Day 12: Arraignment with Ms. Roman, Discussion with Mr. Rost, and Discussion with Mr. Richardson5/31/2019 The first thing I got to do today was see an arraignment with the attorney Jane Roman. On the way to the courtroom, she briefly explained to me the context of the proceeding I was about to see. Shortly after somebody is arrested, they go to an arraignment, where the prosecutor tells them the charges against them, and the defendant decides how they will plead, usually after consulting with an attorney. In this arraignment, the prosecutor charged Ms. Roman's client with four crimes: involuntary manslaughter, endangerment of children, tampering with evidence, and felonious assault. In responding to this charge, the defense can plead in a variety of ways. One of these is a a plea of not guilty, in which the defendant contests the charges that the prosecution has made and makes the state prove the defendant's guilt. In this case, the defense determined that it would not be productive to plead not guilty, because there was a reasonable chance that the grand jury would decide to indict the defendant on more severe charges, and he could ultimately end up serving a more severe sentence. Another option is a guilty plea, where the defendant admits a degree of responsibility for the crime, but sometimes less responsibility than the prosecutor alleges. Although a guilty plea may result in a plea deal for the defendant, which is a lessening of the defendant's sentence, the prosecutor can then use the defendant's testimony of guilt against the defendant. A defendant can also choose to plead no contest, in which the defendant concedes that the prosecutor has sufficient evidence to convict the defendant of the crimes that the prosecutor says the defendant committed. A different option, which is what the defense chose in this case, is to plead guilty to lesser charges but waive the right to a trial and go straight to sentencing. This allowed the defendant to avoid potentially more severe charges by avoiding the process of a trial, in which the grand jury could indict the defendant more severely. I plan on talking with Ms. Roman more later to further develop my understanding of the plea system, because I still have some questions about how it works.
At the sentencing, the prosecutor first read the list of the charges. In response, Ms. Roman said that she had no objections to the charges, and she announced that her client was going to plead guilty to the charges and proceed straight to sentencing. In response, the judge began asking the defendant a series of extensive questions to ensure that the defendant was aware of the rights he was giving up by waiving his right to a trial. The defendant answered that he was aware of every right he was giving up, and he also wished to proceed to sentencing. The prosecutor read a summary of the case from the state's point of view. The defendant's girlfriend left the defendant at home with the girlfriend Morgan's 23 month old son, Lucas, of whom the boyfriend is not the father. A few hours later, the defendant called Morgan at work and said that her son had fallen off a skateboard into a toy chest, and he had been pretty badly hurt. He also sent her a photo of Lucas's injuries. He falsely told Morgan that Lucas was still alert, so she didn't need to come home. Several hours later, the defendant called Morgan again and said that Lucas had stopped breathing. Understandably, she rushed home, and from there, they rushed Lucas to the nearest fire station and then to the hospital where he was placed on life support, but he died four days later. The police didn't believe the defendant's explanation that Lucas's injuries were caused by falling off the skateboard into a toy chest, so they launched an investigation. Before the police could question Morgan, the defendant managed to convince Morgan to delete all the text messages and photos he sent her about Lucas's injury, and he also agreed upon an alternate story with her. Despite the defendant's efforts, discrepancies in the defendant's story and Morgans arose when the police questioned them separately. Furthermore, the coroner had determined that Lucas's injuries were severe enough that they couldn't have been caused just by his falling off a skateboard onto a toy chest. Therefore, the defendant was charged with involuntary manslaughter, endangerment of children, tampering with evidence (for deleting the photos), and felonious assault. Because the defendant had waived the right to a trial, the judge found him guilty of all charges. Perhaps the most memorable part of the case was the victim impact statements at the end. Both of Lucas's grandmothers came up and stood next to the prosecutor, and each one gave an approximately five minute speech about the impact of Lucas's death on their respective children, who were Lucas's parents. They were truly moving to hear, and a significant reason that they were so strong is because they didn't come across as vengeful. They instead focused on the positive qualities of Lucas and the ways in which he would be sorely missed, with little mention of the defendant. With some minor edits, the statements would have been perfectly appropriate for a funeral. I was talking to Ms. Roman and another attorney about this later, and they said that this is unusual for victim statements, since most are very focused on angrily asking the judge to maximize the defendant's sentence. Somewhat ironically, the ones that focus less on requesting severe punishment and focus more on the sadness the defendant's actions have brought upon the victims generally sway the judge the most. Before the victim impact statements, the defendant himself gave a brief statement, in which he tearfully apologized to his family and Lucas's family and promised to study as hard as he could in prison. After the statements, the judge sentenced the defendant to 20 years in prison without possibility of parole, and the defendant left the courtroom in handcuffs and went to the county jail to await transportation to prison. After the arraignment, I got the opportunity to talk with another criminal defense attorney who works in Fritz's office, named Pete Rost. Mr. Rost explained in detail the facts of an interesting and somewhat complex criminal case that he had recently been working on. As he was explaining the case to me, he showed me some footage from the security cameras at the scene of the crime, which definitely brought the case to life and raised some interesting questions. It's amazing how foolish some of the mistakes are that people make when committing crimes, such as claiming they'd never been somewhere after they'd touched things in the place with bare hands, or lying about the contents of a 911 call when all 911 calls are recorded. After I wrote my blog post yesterday, I got the opportunity to have an excellent conversation with another attorney who works in Fritz's office, named Jon Richardson. We began talking about how best to structure one's studies to both have good career options and also fill one's mind with meaningful things, and a big thing that Mr. Richardson emphasized was the importance of the humanities, in addition to science and math. He certainly didn't deny the importance of the latter for many career tracks, but he argued that the humanities are one of the most profound ways that people can expose themselves to beauty in the world and fill their mind with new and interesting things. He also mentioned that knowledge of the humanities has been essential for him in his most successful trials, where he deeply connected with the jury. I think that many of the most profound insights in human history have come from effectively combining the humanities with math and science, and I intend to continue educating myself in all these areas. Mr. Richardson is an excellent speaker and writer, so one question I asked him is how one can improve their speaking abilities. He said that besides natural talent, one of the most effective ways to improve speaking abilities is by reading great speeches and writings to experience great writing, and then to just trying implementing some of the same techniques. He said that learning specific rhetorical tools can also be helpful, though it's essential to combine technical knowledge of rhetoric with experience reading a variety of high-quality works. This reminds me of the strategies that a person should use to effectively learn a language. I also asked both Mr. Richardson and Ms. Roman about how they started their careers and how they'd advise a law school student who wants to go into private practice rather than a big law firm. They (and every other attorney I've talked to) said that it was absolutely key to make as many connections as possible during law school to improve the chances of getting lucky and finding other lawyers to partner with to start a practice or small firm. This advice seems somewhat applicable to all areas of study, not just law. I'll certainly keep it in mind, no matter what.
