Scoplaw

Trial

After a couple of weeks of not going to trial, we got another win, but this time we didn't need the jury, nor did we need MJOAs.  Instead we got a nolle pross during the state's direct. 

Here's how it happened; the state had a weak case.  The judge, no dummy, politely pointed out to the state how weak the case was and how she wasn't sure how the state had declared ready, and the state repeatedly announced that they were going forward in good faith, and explained how they thought they would do so.  So we let them. 

We picked a jury cautiously, but figured our real fight would be over a lack of state's evidence or the presence of too much reasonable doubt at MJOA1 or 2, respectively.  There was a possibility we might not even have to cross the officer, if things went as planned.  I did Voir Dire and a non-division CLI opened for us (and gave quite a good opening, refusing to be rattled when the state objected a few times).

Then the state called their first and only witness.  We didn't think the state could prove up their case by any of the theories/avenues that they tried to use when they were arguing their good faith basis to go forward in front of the judge earlier in the day.  So we were determined not to let the state's witness get in a word edgewise on any of those theories, and set to work objecting to just about everything that came out of the state's mouth.  I took the lead on that piece and the Mayor backed me up.  After running smack into the wall of Crawford/hearsay/relevance/403/improper predicate, the state tried to circle back and got hit with a lot of asked and answered/bolstering/relevance and so forth.  At the peak of this the state got visibly frustrated and totally lost her cool in front of the jury.  It didn't help when the officer she was directing started smirking and rolling his eyes at the fact she couldn't ask him any questions (which of course made it very hard not to laugh myself).  We must have had over 20 objections sustained - we certainly had a nice string of about 7 in a row.  Then there was one question where I really didn't have an objection and the officer looked at me, as if for permission to answer, before responding.  I think that was the high-water point for us.   

I don't know what the hell the jury thought of it - all the objections, two curatives, 2 statements stricken, the state being flat-out denied a request to go sidebar in response to one of the objections. . .  One of the CLIs who was watching said it was "a bloodbath."  The Mayor said I was like an AK-47.  (Which shows he's been paying attention - as I'm *so* much more an AK-47 than an M-16.)  It's apparently violent metaphor day.

Eventually it got so bad that in the middle of direct, the state went sidebar and asked to excuse the jury so we could "clear up some issues."  The court did so, and in the course of the ensuing argument the state finally backed down and announced a nolle pross. Which was about 10 hours after they should have done so, when the case was first called in the morning calendars.

Thing is, even if the case had been provable, I think we had a strong shot with a jury.  They seemed like a good bunch, and I loved our client's story.

Still, I do so love those cases where I can get some traction on evidentiary grounds, or through caselaw.  After a loong day of little traction beyond setting tons of cases for trial in the face of abysmal plea offers, it was so satisfying to just back the state into a corner and not let up.  And after we got our guy out, we found a bed for him and drove him off to it.  When I got back home I put on Big Country's King of Emotion and started jumping around my living room singing to it.  It's been that kind of day. 

Another 70-odd cases tomorrow, another trial day.  Wish me luck kids. 

Kevlar - Bullet/Road Proof Easters are Needed

Don't ride in Miami without Kevlar - I blew out a tire/tube cornering on Sheldon Bike.  Looks like I got some glass clean through the tire and tube this time. Took about a second - Ffft Ffft Ffft grumble grumble grind.  Thankfully I was upright and stayed so.

I was on a local library/pre-work set of errands so I walked home in short order.  On the way back I was tooted by a latino scooter-posse, replete with girlfriends in bikinis.  Such is life in Miami.  So I gave them the two fingers to the helmet salute and two of them cheered.  Are cyclists so unusual here?  Perhaps in these neighborhoods. 

I mean, my philosophy has always been, "Ride it like it's stolen."  But the number of tires/tubes I've been through is getting silly.  I run Kevlar on the Little Red Rocket and I've had two flats (snakebites in the Keys).  Hush, with her old touring Weinmanns and touring Kevlars hasn't had a single flat.  The Lotus (and now also Sheldon Bike) have more generic tires - and I've blown out the rear tube on the Lotus 2xs and now Sheldon Bike 1x. 

OK.  Off to change a tire, then change into trial prep mode.

Happy Easter to all those who celebrate it.  All in all, a much better holiday than Christmas, if only because it hasn't been commercialized.  Although I'm more of an Equinox-er than an Easter-er, I ate two eggs today in honor of Genesius of Rome and Columbkille.  And so the wheel of the seasons turns.

