Steve Palmer [00:00:00]:

Lawyer Talk. They do not teach you that in law school, and we are gonna talk about the stuff they don't teach you in law school. If you've got, if you've checked us out, then you know what this is. We've got Troy and we've got Bella, our resident law students who, we discuss stuff that they don't teach you in law school. And, this is, of course, part of the Lawyer Talk podcast where you can check us out, lawyertalkpodcast.com. We are on YouTube. We are on Facebook. We are on the social.

Steve Palmer [00:00:22]:

I see I'm aging myself. We're on the socials, man. So if you've got a question, by the way, or you got a topic that you want us to cover, here at this roundtable with the law school series, just go to lawyertalkpodcast.com. You can send me an email through the interface. You can leave us a comment. Lots of people doing that, and, we're gonna jump right in. You know, I I covered this before, like, long ago in in in various podcasts and just providing commentary for people. But you guys were asking me about Jesse Juicy Smule.

Steve Palmer [00:00:49]:

Smule. A blast from the past. I mean, this was such big news.

Bella Mata [00:00:53]:

It was yeah. It was 2019. I remember watching the, body cam footage, like, when the cops, like, walk in and they see him. He's, like, got, like, the noose around his neck, and then Oh, in

Steve Palmer [00:01:02]:

his apartment? It just looks so hokey.

Bella Mata [00:01:04]:

Yeah. It's, like, you're telling

Troy [00:01:05]:

me kept it on.

Bella Mata [00:01:07]:

Yeah. Like like, somebody did that. But then, like, I I remember the cops turned it off. I feel like the cops almost felt sympathetic. They're like, oh, shoot. No offense.

Steve Palmer [00:01:15]:

This is crap. Like, in Chicago, where there are no MAGA people at 2 in the morning walking around, they just decide to attack him while he's getting a sandwich.

Troy [00:01:24]:

And he kept the sandwich and the

Steve Palmer [00:01:25]:

whole fucking Yeah. He kept the sandwich. Yeah. There was a lot wrong with the case actually. So, I mean, to summarize, basically, the theory is that, as you say, fabricated the attack for whatever reason, his own narcissistic, egotistical reasons. He wanted attention or who knows? He's an actor.

Bella Mata [00:01:42]:

He wanted to practice.

Steve Palmer [00:01:43]:

He wanted to practice. Now now I think I think he would deny this. I think he still would say it happened. But, you know, having defended lots of people who did lots of things wrong, this is a little suspect. Mhmm. So but the, you know, the the news loved it because this fit the narrative of we've got these horrible MAGA racists running around Chicago attacking, a gay black man, and, it became big news. And he was he was a famous guy to begin with, so it became huge news. And, it quickly unraveled after everybody jumped to the conclusion that, he was this victim.

Steve Palmer [00:02:14]:

Now they had to sort of reel that reel that back in a little bit. And it and I I guess, just to to to lay the the basic procedural history, they initially offered they charged Jusay with crimes related to fabricating this attack. So making a false police report, disorderly conduct, some misdemeanor type stuff, and then they let them off the hook pretty easy by saying, just do some community service, you know, a little bit of supervision. So we would call that diversion maybe.

Bella Mata [00:02:45]:

But but, I mean, it's a plea deal. At the end of the day,

Steve Palmer [00:02:47]:

he I mean Yeah. The prosecutors said, look, we're gonna we're sympathetic to you, for reasons unknown. You can guess. We're gonna be sympathetic to you. We're gonna let you off easy even though you tied up all our police resources and created this huge stink over nothing. So we're just gonna let you out with some community service. And then in exchange for that, we'll agree to dismiss the charges. So you're right.

Steve Palmer [00:03:10]:

A plea a plea deal. Well, you know, fast forward, what, to 2020 ish. And now it's got steam again. There's a new sheriff in town who says, this is b s, man. We're going after him. So they indict him. They charge him with more serious charged crimes as a result of the same facts. Mhmm.

Steve Palmer [00:03:26]:

And, I think he does go to trial. Right?

Bella Mata [00:03:29]:

No. Yes. He does go to trial. But one thing I was gonna ask about that is he, he got reindicted by a special prosecutor. Is that the same thing here as, like, the attorney general's office?

