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Just Ask if They Have Delivery
A huge portion of my cases begin with a routine traffic stop. The single best thing you can do to avoid police contact is obey every single traffic law. At least half of what you do in your car is...
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Drive-By Lawyering
Since I started doing juvie, I sometimes find myself rehearsing my legal advice in my car on the way to work. My seven-mile drive gives me precisely the amount of time that I have to advise my clients...
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Because You’re Next: Why Everyone Needs to Worry About Stop and Frisk
The surest way for those in authority to mask racism is for them to say that they “don’t see race” or that they are “colorblind” to race. To quell any doubts, they find one or two members of the group...
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Profiles in Happenstance
Chasing Truth, Catching Hell turns one year old today. A surprising amount has happened since then; my cathartic creative writing project is now featured on the ABA Journal’s “blawg” roll and has...
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An Afternoon With Judge Goodhair
Seven police officers sat behind me as I questioned one of their colleagues in Judge Goodhair’s courtroom. Witnesses in a case are normally excluded from the courtroom when another witness is...
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Murderer’s Privilege (An Attempt at Mostly Fiction)
The heavy steel door latched shut with the tiniest of clicks just before the jail guard walked away. My seat was round and about as large as a personal pizza. My left buttock tingled and then drifted...
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The Thin Blue Curtain
Dozens of cars whooshed over my head every second; I first heard the engine, followed by thunks of axles bumping over seams in the freeway, and then the air as it tried in vain to catch up in their...
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The Warrant Exception: A Fourth Amendment Field Report
Most of my cases involve some kind of search. My clients have had their homes raided by squads of police officers sporting surplus military weaponry. Their underwear drawers, pants pockets, and...
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Criminology 101 – Advanced Theories of Street Crime and Hard Time.
“There was crime, but it sure as Hell wasn’t organized.” This is a quote my client told me in an interview room at the jail while recounting his growing up as a gang member in an agricultural community...
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