Ubjeckshin - Home of Speezy Story Time

      My mother always told me that “the devil you know is usually better than the devil you don’t know.”  There is a great deal of wisdom in those words, and I cannot emphasize how true they ring today.  When I signed up for this Superior Court gig, I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into.  Now, that is not to say that I am not enjoying myself.  I really do appreciate the experience, the responsibility, and the added variety.  Unfortunately, what I was not expecting, was the logistical nightmare that I have now been dealing with for two solid weeks, with no end in sight.

      It was bad enough that I started out with a pile of cases that I had never seen before, all of which were patiently waiting for me to actually figure out what was going on in them without so much as a simple primer.  Unlike my District Court replacement who had the advantage of…well…me (and I do not mean for that to sound haughty or otherwise egotistical), I have been given no mentorship, no guidance, and no warning of the things to come.  I barely even have someone that I can go to just for some background information.  And as awful as that may sound to some, I do enjoy the challenge of trying to figure stuff out with what resources I have available.

      What I do not enjoy, however, is the constant stream of inefficiencies I have to deal with on a day-to-day basis.  No two files ever seem to be organized the same way.  In District Court, every file had a particular order and layout that made things very simple.  If I needed a defendant’s history, I would go to the bottom of the left-hand side of the folder and look for the green sheets.  Not so simple in Superior Court; apparently consistency is just so gauche.  All sarcasm aside, it really is frustrating have to dig through piles upon piles of schedule settings and continuances just to find a damn police report (which is NEVER in the same place twice).  If I had the time (and not so many case files), I would go through and systematically reorganize every file in my office.  As it stands, though, I am lucky to even have my office organized in the way I want.  And I cannot emphasize enough how accommodating my poor secretary has been; I know this must be just as hard for her as it is for me.  I guess I should count my blessings.

      Even more frustrating, however, is going through a case that you have never seen before, realizing that you have about a week to prepare yourself for the case’s next hearing (or trial), and then further realizing that certain key pieces of your case are missing.  Today’s big discovery was a case I had never once set eyes on until this afternoon, set for trial in less than a week, everything in order (including subpoenas, which is a rare event in and of itself)…except for one crucial piece of discovery.  And when I say crucial, I mean THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT PIECE OF EVIDENCE IN THE CASE WHICH I NEED TO ACTUALLY PROVE THE CASE.

      Here is my long-winded explanation of why this is so damn infuriating.  First and foremost, this case is a possession of methamphetamine charge.  Possession cases are some of the most simple cases ever (either the defendant had the stuff in their possession, or they did not).  Obviously, one of the key elements of such a charge is that the defendant actually had methamphetamine in their possession.  And how do you prove that a particular substance is meth?  Easy.  You test it.  In fact, that should probably be one of the first things you do.  Then you present the lab results in your case, and the defendant gets to make up some excuse about why it was not his/her meth, and how they had absolutely no idea who’s meth it was.

      Unfortunately for me, there was NO LAB REPORT in the file.  And when I checked to see what might have happened to it, I found out that the meth NEVER GOT SENT TO THE LAB FOR TESTING IN THE FIRST PLACE.  Had this case been charged a month or two ago, that might have made some sense; accidents happen, delays occur, and sometimes people just forget simple things.  However, this particular case was charged OVER SIX MONTHS AGO.  On top of that, the defense tried (and failed) to suppress the alleged meth on the theory that the police had issued a faulty search warrant!  You would think that at some point, someone would have actually verified (beyond the field tests, which are inadmissible anyway) that the stuff was actually meth!  But no…despite all the legal wrangling and other efforts put forth…the single most important, absolutely critical piece of evidence was left undiscovered…FOR SIX…EFFING…MONTHS.  Try to wrap your brain around that one if you can.

tl;dr - Superior Court is definitely challenging…but for all the wrong reasons (right now, anyway).