Steve Palmer [00:03:40]:

Yes and no. The the one an attorney general's office could be a special prosecutor, but it's not always a special prosecutor. So what what Troy is asking is, we work on cases where we've got the local say where do we have one right now? I'm worried you got a case in Miami County. Mhmm. And the court or the prosecutor has sort of bowed out of the case, and the courts appointed a special prosecutor. And that prosecutor happens to be somebody at the Ohio Attorney General's office, And there's a division of the AG that comes in and provides support for local prosecutors or special prosecutors. But it could also be somebody else. I mean, I've got another special prosecutor case where it's just a private lawyer who used to be a prosecutor, who has been appointed to be the prosecutor.

Steve Palmer [00:04:20]:

I've got other cases where they'll tap into the resources of an adjacent county. This happens I guess, the next question is why does this happen? Yeah. Sometimes local prosecutors have a conflict of interest. You know, this is a big deal. You guys haven't taken ethics yet?

Bella Mata [00:04:37]:

No. Not yet. This summer. You should take it this summer.

Troy [00:04:39]:

Yeah. I should.

Steve Palmer [00:04:40]:

Alright. Well, one of the things they're gonna teach you is conflicts of interest. And we lawyer this is this is discussed a lot, but not really defined a lot. A conflict of interest means I have some interest in the case that compromises my ability to to do my job in some way. And in the prosecutor side of things, that may be that you've got a local police officer charged with something. It might be that, somebody from your office represented a witness at one point or who a number of things could result in a conflict of interest that was sort of nicks the prosecutor's office or cause them even to just avoid the appearance of a conflict to ask the special prosecutor to come in.

Bella Mata [00:05:20]:

Now Is that, like, the only reason that they're bringing up special prosecutor? Or, like, can the state come in and be, like, we don't want this, like, low town prosecutor doing this. We wanna bring in, like, somebody we feel more confident in. Do they have that power or no?

Steve Palmer [00:05:33]:

I don't. In Ohio, I I can't think of any scenario where an outside entity has come in and said, we have to prosecute this for you and you're gone. It's usually the opposite. The locals don't wanna prosecute, so they ask the outside to come in. I I don't know of any provision that lets it work the other way. Now in in Jussay's case, maybe. But there was a special prosecutor that came in.

Troy [00:05:55]:

Does that happen a lot with, like, high profile cases?

Steve Palmer [00:05:58]:

It happens a lot. Yes. But maybe not for the reasons that you you're thinking. It's not just because they're high profile. But, you know, there's a lawyer we we should bring Paul down. There's there's a lawyer that I work with regularly. His name is Paul Scarcella, and Paul used to be in this attorney general's division that went around and prosecuted cases. And a lot of times, they would they would take on high profile cases, but not all of them are high profile.

Steve Palmer [00:06:25]:

They just happen to be high profile because of the complexity or because of the the news got a hold of them. But sometimes, there's just not local resources to take it on. So you get a case, you know, like the Craigslist killer was 1 here in Ohio. Google it. It's all over the place. You know, you get a case like that or, you know, there's that, the Pike County murder case. There's a few others that people know about nationally that the AG has come in. And mostly, that's because either locals have a conflict and or it they don't have the resources.

Steve Palmer [00:06:56]:

So you get a small county that's gonna a case like that's gonna tie up your entire office for years sometimes. And they just don't have the the manpower to do it.

Bella Mata [00:07:05]:

I always just thought it was like Franklin County, we can handle any case because we've just gotten so many of them. But, like, some of these small counties, I just imagine they get a couple murders a year. That's it. And so then they get some super complex, like, organized crime one. I think I think we did one down it was in, like, Middle Nor County. They brought an AG's office for it because there's just something that that prosecutor's office has never deal with before.

Steve Palmer [00:07:26]:

Yeah. And it's not that they're not competent. It's not that they're not able. It's more that they just say they've got 4 lawyers in their entire office at a smaller county in Ohio. And their their responsibilities are not just to prosecute criminal cases. They have to they deal with all the civil administrative stuff as well, all the juvenile stuff, all the the the county land stuff. You know, there's there's a lot going on. They don't have the manpower to do it.

