The Dallas Morning news is reporting that a former judge now running for Cook County District Attorney (on the Oklahoma border) committed prosecutorial misconduct during the murder trial of a man accused of raping women twenty years ago.  Judge Mike Snipes concluded that the Court of Criminal Appeals should grant Clay Chabot a new trial because Janice Warder, the lead prosecutor in the case, failed to disclose information favorable to the defense that could have changed the jury’s verdict.

The 10-page finding said that Ms. Warder did not tell Mr. Chabot’s defense attorneys about inconsistent statements by his brother-in-law Gerald Pabst, whom DNA tests now show to be the rapist. The judge also said that Ms. Warder did not disclose discussions with another witness about her not being interested in prosecuting him for drug dealing.

Ms. Warder violated what is called “The Brady Rule“. This is a court ruling that requires the prosecution to turn over to the defense evidence which may be “exculpatory”(which may prove the defendant’s innocence)  This was a court ruling in the 1963 Supreme Court  case Brady v. Maryland.

I admit that I have long since forgotten anything I learned about criminal law and procedure in law school and studying for the Texas Bar Exam.  I also admit that anything I know about criminal law is as a result of watching re-runs of Law and Order and Law and Order SVU ad-naseum…..   That makes it easy for me. When someone asks me for advice in the criminal law area, I simply research a particular Law and Order episode, tell the person when that episode will air and to watch it and send them a bill……. Well not really but I do know some attorneys who I would swear practice law that way…… Sure as hell beats going to the law library or paying for Lexis…..  Law and Order comes with my basic cable so it saves me a hell of a lot of money in legal research…..

In any event, I digress…….

I was simply shocked that the article inferred that there was no administrative or criminal legal recourse against Ms. Warder for her conduct in the trial. I clearly recall a Law and Order episode entitled “Under The Influence” that dealt with this issue. 

In this episode, Jack McCoy withheld the statement of a flight attendant whose testimony would have resulted in a lesser charge for person accused of murder by running over some people while drunk. He even encouraged her to leave the country during trial!   There was clear implication in the show that this was prosecutorial misconduct and sanctionable…. 

Jack gets off the hook but hey I love Law and Order, don’t you?

Jack McCoy is my idol.  Isn’t he yours?  I have every episode ever broadcast Tivo’d.  I am sure you do too.  I think I could have bypassed law school and just watched Jack McCoy prepare and try cases.  I would pass the bar and be the best trial attorney ever!  Isn’t that what you did?  I love Jack!  He wins the great majority of his cases, and certainly all his rape cases!  He withholds evidence from the defense and walks away without as much as a slap on the wrist!  He lies to witnesses and defendants and it is okay!  Jack makes inflammatory comments not supported by the evidence to the media and he is a hero for it!   His trial arguments are often emotional and not based on any evidence, but no one objects and he gets the conviction! 

Wait, there is a catch here.  Sam Waterston, who plays Jack McCoy, is an actor – not an attorney.  Sam Waterston, after committing all those terrible legal sins every episode, gets to go home to his wife and kids every night and read his script for his next episode.  

Does anything happen to Janice Warden for her legal sins which in my book are no less egregious twenty years later? 

Don’t get me wrong, I am not advocating some “absolution” for guy on the receiving end of the misconduct….. If you read the article, he is clearly a bad guy and contrary to popular believe the ends often due justify the means. 

What I am concerned about is the drunk driving rule which states for every time you get pulled over for drunk driving, you drove drunk up to 100 times without getting caught. (I can’t remember where I heard that) There has to be an innocent schmoe caught up in that math somewhere……

Maybe I am just naïve and Dallas Justice and justice everywhere is just like the Law and Order television show….

What am I missing here…..

Once again, the premise that attorneys have no sense of humor is proven. This time by a Houston attorney named, Mark Bennett who took some shots at me in his Criminal Defense Blog. It is ironic that I would argue that failure to service and/or communicate with the client is the most excusable in the criminal defense arena where it is about immediate results against huge consequences for a bad one…. If Mark gets me off on a murder rap, I certainly would overlook no returned calls…..

I must have really struck a nerve down there with my “I DON’T GIVE A SHIT BLOG or maybe it was my criticism of Rusty Hardin. Other than my comments about Rusty, (which I am sure he read and was traumatized to no end) I went back and looked at the ‘SHIT BLOG”. Maybe I was off base and should clarify, quantify, rectify and every other “fy” out there……. It really does not matter does it…? I am sure that other than obviously making Mr. Bennett uncomfortable, my little read thoughts will not have much effect on the state of attorney-client service in the State of Texas

I however I frankly think I am in a better position to opine on the subject than the Mark Bennetts of the world…. Why do you say? I say this because I can be more objective in that I am not beholding to any special interests…… What special interests do you ask? The largest legal special interest out there that 90 percent of attorney’s rely on to get their business…….. Other attorneys.