      Another week begins, and I still feel like I am making zero progress.  Every time I think I have one task under control, three more pop up without warning.  I found out about yet another trial this morning that was set for this Wednesday that I had not even seen the file for.  I still do not even know what the charge is, who the witnesses are, or any…you know…useful information about the case.  Add that to the stack of cases that are just sitting around waiting for me to look them over.  But hey…at least I finally have an office, right?

      Wrong.  The office saga continues, and also continues to increase in complexity.  When I found out that I was going to be moving down into the main office area as part of my Superior Court “promotion,” I assumed that I would be taking the one and only open office that was available.  Unfortunately, as the saying goes, you know what happens when you assume.  Apparently, my boss decided to move someone else into the open office, and put me into that person’s office instead.  Seems like a simple enough plan, right?  I wish.

      Turns out, the person being moved into the office I thought I was taking does not want to move there in the first place.  Additionally, the office that she is currently occupying used to belong to another attorney in our office, who has now expressed an interest in getting that office back.  Did I mention that my boss is out of town for the next two weeks?  Long story short, there are a couple of professional office movers coming in this week to start this…complicated project.  Ultimately, at least one person is going to end up thoroughly upset about it, and possibly two.  As for me…I really do not care which office I end up in, so long as there is a computer, a desk, and a place to rest my ass all in the same room.

      I guess my primary concern in all of this is the “politics” involved.  It is patently obvious that there are a variety of intra-office squabbles happening simultaneously.  It is also patently obvious that I stand to get caught right smack in the middle whether I like it or not.  My goal is to pretend like none of it is going on, and maintain a sense of neutrality about the whole mess.  Whether or not that is possible in a practical sense, remains to be seen.  For the time being, I plan on keeping my head down and attempting to manage my case load without incident.  But first, it would be nice if I could figure out what my case load actually is without all of these last-minute notices.

      On the bright side, at least the new guy is doing well.  My intensive training regime seems to be paying off for him.  Maybe I have a future in teaching, or something.

      So, many of you might be wondering what happened to me, and where I disappeared to over the past two weeks.  My last update, I mentioned that I was shipping off to District Court training for a couple of days, and then I never really made it back afterwards until today.  The simple answer is that I have been extremely busy.  The more interesting answer is far more complicated.

      Upon returning from training, I found out that my bosses had hired a new attorney to replace me in District Court.  Those of you who know me well also knew about my impending promotion to Superior Court (the land of felonies, as it is sometimes referred).  The new hire essentially made my promotion official.  As of today, I am now a Superior Court Deputy full-time.  I have my own felony case load, and a whole new world of responsibility.  Just like when I began my life as a prosecutor, I am a little nervous.  Fortunately, I have a number of other, far more experienced attorneys telling me that I will likely do just fine.

      You may still be wondering what happened over the past two weeks that kept me away from blogging.  I guess I would qualify it as a combination of both exhaustion and laziness.  Ever since I returned from training, I have spent numerous hours training my own replacement.  Teaching someone all of the many intricacies of District Court, while relatively simple in its execution…is really quite draining.  The hell of working in the legal system is that, while we essentially have rules for everything that happens in the courtroom, the situations are so variable that it is often hard to generalize.  So as you can imagine, explaining to someone with zero experience why you offer a particular deal to one defendant but not another one requires a great deal of effort and concentration.  I do appreciate that the new guy asks a lot of questions (and a lot of good questions, I might add), but it makes my brain hurt after awhile trying to recall every little detail I have managed to glean out of the last seven months.  Unfortunately, no one else in my office has really stepped in to help me out with this whole training process (why should they when they obviously have far more important things to do? /sarcasm).

      Couple the added stress of training a new attorney with continuing to manage the District Court caseload (and wrapping up as many of the important or complicated cases as possible), and it feels a lot like trying to drive a Geo through an icy mud field.  But what about weekends?  Forget that noise.  My weekends are almost never free, given that the weekends are usually the only time I get to spend with family, my girlfriend, and our many other friends.  It is not that I do not enjoy writing these blogs (I really do enjoy it quite a bit)…it is more that it tends to take a back seat to driving back and forth between my house and Seattle, catching up on much needed sleep, and spending what quality time I can with the people I care about.  Such is the professional’s lifestyle, I suppose.