0 Comments
I started out my day by going to the appeals court to talk some more with Judge Zmuda and ask him a few questions I had about some of the cases I heard yesterday.
One of the cases that I asked Judge Zmuda about was a case that involved a person getting injured at a concert of the band Insane Clown Posse (ICP), and I now have a much better understanding of the case. Insane Clown Posse is a horror clown themed hip hop band that is known for spraying root beer on fans during concerts. At the concert the plaintiff (victim) in this case attended, people could buy special tickets for $100 extra that allowed them to go onstage at a certain time in the concert and spray people with root beer themselves. The plaintiff knew this, so she deliberately stood quite far away from the stage to protect herself. However, things (unsurprisingly) got a bit out of hand, and the people onstage ended up throwing whole 2 liter bottles of root beer into the audience, one of which hit the plaintiff in the chest after sailing halfway across the venue. She immediately felt dizzy and began to try to exit, and after about ten seconds, she fainted, breaking her wrist and injuring part of her head. She promptly sued ICP for damages, but ICP failed to answer the suit, so she won damages by default. The case then proceeded to a damages hearing, in which a judge would determine how much money the plaintiff should receive from ICP in compensation. In this hearing, the judge ruled that the soda bottle's collision with the plaintiff's chest was not the proximate cause of her more severe injuries, so she only awarded the plaintiff $2000. The plaintiff appealed this ruling, saying that she should receive more in compensation, which is how it ended up in the appeals court. The main argument of the appellant is that the judge erred in disregarding the evidence that clearly showed that the bottle was the proximate cause of the defendant's injuries. According to a deposition that the plaintiff conducted with a medical professional, the bottle hit the defendant in a region in her chest that would have caused a cardiac thump, which may indeed have caused her to lose consciousness, which caused her more severe injuries. This references the essential legal concept of a proximate cause. A proximate cause is legally defined as an action that sets into motion a series of logical and foreseeable events that causes the damages. To establish that a party is legally obligated to pay damages for any injury, it is generally necessary to establish that the party in question did something that was the proximate cause of the injury. In this case, the expert's testimony is meant to establish that the collision of the bottle with the plaintiff's chest was the proximate cause of her injuries, and the appellant argues that the judge disregarded this evidence. The main argument of the appellee is that the judge has the duty to act as the finder of fact in this case, and that is exactly what she did. She simply decided that the expert's advice was not relevant, credible, or sufficient to establish that the soda bottle was the proximate cause of the plaintiff's injuries, and she has that freedom as the judge of the case. It's up to the three judges to decide whether the judge's decision constitutes error, or if she acted within her legal freedom. Another thing I asked the judge about is how much he worked during the start of his career as a lawyer. He answered by first emphasizing that when a person becomes a lawyer, they don't enter the kind of job where they clock in and clock out. A lawyer is always a lawyer, even when they're not formally working. This means that they're always thinking about cases, writing about cases, and discussing them, even when they're not at work. It seems like many interesting jobs share this characteristic of always giving the person who is doing them something to think about, and that appeals to me. However, Judge Zmuda said that big law firms generally see their attorneys as commodities, and these attorneys often end up working extremely long hours. This is because the partners at law firms usually have little regard for the activities of the other partners, so multiple partners often assign separate tasks to a single lawyer that have a strict deadline. This makes effective time management an essential skill to have, and lawyers do a lot of this work on their own. However, the lawyers at big firms certainly don't have much freedom to pursue their own interests while they're there. After lunch, I got to see an eviction hearing at the Toledo Municipal Court. The case involved a tenant who was facing eviction from her residence for allegedly smoking marijuana in the building. The first witness the plaintiff called was the landlord, who answered a series of questions from her attorney about the rent contract. Overall, the direct examination was quite straightforward, and the landlord's main point was that the marijuana had been accidentally discovered in the defendant's ashtray during a routine bedbug inspection. The defendant's lawyer cross examined her, challenging her rights to have entered the property, but I didn't think that the cross examination was particularly strong. The plaintiff then brought forward a police officer who had aided in the inspection of the room and verified that the substance in the ashtray was marijuana. It was very interesting to watch the plaintiff lawyer ask the police officer a series of questions to qualify him as an expert witness, because the whole process was surprisingly similar to mock trial. The police officer described how he had initially smelled marijuana in the room and then smelled the piece of homemade cigarette in the ashtray to verify that the cigarette did contain marijuana. The defendant's lawyer cross then cross examined the police officer, but I didn't think this cross examination was very strong either, since most of the defense's questions centered around challenging the accuracy of the officer's nose. I think it's quite hard to deny that an officer who specializes in narcotics cases knows how to identify the odor of marijuana. The defendant herself was then direct examined by her lawyer, and I thought that the strongest argument she brought up was that the eviction order was not handed to her, as the contract specified. Instead, it was both slipped under her door and mailed to her. However, the plaintiff lawyer argued The first thing I got to do today was hear a series of hearings at the appeals court, in which Judge Zmuda is one of the three judges. I'll give a brief, simplified overview of a few of the cases.
