I wasn't on the New Haven jury that convicted Angelo Reyes of arson and conspiracy charges. But I know a thing or two about Mr. Reyes, having represented him in federal court on other arson charges before federal prosecutors engineered a conflict to get me thrown off the case: They threatened to call another client of mine as a witness.
Lawyers can't serve two masters; we owe to each client a duty of undivided loyalty. Although the feds never called my other client against Mr. Reyes, their claim that they might was enough to get me bounced off the case.
My former partner and...
October 14, 2014
Juries are fickle, especially in civil cases, where we give them the right and the power to award money in the form of compensatory damages, and, in rare cases, to assess punitive damages. Money becomes a proxy for justice. Yet standing in well of a civil court asking for money always reminds me of Jesus chasing the moneychangers from the Temple.
“The Scriptures declare,” Jesus said, “‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves!”
In the United States, civil litigants operate under what is known as...
October 9, 2014
"Do you think anyone should go to jail?" The speaker, a youngish FBI agent, looked at me with the same devilish grin I had seen on his face any number of times. He was once the lead agent when a client of mine, a lawyer, was in federal jeopardy. We argued the government to a standstill in that case. My client was never indicted.
I had to stop to think about his question for a moment.
"As a matter of fact, I don't think many people should go to jail, and those who do go shouldn't stay as long as they do. I'll never understand your passion for putting people in concrete boxes," I...
October 2, 2014
“Everybody talks,” the prosecutor said. He was confident, strutting his stuff in the well of the court. “In the end, everyone talks,” he said again.
I felt as though I were watching a bad version of Inspector Javert, from Victor Hugo’s “Les Miserables,” a minister of justice undone, in the end, by the injustice of what the law requires.
The prosecutor was trying to explain to a jury why it should take the word of the state’s star witness, a man I called “No Way Jose” in closing arguments, against my...
September 30, 2014
September 28, 2014
Somehow, the prospect of John Rowland's returning to a federal prison does not make me all warm, fuzzy and grateful to be living in this, the best of...
September 25, 2014
A future historian might one day write the following of our time:
“Despite a generally permissive culture in which sexually suggestive...
September 19, 2014
There’s a cold logic in refusing to pay ransom to terrorists: Holding a firm line may well serve as a deterrent to further acts of terror....
September 19, 2014
Editor's Note: John Rowland was convicted today after scarcely any deliberations at all.
Why don’t jurors get a pause button, or some...
September 18, 2014
During the past year, I've been surprised by the number of times jurors have requested read backs of testimony they just heard only a few days...
September 13, 2014
Folks are sometimes surprised to see a black anarchist’s flag hanging in the corner of my law office. “Aren’t you a lawyer?,”...