      In any event, the important thing that I would like you all to take away from this is that I am still here, still writing, and still very eager to share my stories.  With any luck, the coming weeks will yield a whole new crop of entertainment as I delve into the world of felonies, and the felons who commit them.  My only hope is that I can still manage to keep things lighthearted and relatively humorous.  Admittedly, there is not a whole lot of humor to be found in most felonious conduct…but I will do my best.  At the very least, I am confident that Superior Court will still provide me with a wealth of ridiculous courtroom antics to recount.  Thanks for your continued support!

tl;dr- Speezy’s been really busy lately…but he still <3’s you!

     I will not likely be posting any new material this week, as I will be in training tomorrow (Wednesday) until Friday afternoon.  If I get a chance to update over the weekend, I might do that, but it really depends on how training goes.  If I have any good stories or information to share, I gladly will.  Otherwise, I probably will not have anything worthwhile to post until next week.  Thanks again for reading!

     I have decided that assault cases are my absolute least favorite kinds of cases to prosecute.  I am already sick of dealing with them, and I am not even a year into this job.  Frankly, the idea of people assaulting each other bothers me on a fundamental level, but the most frustrating part of all is the definition of assault itself.  Obviously, punching someone in the face is an assault.  But so is pushing them, or spitting on them, or sometimes even trying to punch them but missing.  This is why assaults are segregated into different degrees of seriousness.  First degree assaults are easy to define because they almost always involve a gun.  Second degree assaults are not quite as easy, but can be roughly classified as assaults involving weapons that are not guns, assaults involving strangulation, and assaults resulting in serious bodily injury (i.e. permanent scarring, disfigurement, loss of organ function, broken bones, etc.).  Third degree assaults are pretty nebulous in general, but typically only come up when there is a law enforcement officer victim.  Everything else gets relegated to the fourth degree assault category.

     Fourth degree assaults are gross misdemeanors in Washington, and can include everything from punching someone with a closed fist, to looking at them in a particularly threatening manner.  Basically, it is designed to be a catch-all, anything-goes sort of category.  This also makes it a ridiculously hard crime to prosecute in most cases.  While most juries are perfectly content to say that an assault occurred when there is clear evidence of injury, or an obvious attack such as a punch or kick to a sensitive area, most assault cases do not involve that sort of thing.  Typically, the kinds of thing I see most often are what I refer to as the “three esses”: Slaps, Shoves, and Spitting.  In other words, the kinds of assaults that rarely, if ever, result in visible injury.

     And while prosecuting these types of cases is already difficult, there is always one major hurdle in any assault case that I dread as a prosecutor: the victims.  In every assault case I have ever dealt with (which has been several), only a rare few have victims that are actually both 1.) cooperative, and 2.) sympathetic.  Most of the time, the victims are women who absolutely refuse to say anything bad about their attacker (usually a boyfriend, lover, husband, etc.), or do anything to get them in trouble (you know…aside from calling 911 in the first place).  The other frequent category of victims I see are the ones who have something to gain from a conviction.  There is almost always a divorce or custody battle happening simultaneously, and the “victim” is so angry and hotheaded, that it is virtually impossible to convince anyone that they do not have an ulterior motive.

     The first category of victims follows a very predictable pattern.  Defendant gets angry with Victim, and then Victim gets scared.  Victim calls 911.  Cops show up, and Victim suddenly changes their mind.  Defendant gets arrested anyway, gets thrown in jail, gets charged, and becomes my problem.  Victim comes to me and says they do not want to press charges, because Defendant is a good person and they just overreacted (or some other lame excuse).  The charges almost inevitably get dropped (because the case cannot proceed without Victim’s participation) and the process repeats itself ad nauseam.

