The perfect witness who won't testify

[RivkahChaya]

You have to remember how big the US is, and laws vary from state to state. There are lawyers who specialize in (US) constitutional law, or practice in federal courts, but generally, someone will be admitted to the bar in just one or two, usually adjoining states. The exception might be lawyers who specialize in something like death penalty appeals, who might be admitted to the bar in Texas and Florida, the states with the most death penalty cases.

Now, someone admitted to the bar in Indiana, who then runs for congress, and wins, is going to end up spending most of his time in Washington, DC. Unless he wants to take time to learn about the law in DC, Virginia, or Maryland, and be admitted to the bar in one of those places, he is going to have a very hard time practicing law in Indiana, and legislating in Washington.

This doesn't mean that he would not serve as a consultant for an old client, say if someone he previously represented in Indiana many years ago has his case taken up by the Innocence Project, and is granted a new trial. He might fly back to Indiana for a week to spend time with the person's new lawyer, handing over all his paperwork and other data on the case, and going over it.

Even if a person is serving in an office in state, though, he may not spend a lot of time in jurisdiction. If someone has a practice in New York City, but is elected to state legislature, and has to be in Albany all the time, he can't keep up with his practice in NYC. And even a mayor of a very small city is going to work too many hours a week to continue a practice.

The only elected job I can think of in direct conflict with being a defense attorney is sheriff, but I really can't see a former criminal defense attorney running for sheriff, and winning.

Now, there are other kinds of lawyers-- patent attorneys, estate planners, and they probably occasionally do things on the side, especially as favors for people, or give advice, and this might mean they have to recuse themselves from legislative votes, but sometimes that happens because of past interests as well. If you were the patent attorney for a drug company, you need to be separate from all previous interests, including selling stock that may have been a perk, if you want the appearance of impartiality when there is some kind of vote coming up involving drug companies and patents. I don't know that there is a law that says you have to, but you don't want your opponent in the next election accusing you of being in the pocket of your former employer.

I'm not sure what your MPs are doing, but it sounds like something not possible logistically, just because of geography, in the US.

[Robert]

Hi Bridewell

Ha, well of course the MPs have always arranged things to suit themselves. Those graveyard late sittings that women MPs so compained about, were originally the outcome of barrister MPs' desire to do their court business in the earlier part of the day, before toddling off to Westminster to make their learned and precious political contributions. And we should be grateful, I say.

Of couse, if they'd put just a bit more time into their MP work, the survivors of the arctic runs might not still be waiting to be awarded a medal 70 years later.

[Robert]

Hi Riv

Well, take someone like Hilary Clinton. She has now stepped down from her job with the President, or will soon do so. I'm just wondering, once she has retired from politics, will she go back to the courts? She's a well-known figure. People must have a view on her, and that must colour their thinking if they're jurors.

After all, if a newscaster is heard off-camera making some political remark, he might have to resign, because he's supposed to act as a transparent lens for the news.Once his own personality gets involved, it's all kaput.

[RivkahChaya]

Well, take someone like Hilary Clinton. She has now stepped down from her job with the President, or will soon do so.

I doubt it, because she hasn't been a practicing attorney for a long time, and I don't know that she was ever a trial lawyer. The reasons she has for resigning probably would prevent her from undertaking something stressful like being a trial lawyer.

After all, if a newscaster is heard off-camera making some political remark, he might have to resign, because he's supposed to act as a transparent lens for the news.Once his own personality gets involved, it's all kaput.

Well, not quite. If a newscaster makes an offensive remark he can get into a lot of trouble, but just making a polemic remark doesn't matter. A lot of newscasters' biases are known. It may be different in the UK, that I can't speak to, but my grandfather was a newspaper reporter during the depression, and there was plenty of activist journalism then.

[Robert]

Oh, over here if they were having a show about the General Election, and the newscaster said "the polls have closed, now the counting begins," and then as he finished his news report we heard him say to someone "Let's hope the tories won" or something like that, I'm pretty sure he'd be sacked or shifted.

It's different with newspapers, because everyone knows that newspapers slant the news. With TV (at least in the UK) news services like BBC news are supposed to be impartial (though many, including me, think that's a joke).

