If you live in Minnesota, it’s almost impossible to avoid the trial of Amy Senser in the media. She is the wife of a former NFL Viking player and has been charged with several counts stemming from an incident where she exited the freeway and struck a man, Mr. Phanthavong, killing him. He was on the side of …
You’ve probably followed the tragic story from Sanford, Florida where George Zimmerman fatally shot Trayvon Martin over some disagreement. There were no witnesses, other than the victim and Mr. Zimmerman, and the only evidence is the 911 recordings and Mr. Z’s version.
It appears that Mr. Zimmerman was a local “watch captain” carrying a gun, who thought Trayvon …
The former governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich was sentenced to 14 years in prison in federal court in Chicago and afterward quoted Rudyard Kipling: “…if you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two impostors just the same…” He vowed to fight and not let the next 12+ years in prison get him down.
Give me …
How can it be that when someone is accused of a crime, they always seem to be released from custody while they wait for their trial.
Instead of the judge holding them in custody, they get released into the community on bail.
What’s going on?
In Minnesota, as in other states, the state constitution in the Bill of …
Why would a criminal defendant choose to represent himself rather than have a lawyer?
The Constitution and the Supreme Court have given every accused person in the U.S. the right to be represented by a lawyer. If he can’t afford one, there is a public defender system in every state to provide lawyers.
In over thirty years working …
Many people I talk with assume that if a defense lawyer costs a lot, he can “get anyone off.” Maybe–
Let’s look at some more techniques that defense lawyers use to win in trial beyond what I’ve already posted:
2. Defense lawyers exploit the evidentiary problems of the prosecutor.
Let’s look at a case I tried several years …
I’ve posted about prosecutors and how they might win/lose cases but what about defense lawyers? Do defense lawyers have tricks or are they so good ts “misleading” the jury that they can win all the time?
It’s important to remember that a trial is not about proving innocence. At the end of a trial, the jury is instructed …
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