to paralyze an Anderson County man to search his body for drugs, this doctor didn’t hesitate.

“That exam was going to occur with or without his consent,” Methodist Medical Center of Oak Ridge Dr. Michael LaPaglia testified Tuesday in U.S. District Court.

No muss.  No fuss.  No warrant.  Doctor’s orders.

After his arrest, officers contended he was unusually fidgety and temporarily “barricaded” himself in an interview room. Booker struggled with jailers after a strip search at the Anderson County Jail and, according to Jailer Jerry Shelton, was strapped naked into a “safety chair” before being hauled, still naked but wrapped in a blanket, to the Methodist Medical Center emergency room.

Once there, the shackled and handcuffed Booker was given a dose of a muscle relaxant after LaPaglia insisted Booker “clenched” his buttocks to thwart a cavity search.

“He still had enough voluntary consciousness to clench his muscles,” LaPaglia testified. “I decided to paralyze the patient and retrieve the object.”

One has to wonder what might make an arrested defendant “unusually fidgety” so as to surmise that he’s concealed narcotics within his body.  Perhaps it’s a lot like a second grader squirming because he has to pee.  Maybe it’s different, the sort of motion that alerts a professional, like a doctor, to believe there’s something to be found on the other side.  Either way, Michael LaPaglia, the physician, was determined to find out.

LaPaglia, of his own volition, decided to inject Felix Booker with a drug to paralyze him.  Not because of medical necessity.  Not for any benefit to his patient.  Not because he was under constraint of a court order to do so.  LaPaglia made his own decision, took the initiative.  Carpe Anus.  And he dove into his work, a place where he would appear right at home.

Booker is on trial in federal court, it should be noted, for possession of the 5.7 grams of crack unearthed by the curious Dr. LaPaglia after his arrest for being a passenger in a car, inexplicably stopped and searched.

Booker was a passenger in a car stopped by Oak Ridge Police Officer Daniel Steakley last February. Steakley found a scant amount of marijuana in the car. He testified Tuesday that he let the driver, a relative of Booker’s, go because he was “cooperative.” But he arrested Booker, who objected to the search and had $1,731 in cash in his pocket.

Without any further details, it’s impossible to discern from this description the justification for the stop or search of the car that revealed a “scant amount of marijuana.”  But then, there’s always the price to be paid for being “uncooperative” by objecting to a search.  After all, what better reason to end up with someone thrusting past the sphincter than asserting a constitutional right?

Yet, Booker’s suppression motion was denied, as the judge, Leon Jordan, failed to find this conduct sufficient shocking, which is a curious commentary on Judge Jordan’s experiences.  Booker’s lawyer, Bob Jolley, decided to take the issue to the jury by questioning LaPaglia about his motivations to go delving into Booker’s backside on his own. 

“If I did not do the rectal exam and he overdosed on some medication, it would have been my fault,” LaPaglia testified.

And how much worse would Dr. LaPaglia have felt if it was a 16 year old psychiatric patient who suffered for his neglect?

Jolley, however, questioned LaPaglia’s judgment, noting that the doctor had been accused of smoking pot and engaging in inappropriate conduct with a 16-year-old psychiatric patient.

The answer, thus, may never be known. The power of rationalization is an amazing thing, as LaPaglia argues that his initiative in ferreting out the drugs was really done for the benefit of Booker, lest he suffer the indignity of ongoing unusual fidgeting and risk anal overdose. 

However, the medical ethics of physicians who not only cooperate with the police for the purpose of law enforcement, the search for evidence with which to convict their “patient,” doesn’t seem to give LaPaglia pause.  Here, he not only was compliant in the search, but based upon the story, took the lead, made the decision to inject a drug to paralyze Booker and took the dive on his own.  His post hoc rationale that there was a medical benefit to Booker is laughable.  Where was the informed consent?

There are serious medical ethics questions raised by physicians willingly serving the police even where a warrant has been ordered; after all, the fact that a judge has approved a search doesn’t implicate a physician’s duty to use his professional abilities to make it happen.  Do no harm?  Unless the police want you to.  Unless you happen to agree with the cops and think it’s fun to paralyze people and enter their anus in search of contraband. 