I suppose over there all your TV news is private so it's a question of who the owners are.

[RivkahChaya]

I suppose over there all your TV news is private so it's a question of who the owners are.

Ah. I see what you mean.

Since news shows are business, even on a supposedly impartial show, like one of the broadcast shows, if that happened, and a popular news anchor got caught on film saying that, it's doubtful that someone who drew ratings would get fired. The cameraman who didn't stop filming on time, or the editor who screwed up the five-second delay would be the one to get fired, and ABC or CBS, or whoever, would issue a press release saying that the guy was making a joke, or telling a story, and people heard only the first half of it, and didn't understand the context.

[Robert]

Well I don't see how they could keep him unless they made excuses as you suggest. The public know that their newscasters have their own opinions on politics, but they put that to the back of their minds when watching the news - just as long as they don't know what the newscasters' opinions actually are. That makes all the difference.

I imagine that none of the newscasters even write the stuff that they read out. I think their political leanings should still be kept hidden away.

Over here a few years ago the newscasters started interviewing people during the bulletins.They'd read out some item about the economy and then question a government spokesman sitting next to them in the studio. I think that's a mistake. The newscaster shouldn't get involved in that stuff.

[RivkahChaya]

Well I don't see how they could keep him unless they made excuses as you suggest.

News is business here. It's all about ratings. US news programs haven't really consisted of an anchor sitting at a desk reporting, with occasional still photos, or field clips, since the early 1980s. We don't have Walter Cronkites anymore.

If news programs thought that what an anchor, or other reporter, had done was so bad it would cause a severe ratings drop, then the person would be fired, but losing a familiar face, no matter what the person has done, generally is worse for ratings, and ratings are needed to sell commercial time.

I don't think Americans have any illusions about unbiased sources of news; they just have opinions about which biases are correct, and want the news with the correct bias, if that makes sense.

Now, if a camera caught Jon Stewart saying he wishes he could have voted for Mitt Romney more than once, and Comedy Central couldn't spin it as a joke, and later it turned out that Stewart was a closet Republican, yes, he would probably get fired. But that's because The Daily Show viewers would stop watching, and the rating would go through the floor.

[hkev]

Interesting article in this mornings "I" newspaper.
Tonight's Dispatches TV show has footage of a senior British rabbi telling a victim of child sex abuse not to go to the police.
He tells the alleged victim that it was "mesira", or forbidden, to report a suspected Jewish sex offender to a non-Jewish authority.

Dispatches - Channel 4 - 10:30

Very interesting in light of Robert Anderson's comments ?

[RivkahChaya]

Interesting article in this mornings "I" newspaper.
Tonight's Dispatches TV show has footage of a senior British rabbi telling a victim of child sex abuse not to go to the police.
He tells the alleged victim that it was "mesira", or forbidden, to report a suspected Jewish sex offender to a non-Jewish authority.

Dispatches - Channel 4 - 10:30

Very interesting in light of Robert Anderson's comments ?

That only applies to certain crimes, and I have never heard of murder being one of them, and in any case, this was not turning over the suspect. "Mesira" literally means "delivery," and refers to delivering, or turning over, the suspect, not offering testimony. It doesn't mean "forbidden," either, the rabbi was just stating that "mesira" is forbidden.

When someone in an Orthodox community suspects someone of something, the procedure is to go to the rabbinate, and then the rabbinate will contact the police if they deem it necessary.

I don't know anything about this particular case, or why it was deemed unnecessary. I don't know whether the rabbis thought the evidence wasn't good enough, or they planned to punish the person themselves. It may be that the rabbis were going to use members of the community to make sure the person was never again alone with a child, and this way spare the person the loss of his livelihood, which could have happened if he were convicted of a sex offense. I don't know anything about the case, so I really have no idea.

I don't like the rabbis doing this, but such is the life in an Orthodox community.

I don't know off-hand the range of offenses to which mesira applies; it will probably vary a little by country, but it hasn't included murder. You will find situations in history where the larger country didn't want to have anything to do with the Jews, and were only interested in prosecuting them for murder of a gentile, business fraud where gentiles are victims, and sedition. The rabbinical courts dealt with all other crimes, including murder of another Jew.