The first case, which I found the most challenging to understand, was a case between a fire department and the township that employed the fire department. A little more than a year ago, the fire department and the township began negotiations about how to reform the health insurance program for the fire department, and after a long series of negotiations, an arbitrator eventually facilitated the reach of an agreement. Both sides originally signed off on the agreement. However, a few months later, the city declared that part of the agreement violated the law, so the city initiated a trial to try to nullify the agreement. The fire department did not support this nullification, since the agreement that they had reached a few months before was extremely favorable to the fire department. The judge in this original trial ruled that the agreement should be nullified. The fire department then appealed the decision, and I saw the appeals court trial today. The reason I found the case challenging to understand was because much of the debate revolved around the legality of the initial agreement, and they referenced many fine points of health insurance policy that I didn't have the background knowledge on to follow effectively. However, I could still pick up on a few broad themes. The main point that the appellee was arguing in his effort to support the original verdict – that the agreement was illegal – is that the agreement essentially gave the workers at the fire department unprecedented insurance privilege that was much better than what the rest of the city employees got. The appellant's rebuttal to this point was that unions have the right to negotiate the terms of their insurance coverage with their employer, and this was simply an example of good negotiation by the fire department. It appeared to me that the appellant had a slightly stronger argument, since he gave several examples of past instances in which there have been legal differences between the health care plans of workers in different areas of the city. Another case I heard raised interesting questions about what kind of evidence can and can't legally be heard in court. In the original criminal case, the crime the defendant was accused of was domestic abuse, for physically beating his girlfriend in a hotel room while he was heavily intoxicated. The defendant had made several phone calls that had been used against him in the trial, and he appealed his conviction because he believed that the jury should not have legally heard the phone calls. The first phone call was a call he placed from jail to his girlfriend. His girlfriend began asking him why he beat her, and he said that he was unable to answer the question because there was a police officer standing next to him who told him not to talk about the case. The prosecution argued that his failure to deny that he beat his girlfriend amounted to an implicit admission of guilt. The second phone call used in the original trial was the 911 call his girlfriend placed when the defendant was beating her. The issue lies in the fact that the defendant didn't realize that the phone call was still going after he thought that his girlfriend had hung up, so he said some things that could be considered incriminating. I still don't perfectly understand why this might not have been legal to use in the original trial, so I'll be sure to ask Judge Zmuda that tomorrow. One of the appellant's main arguments was that the defendant was not free to answer his girlfriend's questions in the first call how he wished, since he had a police officer standing over him, so that call can't be used as an implicit admission of guilt. Another one of his main arguments is that the prosecution's reproduction of the 911 phone call in the prosecution's closing statement was not legal, since closing statements are meant to be only verbal consolidations of evidence, not a place to introduce new evidence or display exhibits such as the phone call recording. The appellant claimed that the defense attorney in the original case did not object to this, which means that the defense provided ineffective assistance of counsel in the original trial. On the other side, the appellee argued that the defendant voluntarily called his wife, so he was putting himself in a situation where he might have to answer questions like those his wife asked him, and the defendant's failure to respond to his wife's questions is an implicit admission of guilt because he should have expected and been prepared to answer such questions. The appellee also referenced the trial record to say that the defense counsel actually did object to the playing of the 911 phone call in the prosecution's closing statement in the original trial. I think the appellant had a slightly stronger argument in this case as well, though not by much. The court record that shows that the defense did object to the use of the 911 call in the closing statement sinks the second half of the appellant's argument. However, I think that the assertion that the defendant wasn't actually free to answer his girlfriend's questions on a recorded jail phone conversation with a police officer standing over him is still valid, so I think he should be entitled to a new trial in which this phone conversation is not used as evidence. The appeals hearing was quite different from a regular trial in several ways. For one thing, the structure of when people talked was completely different. The appellant first took about 15 minutes to present their case, then the appellee took about 15 minutes to present their case, and the appellant got 3 to 5 minutes to do a rebuttal. During the course of the speeches of both the appellant and the appellee, the judges would sporadically interrupt the attorneys to ask directed questions, so it felt almost like a conversation between the attorneys and the judges at times. Sometimes the judges actually asked quite pointed questions, which turned the proceeding into a bit more of a back-and-forth debate. The judges, especially Judge Zmuda, challenged each attorney's argument every time to try to expose its weaknesses and see which argument was superior. The appeals hearing also differed from a regular trial in that no witnesses are called forth, so the hearing consists entirely of discussions between the attorneys and judges. After the hearing, I got to go up to Judge Zmuda's office to discuss the hearing and a variety of other things. The judge told me that one of the most challenging parts of being an appellate judge is that he has to get as familiar as possible with a high volume of cases as fast as possible, since he hears hundreds of cases every year. Earlier, he emphasized that there is no room for error in the appeals court, since this is usually the final verdict on a case, so it's essential that he has an excellent grasp of the facts on all the cases, especially since the lawyers have each spent weeks and sometimes months preparing their arguments for him. After lunch, I met up with Shay Bailey to meet Judge Helmick, who works in the federal court. He informed us that we were about to watch him sentence somebody in an immigration case. Several people who work in the area of immigration walked in his office with us, along with the attorney who represented the government in this case and the attorney who represented the man who was illegally in the US. They discussed the case a bit, and the judge then led us down to the courtroom. We got to watch the proceeding of the trial from the jury box. Judge Helmick gave a bit of brief background on the case and made sure that the defendant's interpreter was ready, and the defendant actually told the interpreter that he didn't want her to interpret throughout the whole trial, since the defendant's English was quite good. The argument of the attorney representing the state is that the defendant should serve the full statutorily recommended sentence of 30-37 months. In this argument, she referenced his history of multiple robberies starting at age 15, his various drug smuggling charges, his alleged gang activity, and his illegal reentry into the US after he was deported once. The defense attorney did not directly deny anything the prosecution attorney said, but she did request that the defendant's sentence be lessened. In this argument, she referenced the defendant's relatively clean record over the past ten years, his active employment, and the initiative he took in utilizing the educational programs that were made available to him during his detention. After she finished speaking, Judge Helmick gave the defendant himself the opportunity to speak. This was tremendously powerful to hear. He gave an emotional but coherent description of his difficult childhood and his experience losing his father at the age of 10. He discussed how this background led him to make serious mistakes as a teenager, but he had come to the US again in search of stable employment. Interestingly, he denied all involvement in gangs, instead claiming that he had been assaulted by a gang in his native Mexico when he was coming home from work, which contributed to his decision to come to the US illegally in search of safety and a good job. Ultimately, Judge Helmick gave him a slightly lessened sentence of 24 months in prison followed by deportation, and it was truly moving to hear how the judge delivered the sentence. His reluctance at issuing this sentence was evident, and he repeatedly expressed his human love for the defendant and sadness that he had to punish him in this largely unproductive manner. The gravity of the situation weighed heavily on everyone as we white Americans silently listened to the only sounds in the courtroom – the clinking of handcuffs and the defendant's shuffling footsteps. The sentencing was tremendously saddening to watch, but I'm extremely glad I got the opportunity to see it. Ultimately, it passionately motivated me to make some kind of positive difference in these people's lives. My main activity today was talking to Judge Gene Zmuda, who is one of the judges of the Ohio 6th district appeals court. We began our discussion by discussing where the appeals court stands in the broader nationwide court system. A party (the appellant) can issue an appeal when they believe that the judge made a legal error in their case. Since Judge Zmuda is in the Ohio 6th district court of appeals, any case being tried in the 6th district of the state court system in which a party appeals goes to his court. Judge Zmuda and two other appellate judges ultimately decide whether the decision of the original case's judge should be upheld or whether it should be overturned.
