ride-along

It has been very crazy since getting back. I have not caught up from being on vacation. The good news is that I am now authorized to speak in court (albeit still supervised for a while.) I have been handling the arraignment calender along with the new prosecutor. For those of you who do not know,that is when you tell a criminal the charge against them and give them a chance to plead guilty or not guilty (which happens most of the time.) It is pretty simple. The part that requires some thinking is if they want to plead guilty and you can present them with an offer, or when you are asking the court to set bail. When I am would get flustered on bail I would just defer to the court.

Well, I am off to watch cops arrest some criminals. I guess I will be arraigning them come monday morning.

wildlife and doctors

I saw this bighorn sheep on my drive out of the mountains. I did not want to leave it was such a beautiful day in the mountains. Now I am in the dermatologists lobby. I used to get annual checkups,but during my wayward twenties I have not been here in seven years. I guess its part of my growing up that I am getting the once over by my dermatologists. I wonder if doctors are more careful with lawyers? my doctor friends definatly have had the fear of malpractice instilled in them. how much could go wrong taking off a mole anyway?

vacation

my body finally gave out on me after a crazy past six week which included finals, a move to a new city, and a new job. I spent the bulk of the last two days asleep on my parents couch with a cold. It doesnt help that I am experienceing a bit of altitude sickness for the first time in my life. It is a bit frustrating to have grown up in Colorado and feel the altitude so much. It doesnt help that my parents live at over 9000 feet. The mountain views and the sound of the creek make up for it. I hope I am feeling better for the bachelor party tomorrow. Otherwise I am going to exercise a lotof self controll.

our puppy

It works. I sent this picturefrom my phone.technology is cool. And to think, I used to be a ludite.

what a week. . .

Where do I begin. So much happened this week. I cannot even begin to describe to you all of the new experiences, starting with Monday morning arraignments in a courtroom packed with defendants, attorneys, families, cops, crazy guys in cuffs. I mostly just watch and try to absorb as much as I can. I have not gotten to do much yet. I am restricted from speaking in court until my Rule-9 card is approved by the Bar association (a limited license to practice law.) I have been in court every day. I watched a whole jury trial, sat through lots of motion calenders, have already seen a criminal plead out on Monday and get arraigned again on new charges on Thursday, have been to jail twice, found out the punk-kid who got the not-guilty verdict in our jury trial lives in my apartment complex, and am researching about drug paraphernalia.

And that was just at work. I also had a chance this week to meet, and briefly chat with the governor at a fund raiser I was invited to. Also present were lots of lawyers from the county, city counsel members, the county prosecutor, and other politically involved citizens. After two years of relatively limited assimilation in Seattle, I feel like I am part of a community after only living here for only about a month.

Oh, did I say, I really like criminal law. Now, I know it is only the first week, but I think I am going to really enjoy this work. One of the things I like is that half the time you are still sitting at a desk, but the rest of the time you are standing up in court. I am still a bit intimidated. Things move fast. The judge gets through about sixty cases in just over an hour during a trial call or arraignment. I am definitely not ready to keep all the paperwork together on my own, but they seem to be phasing me in slowly. In fact, I am going to be on vacation next week. So before I can gather more stories from the world of crime, I will be back in Colorado for a week.

As for blogging, I am trying to set up mobile blogging from my cell phone, so look for that in the interim.

New Direction

I start my new internship tomorrow. I am a little nervous. Even though I was not completely happy with the work at my old job, I knew what I was doing, and I felt pretty successful in my work, but starting tomorrow, I am going to be in completely new waters. It is not correct to say that I know nothing of criminal law. I took the required criminal law class; my legal writing II appellate brief dealt with a criminal issue; and, I have been in law school now for two years. Even though I am starting at the beginning again in some ways, I more prepared for legal work now than I did at the beginning of last summer. On the other-hand, this is all speculation now. I will probably be writing here later this week about how I have absolutely no idea what I am doing.

Besides being a little nervous, there are a lot of things I am looking forward to:

1. short commute. I only commuted from Everett to Bellevue for three weeks and that was enough for me. I am trying not to think about the fact that next fall I will still have to go to school. Is there some way I can skip my third year?

2. lots of court time. From what I can tell, I am going to be in court almost every day. We probably won't get any Paris Hiltons in municipal court here, but I am sure there will be plenty of drama. The other prosecutors I have met have lots of stories about defendants (mostly the stupid things they do.) I don't know if it is possible to do this work and not get jaded about crime. One long time prosecutor told me a story about how he saw an old man talking to child on the street one day and he was thinking "child-molester," but when he walked by he heard the child say "ok, grandpa."

3. connections. They tell you at the beginning of law school that you get your jobs from the people you know. That was not the case on the first job I got, but I had a little help on this one (I'll keep my sources secret.) Since I will be interning in Snohomish County/Everett, I am going to get to know other lawyers here, and I hope after I graduate I can get a job near here too. Apropos connections, tomorrow night I get join my girlfriends firm to dinner with the Governor. Our first question for her is going to be why it takes two and one-half hours to get a driver's license in this state. (now you know what I did Saturday)

4. a break from convincing insurance adjusters that $500 in property damage, and a two month delay before an injured individual seeks chiropractic care can still mean a person was severely injured. Anything can happen, but I am just ready to advocate for some different clients.

A shave and a hair cut

For those of you who do not see me on a regular basis were probably surprised to see my clean face and short hair. I have had that look for a while. It is part of my "look like I could fit in in a courtroom look," and it seems to have paid off. I was just offered a new job this afternoon. No, not at the firm that would not call me back. He did not offer me the job. I finally called after three weeks and he told me he offered it to someone else (thanks for letting me know.) Its the other job I applied for: law enforcement (darn, I should have kept the mustache, but then I might get mistaken for a cop.) I will be starting an internship at the City of Everett Prosecutor's Office next week. I should fit in as a prosecutor with the clean shave. It sounds like they will get me into court as soon as possible, which is exactly what I wanted. I will be mostly working on DUIs, domestic violence, and other municipal criminal violations, but it sounds like the perfect place to get my feet wet, and I no longer have to commute to bellevue. I am a little nervous, but I'll get over that.