There is a warm blanket of honesty attached with not needing referral business as I am sure Mr. Bennett does……

Time to go get my bicycle hose out of the closet. Need to “self’ inflate” my reputation value….. I have no doubt Mr. Bennett uses one of those electric heavy duty ones to deal with his ego……

So you think that Blu Ray has won the one and only battle it will fight with the victory against HD DVD? Think again…. Round 2 has not yet been fought. There will not be as much at stake as the the battle just fought but it will be fought just the same.  How do I know this battle to be fought? It will be fought because there are more law students than lawyers in this country.

 The next battle will be the class action litigation against HD DVD player manufacturers. The first cannon shot has already been fired by Toshiba with their statement that there will be no refunds offered to those who have purchased soon to be obsolete HD DVD players. No rebates towards purchase of other products, zippo, zilch, nada…… Just a caveat emptor right in the kiester! I can not think of a quicker way to get sued than telling your customers with legitimate complaints to F***k off…… 

Nothing new here though. Without short sighted companies like Toshiba there would be no need for McDonalds coffee case taking Democrat plaintiff’s attorneys. The whole legal system would collapse……So let it be written…. So let it be done……

Attorneys are a lot like strippers. The world is all about our client until the bill is paid…..

I can across a post on a very well respected legal marketing blog called Legal Marketing Blog.com. The title of the blog was “How Convenient is it for Clients and Prospects to Reach You?”. The blog makes the common sense point that in pretty much any profession, the easier you are for your clients to access you the more goodwill you build resulting in greater client retention and referrals. Makes good sense right? Of course right!

What I found humorous was the attempt to lay out these principals to the legal profession. The proposition that attorneys will read this and change the way they do business was very intriguing to me and contradictory to what every legal bone in my body tells me after 20 years. In fact, there is about as much chance of that as there is any validity to my untested theory that I can go backwards in time by putting my auto up on cylinder blocks and going in reverse at full speed…

It is a time tested and well accepted position that 98 percent of attorneys don’t give a shit about who can get a hold of them and for the most part actually go to great lengths to keep people from getting a hold of them unless of course the person is calling about their unpaid bill or the call will generate a substantial billable rate. If the call will not generate a fee you have as much chance of talking to the attorney as Johnny Cochrane rising from the dead. Client goodwill is something only mused about in terms of what you could have done after the client has told you to F*** off and/or files a grievance with the State Bar. Not that you will learn anything when you send the next client’s call to voicemail.

The golden rule from what I have seen is that a client is just a means to an end with no form substance or history unless a payment is late or a trial is about to start…. Other than that all phone calls are unnecessary time wasting annoyances. Client service is for sales people. We attorneys are not sales people; we are highly educated and skilled professionals who are above client service small talk. You come to us for results, dog us when we don’t get them and forget about us after we come through. Doesn’t this justify the fact that I don’t give a shit about you the client? Right? Of course right!

I know solo and small firm attorney’s who have taken so many cases beyond their ability to provide client service that the only way you will get a hold of them is to impersonate a judge or an investigator from the State Bar of Texas. In my 20 years, there have been 4 times where I looked at a practice and predicted that an attorney would be sanctioned by the State Bar in some form within a few years. I was right each time. It was not rocket science in each case, the attorney absolutely did not give a shit about any of his clients other than getting a check. They avoided client calls, didn’t return calls, full voicemail’s etc etc. The ” if” was easy. It was only a question of when…..

Lawyers at large firms often don’t give a shit about their client any more than small or solo firms but they are able to do better damage control because they have people they pay to give a shit and to tell them when they’re not giving a shit is about to cost them money such as more work from the client or the referral of a new client.

Small firm and solo attorneys lose out the worst because they they don’t give a shit to the same extent as big firm attorneys but they generally do not have any “I don’t give a shit” damage control procedures in place. They therefore don’t find out that the “I don’t give a shit” philosophy has cost them until they are fired. They also get hit with the double “I don’t give a shit” whammy when they are fired and the client bad mouths them. Obviously referrals are not forthcoming from pissed off clients….

Large firms generally have enough “I don’t give shit” buffers in place that the client may never realize that his/her attorney does not give a shit.

In my experience, do you know what the solo and small firm response to this problem is? You guessed it….

“I don’t give a shit”

Are there excellent kick-ass client service oriented attorneys out there at small firms and large? Of course there are. I know many. There are however also a ton of attorneys out there. In my experience the “I don’t give shits” far outnumber the “kick ass” and they are not reading legal marketing blogs… Why? You guessed it!

THEY DONT GIVE A SHIT