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Nobody Ever Said Lawyers Were Smart
In one of my recent posts, I uttered a remark that I said was common around criminal courts:
Nobody ever said criminals were smart.
That statement kicked up enough private comments that I’m glad I’m no longer an active judge and so I don’t have to worry about having to respond to a complaint at the Judicial Qualifications Commission. I did get a few of those in my day, but only one got past the front end screening.
Every judge I know has a short list of lawyers who are complete pains in the ass. They bleed all the fun out of law practice because they are stupid or unskilled at controlling crazy clients or inclined to try every case just to prove they will.
(Russell digression™ In that last category, I mean everything. Every lawyer — at least early in their career — has had to go to trial with cases they knew they would lose, for any number of reasons. Most commonly, you have summarized the cards in the other side’s hand and expressed the opinion that a trial against those cards would be like drawing to an inside straight — but they have more money than good sense and so insist on a trial.
Then, take divorce cases. Please. Take all of them. To my students, I summed up my preference for a criminal…