Steve Palmer [00:07:52]:

So if you're tied if you got 2 prosecutors tied up on a case, you're not gonna be able to handle anything else. So everything just gets behind. So it's not just that they haven't done it and they're not capable. It's it's it's probably maybe sometimes it's that, but more often than not, they just don't have time Okay. Or the time or the manpower. But so I don't know why they brought in the special prosecutor in Jusset's case. I mean, maybe it it clearly, it appears that the locals weren't willing to prosecute this guy for the crimes that he actually committed. And, you know, some would say he got a pass by getting the sweetheart deal of, community service and nothing else.

Steve Palmer [00:08:32]:

So a new sheriff comes in at the at the higher level, I think, and says, alright. We're gonna now look at felonies. Is that they ultimately indicted him? Or did they?

Bella Mata [00:08:44]:

I know it was 6 counts of I thought it was the same charges.

Steve Palmer [00:08:50]:

Making a false statement, they charged him with to to law enforcement or emergency officials. At any rate, crimes relative to the same case. And they said we're gonna charge him now. We're gonna charge him now. And he goes to trial, and he loses.

Bella Mata [00:09:05]:

Yeah. And I think it was when I was looking up the the jury, they made notes of it. It was like it was a split jury, like, 6 males, 6 females, and they deliberated for, like, 9 hours. So what When

Steve Palmer [00:09:15]:

they convicted him for 5 out of the 6 counts Mhmm. He was sentenced to serve a 150 days in the Cook County Jail, 30 months of probation, $25,000 fine, restitution of a $120,106 to the city of Chicago for investigative costs. And that's really you know, we should we should pause there for a second because that that really is the when you have these kind of cases, the the the the governmental entity is the victim. Like, if you pull a if you pull a fire alarm and you've got 4 fire trucks coming out and a bunch of firemen coming out, and they have to, expend all their resources, you know, it costs money. Yeah. It costs you money and you money, taxpayer money. So

Bella Mata [00:09:55]:

And I think the fine is obviously the most important part. That was what actually got offended. I mean, another thing I think of is imagine these cops got tied up because of this, and then down the block, there was, like, a more serious emergency. And, like, imagine somebody actually died, and because the the resources were just tied up, and you did that for this. Now you unintentionally, like, kinda took someone's life. That's really far removed. So I don't I'm not saying he's gonna be directly responsible for that.

Steve Palmer [00:10:19]:

But that's a theory.

Bella Mata [00:10:20]:

Yeah. And I the one thing that stuck out to me about this sentence though was he didn't actually serve the sentence all the way. He got the 150 days, but he only did 6, and he got out, on his appeal. And I was wondering how that works because we do a lot of appeal work, and none of our clients are, like, holding their sentences until their appeal goes through. Why does it happen here for him?

Steve Palmer [00:10:44]:

It's something called an appellate bond, or there's a couple different ways you can describe it. So Jesse gets convicted. And, he says, I'm gonna appeal my sins, or I'm gonna appeal my conviction rather. He asks the trial court, the judge at trial, judge, I'm gonna file a notice of appeal, and I'm gonna challenge this because this is a bunch of BS. And I'm gonna I'm gonna argue that I shouldn't have been prosecuted. I'm gonna argue that the trial was unfair, whatever it would be. And because I feel like or because the evidence is strong in my favor, I want to remain free. I don't want you to impose this sentence.

Steve Palmer [00:11:23]:

I want you to postpone it. In law, we use the word stay, meaning postpone this sentence until we work out the appeal issues. And sometimes the judges say, okay. Done. I'll postpone it. But then we have to address bond, your conditions of bond. So I've been, you know, if the if the judge has said your sentence is a 150 days in jail, They're asking you to postpone it. The judge is gonna say, yeah, but you're still a flight risk.

Steve Palmer [00:11:50]:

You know, you've been convicted of a crime. You know, you've got whatever whatever, was going on before is, you know, it's even worse now because you've been convicted. Yeah. So I am gonna impose a bond. I'm gonna make you pay some sort of surety in exchange for your freedom while we work out the appellate issues. And that might be money. It might be going through a bondsman. I should do a whole segment on bonds one day.

