Ben and Me_ From Temperance to Humility - Cameron Gunn [21]
At least we weren’t talking about someone else.
Resigned to a certain level of indifference from my colleagues, if not outright hostility, I carried on in Silence. Or so I thought.
To understand what happened next, I need to explain that the criminal justice system seems perpetually overburdened to the point of complete collapse. Not long ago, in one North American jurisdiction, the courts were so backlogged that forty thousand cases were dismissed en masse because of breaches of the accused’s constitutional right to a trial within a reasonable time. We are a ship that sails along, but we are constantly taking on water.
Plea bargaining is the bucket with which we bale our leaky ship. We haggle, barter, and negotiate. We wheel and deal. We sell off charges in exchange for pleas, lighter sentences for the certainty of result. We, both prosecution and defense, become the infomercial pitchmen of justice.
Why do we do it? It’s simple. The system operates on a principle a little like the old Cold War notion of mutually assured destruction. Both sides have an understanding that if everything went to trial all the time, the world would end, at least metaphorically.
Ask any criminal lawyer and he’ll tell you that plea bargaining leaves everyone feeling a little dirty. It’s not wrong, of course; indeed, it’s judicially sanctioned. Still, there is a certain ickiness to it—like taking your sibling to the prom. No law against it, but it just feels wrong. Those of us knee deep in the bilge of the justice system, despite whatever ickiness we feel, are forced to plea-bargain. So when we do it, we demand a certain amount of trust between counsel—an understanding that a deal is a deal. When that doesn’t happen . . . well, on that third day of Silence, it didn’t.
It was a minor thing really. As part of a plea negotiation (that’s what we’re supposed to call them), I had agreed not to submit to the judge a criminal record that was outdated by twenty years. This is consistent with the law in my jurisdiction. Such an old record is of little or no significance to the imposition of a just sentence. It does not mean, however, that the accused has never been involved in the criminal justice system, and the quid pro quo in this deal would include the defense lawyer not suggesting any such thing.
But that’s exactly what my opponent said on this particular occasion.
When it was his turn to address the court, he stood up and said that his client had never been involved in the criminal process before. This was not part of the deal. Worse, it was an outright lie. The trust that the process demands was breached.
The immediate problem was easily resolved. I stood up (after taking a deep breath), advised the court of the fact that I had been misled, and made further submissions on the sentence, which the judge promptly accepted. From a virtuous standpoint, however, matters were not so easily resolved. The lawyer involved, sensing that the wisest course of action was a physical retreat, left the building before I could complete my other trials and wrap my chubby fingers around his neck. This left me with an almost overwhelming desire to vent my frustrations to my colleagues—in effect, to bad-mouth my opponent. As soon as the notion of telling others about how angry I was popped into my head, however, I sensed the warning finger of Franklin waving in my face.
Would venting about the other lawyer have benefited myself or others? Initially, I tried to rationalize the situation. If I didn’t tell my colleagues, they might be similarly duped by this counsel sometime in the future. Then I remembered that rationalizing gossip was a no-no according to the Ten Pathways. Now my virtuous guides were ganging up on me. Giving in to Silence, I said nothing. Until now, that is.
Ben should have put this virtue last.
Of Peter Lorre and Learning to Sit Down and Shut Up
There are two truths that all lawyers know: (1) never ask a question to which you don’t know the answer; and (2) know when to sit