The doctor is under no compulsion to become the pawn of the court any more than he is subject to the command of the police.  He makes the choice to limit his involvement to the treatment of patients rather than the facilitator of law enforcement.  Whether there’s a warrant authorizing him to do so or not.

But then, why should Dr. Michael LaPaglia hesitate from paralyzing a person and entering his body.  After all, it was going to happen anyway.

H/T Radley Balko

I’m neither wise enough nor knowledgeable enough to have a view worthy of expressing on what’s happening in Egypt.  I do know that anyone applauding anarchy is a naive fool, but I suspect the rest of you know that as well.  Nature abhors a vacuum, and someone will fill the void.

What I do know, however, is that monumental and irreparable damage can happen in the blink of an eye during the brief moment when there is no one in control.  With forces preoccupied, Egypt is at grave risk.  Not politically, but historically.  It’s an ancient civilization that possesses artifacts of priceless historical value.  Stewardship of history is not high on the agenda of erstwhile anarchists.  But it makes for some damn fine looting.

Some kept their heads in the midst of chaos and potential ruination.  While Egypt’s antiquities were imperiled, some chose to put their bodies, their lives, at risk by standing between the relics and the protest.

Egypt’s ancient treasures appear to be safe today, after citizens, and later the military, banded together to stop looters amid an uprising that left some of the world’s most prized artifacts perilously vulnerable to common thieves.

Egyptians, desperate to protect their country’s heritage from the kind of mass looting that devastated Baghdad’s museums in 2003, created a kind of human shield around Cairo’s Egyptian Museum this week, linking arms in front of the historic site and chasing down vandals who had managed to enter the building after it was abandoned by the country’s police.

It’s unlikely that many readers remember the Dropsy Days. I don’t, and I’ve been around longer than most of you. I do, however, remember learning all about the Dropsy Days when I was a pup.  For those asking, “what’s this guy talking about, I don’t even know what dropsy is,” allow me to explain.

Back in the 1960s, following the Supreme Court’s monumental decision in Mapp v. Ohio that held the exclusionary rule to be applicable to the states…

You mean there was a time when it didn’t?
Yes, Tiffany, there was; a time, long, long ago.

…the police were suddenly compelled to come up with explanations for the otherwise rampant conduct of warrantless searches of people they decided, for whatever reason, needed searching.  And suddenly, out of nowhere, came the dropsy search.

Dropsy was when a police officer merely approached a person, without any questions or commands, and, inexplicably, the person would let a package whose contents were unknown fall from his hands to the ground.  He would drop it.  By doing so, he abandoned it, thus removing it from the purview of the warrant clause, whether state or federal.

The officer would then reach down, having seen the “thing” fall from the person’s hand to the ground, and pick it up. He would look at it. He would know, based on his training and experience, that it contained contraband. He would seize the package, and the person who inexplicably abandoned it on the ground.

This happened in case after case, defendant after defendant, day after day. It was incredible!  Didn’t these criminals ever learn?

Criminal defense lawyers with long hair and muttonchop sideburns, often wearing wide flower ties, would argue that their clients didn’t toss the drugs to the ground, that such a claim was an outrageous lie.  And judges would uphold the seizures because, well, there was no reason not to.  The officer had no reason to lie.  The defendant couldn’t prove that he did.  Suppression denied, and the promise of Mapp proved empty.

I have very fond memories of listening to Irving Younger talk about the Alger Hiss case at Cornell, thinking he was quite the spellbinding raconteur. He was also the man who wrote an article in The Nation in 1967, the year before he was elected a city judge in Manhattan, called The Perjury Routine.

When I wrote about the Ruiz decision out of Florida’s Fourth District Court of Appeals, it would have been the perfect opportunity to take this walk down memory lane. But I didn’t.  Thankfully, Johnny Gardner at Law and Baseball did.

