Dennis Elias’s Latest Tweet :. Injustice News Twitter Feed :.Mark Bennett | September 29, 2010
In the markets of South and Southeast Asia, where I learned to haggle, one of the gambits used by vendors is to claim that the offered price has to be accepted right now: “for you, today only, fifteen Rupees!” They never mean it. Turn and walk away, and the price goes down. Leave and come [...]
Mark Bennett | September 24, 2010
Add this to the list of reasons that Texas is a better place to practice criminal defense law: Art. 38.075. Corroboration of Certain Testimony Required (a) A defendant may not be convicted of an offense on the testimony of a person to whom the defendant made a statement against the defendant’s interest during a time [...]
Mark Bennett | September 8, 2010
Defending people should be personal. A human being has put his future in your hands, and someone is trying to take that future away. “Don’t take it personally” is lousy advice; it may not be necessary to care about the human being you’re defending, but it helps—when a lawyer cares about his client, the jury [...]
Mark Bennett | August 18, 2010
Houston DUI lawyer Paul Kennedy, in Going for the Gut, calls to our attention this Boston Globe article by Drake Bennett about how disgust may shape our moral judgments. A few thoughts: First, one of the experiments discussed: In one study, [psychologist Jonathan Haidt] had some of his unfortunate test subjects respond to four vignettes [...]
Mark Bennett | August 1, 2010
We have heard talk of “justice.” Is there anybody who knows what justice is? No one on earth can measure out justice. Can you look at any man and say what he deserves—whether he deserves hanging by the neck until dead or life in prison or thirty days in prison or a medal? The human [...]
Mark Bennett | July 26, 2010
Quoth Vincent Bugliosi, in a comment posted by John Kindley: ‘Everyone is entitled to be represented by an attorney’ is the idealistic chant often recited by defense attorneys as justification for representing even the most vicious criminals in our society. The concept is unassailable, but idealism is rarely what motivates lawyers who represent guilty defendants. [...]
Mark Bennett | July 23, 2010
Back in March (sometimes posts percolate for a few months before bubbling to the surface) Norm Pattis wrote something about about Gerry Spence that caught my attention. I recall years ago his complaining that he could not get into court. His cases kept settling. I offered him a chance to come on board in a [...]
Mark Bennett | July 7, 2010
After twelve days of trial and deliberation, the jury found my client guilty of tampering with physical evidence. Now, ordinarily I figure that going and talking to a jury after a trial is a good way to get lied to, but here we had what I felt was a full and fair exchange of views. [...]
Mark Bennett | July 2, 2010
Law student Laura McWilliams, blogging at Really? Law? (go ahead and add it to your feedreader now—done?—great), writes here and here about the thought process that has her leaning toward an eventual job prosecuting people. From the first post: In an idealist vision, (let’s just go with it; there’s nothing wrong with a little idealism) [...]
Mark Bennett | May 18, 2010
In 2007 years ago, when Pennsylvania decided to prosecute William Barnes 40 years after the fact for the murder of William Barclay, after Barnes had already served a prison sentence for the attempted murder of Barclay, I asked (Gideon reminds me now), "How does a conviction for attempted murder not jeopardy-bar a prosecution for murder [...]
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