When a case is appealed, the appellant and the appellee (the party who argues that the original judge's ruling was valid) exchange a series of written arguments, which go to the appellate judge. When the appeals court receives a case, an appellate judge takes a look at all of the records and evidence in the case and directs his team to do further research into the case if necessary. Sometimes there are also oral arguments, in which both the appellant and the appellee argue in person for their side, which is somewhat similar to a trial. To make the final decision, the three appellate judges confer and debate about what should be done, and the vote of the majority of the judges determines what happens. If the original ruling is overturned, the appellant is generally entitled to a new trial. On the other hand, if the original ruling is upheld, the defendant can try to take the case to the Ohio Supreme Court. However, the Ohio Supreme Court does not hear every case, so the appellant must petition for the case to be heard. The Ohio Supreme Court generally rejects appellate petitions, so an appeals court's decision to uphold the original ruling is usually final. Because of this, Judge Zmuda continuously emphasized that there is no room for error in the appeals court. They must do absolutely all they can to get the decision right, since there's often nowhere else for a somebody to turn once their case is through the appeals court. A critical distinction between the appeals court and the Ohio Supreme Court is that any party in a civil case, or any defendant in a criminal case, has the right to appeal the ruling of the original judge and have it examined in appeals court. However, there is no right to have a case heard in the Ohio Supreme Court, so it is necessary to for people to petition for the privilege of having a case heard there. Judge Zmuda also emphasized that the appeals court is only evaluating the quality of the legal process that took place in the trial, so they are basically "grading papers". The appeals court is not evaluating the case based on how they feel about it. If it looks like the original judge correctly followed all legal procedures on a close case but ultimately arrived at a decision that the appellate judges don't agree with, the appellate judges are still expected to uphold the original judge's ruling. This necessity to put one's own beliefs aside contributes to the challenging nature of being an appellate judge. One of the most interesting parts of our discussion occurred after Judge Zmuda asked me what I was interested in doing with my life. When I replied that two of my top interests right now are law and data science, he got quite enthusiastic that I mentioned that I was interested in data science. He said that one of the ways in which he is expecting the legal field to change most in coming years is through the application of data to law. Right now, many decisions in the court system, such as whether to allow a defendant in a case to be in custody or be free, are made primarily based on the judge's gut instinct. However, with the rise of data science technology such as machine learning and artificial intelligence, it is becoming possible to analyze data from past cases to make predictions about what the best options that balance society's safety with the defendant's freedom would be. Overall, he described data science in law as the legal equivalent of "moneyball", just like data science was used in Wall Street and sports betting. The connection between data and law also exists the other way around. As I mentioned a few days ago when I talked about the speech Fritz gave at paralegal day, the rise of incredibly powerful database technology such as that used by online news sources and social media sites like Facebook is giving rise to fascinating legal situations revolving around how data can and should be legally collected and used. He said that being familiar with both technical and legal fields would give rise to lots of exciting opportunities in the near future. Another question I asked Judge Zmuda that led to an enlightening answer was what the best preparation for law school is in college, and even before college. He answered that the number one thing was to take plenty of good writing classes, since learning to express oneself clearly and concisely is of utmost importance to law. Learning to write well is among the best ways to build this skill. I've actually heard similar advice about how to prepare for a career in data science. Of course technical skills are indispensable in data science, but communication skills are also essential, since brilliant analysis that nobody can understand has no practical value. It's interesting to me that the value of extremely effective communication is tremendously high in both of these fields that I find fascinating, and undoubtedly in many others. After my conversation with Judge Zmuda, I got to talk to an attorney who helps Judge Zmuda research appeals cases, named Beth Michael. Ms. Michael got out a big box full of extensive trial documentation and physical evidence from a criminal trial, and she explained that this was sent to the court of appeals when this case was appealed. The documentation included complete transcripts of the trial, the defendant's record, and numerous proceedings that occurred before the trial, and the physical evidence included a wooden club and a plastic flyswatter, both of which were allegedly used in the commission of the crime. She explained that this was the material that the appellate judges and the appeals court team looks through to try to determine if any judicial errors occurred. I observed that I found it interesting that the judges couldn't watch a video of the case to analyze every part of the trial more closely. She replied that only the jury was allowed to determine what the facts of the case were, and they do this by by analyzing every part of each witnesses testimony and the evidence. The appeals judges are only there to review how the original judge processed the case, not the facts that were established in the case. Therefore, only allowing the appellate judges to read transcripts of the case helps them stay more objective and within the scope of their duties. I'll get the opportunity tomorrow to hear oral arguments in the appeals court for a variety of cases. Ms. Michael sent me the appellate and appellee arguments and briefs for five different cases that I may hear tomorrow, so I'll spend the rest of the day reading those. I'm looking forward to hearing the oral arguments tomorrow! I spent most of the day helping my sponsor research for a case that he's actively involved in. To help, I dove deeply into several statutes and summarized a variety of sections that he asked me to look at. Finally, I constructed a detailed argument about the case based on the statutes and gave it to my sponsor for him to look over. Unfortunately, further details can't be made public due to the confidential nature of the case.