‘* * * Policemen see themselves as fighting a twofront war —against criminals in the street and against ‘liberal’ rules of law in court. All’s fair in this war, including the use of perjury to subvert ‘liberal’ rules of law that might free those who ‘ought’ to be jailed * * * It is a peculiarity of our legal system that the police have unique opportunities (and unique temptations) to give false testimony. When the Supreme Court lays down a rule to govern the conduct of the police, the rule does not enforce itself. Some further proceeding * * * is almost always necessary to determine what actually happened. In Mapp v. Ohio, for example, the Supreme Court laid down the rule that evidence obtained by the police through a n unreasonable search and seizure may not be used in a state criminal prosecution. But before applying the rule to any particular case, a hearing must be held to establish the facts. Then the judge decides whether those facts constitute an unreasonable search and seizure. * * * The difficulty arises when one stands back from the particular case and looks at a series of cases. It then becomes apparent that policemen are committing perjury at least in some of them, and perhaps in nearly all of them. Narcotics prosecutions in New York City can be so viewed.

Before  Mapp, the policeman typically testified that he stopped the defendant for little or no reason, searched him, and found narcotics on his person.  This had the ring of truth.  It was an illegal search (not based upon ‘probable cause’), but the evidence was admissible because Mapp had not yet been decided.  Since it made no difference, the policeman testified truthfully. After the decision in Mapp, it made a great deal of difference. For the first few months, New York policemen continued to tell the truth about the circumstances of their searches, with the result that evidence was suppressed.  Then the police made the great  discovery that if the defendant drops the narcotics on the ground, after which the policeman  arrests him, the search is reasonable and the evidence is admissible. Spend a few hours in the New York City Criminal Court nowadays, and you will hear case after case in which a policeman testifies that the defendant dropped the narcotics on the ground, whereupon the policeman arrested him.  Usually the very language of the testimony is  identical from the case to another. This is now known among defense lawyers and prosecutors as ‘dropsy’ testimony.  The judge has no reason to disbelieve it in any particular case, and of course the judge must decide each case on its own evidence, without regard to the testimony in other cases. Surely, though, not in every case was the defendant unlucky enough to drop his narcotics at the feet of a policeman.  It follows that at least in some of these cases the police are lying.

People v. McMurty, 314 N.Y.S.2d 194, 195-96 (N.Y. Crim. Ct.1970), (Younger, J.). “Dropsy” in 1970 has evolved into “consent” in 2010.  The more things change the more they stay the same.

Dropsy died overnight. Judges rejected the testimony as facially incredible, and, miraculously, there were suddenly no more dropsy cases. But, as one might expect, that wasn’t the end of the story, or the end of seizures.

Chances are fairly good that there aren’t many judges sitting on the bench today who were practicing criminal law back in the 1960s, or remember Irving Younger’s article in The Nation, or think about the dropsy cases and how they suddenly disappeared from the well.  They should remember, but it would likely make them feel sheepishly embarrassed at the rulings they give after suppression hearings, and no one wants to feel bad about themselves.

Judges have feelings?  Do judges suffer from low self-esteem?
Yes, Tiffany, even judges have feelings. They’re human too. Some more than others.

But judges should remember. And Chief Judge Gross is wrong that “dropsy” had evolved into “consent” in 2010. The Dropsy Days were an easy, breezy time, when the cops fixed liberal rulings with simple “white lies.” Times have grown more complicated, and the police have adapted. No matter how good your fastball, you need to change it up with a curve every now and then. Maybe even a spitball if the ump will let you get away with it.

Consent has been part of the arsenal since those early, immature days.  As has the ability to use the few provable facts combined with the unprovable, like the “poignant” smell of marijuana, or the omnipresent glassine handed off, as seen from 700 yards away through two buildings and a parked car. Whatever was needed, arose.

Yet here we are, forty-something years later, still approving convenient testimony that no one really believes to be true, because we haven’t come to grips with the Dropsy Days when Irving Younger explained to all that the police do not always tell the truth.

I first met her when she was working for New York City’s corporation counsel, defending the City against claims that police officers violated the civil rights of individuals.  She subpoenaed me to testify in federal court in a claim by my client.  She was nice enough about it, and understood that I wasn’t going to give her anything to use to hang my client.

Her first question to me before Judge Jed Rakoff was whether I was a “criminal lawyer,”  That was all I needed, and I went off correcting her, that I was a criminal defense lawyer, a very different thing.  Judge Rakoff enjoyed the repartee.  I did as well, as she played fair and honest.