     The other set of victims usually start frothing at the mouth the moment you initiate prosecution of their case.  They hound you constantly, trying to interject “important information” every step of the way.  And the moment you tell them that their “information” is either crap, or otherwise unusable (which it almost always is), they get pissed at you.  Of course, it is obviously my fault that the rules of evidence and criminal procedure are the way that they are, and shame on me for not changing them specifically for this case…due process be damned!  What is even better, though, is that they insist on trial no matter what…alternative resolutions simply are not acceptable, and some even consider them a violation of their “victims’ rights.”  But once you get them to trial, five minutes on the stand, and your case is hosed.  And I mean in the not-recoverable-never-going-to-get-a-guilty-verdict-no-matter-how-much-evidence-you-present kind of hosed.  Juries do not want to hear about how angry you are because someone else slapped you; they want to hear about how hurt and devastated and scared you are.

tl;dr - Assault cases piss me off, but not half as much as (typical) assault victims.

     One of my biggest fears as a prosecutor is having things that I have said in court come back to haunt me.  In District Court, everything is digitally recorded, and can subsequently be transcribed upon request.  So far, I have been lucky enough not to say anything really stupid…at least, as far as I am aware.  Lately, I have had the occasion to read through a few transcripts of hearings that I have participated in, and I have to admit, reading a transcript of your own speech is kind of a strange feeling.  You never know how you sound when you are in the middle of an argument, and it is easy to mangle words.  But at the same time, it occasionally gives me comfort to know that I somehow managed to put together a string of coherent sentences, and do not always sound like a complete idiot on the record.  I figure, though, that it is only a matter of time before I goof something up.  It happens, it is expected to happen, and I imagine that it will be immensely funny when it does happen…at least in retrospect, someday.

     I know I have not been great about updating recently, and those who know me well are aware of why that is.  For that, I apologize.  However, I do have an amusing story to relay from earlier this afternoon.  Normally on Wednesdays, I would be stuck in trial, and would otherwise be too busy to work on other things.  Today, I did not have any trials scheduled, so I spent most of the day in my office working on menial things, such as plea offers and response briefs.  One of my fellow attorneys down the hall was not so lucky.  He did have a trial going today, and apparently he was having some difficulty with his jury instructions.  For whatever reason, his usual secretary was unable to compile a set of jury instructions, and the task had been delegated to one of our new secretaries who had 1.) never compiled a set of instructions before, and 2.) had never even been involved with the prosecution of a criminal matter.  For clarification’s sake, this particular secretary normally works with our civil deputies, and has no involvement with criminal cases.  

     Anyway…as the two of them struggled to assemble the proper instructions together, I was busy reading through a police report in my office nearby.  All of a sudden, I hear my colleague exclaim, “does your colon not work?!”  I immediately yelled out to him from my office, informing him that his comment was rather awkward when taken out of context.  Next thing I know, both he and the secretary are cracking up in the other room.  So yeah…even lawyers manage to say ridiculous things once in a while, and at least some of us actually have a sense of humor about it.

     I had an interesting experience this morning.  The event itself was nothing particularly unusual; it was really just a suppression hearing on a DUI.  These sorts of motions happen quite regularly in DUI cases.  The defense picks apart the traffic stop and looks for every possible way to get evidence tossed out or otherwise limited.  Most of the time (like, 99 times out of 100), they get nothing, and it really is nothing more than a waste of time for the sake of “preserving the record” on appeal.

     What made this experience unique was the attorney (or, actually, attorneys) arguing for the defense.  I have dealt almost exclusively with public defenders and local private attorneys for the entirety of my short career.  Today, I met one of the preeminent DUI defense lawyers in the state.  And this guy does not kid around…he is the sort of attorney who requires a five figure retainer just to walk in the door.  Given what is at stake in this case (the defendant’s commercial driver’s license, and his entire livelihood), it is no surprise that he wanted the best to come to his defense.