Sheldon Bike

This is how you recycle a Peugeot wanna-be-fixed gear.  First of all you take off the wheels with the beach cruiser hub (which can't brake for a damn).  Then you hammer apart all the stuck components, imagining you are wielding said hammer against your least favorite prosecutor.  Soon, you'll be down to a bare frame, well - a frame wrapped up in electrical tape, because, that's like, you know, cool.      

Sheldon Bike's been crashed once before - the handlebars are a loss.  Probably someone wanted "fixed cool" without knowing how to ride one, then promptly rode their sluggishly breaking looks-like-a-fixed bike into something.  These are the kind of people who buy fixed gears off craig's list then start talking about their "fixies," as though they even knew the word a few months prior.

The hardest part was getting the electrical tape off, then the goo the tape left, then sanding down the bike so that it didn't look ridged from where the paint had been eaten away by said tape goo.  Simple Green and steel wool answered nicely.  I should have taken pictures, but I was cursing.

Instead of refinishing Sheldon Bike, I decided to let all the chips and scrapes stand for themselves.  I hit the entire frame with a coat of clear spray paint.  And then thought of taking pictures for the blog. Clicking on any of these will get you a larger picture.

I'm always amazed at the beauty of frame geometry.  This particular Peugeot is an 80s model - middle of the line, I think, judging from the frame features.  It's welded, not brazed, so there are no external lugs, and the seat post is some weird non-standard Frenchified 24mm thing.  Shims, be with me.  All in all, it's a clean looking bike, and, because I'm not doing any elite level racing, I'm sure as hell not going to be bothered by a few extra grams.

Here are some of the stripped and scraped bits on the tubes.  The blue lion decals survived though, which is nice (and personally amusing, as anyone who has seen my tattoos can attest to.)  I'm not sure what kind of person put her together in her older mode, but I'm sure she came by these scars honorably, as only French bikes can.  Note the ridges from the dipshit tape job: 

The next step was stripping the paint off the chrome fork and fitting the headset. 

A junked Fuji, found at the Miami Rescue Mission for $10, donated some bearings, a quill stem, some nice retro 1970s steel handlebars, and a pair of diacompe breaks with secondary levers. 

Next, the cranks, wheels, and chain.  I kept the cranks I found on Sheldon Bike - midlevel Suntour.  I added some fixed wheels I have around (came across a set for next to nothing awhile ago - and I'm relative good at picking up stuff I know I'll later use.  Want creates awareness.)  I did a ghetto fixed version with this guy, shifting around the big and small rings and essentially using the small ring as a spacer.  The chain-line is perfect, both in terms of angle and tension and chain fit into these old rings.  At this point all the hard work is done.

Last step is all the small stuff: seatpost (shims!) a saddle, a front brake, pedals, removing the unwanted break lever, and a final cleaning.   I tend to grease liberally as I build, so it's always a good idea to revisit the bike with the cleaner again after everything else is done. 

I had to get out some esoteric tools on this one, plus do a bit of filing to get the quill stem to fit the fork.  Chewed up about 6 hours of my time and $50 for odds and ends.  It's a good occupation for the hands - frankly I'd go nuts if I wasn't able to make/fix something and had to do book/brain work all the time.  And it keeps me from infecting my friends with my gruesomeness.  Which is getting better.

I took her out for a test spin - she handles beautifully.  She rides big and smooth like Hush, but is snappy on the corners.  The short Suntour cranks make me a bit less paranoid about pedal-strike, which is still a problem on the Lotus.  If it wasn't so wet, and if I weren't so weary, I'd go for a longer break-in ride, because I'm curious about how'd she do on my Miami Beach cycling circle.  While I'm feeling better, I'd rather not risk a setback by pushing myself too hard right now.

I particularly like the small steel handlebars.  They make her a bit front-heavy for a fixed, but with the Miami roadways I'm not going to be hitting many hills.  (I miss Lumina (she's in CT) for her lightness and all around ease in hillier terrain.)

The "Final" Sheldon Bike, with headlamp, posing in front of the Mighty Sage (and rock garden).

And this is a very tired, greasy, but hopefully healing Scoplaw, on said Scoplaw's very comfy couch, the other end of which is being held down by El Gato Perfecto, who provided bike building supervising efforts:

I think I'm going to finish cleaning the apt., open a bottle of wine, resume a conversation with Riposte, finish off my latest book (Joseph Campbell) and then maybe watch an 80s film.  I was listening to the Psychedelic Furs live version of Pretty in Pink at some point when I was working.   Hence the desire for some 80s high school drama - but not my own.   I also have Howl's Moving Castle from netflix, so it's a tossup.

Damn it.

Sheldon Brown died. 