Soon thereafter, she left the womb and hung out her shingle to represent those who had suffered at the hands of the police.  I welcomed her joining the side of the angels.  One of the things she chose to do was join the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, because her fortunes where inextricably tied with what we do.  As a member, she joined the listserv.

Nobody told her, however, that she should put aside her healthy belief in ethics.  Just as she played fair and honest in the employ of the City, she was fair and honest in all her dealings.  It never occurred to her that her integrity, something that would maintain her in good stead during her years of fighting for good causes, would be the basis for her eventual vilification.

Rose Weber took umbrage with a lawyer on the listserv who asked a question, one that she believed any criminal lawyer should know the answer to, or at bare minimum should find the answer to rather than prevail upon others.  This is an ongoing issue on listservs in general, and the NYSACDL listserv in particular.  There are two schools of thought, one being that the listserv isn’t a substitute for personal responsibility, and the other being that it’s better that people ask then screw up.  My support goes to the former view, but that’s not the reason for this post.

After a skirmish broke out over the issue, Rose took a look at the website of the person asking the question and noted something troubling.  Yup, you guessed it.  It said she was “highly experienced.”  Two years out of school, both spent in the service of a nearby legal aid office.  Whether that constitutes “highly experienced” may be a subject of debate, as it’s a purely subjective assessment.  Some would (and did) argue that she earned that description in the trenches.  Others would disagree. Still this isn’t the point of this post.

As has been argued  here and elsewhere, and elsewhere, and elsewhere, and still elsewhere, one of the foremost problems confronting the legal profession in this age of technology and rampant self-promotion is the puffery, the deception, the over-hype that marketers, and marketing lawyers, employ to sell themselves.  While the ABA 20/20 Commission considers what, if anything, to do, many within and without the profession consider the internet to be an ethics-free zone, the place where lawyers are entitled to lie through their teeth about themselves, their abilities, their experience, to get clients and make money.

Rose Weber raised a question.  It was a good question, a right question.  Some may quibble about the context or manner or tone, but someone will always quibble about such things.  We’re no more likely to share sensibilities than common sense.  It’s just a diversion from the issue, that one person’s approach isn’t the way another would prefer it. 

And so I finally come to the point of this post, bearing in mind that Rose’s question was put out on the NYSACDL listerv.  She was vilified for having questioned the propriety of holding oneself out as more than she might be.  Put another way, deceptive marketing.

The important official voices of this bar association spoke out in unison, we don’t ask such questions.  The target of Rose’s question was furious, asserting that the listserv was a safe haven for criminal defense lawyers, a “member benefit,” where no one would ever challenge her or say anything that might hurt her feelings. 

The important official voices cried “hallelujah,” that this bar association existed to make its members happy, to embrace them no matter what they did, as long as they paid their dues.  But let me not put words in anyone’s mouth.  From Kevin O’Connell, the new president, only a few days in office:

This listserv should be a safe environment for a colleague to ask a question without fear of ridicule. While colleagues do sometimes ask pretty rudimentary questions, it is better that the question gets asked and answered than not….Attacks launched in this semi-public forum have a serious chilling effect of the flow of information.

Is there a problem with some of our colleagues puffing their qualifications? Clearly there is, but that is an issue that should be dealt with in another setting. Perhaps we should consider taking it up in a CLE event of some type…

Can we please get back to business?

And there’s the reaction of the immediate past president, George Goltzer, who, despite no longer speaking for the association, can’t find it within himself not to.

rose, i stopped speaking for the association three and a half days ago when i administered the oath to kevin o’connell. he speaks for the association now and just spoke very well.  a smiley face is sometimes better than vitriol. as for this important issue, i can think of more pressing problems plaguing our members than each others advertising.

Why would a bar association concern itself with such trivialities as lawyer deception when it can offer a smiley face?  After all, it’s hard enough to keep the slightly more than 200 members statewide paying their dues, and we all know that happy lawyers, even if liars, are more likely to pay dues than ones whose integrity is called into question.  Certainly, in the quest for bar association dollars, the ones used to pay for its ongoing existence in the hope that someday it will again serve a purpose as it did when its was formed, there is no higher purpose than appeasing any lawyer with an open checkbook.