Steve Palmer [00:12:11]:

Mhmm. It might be going through a bondsman. It might sometimes people bring their property deeds into the court and say, hereby put up my land, so I can be free while we figure this out. And if the judge grants that, well, then he's then Jesse is free on bond. And that's what I think what happened here. I don't know what the appellate bond was, but he only did 6 days and applied for an appellate bond and a postponement of a sentence and the judge agreed, apparently. Now judges don't always agree to that. We that's why you say most of our clients have made that request and it's been denied.

Steve Palmer [00:12:42]:

Now oh, you you would imagine you can probably guess the kind of the kind of cases that the more severe the case, the less likely you are to get a pellet bond.

Bella Mata [00:12:51]:

Yeah. And a lot of at least for ours, it's like they're serving decades or a 150 days. It's like it's like, we can postpone that. Like, it's not the end of the world.

Steve Palmer [00:13:00]:

Yeah. Your your incentive to run away from a life sentence and go try to live in Costa Rica or something is probably a lot greater than it is for, as you say, to run away from a $150 or a 150 day sentence. But

Bella Mata [00:13:11]:

I picked Colombia over Costa Rica. That's just me personally.

Steve Palmer [00:13:14]:

I'm not familiar with I'm not familiar with Colombia. But I've been to Costa Rica. It's quite nice. At any rate, that's so Jesse gets out on a on an appellate bond and files an appeal, and he challenges it. Mhmm. And ultimately He win he wins. He wins.

Bella Mata [00:13:28]:

Yeah. And I'd on on the headlines alone, I was like, how did this guy win? And then, like, when we're looking at it, I was like, holy crap. He actually did deserve to win. Like, I mean, he he got double jeopardy. He made a plea deal. It was all set and snow. And the next thing you know, this new prosecutor comes down and is just like, we're just gonna do it again. And so I I did not agree with that whatsoever.

Bella Mata [00:13:47]:

I I I really grieved Jesse on this. He and I'm happy the appeals court worked in his favor. And he got, like, he got taken care of. So I'm happy with it. I don't know how you guys feel about it.

Steve Palmer [00:13:57]:

Bella, what are your thoughts?

Troy [00:13:58]:

I don't think they really shoulda let him off the first time so easily with probation. I think he was honestly trying to start, like, a race war, And I feel like it could have been a lot worse, but because he started with, like, the, hate mail that he got on set. Do you guys remember that?

Bella Mata [00:14:13]:

And it

Steve Palmer [00:14:13]:

was like What what is that about?

Troy [00:14:15]:

Well, that was before, like, this attack happened, and

Steve Palmer [00:14:18]:

he stopped now. He's, like, creating a narrative. Yeah.

Troy [00:14:20]:

And it, like, said some racial slur, and the return address was MAGA. So he was really trying to put out this narrative. And then he said, like, during this attack, they, like, threw bleach on him and, like, said you're in MAGA country. Like, he was really just trying to start this whole race war.

Steve Palmer [00:14:37]:

So Yeah. It's a pretty heinous crime. I mean, look. If if it is true, if all those things actually happen, it's a horrible crime. If he made it up, it's also a horrible crime.

Troy [00:14:45]:

Well, then those 2 Nigerian boys testified that he hired them.

Bella Mata [00:14:50]:

Yeah. Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:14:50]:

He hired he hired the thugs to actually fabricate the attack.

Bella Mata [00:14:54]:

Yeah. I mean I mean, the jury, I feel, had a lot to work with you. I think it was very, like, easy. Like I think he

Steve Palmer [00:14:59]:

was I think he was easily convicted of faking it. The evidence, I think, was pretty solid that, as you say, had fabricated the accusation, that it was all made up, that he did it for whatever egotistical reasons he had. I mean, I looked, I don't know you from Adam, Jesse. I feel bad for you, if this was whatever the scenario. Either way, I feel bad for you. But it evidence looks like you made it up. Yeah. So anyway

Troy [00:15:19]:

But I do agree with the double jeopardy thing.

Bella Mata [00:15:22]:

Yeah. I I agree that he got off way too easy the first time.

Steve Palmer [00:15:25]:

Right.