Sheldon was a man who rode bicycles.  A lot.  And thought.  A lot.  And decided to share what he knew.  On an epic scale - with no renumeration but your satisfied curiosity.

I'm not sure how one can possibly measure the number of people Sheldon was a virtual mentor for - nor the number of people who were encouraged to fix a bike, get on it, and in so doing, slowly begin to realize a vision of what our world could be - how we could live healthier, less wasteful, more aware and creative lives. I like to think the here and now is enough - that one must not need to be purchasing something in preparation for, jetting off, driving toward elsewhere to live.  And if Sheldon stood for anything, it was the counter principal; build, ride, live, right now.  And that seems to be something that people realize.

I'm currently working on a Pugeot fixed gear, frame found on the side of the road.   It may be a gift bike, or a loaner for anyone who visits.  Her name is Sheldon. 

Go, Read, Learn

PD awesomeness.

Working in the Background

I'm hopeful I'll finally be able to shake this whatever-it-is I've been carrying around.  I keep trying to kick it out and it won't go past the door-sill.  Grr.  Uninvited guests are usually a joy.  This one ain't. 

A lot of the background work I've been putting into the division has paid off in expected ways - which then pays off in unexpected ways.  I thought I'd have to cancel yet another doctor's appointment when the State continued their pattern of nolle pross or CTS on our trail cases, enabling me to get some more (and more potent) western medicine.  I'm not sure the last case we had which involved further jail time/additional terms for anyone.  I mean, we've had them, but just not in the past few weeks.  For us (as a division) "a few weeks" means about 100 cases set for trial. 

I passed on what sounded like a very fun trip to Savannah, GA with friends.  Besides coughing in the car with them for 10 hours (ack!), I've a few housekeeping things to catch up on, not to mention some trial prep.  (I snapped a great pic of The Mayor with our stack of cases - it was about 1.5 feet deep on his desk.)  We must be ready on everything we must be ready on, of course.  This week features some charges I haven't seen before, some interesting issues, and a handful of cases that, if not dropped, must go to trial for different structural reasons.  So I'm fairly confident that I'll be in front of a jury on Mon, Tues, Wed, and Thurs.  Unless of course, the state crumbles.  Which happens. 

Some of you may have read about the massive budget problems the FL judiciary is facing, resulting in threatened lay-offs.  I think my job is fairly secure, but in any event I'm not worried.  One thing I do well is land on my feet and go on.  And to be honest, I haven't really spent all that much time thinking about it, except for a few seconds of very non-emotional "huh - well, I guess I'd have to do X, Y, Z."

**

It's good Friday, which means I have the day off.  Yea!

And it certainly looks like an awesome and breezy day outside in my tropical city.  I got a wedding invite recently for cousins who are getting hitched down in the D.R. which will be fun.  I'm not saying Miami has jaded me, but the weather above our palm trees is *so* consistently amazing down here that the thought of the D.R. is kind of ho-hum. 

I have to wonder how much the fact that I love my job, despite the chronic overworkedness, comes from a) our success for our clients, b) the awesome weather and sunlight, c) the ability to bicycle at any point  in the day/week/year without massive prep work, d) the amazing people I work with.  I mean, I don't want to imply that I don't inherently love what I'm fortunate enough to be paid to do.  Because I do.  But I could see it getting to me if I were slush-bound, in low-lit dark weather, jury/voir-dire-less, and/or working with a bunch of disengaged self-absorbed would-be litigators.  Which I understand happens in places.  The Mayor and I talk about this a lot - he's from Uruguay, I'm from New England, so we both understand real seasons.   

I think I'm going to go goof off for a bit.  Buy a cigar.  Have an aguapanela or a cuban coffee, a couple of pastelitos de guayaba.   Walk around in Little Havana for a bit listening to a new set of Skatalites songs.  Stop in a cafe and work on some poetry.  Maybe catch dinner/whiskey later with The Mayor. 

I'll stop by the office at some point and get a few things done in there as well, probably with the window open. 

Hmm.  Sounds like a plan.  See y'all soon.

Notes

Observation:  if you are part of a crew of prostitutes, perhaps it would be not a very fine idea to show up (with friends) dressed as prostitutes in support of your friend who is charged with prostitution - let alone it not being a fine idea to attempt to keep the friend's spirits up by giggling and waving from the gallery towards the box. 

For if you were to do so, you just might run the risk of being recognized by a detective there to be a witness on that case, and, if you (and all your friends) have *open* bench warrants, you might then be arrested by armed officers, even though one of you tries to hide under the court pews themselves.  And then there's the possible contempt charges.   It's a long hypothetical, but my days are filled with them.

Yep.  Just sayin is all.

