"I am not gay" Senator Larry Craig, conservative anti-gay rights Republican, of....Idaho? (it just doesn't get worse on the hypocrisy front) has given criminal defense lawyers a 3 word perfect answer to those potential clients who ask one of the most recurring and dumbest questions I hear:
"If I hire a lawyer, won't I look guilty?"
See, Senator Craig was arrested for, ahem, some fancy hand and foot signals in a public restroom in the Minneapolis Airport in June, indicating he wanted sex with who later become known to him as, damn, an undercover cop. Oops.
Craig quietly went in to court pro-se (without a liberal criminal defense lawyer) and pled to a reduced non-sex charge of disorderly conduct.
People are screaming why an innocent man would plea guilty. That makes me laugh, hard. Happens every day folks. He said he "wanted to make it go away," and it did. For a while at least.
Now he says he wasn't guilty, shouldn't have pled guilty and is, hey, hiring a lawyer to withdraw his plea. I don't know the law in Minnesota, but I bet it's too late.
Too late Larry.
So when a potential client asks that ridiculous question about whether "hiring a lawyer makes me look guilty," answer "Remember Senator Craig?"
Brian Tannebaum is a criminal defense attorney in Miami, Florida practicing in state and federal court. To learn more about Brian and his firm, Tannebaum Weiss, please visit www.tannebaumweiss.com
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6 hours ago
I agree with you to an extent.
ReplyDeleteIn reality though, our defendants, even with competent representation, often plead to something or are found guilty.
I hate dealing with the client who thinks that simply because he hired me that his charges will be dropped.
Even worse are the clients that then think that they're going to make money from the state on some type of wrongful arrest case.