Whether Rose Weber’s point was right or wrong isn’t the question.  That she challenged the propriety, the honesty, of claiming to be “highly experienced” within the “safe environment” is precisely what must be done to protect the integrity of the profession.  Maybe the lawyer had damn good reason to make her claim of experience.  Maybe not. 

But when the NYSACDL was formed, and some very hard-nosed lawyers fought long and hard for it to reflect the best that criminal defense lawyers could be, they screamed and yelled at each other, challenged each other, called each other some pretty bad names, all the time.  And nobody, but nobody, ever told anyone in the room to play nice and behave like good little boys and girls.  These were lawyers, and they argued their points, and they were honest enough to call someone out when they disagreed, and they were tough enough to handle a challenge.  These were lawyers, not smily faces.

So these important officials made Rose Weber the bad guy for having done the unthinkable, raised a pressing and justified question about the potentially deceptive marketing of another member of the club.  And for that, they vilified Rose.  Because, as Goltzer said, “i can think of more pressing problems plaguing our members than each others advertising.”  Like membership for its own sake, since it’s not like this bar association gives a damn about the integrity of its own little niche of the profession. 

Rose Weber did nothing more than raise a valid and important issue, and for that she was castigated by the important official people.  I may be neither important nor official, but I applaud Rose Weber for putting integrity on the table while other made clear they couldn’t care less.

Of course, that was  made clear before this happened.

* A note for the uninitiated. I was a board member and vice president of the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and twice resigned.  I am, and always have been, a huge supporter of what this association was and could be.  I am disgusted by what it’s become, and I’ve made that clear in word and deed.  This, in turn, has made me an outcast to some in the association, and the voice of reason and institutional memory to others.  If it didn’t matter to me, I would ignore its existence, but the criminal defense bar needs a strong, honest voice rather than a smily face.

Like most blawgers, I get my fair share of emails of press releases from marketers and publicists, ranging from the banal garbage of “Law firm so and so just landed a new client in the fascinating and earth-shattering representation of a fender bender.  If you would like to interview Joe Dipshit, Esq. for your blog, please contact the undersigned to make arrangements given Joe’s very busy schedule.”

This description isn’t far off from what actually comes in.  Ask any blawger, and they will confirm the receipt of these cringe-inducing emails.  It’s truly embarrassing that lawyers pay publicists to promote their latest bowel movement.  Some are really that bad.

But some of the press releases speak to things of substance and interest to the criminal law community.  There are movies of interest.  There are articles in major magazines like Time and New York Magazine, which oddly seek to entice blawger’s interest in the hope of creating “buzz”.  And there are conferences on issues about which criminal defense lawyers should know.  One such email arrived yesterday, and caught my eye.

To whom it may concern:

My organization is putting on an upcoming conference called “Law & the Brain: How Recent Advances in Neuroscience Impact the Law” on neuroscience and law in March in NYC.  We have many of the members of the MacArthur Law and Neuroscience Project speaking at our conference including Michael Gazzaniga, Owen Jones, Martha Farah and Judge Jed Rakoff.

I was wondering if you could mention our event on your blog or post a link.  We have an early bird registration deadline this Friday about which you may want to alert your readers.

I’m always curious when someone asks me to promote their conference, why? Are you asking me to speak (no), to participate (no), to come for free (no), because we’re old, dear friends (no).  And yet you want me to promote your conference because, well, you want me to.

So why would I want to promote your conference?

As a group, they suffer the indignity of being seen as less than real lawyers by the very people whose lives they are charged to protect.  Individually, they can be great lawyers, awful lawyers and everything in between.  Institutionally, they are overworked, underfunded and under-appreciated, except at saloons close to the courthouse.

Public defenders.  They shoulder the bulk of the work of defending the accused against the State. 

And then there’s the Jefferson Parish Indigent Defender Board.   Jeff Gamso tells the story, which he found at   Second Class Justice, of what they did to Vincent Castillo.  Not for Vincent Castillo, but to him.  Castillo was their client.  And they burned him.  Deliberately.  And put in all the effort they could muster to do so.

