Fall, or, Dodge in Hell -- The Case for Mortality

Suppose money were no object: Would you declare in your will that, upon your death, every effort should be made to preserve your body, and, when technology improves, the best reasonable effort should be made to revive you? If you answered in the affirmative, read Neal Stephenson’s Fall or, Dodge in Hell. It just might change your mind.
Richard “Dodge” Forthrast made such a will. When he died abruptly, his body was preserved. Years later, when the time and technology were ripe, his brain was copied, one axon at a time preserved digitally and...
August 8, 2019

El Paso and White Supremacism -- Not So Fast

We live in dangerous times, and it won’t take much to destroy the accomplishments of generations. This much is clear after the mass shootings last week in El Paso, Texas. Twenty people were killed, and 26 more wounded, by a young white male. It was an act of domestic terrorism by a white supremacist, people were quick to assert.
Not so fast.
Although police are still investigating, the narrative arising from the killing is clear enough. Twenty-one-year-old Patrick Crusius of Allen, Texas, is suspected of driving 10 hours from his home to El Paso, tucked along the border with...
August 4, 2019

How Do You Defend Those People?

How do you represent those people?
The question is common enough for criminal defense lawyers. In the past few weeks, I’ve received variants of the question scores of times. You see, I represent Fotis Dulos, a man suspected in the disappearance of his estranged wife, and the mother of his five children, Jennifer Dulos.
As if that weren’t bad enough, I also represent Alex Jones, the owner of Infowars, a man sued for denying, years ago, that that Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings took place.
Why would I choose to...
June 28, 2019

Can The First Amendment Harness Facebook?

Let me put my cards out on the table: I represent Alex Jones and Infowars. I despise efforts to silence him because his speech discomfits the self-righteous. And I regard Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg as clear and present dangers to the right to speak freely.
If any of this offends you, move on.
If you’re interested in helping to conceptualize litigation against Facebook, read on.
Last week, Facebook “de-platformed” Jones and Infowars, and several others. The social media behemoth promised to do likewise to anyone who...
May 15, 2019

Alex Jones Speaks Out

May 3, 2019
Editor's Note: The New York Times, Boston Globe and Wall Street Journal won't publish this piece by my client, Alex Jones. Yet they will run...

Yuval Noah Harari's Dismal Nihilism

February 17, 2019
Yuval Noah Harari is an Israeli historian with a love for the long view, as in where did we, as a species, come from, the topic of his...

A Police Shooting In Hamden

April 21, 2019

The City of Hamden was rocked this week by protestors angry about the shooting of a young woman, Stephanie Washington, by a...

To Facebook, Or Not To Facebook, That Is The Question

January 3, 2019
I like to say the following to folks after one of my all-too-frequent displays of bad temper: “I’m sorry. I’m in AA. That outburst...

Gov. Lamont's Disastrous Tax On Legal Services

February 20, 2019
Gov. Ned Lamont lives in a bubble, and that bubble is impenetrable. I know this because he was once a potential juror on a criminal case...

Build The Damn Wall, Already

February 20, 2019
I suppose it was inevitable that Connecticut’s Attorney General would sign on to California’s federal lawsuit seeking to block president...

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Taking Back the Courts
Norm Pattis Taking Back the Courts

The Wizard of Oz was one of my favorites movies as a kid. Little did I know judges were so much like the wizard, hiding behind empty trappings of power. This book tells you things you need to know about what really goes on in court. Read it, weep, and then demand that the courts do better.

In the Trenches
Norm Pattis In the Trenches

Plenty of lawyers write about the law, but few who write try cases. Judge for yourself whether I talk the talk and walk the walk in this collection of occasional essays about life in the law's trenches.

Juries and Justice
Norm Pattis Juries and Justice

How prepared are you to take seriously the notion that 'we the people' are, in fact, sovereign? Discover the secret, and unused, power of jurors. 'Ask why; then nullify.'

Norm Pattis

About Norm

Norm Pattis is a Connecticut based trial lawyer focused on high stakes criminal cases and civil right violations. He is a veteran of more than 150 jury trials, many resulting in acquittals for people charged with serious crimes, multi-million dollar civil rights and discrimination verdicts, and scores of cases favorably settled.

© Norm Pattis is represented by Elite Lawyer Management, managing agents for Exceptional American Lawyers
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