I’m really grateful that I’m a lawyer. Law, I suppose, is a calling. I think that I’ve always been a lawyer. Really, even when I was a little kid I was arguing, defending, and figuring out the rules at home or at school.
I started out in the DA’s office. A great place to work and learn. Some people stay there for their entire careers. For me, I just had to be representing individuals. So, I stayed long enough to learn the basics and then went into practice.
Criminal Defense, in my view, is the very highest calling of the profession. Certainly there are lawyers who make more money, but those of us who practice criminal law fight for the important principles of the Constitution and individual rights every day. And, it is being in the front line of that battle that produces the professional excitement of going to court.
I am inevitably asked whether I ever represent guilty clients and if so how I can do that. Let me be clear, almost all of my clients are guilty. (Once in a while I have an innocent client.) The question is: can the government legally and Constitutionally amass admissible evidence to prove their case, and if so, how can the consequences of that case be mitigated for the individual that is the target of the prosecution. I can do it because protecting the rights of the guilty protects the rights of the innocent.