The first thing I got to do today was attend a board meeting of the Lucas County Health Department, of which Fritz is a member. A wide variety of topics were discussed, including fair distribution of employees' salaries, HIV testing strategies, and concern about measles in Toledo. One major topic the board discussed was whether or not an employee who is terminated with cause from the health department can use the vacation time they have accumulated before leaving. This is not a common occurrence, since it is quite challenging to establish a case to terminate an employee with cause in Ohio, but the health department says that they still need to have a policy on it. After some discussion, they resolved to return to the issue at a later date. Another interesting and crucial topic of discussion was when to charge people to be tested for HIV. When being tested for HIV at the health department, a person is required to take a survey that asks various questions about their family background and sexual activity to estimate the risk that they will be a carrier of HIV. If the risk is determined to be sufficiently high, they will be tested for free, but otherwise, they have to pay $20 to be tested. This policy was apparently decided at the state level, and several members of the board disagreed with it. These people argued that this policy simply incentivizes people to answer the survey dishonestly so that they will be eligible for free testing, and I agree with this argument. The whole board agreed that the ultimate goal was to do whatever they could to minimize the number of people to walk out without getting tested at all, so they briefly considered options to pay for low income people to get tested, no matter their risk. This strikes me as another interesting example of conflict between state and local interests, similar to LEBOR. It definitely highlights the importance of giving municipalities a degree of freedom to make some of their own laws. The topic the board spent the most time discussing was the recent measles scare in Toledo. About a week ago, a child in an elementary school in Toledo was displaying symptoms similar to those of measles, including a large rash and a high fever. The school called the health board, and the school ended up sending the child home, along with 16 other unvaccinated kids who were at risk to exposure. (Only one of those 16 was unvaccinated for a legitimate medical reason.) The child's parents indignantly called the school and insisted that their child didn't have measles, and the parents gave some other explanation for the symptoms. Several days later, lab tests revealed that the child indeed didn't have measles, but it still sparked a serious discussion about how to responsibly handle cases like this in the future. The most significant problem in combating the spread of infectious diseases is the unnecessarily low rate of vaccination in the Toledo community, especially in poorer areas. Besides unnecessarily low vaccination rates, one of the most significant barriers to infectious disease control that they discussed is the backlog of tests to be done at centralized labs, which results in wait times of several days to receive results on tests. New technology may be able to improve this issue in the near future, but for now, significant wait times remain a serious issue. The board mentioned that the consequences of not vaccinating a child can be extremely severe, since a school has the authority to send any unvaccinated child home for 21 days if it is suspected that they could have had contact with the disease. This could potentially cause a parent to lose their job if they have to stay home from work during this time. Unfortunately, a characteristic of vaccines is that their effects are invisible when they are serving their intended purpose, which is preventing the spread of disease. Because of this, the main thing that consistently causes vaccination rates to rise in a community is an epidemic. Some board members mentioned that parents were often extremely unreceptive to evidence, and the more studies health department workers cited when trying to convince unwilling parents to vaccinate their kids, the more unwilling the parents became. Convincing these parents to vaccinate their children remains one of the most complex challenges of modern disease control. After the board meeting, I had the opportunity to discuss the health department's job with a few people who work there. One of these people is Eric Zgodzinski, the current Lucas County Health Commissioner, who was eager to inform me about the kinds of things the health department does. Broadly, his duty is to oversee the operations of the health department by facilitating positive relationships between people and fostering data-driven decision making. One thing we discussed was the role of research in influencing the health department's decisions. During the lake Erie algae bloom in 2014, the health department wanted to ensure that they could send out information to as many people as possible that these people would be willing to trust, so the department conducted a qualitative study in which they simply asked people what their most trustworthy sources of drinking water related information would be. A trend of people trusting independent media more than the health department's website emerged, so the health department began cooperating with The Blade to spread information about water safety. This made me wonder how information about how trustworthy people find various news sources could be discovered quantitatively, when the people themselves weren't available to interview, and I thought it would be fascinating to look at internet use statistics for various websites and look for trends that suggest people's level of trust in the source. I then got to talk with Brandon Palinski, who works in performance management at the Health Department. The project he is currently working on is making sure the health department can pass the accreditation process that all health boards in Ohio are required to go through. We discussed a variety of things, including the data he analyzes to aid in the process of securing accreditation, the accreditation process, and the reasons that Ohio mandated the accreditation of all health boards statewide. During the second half of my day, I got to observe discussions between Fritz and his colleague and their clients about a case in the Sylvania municipal court. I can't disclose the contents of the discussions, but it was an intriguing case to hear about. After the private discussions, I watched the attorneys formally schedule the date of future court proceedings with the judge in the courtroom. I find it interesting that even the most seemingly mundane tasks, such as scheduling dates of court proceedings, are almost always carried out in a highly formal manner in the court system. It certainly lends an air of importance to the whole institution, which I assume is one of the goals. In the morning, I had the privilege of spontaneously having an intriguing conversation about juries with an extremely experienced and intelligent lawyer named Robert Kaplan. (He's the father of Sam Kaplan, whom I've mentioned earlier.) Mr. Kaplan began the conversation by commenting on the fact that the presumption of innocence, which is the idea that the defendant is innocent until proven guilty, is a completely artificial social construct. Given the context in which the jury sees the defendant – surrounded by lawyers, with his/her head down – and the