Bella Mata [00:15:25]:

And, like, we can all be mad about that. Unfortunately, like, don't be mad. Oh, you have to be mad at the prosecutor. Right.

Troy [00:15:30]:

Like Yeah.

Bella Mata [00:15:30]:

Why'd you offer him such a juicy deal? And the poor lack of communication between the prosecutor and the special prosecutor. If they were bringing bringing the special prosecutor, and they should've just reached out and be like, hey. Do not offer a plea deal. Just continue this until we get the special prosecutor on. And they just

Steve Palmer [00:15:45]:

Yeah. So what he got was a friendly prosecutor in Chicago, basically giving him a pass. Mhmm.

Troy [00:15:53]:

In a way, I don't know if I get it, but, like, Chicago, they're probably dealing with a lot worse than this, so they probably looked at it like

Steve Palmer [00:16:01]:

Well, and Chicago was the place where they I mean, at that time, I I don't know what it's like now. But at that time, they were advertising that they weren't gonna prosecute low level felonies. They weren't gonna prosecute property crimes. I mean, there was all this sort of, decriminalization going on anyway. So this is somewhat consistent with that. Yeah.

Troy [00:16:14]:

Right.

Steve Palmer [00:16:15]:

It's just But but as you say, takes advantage of a plea deal. And the plea deal was you do some community service, you do some supervision, and we'll dismiss everything. And a lot of places call that diversion or some sort of version of diversion. And diversion is like this. It's it's a it's a process that lets suspect or defendants rather, pay it in advance, and and basically serve probation upfront. If if you, Troy, are charged with a crime and, say, you've never been in trouble before and the crime is something stupid, like you, lifted a bag of Doritos from Walmart and you've never done it, but you were maybe a little tipsy and a little hungry, and you decided you wanted some Doritos. And, you walked out with a bag of Doritos, and you've never been in trouble before. Prosecutors have programs called diversion here in Ohio, where they don't wanna ruin your life with a theft offense because of that.

Steve Palmer [00:17:07]:

They're gonna let you, atone for it in advance. And sometimes, the atonement is things like community service, apology letters, any restitution that should be made so you have to pay for the Doritos, and, and a period of supervision, typically about a year. You do about a year of supervision. You don't get in trouble. You come back in, and your diversion officer, I think, probation officer says, alright. You hereby are absolved. Go go forth and prosper. Your case is dismissed or never will be charged.

Steve Palmer [00:17:36]:

And that's what happened here, I think, to Jesse. Some version of that happened here. But I think there's a little bit of outrage as a result of that, thinking he got maybe a little unfair treatment. They bring in the new sheriff or the new prosecutor says nonsense. I'm going after him, and they convict him. So the issue on appeal was, should Jesse's double jeopardy rights have attached at the time of his initial deal with the friendly prosecutor such that that prevented any other prosecutions going forward?

Bella Mata [00:18:07]:

I would say yes. I I I think so. You can maybe look to charge on other stuff, maybe. I mean, is there, like, fraud or something like that?

Steve Palmer [00:18:17]:

I I don't know. You know, you're you're, you're you're in the right ballpark on all the standards. Let's pull up the actual language of the double jeopardy provision.

Bella Mata [00:18:30]:

Because another problem is then we've talked about upstairs too with clients. It's like the speedy trial, because the clock starts from his initial indictment. And since he made a plea and all that was done, the clock the clock is still going if you want a re indictment for the same Well, for

Steve Palmer [00:18:46]:

there. Or for additional charges at the same factual events. Yes. That that may trigger some speedy trial issues. But the 5th Amendment double jeopardy clause, basically says, you can't be twice put in jeopardy for the same offense. You know, you can't be tried twice for the same conduct. Now it's it's like everything in law. It's never so simple.

Steve Palmer [00:19:08]:

You know, what is the same offense? And there there was a famous case, the US Supreme Court, I think, called Blockburger, where you you look at the elements. And the Blockburger test said, look at the elements of one offense, and do they does the other new offense that you're trying to be prosecuted with get sort of swallowed up by the first offense? And if so, then jeopardy would apply, and you can't be prosecuted for that. It's already done. But if there's additional elements or it's a different type of offense, maybe you can be prosecuted. But here, there was a plea bargain, and it was a dismissal. So it really wasn't even a plea, I don't think. It was just a dismissal. So We

Bella Mata [00:19:39]:

got it off really easy then.