     Overall, I would say the whole thing was a good experience, though.  This lawyer was extremely friendly, cordial, and very professional.  There were no low blows or dirty moves.  There was no mudslinging, or skullduggery.  It was one of the most passionate, yet subdued arguments I have had so far in my career.  Unfortunately, the judge took the issue under advisement, so I will not know right away how well I performed.

     The most interesting part of my day, however, came after I got back to my office later on.  On a typical Monday afternoon, I spend most of my time returning calls, checking e-mails, getting my files organized for the week, and sitting in meetings with the other attorneys.  Today, I had no voice mails, there were only a couple e-mails that required my attention, my secretary was already organizing my files for me, and the afternoon meeting got canceled.  In other words…it was looking to be a boring afternoon…until about 3:45.

     That was the time that my secretary informed me that I had a couple things on my desk I might want to look at.  Two of them were notices for motion hearings in District Court…pretty standard stuff.  The other one, however, was a notice for a motion hearing in Superior Court.  Presently, I only deal with an extremely limited number of cases in Superior Court, so the options were relatively limited.  I had just won an appeal there last week, and my latest felony DUI was already scheduled for this coming Friday for a status hearing.  So, who could possibly be requesting a motion hearing in Superior Court with me as the attorney of record?

     The answer was, my first felony DUI defendant.  Apparently, after they hauled him off to prison (awaiting his appeal, of course), he decided to do a little legal studying, either on his own, or (the more likely scenario, I presume) with the assistance of some friends.  In his not-so-eloquent notice of issue, he decided to petition the court to modify his judgment and sentence for two reasons.  First, he felt that the court had improperly calculated his offender score.  Second, he decided that he actually did not have four prior DUIs, and that his sentence should be reduced to a gross misdemeanor instead of a felony.  I laughed so hard I almost cried.

     First off…the issue of whether or not he had four prior offenses is completely ironclad at this point.  Not only did his lawyer stipulate to the prior offenses and their validity at trial, it was subsequently affirmed by the jury!  You cannot simply agree to the prior offenses and then say “whoops…do-over.”  Besides, he is just flat wrong, and I have the certified documents to prove.  More importantly, so does the court…which is to say, the whole argument is beyond a colossal waste of time.  I may ask for sanctions…but I doubt it.

     Second, the offender score issue was also adjudicated at trial.  I submitted a five page long brief regarding the issue of offender scoring, and the defense had ample opportunity to respond.  In fact, the defense specifically requested a two week continuance for that purpose.  What this genius probably does not realize is, that I spent a considerable amount of time researching the issue myself, because, given the importance of this case, I wanted to be absolutely sure not to screw anything up.  

     Adding insult to injury, the guy could not even argue his own modified score and range properly.  By his own admission, even if the court accepted his argument that the prior DUIs do not count as points for purposes of scoring (which they do…the sentencing statute is blatantly clear about that), his offender score would still be a 4.  Yet, somehow, he figured that he really ought to have five points knocked off, giving him a score of 3, and a range of 15-20 months.  Okay…so…I give the guy credit in the fact that he is not a lawyer.  But keep in mind…he already had a lawyer at trial, and that lawyer already lost this argument once before!  Now, I know some lawyers are incompetent (and I also know that this guy’s lawyer is definitely not incompetent), but I cannot imagine why this idiot thinks he can make a better argument himself, without assistance from legal counsel.