fact that the defendant was quite possibly arrested before being brought to court, the jury's first instinct is that the defendant is most likely guilty. The idea of the presumption of innocence was created hundreds of years ago in England to try to balance out a jury's natural bias against the defendant, to push the jury to a more neutral assessment of the defendant at the beginning of the trial. Another thing I got to discuss with Mr. Kaplan was the common defense strategy of not having the defendant testify. The jury is instructed that they should not rule the defendant guilty unless it has been demonstrated that the defendant is guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt." Therefore, if the defense can leave some reasonable doubt in the jury's mind that the client is guilty, the jury should rule the defendant not guilty. To understand how the defense leaves guilt in the jury's mind, it's important to first understand how the jury is led to feel about the defendant throughout the course of a sample trial, in which it is assumed that there are strong arguments/witnesses for both sides of the case and each side's lawyers are of similar skill. The jury starts out relatively neutral, likely with a slight inclination against the defendant given the fact that the defendant has been accused of something. The jury then hears the opening arguments from both lawyers, first the prosecution, then the defense, and if both the lawyers are similarly skilled and there are strong arguments for both sides, the jury may be further neutralized. Next, the jury is presented with the witnesses and evidence from the prosecution, which are cross-examined by the defense. If these witnesses are strong, the jury is likely led to believe that the defendant is guilty, especially if the jury forms an emotional connection to the witnesses or if the circumstantial evidence seems undeniable. However, they are then presented with the defense's witnesses and evidence, and if the defense has a strong case at all, this should raise some degree of doubt in the jury's mind. The jury will likely be thinking that they'd have a much better idea of whether or not the defendant is guilty by just hearing them testify. Because the defense knows that this would likely resolve much of the doubt in the jury's mind the defense often doesn't let the defendant themself testify. After the closing arguments from each side, the jury is likely left with some doubt in their mind about the defendant's guilt, and due to this, the jury will often rule that the defendant is not guilty. The defense knows that the jury would have far less doubt if they had gotten to see the defendant testify, so they usually opt not to let the defendant testify, to maximize the jury's doubt and ultimately maximize the defendant's chances of avoiding a conviction. I also got to see Fritz give a talk about freedom of speech and technology at an event called paralegal day. Paralegal day is an event that is held in honor of the Toledo Paralegal Association, and a paralegal is a person who isn't qualified as a full lawyer who helps lawyers with certain tasks. Fritz began his speech by explaining his main point, which is that the law has a difficult time keeping up with ethics in times of rapid social change. An interesting example he gave was of a young boy getting his hand cut off by an exposed gear in Britain during the industrial revolution. This caused the machine to break, so the owner of the machine sued the boy's family. Amazingly, the judges ruled that the boy's family was liable for the damage to the machine, and the owner of the machine did not have to pay any damages to the boy's family. Fritz then transitioned into discussing how this same idea of the law not being caught up with ethical standards applies in the modern world. In the 1964 supreme court case New York Times Corporation vs Sullivan, it was determined that one party could sue another for defamation if the alleged slanderer's statements were both false and damaging to the victim's reputation. Critically, this ruling was passed in a time when the only people who had the ability to rapidly spread information were journalists. In the modern world, with the advent of social media and handheld technology, nearly everyone has the capability to spread information. This has led to debate about whether people can sue each other for defamation about cases such as a critical post on twitter that technically meets the 1964 definition of defamation. A potential resolution that Fritz discussed in his speech is that defamation suits could be governed by the difference in power between the parties to spread information, in that only the party who had an inferior ability to spread information could conduct the lawsuit. This would prevent people from suing each other over twitter spats, but it would still allow private individuals to sue newspapers for defaming them. This relates to the interesting issue of the government's ability to regulate the ability of private entities to keep data. In the past, people's pasts could be buried after a certain amount of time by the flood of new information, since it wasn't realistic to pore through all past editions of a newspaper just to find potentially incriminating information on one person. Nowadays, however, it is easy to find information on people with a simple google search, so it's extremely difficult for people to escape from their past. This goes against the idea behind expungement in Ohio, which means that a judge can completely clear somebody's criminal record if they don't break any laws for a certain amount of time. This allows a person whose record has been expunged to legally do things such not reveal previous convictions on job applications. However, this isn't particularly useful if all mentions of a person's name in all past records can be accessed with a single google search. This has led the European Union to pass a series of laws that relate to what is known as the Right to be Forgotten, which allows a person to request that search engines take down search results that relate to that person after a certain period of time. I think this is an essential law to replicate in the US, as it would allow the spirit of laws such as expungement to continue to be expressed in the technological age. The beginning of my day today was a continuation of the case I began discussing with Mr. Kaplan yesterday, in that I got to see a pretrial proceeding between the judge, the defendant, and Mr. Kaplan. The original purpose of the proceeding was to establish whether the two defendants in the case would be tried together or separately, but since the judge decided on Monday that the two defendants would be tried separately, the main purpose of the meeting was to review the facts of the case and confirm the date of the trial, which I believe is June 10. I'll be sure to confirm that soon, because I intend to come up to Toledo to watch the trial, even if it's after my formal independent study period is over. I got to see pretrial proceedings for a few other cases as well, and though I wasn't informed on the facts of those cases, it was still interesting to observe the way in which the judge interacted with the defendants and the attorneys. One of the people who came up was a man who was unable to afford a lawyer, and the judge asked him a series of questions about his employment history and family background to determine whether he was eligible to be represented by a defense attorney funded by the state.