Steve Palmer [00:19:40]:

So it's a it's a really it's a it's a dicey question. So this is really about plea bargains. And I haven't read this decision, but I've had this come up in in a few cases. And it comes down to a defendant's expectations for entering into the plea bargain. Would a defendant reasonably expect that his plea agreement cover the future crime? And if the answer is yes, then it sort of leans on a double jeopardy problem. If the answer is no or it's something totally different, then, it goes the opposite direction. And, you know, there there's all there's all sorts of play in the joints on this stuff, so there's no hard fast rule. But I tend to agree with you.

Steve Palmer [00:20:17]:

I I think that look, right or wrong, we may not like it that he got the sweetheart deal. But he got the sweetheart deal. That doesn't mean you come back and do it again Right. Just because somebody later doesn't like it. That is double jeopardy. That I always try to look at, like, what's what's what's the spirit of what we're trying to do? We're trying to prevent corrupt prosecutions. We're trying to prevent the new sheriff from coming in and sort of plucking off, all the people he doesn't like. And that that's what's going on here.

Steve Palmer [00:20:44]:

And and look, you guys don't know this, but there's there's a famous movie called The Man of All Seasons. But anyway, it's like It's a

Bella Mata [00:20:52]:

little outdated for me. I don't know.

Steve Palmer [00:20:53]:

Check it out. Okay. At any rate, one of the the one some there's dialogue in there, and I won't go into the gory details. But basically, there's there's a dialogue that says we're gonna get them. We're gonna get them. You know, we'll do whatever we have to to get them. We're gonna, you know, we'll knock down every barrier. We'll do whatever we want.

Steve Palmer [00:21:10]:

Because the ends will justify the means to go get this person they don't like. But then you turn around, you would say, yeah. But once you get rid of those institutions, once you get rid of those protections, the devil will surely come back and turn on you when it's your turn. You have to have these protections for everybody. You these these constitutional protections aren't designed to reach an outcome that we all agree with, necessarily on a factual level. They're designed to protect against outcomes that we don't agree with, even though we don't agree. Because the look, when are we gonna be most likely to go and and maybe brush aside some of these constitutional protections? It's when we when we think we're right. Mhmm.

Steve Palmer [00:21:48]:

You know, beware of the righteous, you know. It's like, if you if if if if the government's coming coming at you from the position of their the this righteous morality, that's when it's the most dangerous. You know, it's the most dangerous when they're going after the KKK guys. It's the most dangerous when they're going after the BLM guys on the other side. You know, that's when it's the most dangerous, because then it's really easy to say these people are so bad that the ends will justify the means to get them. And and that's where, you know, my my my philosophy of law is that we have these protections for everybody. And people often ask me, would do would you represent these horrible rotten people? And it's like, yeah, absolutely. I would do it.

Steve Palmer [00:22:30]:

I've I've been I've been involved in cases where I am absolutely floored by what my client did. But I still do it, because we are here to protect those things, not necessarily well, our job is to protect our client. But if you're looking for a bigger justification, it's there to protect us. Because if it's not there to protect this guy, it surely is not gonna be there when we're in that position. And I I I urge everybody to consider that. Kick that around for a while. Because they're not teaching that in law school, I don't think anyway. No.

Steve Palmer [00:23:01]:

No. No.

Bella Mata [00:23:02]:

I think most of the people in law school that if you're in criminal defense, they're like they're like, I don't think I could do that. They're like, oh my god, these people are like terrible. And it's like, I don't think you're really here for the right reason then. I don't know. Everybody deserves a fair shake.

Steve Palmer [00:23:15]:

Yeah. But if look, I I I can be I I disagree with those people who that who have that opinion. But I respect their right to have that opinion, and and at least they recognize it. So they're not gonna do this job Mhmm. Because they couldn't do this job. I mean, I've had I've had clients, in fact, one one parent of a client, said, look, I I and it it I was a little bit I don't wanna say pissed, but I was like, damn it. It was it was a guy I'd helped, or I'd helped a family member of this gentleman. And there was a big case that was going on in Columbus, and the guys that I'm talking about had an in with that case.

