I was asked to defend the man accused of kidnapping and rape. His former girlfriend had accused him. He was no angel. In fact, he was not only a convicted felon already. He had only the year before been released from prison. If convicted of these charges, he would be sent back there for the…
Continue reading ›Kessler’s Rule Number One is never prosecute. I never have. I never will. The duty of the prosecutor is to seek justice, not merely to convict. So says the American Bar Association, in Rule 3-1.2(c) of its Standards for Criminal Justice. The problem is, not enough prosecutors believe this. Instead of being a place to…
Continue reading ›I suppose, when I have time to think about it, which is not often during the long day’s trudge around the verdict factory, that the law represents some attempt, however fumbling, to impose order on a chaotic universe. Chaos, in the form of human waywardness and uncontrollable passion, is ever bubbling away just beneath the…
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