I had quite an interesting conversation with Mr. Kaplan after the proceeding, in which I got to ask him a variety of questions I've had for a while about what it's like to be an attorney. One question I asked was whether it was possible to achieve a healthy level of work/life balance when starting out as a lawyer. He replied that there are a variety of possibilities. Some people get internships in law school, after which they manage to get hired by the person who helped them with their internship, so in those cases, it's usually fairly realistic for a new lawyer to keep their hours reasonable, though it depends on the person who hired the new lawyer. A new lawyer working in those kinds of positions often builds up their own client base, which can allow them to transition to an independent practice eventually, in which case they would have great control over the number of hours they work. On the other hand, if a lawyer can't or decides not to get a job with a single lawyer after law school, they usually work at a law firm. Law firms generally require new lawyers to work a large number of hours, and attorneys at law firms receive pay and promotions largely based on the number of billable hours they accrue. I then asked Mr. Kaplan about how much autonomy lawyers generally have, and once again, he said it depends considerably. In a private practice like his, lawyers have almost complete autonomy. They decide when they work, and their only responsibility is to their clients. However, cases can end up taking a considerable amount of time, and he said that though an attorney doesn't have a boss in an independent legal practice, an attorney's practice often ends up functionally owning them, in the same way that a business would own an entrepreneur. Attorneys who have achieved a strong reputation and an extensive base of clients, such as Fritz, generally have the most autonomy and independence. However, attorneys working in a law firm have very little autonomy, which works well for people who prefer to be in more structured environments, but it constrains those who prefer to be more independent. I also asked Mr. Kaplan about how easy it is for lawyers to move to a different city or state, and he said that in general, it's pretty difficult for both independent practitioners and attorneys who work at law firms to move. Independent practitioners are quite dependent on their connections and client base for business, so they largely lose that when they move. Lawyers who work at law firms often have a hard time leaving as well, in part since a lawyer's client base is quite associated with their law firm. Practicing law in another state is certainly possible, though it does require passing the bar exam in another state, which involves learning an entirely new set of laws. I asked Mr. Kaplan about a variety of other topics, such as the high unemployment rate amongst law school graduates, non-traditional reasons to get a law degree, and good preparation for law school. He commented that the issue of law-school graduates being unemployed exists partly because many people go to law school without having a good idea of what they intend to do with their law degree. Mr. Kaplan said he knows plenty of people who didn't really know what they wanted to do in life and decided to get a law degree just to become more educated, but then suddenly found themselves taking the bar exam and practicing law, not really wanting to be full-fledged attorneys. He said that law degrees certainly can be helpful for people who aren't attorneys, in areas such as politics and business, and the critical thinking and communication skills that one develops in getting a law degree are helpful anywhere in life. One thing I found fascinating is that a person can enter law school and become a lawyer with any undergraduate degree. I then asked Mr. Kaplan why law schools don't accept people straight out of high school, and he said he honestly wasn't sure. Perhaps accredited law schools require at least a bachelor's degree to make sure only people who have demonstrated a commitment to education apply. Later in the day, I got to go to an executive session with Fritz, which is a confidential city meeting in which city officials discuss how the practical measures they will take to respond to challenges the city faces. I can't disclose what was discussed in the meeting, but it was interesting to observe Fritz's unique role as the legal expert. He gave several pieces of legal advice that were extremely useful for the committee. One thing about Fritz's role in the executive session that makes the legal profession look appealing is the wide breadth of knowledge that he has accumulated in his years of practice. He can give effective advice on a wide variety of topics, and I find that intellectual diversity quite admirable. It's certainly a quality that I am committed to continuing to work on developing. I'd only been exposed to civil law so far in my independent study before today, so today was my first direct contact with criminal law. I started the day with Sam Kaplan, a defense attorney who shares office space with Fritz. Mr. Kaplan gave me a brief description of the criminal case he is currently working on, which I can summarize here because the facts of the case are public information.
On the day of the murder, Mr. Kaplan's client, Marwan Lamb, Lamb's friend, Randall Mullins, and two other people were driving to an arranged location to purchase marijuana. When they arrived, one of the other people in the car exited and begun to negotiate a deal with the seller. A conflict began, so Lamb grabbed a Mullins' legally purchased gun out of the car and shot the seller, took the marijuana, and the four of them left. The witness who was negotiating the deal contacted the police three months later, and on November 14, Mr. Kaplan's client, Marwan Lamb, was arrested. A grand jury indicted him on charges of Murder and Aggravated Murder (the Ohio equivalent of second and first degree murder, respectively). Interestingly, the grand jury did not indict him on drug charges, which could be due to the fact that the punishments for murder are generally more severe than those for drug possession/distribution. Judges often only make a defendant serve the time that they have to serve based on their most serious conviction. For instance, people generally don't have to serve time for both murder and aggravated murder; in a case in which they are convicted of both, they often just serve the more severe conviction, which would be aggravated murder in this case. There was some debate about whether Lamb and Mullins would have separate trials or the same trial. Mullins is legally regarded as an accomplice to Lamb in his crime, since Mullins's gun was not stored properly, and this lack of proper storage enabled Lamb to use the gun and commit murder. The formal term for this kind of complicity in Ohio is aiding and abetting, and a person convicted of aiding and abetting serves the same punishment as the person who actually committed the crime. Since they were both involved in the crime and would serve the same punishment if they were both convicted, they could potentially be in the same trial. Interestingly, whether Mullins and Lamb are tried separately or together, neither one would be required to testify against the other. This is because the 5th amendment says that people can't be forced to give testimony that incriminates themselves, and in this case, if either man testified against his co-conspirator, it would almost certainly incriminate the person testifying as well. Thus, the prosecution must either use other witnesses to establish the defendants' guilt or depend on circumstantial evidence. One witness that the prosecution had the option to use against both Mullins and Lamb was a man who had stayed in jail with Mullins: Mr. Hood. Likely in an effort to lessen his own sentence, Hood reported to the police that Mullins had incriminated both himself (Mullins) and Lamb during a conversation Hood and Mullins had in jail. However, Hood may not be a legal witness for the prosecution to use against Lamb, because any testimony Hood gave against Lamb would amount to hearsay, so it would be admissible in court. Hearsay is when a witness testifies against a defendant based on something the witness heard about the defendant, without having direct contact with the defendant. It might be theoretically possible for Hood to testify in Lamb's case, but Hood would have to be instructed to only talk about what he heard Mullins say, not about Lamb's actions. This becomes very close to hearsay, though, and it's extremely unlikely that a judge would allow it, so if the two defendants were tried together, Hood would not be a legal witness. Hood could legally testify in Mullins's case if Mullins were tried alone, since Hood heard about Mullins's actions directly from Mullins himself, but Hood might not be viewed as a particularly credible witness, since he is simply reporting a confession that he claimed to have heard, in exchange for the potential of receiving a lighter sentence. The judge later determined that Lamb and Mullins would be tried separately, and Mr. Kaplan represents Lamb alone. Immediately after it was determined that the two defendants would be tried separately, the prosecutor made a deal with Mullins, in which Mullins would plead guilty but receive a significantly reduced sentence in exchange for testifying against Lamb. This makes Mr. Kaplan's case defending Lamb quite difficult. I had the privilege of sitting in on negotiations between Mr. Kaplan and the prosecutor, and while I can't disclose the details of their discussion, I can say that it was very interesting to watch. I plan to watch the trial in a few weeks to see how the case ends. One of the primary themes of my legal adventures today was a recent amendment to the Toledo city charter known as the Lake Erie Bill of Rights, or LEBOR. The main purpose of this amendment is to assert that the people of Toledo have certain rights with respect to how Lake Erie is treated, but there is some significant controversy about the amendment is legally sound. I spent a large part of the first half of my day reading about the issue, and I spent the second half of my day observing a meeting between various parties debating LEBOR.