Yep. 

And in the vein of just sayin, trying to hide under a bench. . .

**

Dialog of the Day:

I was interviewing a client in jail when Corrections trooped a bunch of clients from earlier in the day past the cell the client and I were in.  I get a chorus of "Hey - he's great!  Do whatever he tells you to!  You're in good hands!"

Client being interviewed:  That's pretty cool, but if you were all that good they'd be out of jail right now, right?
Scoplaw:  You're a smart man.  I can see we're going to work well together on your case.

**

Tues/Wed is generally our busiest stretch of the week.  Especially if we're in trial on Tues. from a case that rolled over from Mon.  The long and short of it is that the week looks like this: Sunday - 4hrs; Monday - 12hrs (15 if trial); Tues - 15hrs (same if trial); Wed  - 12hrs (15 if trial); Thurs - 9hrs (15 if trial); Fri 8hrs. 

Thurs (without trial) and Friday are more leisurely, even in court - we take breaks, get to eat lunch.  When we leave on those days, we can even sort of generally goof off for some of the remaining hours if we finish court super early (like at noon).  It's almost like being on vacation, and we, of course, do not hesitate to go out to lunch if the opportunity arises, given that we've usually logged 40 hours on the week already.    

However, we always crunch from Mon 6am to at least Wed 5pm, even if the state kills all the trial cases by making offers our clients can't refuse or nolle prossing cases. 

I write this because we picked up a new trial partner on Monday, and I am just flat out impressed.  The Lioness got flung into that thick schedule and didn't blink; she was there, was engaged, and really got some gold nuggets for us throughout her first days, which I certainly just spent learning the ropes. 

Now I've worked with some really good people, and I certainly don't want to seem to take anything away from them by comparison.  Since I've started, 3 of my full-time and more Sr. trial partners have moved on, either laterally or through promotions.  The most Sr. trial partner (when I just started) is now doing felony cases with my old felony "mentor."  Another is in Juvie, while another will be in a different county court non-jail division.  All of them were great to work with, and I learned from each of them.   

I've also gone to trial with 3 other attorneys who jumped on cases, and almost went (heavy prep) with two more.  Mostly though, I've been to trial with The Mayor - I honestly don't know how many times, largely do to a string of sicknesses/vacations with the other trial partners of the moment.  The Mayor and I work so very well together, there's no need for in-depth discussion about *how* we do things - we just talk about the case/motions and do them.  And we've had a lot of successes, in no small part due to our complimentary styles. 

One of the patterns that seems to work is that I'll do pre-trial motions then Voir Dire, The Mayor will open and cross the major witness/victim, I'll cross the minor witnesses and do MJOAs/Jury Instructions, and the Mayor will close.  Though if we do it the opposite way, it also works well enough.  (Basically it seems to make sense to have the major witness cross paired up with the close - otherwise we kind of flip-flop the pieces to keep us fresh, the jury interested, and the work spread out.  And, depending on the case, if we do our jobs very well, there is no close - we win at MJOA1 or 2.) 

So, given that I'm used to only going to trial with the same people since last November, it was kind of weird prepping with a new partner at 8pm, after a day which featured us calling cases at 8am.  "I do things this way - how do you like to do them?" isn't something I'm real used to saying, let alone as I'm trying to crunch through 30 odd cases set for trial.  Let alone to someone who is absorbing a massive amount of information on the fly and should have by any right been absolutely overwhelmed. 

But she did absolutely fantastic both with the prep, learning the ropes on all our "regular" cases, and handling anything we just threw at her. 

The irony of course, is that she's due for vacation, so it will be The Mayor and I going yet again to trial tomorrow.  Not that I mind as I love the man dearly and completely trust him.  Still, I admit I got pretty excited over our new partner - and it would have been particularly good to go with her on a few of our new cases, given the facts, her interests and experience, and the ideas she came up with on the fly.  Soon enough though I think.      

Random Senses of Arrival

Discussing Uribe with a quite-gorgeous 6ft-plus-tall red-headed Scandinavian political-science professor over avocado and arrugula.  One so-seldom gets to write such things.   
Having the State nolle pross or offer CTS on all of our divisions trial cases.  Almost like they were scared to go to trial.  Heh.
Introducing a dear friend to Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter and other random cultural goodies - and not infecting her with the plague.
Watching the State implode (bad faith violations/misrepresentations to the court) to the point where we flat-out manhandled a Richardson hearing into a nolle pross.
4 unexpected weekend phonecalls from old friends - none more northerly than the Carolinas.
Actual moments of unexpected just-nothing-happening which feels surprisingly like boredom.
Still being sick.
Spending a night reading poetry aloud. 
Being totally unphased (but still confused) when a slightly-something inmate started screaming at me, "You're a fucking vampire!" over and over. 
Cresting over the eleven-hundred client mark.  That's in 200 days here.   
Hearing nice things about my rep. and practice from strangers via strangers.