Over at the ABA Journal, someone got the bright idea to solicit lawyers who wanted to see their name in lights to tell why they love being lawyers.

We’ve all seen the downbeat headlines—surveys show as many as half of all lawyers wouldn’t enter the profession if they had it to do over, wouldn’t recommend their children become lawyers, would rather be digging ditches or breaking rocks. As the profession struggles to recover from the Great Recession, it’s certainly not easy being an attorney.

But what about the other half of the profession—the half that doesn’t grab the headlines, that finds satisfaction in their jobs?

If you can get past the logical gaps that would make a satisfied lawyer cringe, the balance of the article consists of some curious testimonials.  My absolute favorite was the very first.

I knew nothing about criminal law and said as much to a California federal court judge who wanted to appoint me to represent a woman facing forgery charges. I was a business and tax attorney in court that day for a calendar call. The judge saw my name on a pleading and appointed me.

The woman was about to plead guilty to 22 counts of forging signatures on Social Security checks. Her hearing was scheduled for 2 p.m. The judge told me to educate myself and if I needed more time, he could continue the case for a week.

I introduced myself to the defendant. She told me that she was guilty, and I asked her why she had forged the checks. “Because he told me to” was her answer. The “he” turned out to be the woman’s husband, a Social Security recipient who was hospitalized in Texas. She handed me a letter her husband had written directing her to sign the checks and deposit them in their bank account.

Relying on what I learned in bills and notes class, I told her that an authorized signature wasn’t forgery. At the 2 p.m. hearing I moved to vacate the woman’s plea, offering her husband’s letter as evidence. The government acquiesced and the case was dismissed.

It was at that precise moment of dismissal that I realized being a lawyer was about helping people who needed help. And I felt that I had found my calling in life.

Jay Foonberg
Beverly Hills, Calif.

Before you jump all over Jay Foonberg for the procedural, ethical and substantive issues his story raises, bear in mind that he is the  author of such scholarly tomes as How to Start & Build a Law Practice and How to Get & Keep Good Clients, prominently displayed for sale on his website.

Assuming that they are leading with the best they’ve got, the ABA Journal’s “other half” promotion isn’t quite moving me to tears.  In fact, my initial reaction was to respond with some very snarky thoughts about dredging up dead bodies to fill the empty space.  But that’s really not my view of the law. 

Some days, I love being a lawyer.  Some days, I hate it.  There have been more of the latter than the former over the years.  Everybody loves doing something useful and productive, feeling that their efforts have had a positive contribution to others and society, which is why being a good carpenter can be so fulfilling.  Criminal defense lawyer?  Not so much.

But rather than serve up a heaping bowl of snark in reaction to the ABA Journal’s “let’s get happy”-fest, I wondered what you, kind reader, think about being a lawyer.  We do it because we must, because if we don’t, then who will stand between the accused and the mighty.  But do you love it? Do you?  Tell the truth.

Addendum: As I’m reminded by my buddy Bennett, this question has been asked before, but as time passes and new folks come by, it’s worth another go ’round.

It’s been a bloody start to 2011 for law enforcement. In a bizarre sequence of events, 11 officers in five states were shot in a 24-hour period between Sunday and Monday of this week. The most brazen attack happened in Detroit where a gunman opened fire inside a police precinct.

This is the opening to an NPR program interviewing John Jay College of Criminal Justice Professor Jon Shane. Scary. Following the shooting of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, attributed initially to anger and frustration fueled by intemperate rhetoric, this bit of news suggests that things are indeed out of control.  And Jon Shane sees it that way.

Prof. SHANE: Well, there’s certainly something to be said for that. I think it follows some bit of a larger trend in the United States, that there’s this overriding sense of entitlement and don’t tread on me. And law enforcement stands between the law-abiding people and this chaos that’s going to erupt, that these would-be criminals would have if they get their way. And it’s, well, police work is intrinsically dangerous, and just kind of highlights the larger social movement that’s afoot.