Steve Palmer [00:24:00]:

And what the the defendant in that case asked this person for a referral. And the guy called me and said, look, I didn't give him your name because I, you know, I didn't want you to help have to help that guy. I don't want he's he's he's guilty. And I'm like, well, dude, that's what I do. You know?

Bella Mata [00:24:14]:

It's like,

Steve Palmer [00:24:14]:

I mean, don't don't hold back. Yeah. Please. I I represent guilty people. And if I didn't, I'd be broke. Mhmm. You know? And and it's not just about, people ask all the time, how do you do this job? How do you represent these horrible rotten people? That's the and when I do avoid you, when I ask jurors questions, I always I start sometimes I ask that, like, what do you think the number one question criminal defense lawyers get? And sometimes you get somebody say, can you give me off? And I'd be, you know, so they can can get me out of my trouble. But you eventually get to this where the question is, how do you represent those horrible, no good, rotten people? Like, as you see Smollett or, Terrio, the guy from, the Proud Boys or any how would you represent those awful, horrible people? How can you do it? And, you know, my you know what my response is?

Bella Mata [00:25:03]:

Someone has to.

Steve Palmer [00:25:04]:

Someone has to.

Troy [00:25:05]:

Gotta make money.

Steve Palmer [00:25:05]:

Gotta make money. Good response. Because we

Bella Mata [00:25:07]:

do have

Steve Palmer [00:25:07]:

to make money.

Bella Mata [00:25:08]:

But everybody deserves a fair shake.

Steve Palmer [00:25:10]:

Everybody deserves a fair shake.

Bella Mata [00:25:11]:

Yeah. I don't know.

Steve Palmer [00:25:12]:

What else?

Bella Mata [00:25:17]:

I'd like to hold the state accountable. Here here here's here's what here's how I

Steve Palmer [00:25:22]:

look at this. Those are the easy ones.

Bella Mata [00:25:25]:

Okay.

Steve Palmer [00:25:26]:

What if what if this guy over here is not guilty? Like like, then what? Like, how can you possibly represent somebody who's innocent in a case that can put that person in prison for the rest of their lives? Think about that for a minute. Like, think of the gravity of that. So if you've got a a guilty client, are you gonna lose more sleep over that person than an innocent client? Now, I'm talking facts. Now, look, we if you're gonna do my job or you're gonna do this job that that you guys are interested in, you know, you better have some thick skin on this stuff. But the the path through it, the moral path through it, is understanding that we all get the same protections. And we have cases, not causes. And and we have people, not not causes. So you you know, when you have somebody who is innocent, think about waking up for day 1 of the jury trial and thinking to yourself, man, if I lose this case, this guy's going to prison for the rest of his life.

Steve Palmer [00:26:25]:

And I think he's wrongfully accused. But the government thinks he did it. The police think he did it. The social workers think he did it. The judge thinks he did it. And here I am. I just don't. And, you know, Troy, you've maybe been around for a couple of those now.

Steve Palmer [00:26:42]:

But think about the gravity of that one versus, alright, this guy has killed somebody. It's pretty obvious he did it. We've gotta go to trial, and we're trying to maybe, not to win the case, but to get a lesser offense or something like that. That's a whole different game than all or nothing for somebody who is innocent. So, you know, everybody just assumes that the people charged with crimes are guilty, and that's the problem. So you've gotta have those protections in place because of that assumption, and the assumption can't be used to get around those protections. You know, that they're they're there to deal with the problems that that you say it was dealing with. Somebody didn't like him, so they wanted to do an end around and say, I'm gonna get him.

Steve Palmer [00:27:25]:

But he was able to he was able to use and rely on a constitutional protection against double jeopardy, and he did it successfully. And, you know, the the real travesty of that case there's there's several. 1, Bella, you said, look, this guy got away with all sorts of obvious stuff. But then the other travesty is he had to go through a trial and spend a bunch of money and go through the stress and exonerate himself after it shouldn't have happened.

