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| Zealous advocacy | | Date Created: Mar 26, 2005, 02:39 PM |
 Let's review. Scott Peterson, relatively irrespective of his guilt or innocence, could be expected to lose a high profile, media circus trial because he's not a celebrity, he's not a PC minority, and he's not rich. So what's in it for his defense attorney? Two things: money or publicity. Since Scott Peterson didn't have any money, it must be the latter. Turns out Mark Geragos, even had to forego the Michael Jackson defense because of his commitment to Peterson's trial. And Jackson is likely to be acquitted using the same criteria. Turns out also that there's no such thing as bad publicity for defense attorneys either. Losing in court doesn't seem to be a problem on the way to Johnnie Cochran level money and power.
One might think that a defense attorney would fall back on the correct principle that even a guilty man deserves a proper defense. But how proper? Does that include "zealous advocacy" that defense attorneys use to justify anything and everything they do to get their client off the hook and which necessarily leads to more money (or more publicity) leads to more defense? i.e. you can buy justice. Does it mean getting someone obviously guilty like OJ off the hook entirely? To hear Geragos tell it, he just couldn't convince 12 jurors of Peterson's complete innocence. Just where does zealous advocacy end and justice and reality take over?
And I just wonder if Geragos knows Peterson is guilty and is just a professional liar or he really convinces himself that his client is innocent like OJ convinced himself (with a little help from his friends).
If you doubt the role of publicity, here's a page 8 interview w/ picture of Geragos in the 3/21/05 issue of Newsweek. The question of why this should be in Newsweek at all and more broadly why any journalist would pay attention to what lawyers say and even put it out in their story as if they were a factual source will be left for another time.
(Newsweek interviewer) Q: You told the jury you'd show Scott was "stone-cold innocent". Where did you go wrong?
[Note the accepted assumption that he's innocent, it's just all about winning and losing. Or to be more charitable, if he's so innocent how come you couldn't prove it?]
(Geragos) A: There's a multitude of things you wish you could do differently. I don't believe anybody can -- after 30 years on this earth without hurting anyone -- engage in a coldblooded, precalculated murder and not leave one shred of forensic evidence. I truly believe he's innocent. And if I didn't convince 12 people of that, then I didn't do enough.
[This must be the TV forensic show defense. All the TV shows find the forensic evidence to get the perpetrator to confess, so the absence of such proves Scott Peterson is innocent -- oh, and he didn't kill anyone before either]
Q: There have been a spate of books out about Scott Peterson, all of them damning.
A: And undertandably so. Because that's what sells.
[It couldn't possibly be that he's guilty of a heinous crime and there was a media circus trial. Would a book "proving" that he's innocent not sell?]
Q: What was it like to represent the most reviled defendant in America?
A: At least OJ had his constituency. This guy didn't have any.
[This supports what I contend but it's hard hearing it from an officer of the court. Apparently you're more innocent if you have a "constituency" or you need one to be acquitted in this country.]
...
Q: Taking Scott Peterson's case cost you the Michael Jackson case. Any regrets?
A: I don't believe in regrets. I wish Michael all the best and I'm still pulling and fighting for Scott.
[What a guy! Too bad he couldn't have done both.] |
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