LEBOR (full text: http://www.lakeerieaction.org/) declares that the Lake Erie ecosystem has a right to "exist, flourish, and naturally evolve," and that the people of Toledo possess a right to a "clean and healthy environment." This sounds like common sense, and in many ways, the substance of LEBOR is. The controversy lies in the enforcement of these stated rights. In fact, the day after the amendment was passed, a group of small farms sued the city of Toledo. I had the privilege of observing a meeting between the plaintiff lawyers, who represent the farmers, the defense lawyers, who are defending LEBOR, and the judge, so I did some research before the meeting on the arguments that each side is using. The main source I use in discussing each side's arguments here is an article by Kenneth Kilbert, which can be found here: https://www.jurist.org/commentary/2019/03/kenneth-kilbert-lebor-important/. LEBOR gives any resident of Toledo standing to sue any person or corporation alleged to have violated these rights. However, since LEBOR is just an amendment to the Toledo city charter, it's only creating a new municipal law, not a new state law. This is of note because cases that involve violation of state law must be tried at the state level, whereas cases that involve violation of municipal law must be tried at a municipal level. The issue with LEBOR that the farmers are highlighting in their lawsuit is that LEBOR creates a cause of action (a set of circumstances that permits a lawsuit to occur) in the Lucas County Court of Common Pleas, which is a state court. This is an issue because municipalities cannot create a case of action in a state court; they can only create a case of action in a municipal court. It seems to me that a viable option could be to alter LEBOR so that it creates a case of action in the municipal court, so I'll investigate why that hasn't been done. Another issue farmers take with LEBOR is that LEBOR says that any permit given by the state or federal government is illegitimate in Toledo. Here is the text of this operative clause: "No permit, license, privilege, charter, or other authorization issued to a corporation, by any state or federal entity, that would violate the prohibitions of this law or any rights secured by this law, shall be deemed valid within the City of Toledo." The issue here is that this conflicts with the Ohio constitution's equivalent of the US constitution's Supremacy Clause. The Supremacy Clause states that when federal laws conflict with state laws, the federal laws take priority over the state laws. This same idea is present in the Ohio constitution: when state laws conflict with municipal laws, the state laws take priority. LEBOR declares precisely the opposite, which is that "no permit... that would violate the prohibitions of this law... shall be deemed valid within the city of Toledo." The legality of this is questionable. The underlying issue seems to be that the state laws aren't robust enough to effectively combat pollution of Lake Erie, so the long-term solution would be to change the state laws. Of course, this is easier said than done. At this point in the case, the main argument of those defending LEBOR is that the farmers don't have standing to sue the city, since they haven't established that they will be injured by LEBOR. The farms claim they already follow industry best practices, so if this is really true, then they should have nothing to worry about, and thus shouldn't be hurt by LEBOR. The farms' concern seems to indicate that they may not be following industry best practices quite as closely as they may say. Regardless of whether or not they are following industry best practices, Ohio laws don't seem to force the farms to be environmentally conscious enough to avoid devastating algae blooms. Perhaps another issue could be that the laws that exist aren't being enforced strictly enough. I'll investigate that as well. LEBOR may be legally questionable, but its underlying goals are essential for maintaining the health of the Lake Erie ecosystem. When the US congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972, it was seen as a monumental step forward for the health of all US waterways, including Lake Erie. However, the Ohio legislature hasn't managed to pass many effective aquatic environmental protection laws in the meantime. This is in part due to the influence of agricultural and animal farming lobbyists throughout Ohio, since the runoff from these farms is largely responsible for algae blooms in Lake Erie in recent years, such as the bloom in 2017 that rendered thousands of Toledo citizens' tap water undrinkable for 2 days. The legislative inaction in Ohio has made these blooms a regular annual occurrence. While LEBOR may or may not survive the litigation it is currently involved in, the passage of LEBOR represents that the people of Toledo are getting tired of feeling the effects of the state legislature's inaction. The challenge is that the only people who directly feel the effects of farm runoff into Lake Erie are those who depend on Lake Erie for drinking water, which is a minority of Ohio's population. The small number of people affected has made it impossible thus far to vote in a new group of Ohio legislators who will do something about the algae bloom problem, which has led Toledo to desperately try to take measures into its own hands. Fundamentally, this is a classic example of the needs of the minority being ignored at the convenience of the majority. A lone city cannot single-handedly combat this issue that the whole state contributes to. To make long-term progress, a group of people must stick together to vote out representatives who refuse to pass effective legislation that combats this issue. Perhaps a Lake Erie conservation subcommittee could be formed in the Environment and Natural Resources committee of the Ohio General Assembly. This committee could be tasked with researching, proposing, and supporting legislation that would combat the problems Lake Erie is facing, on a state scale rather than just a municipal one. |