Bella Mata [00:27:48]:

Awesome. They might use more government resources.

Steve Palmer [00:27:51]:

Even more. Right?

Bella Mata [00:27:51]:

Yeah. Yeah. Like retrying him and then go through the appeals courts.

Steve Palmer [00:27:55]:

Yeah. Anybody who knows me would would know that, like, as a practical matter, I look back on this and say, man, that asshole. I I mean, if he made that up, what a what a schmuck. On the other hand, I think he was entitled to the protection of that plea plea agreement they got. Yeah. So I think both those things are perfectly consistent to me. Mhmm. And because they have to be.

Steve Palmer [00:28:16]:

Because if you take those protections away, the devil surely will turn around on you one day, and they won't be there to protect you. That's that's just a fact.

Bella Mata [00:28:24]:

Mhmm. I might have might have covered everything on him here. I'm I'm just happy we got to touch on this because I know this happened back in November. I know we've been kicking around for a while.

Steve Palmer [00:28:36]:

Well, you know what's interesting? It it just flew under the radar, didn't it? I mean, I didn't I didn't see much about this. I I I saw the reversal, and I thought, that's interesting. And, that was about it. So I'm glad you guys brought it up. It's a great topic. It's a great question. And and and look, people aren't, I think there's this there's this sort of, the media has the everybody gets all hot and bothered about a certain thing and then it dissipates and it goes away. And we don't or or they're they're making the same or they're committing the same fallacy that we've talked about where they hate him so he's guilty, and this is BS.

Steve Palmer [00:29:07]:

He should never gotten away with it. And Yeah.

Troy [00:29:09]:

That's the problem. The media, like, creates a narrative before the trial even begins.

Steve Palmer [00:29:14]:

And I watched the talking heads. I watched the legal talking heads, and some of them get this.

Bella Mata [00:29:18]:

Right? Legal talking heads?

Steve Palmer [00:29:20]:

The legal like, guys who are doing commentary on the big news.

Bella Mata [00:29:22]:

Oh, like news. Okay. I was I was just imagining these heads.

Steve Palmer [00:29:25]:

It's like

Bella Mata [00:29:25]:

a I didn't know if it was a whole news network of just talking heads. It's like Yeah.

Steve Palmer [00:29:30]:

We've got a, we've got a generational gap here. But

Bella Mata [00:29:32]:

anyway, there's a there's,

Steve Palmer [00:29:35]:

I watch these guys and, you know, the the news doesn't want this stuff. So they get it wrong. And it's it's like they they sort of whitewash the real issues of what's going on underneath it. And I love these kind of issues because you take a person who is a villain, and he gets the protection of a constitutional right. And he may not be a villain to everybody. He's only a villain to some people. And the other half would say, no, he's he's, righteous. And I love it.

Steve Palmer [00:29:56]:

I love taking the person who is being villainized and then using that as an example, for constitutional protections and then flipping it around. Yeah. Because, you know, like, if this were the Terrio or the Proud Boys guy, man, at b s, he should never he should have been in prison forever and blah blah blah blah blah. But there's not much fanfare about, as you say, and maybe it's because people think that, alright, well, we'll give him a break because they like him. Yeah. You've got to protect the people you hate. That's the sad part of the system. Anyway, this is they don't teach you that in law school.

Steve Palmer [00:30:27]:

If you've got a topic you want us to cover here with Bell and Troy, I'm happy to do it. You guys keep bringing stuff to the table, and it's awesome. I love it. Check out Lawyer Talk Podcast at LawyerTalk podcast.com. And we talk you know, you can check us out on YouTube, and I think we even got TikTok. I don't know if TikTok will be around much longer, but we got TikTok. We got Facebook. We got the social 3 days.

Bella Mata [00:30:45]:

We'll talk

Troy [00:30:46]:

about that next time.

Steve Palmer [00:30:47]:

We should be yeah. We should do a TikTok talk, next time. But there's also a podcast you can like, subscribe, share, do whatever you do. We do appreciate everybody listening. It's getting lots of fanfare and, that sort of gives us a little bit ahead of steam to keep doing it, so we will. LawyerTalk, they don't teach you that in law school off the record on the air, at least until now.