     I am pretty sure that the judge will not think for more than about the time it takes to form a complete thought in his head before he dismisses this motion.  In the meantime, I will spend my time worrying about legitimate legal arguments from people who actually know what they are talking about.

tl;dr - “A man who represents himself has a fool for a client.” -Abraham Lincoln

     Since starting at the prosecutor’s office, I’ve conducted more than a dozen trials, all but three of which have resulted in guilty verdicts.  Today, I got to experience something I had not previously encountered: a hung jury.  Now, I assume that all of my readers are bright, intelligent people, but on the extremely unlikely chance that someone does not know what that means, a hung jury is when a jury simply cannot render a verdict one way or another.  In a criminal trial (at least in Washington), jury verdicts are supposed to be unanimous whether they are guilty or not guilty.  If the jury cannot agree, and cannot reconcile their disagreements, then the court is forced to declare a mistrial.  Basically, it is the legal equivalent of a do-over.

     Today’s trial was relatively familiar territory; the defendant (∆) was charged with DUI and Reckless Endangerment.  Unfortunately, since the case has not actually concluded yet, I cannot go into great detail about some of the disputed facts.  However, the basic scenario is not disputed by either side.  The story goes a little something like this…

     Back in mid-March, ∆ was driving his unregistered farm truck on his private property.  At some point, ∆ decided to drive the truck off the property to go get some firewood.  While backing the truck down his driveway, another vehicle (a large, red SUV) rounded the corner onto the main road.  The driver (V) saw ∆ backing down his driveway, and made his presence known by honking his horn.  And when I say honking his horn, I really mean laying on the horn as hard as he possibly could.  Despite V’s efforts, however, ∆ continued to back down the driveway, and proceeded to slam into the side of V’s SUV.  I should also mention that ∆ also had a passenger (a 13-year old boy) riding unsecured in the bed of his truck at the time.

     So, as you can plainly see, the real crux of this case is whether or not ∆ was drunk at the time of the collision.  You might be thinking that it ought to be an open and shut case.  Unfortunately, the story does not end with the collision.  After the collision, ∆ and V exchanged some heated words, and V was obviously very upset.  ∆, on the other hand, decided to drive back up onto his private property where he proceeded to build a campfire, and grab a beer.  See where this might be going yet?

     Basically, on a typical DUI, you have an officer who pulls the defendant over, and then checks the defendant for various physical symptoms of intoxication.  The officer then takes the defendant into custody and asks them to submit to a breath test.  The assumption, of course, is that the breath test will register anything they have consumed prior to driving.  In this case, there are a few major problems that make things very very complicated.

     Because this was an accident out in a rural area, the authorities were not immediately present on the scene.  It took about 20 minutes before the first officer was able to arrive.  By that time, the defendant had already consumed at least one or two beers.  In other words, any breath test would then register everything that he had after driving, effectively rendering the results useless for purposes of prosecution.  So…long story short…even though the officer performed a breath test, there was nothing I could actually do with it.

     You might be asking yourself at this point, “Well, what about other tests?”  In most DUI cases, the officers perform some kind of standardized field sobriety test (SFST) to determine whether or not a defendant is intoxicated.  However, there are some cases where an officer simply cannot perform the tests, such as when a defendant refuses to take them (which they can…SFSTs are entirely voluntary), or when the defendant has some kind of physical defect that makes it impossible for them to perform.  In this case, ∆ has a bad knee.  And again, because of his post-driving alcohol consumption, any SFST results would be irreparably tainted.

     And now you may be declaring, “but surely there were other physical symptoms of intoxication!”  You bet there were.  But were they reliable?  One of the major physical signs of intoxication that law enforcement officers look for are the telltale watery, bloodshot eyes.  Recall, if you will, what I said earlier about what happened immediately after the collision; ∆ went back onto his property and built a campfire.  Guess what happens when you get campfire smoke in your eyes.  Couple that with the drinking after driving, and you really have nothing to work with at all.  The taint is immeasurable.

     But of course, you have realized by now that there must have been other witnesses at the time of the collision, simply by virtue of the fact that ∆ hit someone.  Well…there is a problem there as well.  As it turns out, V had a passenger in his car with him, who we will call “G.”  G happens to be V’s girlfriend, but G also happens to know ∆ because ∆ used to live with G (though there was never any romantic involvement).  I would not exactly describe this as a “love triangle,” but unfortunately, it creates a very strong presumption of bias, particularly on V’s part.  Given that ∆ very nearly creamed his girlfriend, V is (rightfully so) rather upset about the whole incident, and he made that patently clear at the trial today.  Sadly, it also hurt his credibility.