This is neither the  first time we’ve heard this view, nor the first time it’s come from the mouth of a John Jay professor.  Eugene O’Donnell  pumped and dumped last time, but it failed to ignite.  Note the use of putative academics (to the extent one can consider John Jay College of Criminal Justice part of the Academy, given it’s facially partisan perspective and myopic educational direction), but the fact that the media can put a fella on the air and call him “professor” lends a certain scholarly air to his musings.  Credibility attaches like leather patches to threadbare tweed elbows, and that’s more than enough for most folks.

And if it’s true, then it’s a real problem.  After all, eleven dead cops in 24 hours is, well, a lot.  But the question remains whether these are random or reflect a trend, and if the latter, whether the trend can be attributed to a cause by more than professorial fiat.

At Reason, Radley Balko considers this claim, that there’s a war on cops happening and it reflects an assault on authority.

Dig into most of these articles, however, and you will find there is no real evidence of an increase in anti-police violence, let alone one that can be traced to anti-police rhetoric, gun sales, disrespect for authority, or “don’t tread on me” sentiment. (CNN is one of the few media outlets that have covered the purported anti-police trend with appropriate skepticism.) Amid all the quotes from concerned law enforcement officials in MSNBC’s “War on Cops” article, for example, is a casual mention that police fatality statistics for this month are about the same as they were in January 2010. Right after suggesting to NPR that the recent attacks were related to anti-government rhetoric, Shane acknowledged there has been little research into the underlying causes of police shootings.

What’s particularly interesting is the cross-connection between varying political factions being blamed at the same time. 

anti-police rhetoric, gun sales, disrespect for authority, or “don’t tread on me” sentiment

This runs the gamut, from liberal to libertarian to tea party conservatives and RKBA supporters.  It must be hard to figure out what to wear to the rallies, love beats or camo. 

Balko goes the unfashionable route, crunching numbers to show that this year is little different than last year, but very different from earlier years.

In truth, on-the-job police fatalities have dropped nearly 50 percent during the last 20 years, even as the total number of cops has doubled. According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, 279 cops were killed on the job in 1974, the worst year on record. That number steadily decreased to just 116 in 2009. The leading cause of death for cops on duty is  car accidents, not violence. For the last several years, the number of officers intentionally killed on the job each year has ranged from 45 to 60, out of about 850,000 cops on the beat. That makes police officers about 50 percent more likely to be intentionally killed than the average American. But contrary to Sheriff Smith’s claim, the job isn’t among the 10 most dangerous in the country, let alone the “the top five,” even if you include officers unintentionally killed in traffic accidents.

The message here is that it’s safer to be a cop than a logger, farmer or fisherman.  Does that mean that angry rhetoric is fueling attacks on people who fish? 

Police are well aware of the power of spin, and have used it well to their advantage over the years in persuading people to respect their authority.  There’s really nothing wrong with this, as they’re promoting their self-interest and making their life, job and situation better.  We all do this, whether consciously or not.

But at a time when videos reveals that those we entrust to protect and serve prefer to serve themselves first sometimes raises the stakes.  When it was just our word against theirs, and law-abiding citizens would be naturally inclined to stand alongside their men in blue when challenged, the effort to remind us that we’re better off calling a cop than a criminal was easy.  Maybe we know too much now.

I recently bemoaned the fact that we have become deluged in police misconduct and abuse, and feared that we were  becoming desensitized toward wrongdoing.  While that concern remains, the counter-effort from John Jay, that hotbed of cop-love propaganda, suggests that the police remain very concerned that people are not becoming inured to police misconduct, but rather growing deeply concerned that the shield may be badly tarnished. 

Let the professors from John Jay take to the airwaves and cry about a war on cops that doesn’t exist.  As long as there are people like Balko to debunk the spin, we’ll get past it.  In the meantime, maybe our daily dose of police misconduct is opening up minds about the reality on the street of police becoming a law unto themselves, putting both bodies and rights at risk.

The more the police apologists and spin-meisters whine, the more it appears they are afraid that people are seeing the truth behind the blue curtain.  If the cops don’t like it, then all they need do is clean up their act and demonstrate the respect for others they wrap around themselves whenever a new video of a beating comes out.  If the professors at John Jay want to do some good, they could spend more time teaching respect for civil rights and less giving interviews about this non-existent war on cops.