** 

I am filled with an increasing conviction that I have space to make things happen now.  I'm not sure why I have this sense of "yeah, I can handle it" pushing-everything-backness. 

Perhaps it's a feeling that our division is back to full strength with the addition of our new cracker-jack trial partner (it's now me, The Mayor, and our new Lioness, which drops us under 200 cases per person for the first time in a couple of months).  Perhaps it's now that I'm most Sr. attorney in our division, on either side of the aisle.  (We burn through 'em fast, and my "status" is purely nominal and measured only in weeks - but it's pretty cool to have been able to implement a plan, remake a division, and start bringing people into that plan.)  Perhaps I'm thinking creatively about the law again; enough recent arguments have stuck at trial to, I hope, give the state pause.  But beyond that, I feel I'm again starting to braid interesting ideas together strategically and am once again getting aggressive with the state. 

While I can still grow (tons! obviously!) as an attorney - I feel less "rushed" about it.  I don't mean that to sound lazy, but rather that I feel I am actually working on growing *now,* instead of being caught in the mad rush of clients, cases and trials, all-the-while hoping that "someday" I'll be able to start making legal headway. 

And what to do with my increasing amount of "free" time?  I think it's time to resuscitate my cooking and finish off a long lingering poetry project. 

Of course, this could all just be the cold medicine talking.

In News of the Weird

a prosecutor asked me if he could read my hallway interview notes with the officers from our impending (as in one hour away) trial case, because, you know, it was really busy this morning and he didn't have a chance to talk with his own witnesses on this case he'd, like, declared ready on, and which were were about to, you know, pick a jury for.

No.  I am not shitting you dear readers.  And to keep in the world of profane colloquialisms, my proper response should have been, "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Instead I settled for, "No." 

I mean really, these are the state attorneys I work with.  And usually I try (as you might notice from the dryness of the blog) not to talk too much about the job for various reasons of professional courtesy and client confidentiality.  But come on.  While I could probably curl the hair of the average reader with bathotic tales of incarcerated men, women, and the state attorneys who seek to keep them locked in little metal cages, I'd rather the blog not become blindly reflexive.  However, there are some high water marks that should be noted. 

In general, it was a banner day - even with the alleged indecent exposure (inmate to corrections), the usual family member drama ("Whoa, that "perjury" thing sounds pretty bad. . ."), a separate alleged act of inmate/inmate fellatio in the holding cell ("Our Lady of Purell, protect us". . ./I wiped my shoes well after conveying pleas in there this afternoon, I tell you), the general chaos of a trial day with Russian, Creole, Spanish, and English being bandied around the courtroom, the mental health clients, the regular clients who probably should have been mental health clients, and an infestation of jailhouse lawyers resulting in one person having an absolute conniption (Injustice!  Conspiracy!  I will Kill You ALL!) when his case was legitimately court continued on good grounds for an entire week later (but still within his artificial speedy trial period), well, I still think that the State Attorney asking for my notes so he could evaluate his own case was the oddest thing I dealt with that day.

Odd, because when I said "no" he got very angry and, before huffing off to pout, direly informed me that keeping his good will was the most important thing I could do as an attorney.  Never mind that this guy has never won a case against us, yet offers the *most* ungenerous pleas of all our State attorneys.  Never mind that this guy has never won a case against us and nolle prossess the *vast* majority of the cases he brings to trial day.  Never mind that this guy can't figure out that being offered professional courtesy and/or common politeness is not the same as earning any kind of respect via showing, in action, one's personal integrity through exercise of discretion (as several of his fellows have). . .  Oh, and then there's that kind of subtle argument that he's asking me to turn over work product prepared in the defense of my client! - so he can do what with it? decide if he wants to keep going  in his quest to lock my client in a little metal box for six months?

It's so perplexing I rely on the reaction of a far more experienced attorney/friend of mine had when she heard about this (and not from me!): "Oh my.  Oh my.  Well, that will be so embarrassing for him.  Someday.  Possibly.  I mean, if he ever understands how embarrassing that is.  Which seems unlikely, given that he did that.  Oh my."

So, anyway, more craziness updates as we get them.

Even Though

this blog's author is not one of the Hard Drinking Librarians (tm) of which the Scoplaw was a founding member back in our days of yore, I think they make the cut.  Therefore, the link.  Which is both recommendation and referral.