     By now, many of you are probably thinking that this case sounds like a lost cause.  However, you would be wrong.  There were a couple of key pieces of evidence that I was unable to introduce at trial for a variety of reasons.  Had I been able to introduce them, the results might have been dramatically different.  And I really have no reason to believe that I will not be able to introduce them at the next trial (assuming we get there).  This case is far from lost.  But the best (or worst, depending on your perspective) is yet to come.

     As I said previously, a mistrial is like the legal equivalent of a do-over.  Because the case was declared a mistrial, the charges were never actually dismissed.  Instead, the judge ordered that a new trial setting be entered immediately.  In other words, ∆, who likely thought he would finally be going home, was taken back into custody, and had his bail reinstated.  Did I mention that ∆ has already been in jail for nearly two months awaiting this trial?  Now he will have to spend another six weeks or more in jail waiting for a new trial, unless he manages to make bail (which is extremely unlikely).  The only other way he can get out of jail is if one of two things happen; either I choose to dismiss the charges (which absolutely will not happen), or he chooses to plead guilty.

     I guess we will just have to wait and see how things play out.  Either way, I feel comforted in the fact that I have managed to keep his crazy drunk ass off the road for a while.  I doubt he will actually learn anything from this experience, nor am I confident that he will ever change his behavior.  But at least no one will have to worry about him injuring or killing someone in the meantime.

     I have been remiss in updating as frequently as I had previously.  Unfortunately, there really has not been a whole lot of excitement going on in District Court lately.  Quite the opposite, really…we seem to be in a slow period.  Normally, where we would get between 20-30 new cases a week, we have been lucky to get half that many as of late.  I do have a couple of interesting cases coming up in the foreseeable future, but there is not a lot to say about them at the present.

     I suppose there has been a bit of drama between myself and a certain judge, lately.  However, I am smart enough to know that badmouthing a judge in any public forum is a surefire way to end one’s career prematurely.  So, I will not say anything other than the fact that we have had some strong disagreements in the recent past, and the effects have been relatively obvious to all outside observers.  Which really only exacerbates the problem further, because it means that everyone else is getting upset, and that only seems to be adding fuel to the fire.  My hope is that things will blow over by next week, but we will just have to wait and see.

     On a more positive note, however, today I discovered something wonderful.  It turns out that I am not the only nerdy lawyer in my county.  A young associate private defense lawyer and I have been gradually getting to know one another in court as she is given more and more responsibility from her employer.  Actually, it seems more like her employer has relegated all District Court matters to this young associate for…shall we say…less than gratifying reasons.  Regardless, we cross paths relatively frequently these days.  After doing a rather tense change of plea this morning, this young defender and I had a moment to chat out in the hallway outside of the courtroom.  Somehow, the topics of thrift store shopping, Nerf guns, and old video games came up, and before I knew it, I had somehow managed to coax this otherwise reserved young lady out of the nerd closet.  

     And while this may seem like only a minor achievement, it really is a lot more.  I deal with a host of other attorneys in the courtroom, and most of them are nearly twice my age.  This makes it very difficult to connect with them on a personal level, and really share interests outside of work.  It is nice to see a couple of new, younger lawyers in town with some similar interests (there is a new public defender I have been getting to know as well, who also has some nerdy tendencies about him).  With any luck, I will be able to build a small social network locally, rather than relying entirely on my (huge) social network about two or three hours away.  Not that I have any gripes with my long-distance social network (which I still consider my primary), but it is really difficult to enjoy their company on weeknights, unless we all happen to be chatting on IRC.  And for all I know, maybe my local social network will eventually find a place in the larger network, which would be totally awesome.