<p>Kluge, do defense lawyers always tell the truth or do they attempt to put a spin on the facts?</p>
<p>Spideygirl, your response to Cartera’s quite accurate observation that police officers lie was to wrap yourself in the flag and weep copious alligator tears over the heroic cops who were maligned by Cartera’s observation of the truth. That was grossly intellectually dishonest.</p>
<p>As to lawyers, again you are parading your ignorance. Lawyer’s generally don’t “lie” because lawyers rarely are witnesses. Good lawyers highlight testimony that is favorable to thier case, and ignore or downplay evidnce to the contrary. But that’s not “lying” - that’s argument. When a police officer writes that a witness told him that she saw two black men with backpacks on the front porch of a house, when she actually never told him any such thing - that’s lying. If a lawyer were to make a formal factual statement as to a matter within his or her personal knowledge which was equally false it would be a lie - but that’s actually a far less common event than police officers making such statements. And a lawyer who actually lies in court is far more likely to suffer adverse consequences from those actions than a police officer, and correspondingly far less likely to do it. But there’s no way you would know that, is there?</p>
<p>I understand that your world view is governed by popular myths and preconceptions - cops are all heroic, lawyers are all slimy liars, etc. But you have no actual first hand knowledge of either question, and are simply repeating what you’ve been taught to believe. That’s naivete. </p>
<p>I say many police officer lie in court because I’ve seen it. So has every other lawyer who spends any appreciable amount of time in a criminal court. No lawyer who has posted here has denied it; several have confirmed it. It’s winked at or ignored most of the time. It’s a simple fact. I’ve seen very few lawyers lie in court - I honestly can’t think of a single one right now -even bad lawyers, slimy lawyers, and lawyers for whom I have little or no respect. It’s career suicide for a lawyer to actually lie in court. </p>
<p>For a person to think I’m a liar because I’m a lawyer would be evidence of their gullibility and ignorance. Who cares if it’s “fair?” People who think like that are weak and stupid. Go to any right-wing blog - you’ll find lots of people like that posting on a regular basis.</p>
<p>Barrons - see above. Lawyers don’t testify. They argue. For the most part, they can’t either “tell the truth” or not “tell the truth.” They weren’t there when whatever it was happened. It’s not their job to ascertain what is or isn’t the truth, that’s the jury’s job. It’s the advocates (on both sides) job to make sure that the jury sees every fact and inference that is favorable to the side they represent. When you’ve got a good lawyer on each side it works out pretty well, in my experience.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>LOL! Spoken like a true lawyer! ;)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>UM, Kluge? I never said that cops are all heroic, or that liars (lol - I mean lawyers) are all slimy. And, with all due respect, you have no idea about my first hand knowledge.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Literally - roflmao! Seriously, Kluge, what are you doing here? First of all, I don’t think I am stupid. Also, I know for a fact that I cannot be weak, because I am a superhero. That means I am stronger than you (even though I am a girl).</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So, Dross, what do we do with the efforts & successes of The Innocence Project, which has freed a number of wrongly imprisoned black and white and Hispanic prisoners? Are these also walking proofs that the American Constitution is a joke? Because in my mind, these personal heroes of mind are walking proofs of quite the opposite.</p>
<p>I understand your realistically modified view of the Constitution (ideals vs. realities), particularly in light of black history. I do not understand your unwillingness to acknowledge the opposing realities as well.</p>
<p>Intellectually and morally I cannot subscribe to condemning a document that is imperfectly understood and applied. That’s why we have lawyers and judges: contracts are broken, Constitutions are unequally applied. The point is to reactivate those documents so that the inequalities are remedied. We will continue to need that until some utopia moment when humanity has reached perfection.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>A couple of points on this. Americans who dedicate themselves to understanding and pursuing justice are walking proofs that noble people still exist in the country. They represent, in my view, a minority of Americans.</p>
<p>This means, secondly, that when the majority speaks, as it often does in ignorance, many people are left without recourse. This is especially true in cases of minorities. Kluge described a client who had a run-in with the cops, for example. The cop lied on the client, the client then hired an attorney, took out a full-page ad asking for witnesses, and eventually found justice. Imagine had some poor working stiff been in this situation. He can’t afford a fancy lawyer (compliment to Kluge), and he can’t put out a full-page ad in the newspaper. Most Americans are so lacking in a healthy skepticism of the government that when a cop releases his Police Report, they take it as Sweet Baby Jesus Gospel Fact, which puts the citizen at a profound disadvantage. What good would the Constitution be for a guy like this? What good is it for me? There are millions of us, and this document fails us all the time.</p>
<p>Look. I grew up seeing this, and learning it from experience. I know how this fact helps completely destroy communities and lives. Were I to enter some communities here in America and preach the noble ideals of the Declaration and Constitution, I am likely to get shot because from infancy the folks there have been taught that it is all a bunch of lies. And their parents were taught this due to their experiences in the 50’s and 60’s. And their parents were taught this due to their experiences in the early 1900’s, when the Klan reigned and when policemen were very much a part of it. And their parents were taught this due to their experiences from 1865-1877, when the reign of the Klan first began. And their parents learned it from 1864 back to 1787, when despite the Constitution’s noble ideals, blacks were still slaves and would be slaves for essentially another century.</p>
<p>I understand that there is no perfection in the world. But my goodness, when lying is as obvious as it is here with Crowley, and as it has been with cops ever since there have been cops, we really ought not need perfection in order for Americans to enjoy their rights. When injustice is as obvious as it is here against Gates, we really ought not need anything near perfection in order for him to enjoy his American right to speak his piece to authority without fear of arrest. We merely need people who take the Constitution seriously, regardless of the person it protects.</p>
<p>We ought not excuse this nonsense by referring to the fact that no one is perfect. The situation is too obvious for that. There is even evidence enough to cause any True American serious anger against and doubt about Crowley. But the majority is so happy to see the uppity black guy slapped around by a white cop, the opinions of True Americans just do not matter. And Obama understands this. He was clearly shocked that what is so obvious to any thinking person (that it was stupid to arrest Gates), caused so much bitterness against him. He assumed that Americans were reasonable and would follow justice first. When they turned against him, despite his stating the obvious, even he was compelled to throw the Constitution out of the window. He even invited the lying cop to the White House while there sat Skip Gates knowing all along that the cop had lied and cheated, unable to press the issue because the majority wants him nailed. That is America.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>There are hundreds of thousands of young black people who I would really love to believe in America as you do. It would help them invest themselves in the country and take advantage of its many opportunities. But the history that has affected their parents, and that affects them, tells them that the nation stands dead against them and always has. I think this is no reason to be defeatist. In my view I say take on the challenge even if there is no chance of success. Take it on just to see what happens. But most people aren’t as foolish as I am. Many of them know that the only thing that matters is money and getting whatever pleasure they can get in the short time they have. They do not respect the law because throughout all of American history the law never really respected them.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This sounds nice. But when you are compelled by circumstances to rely on an overworked court-appointed lawyer against a system that uses fancy, highly competent lawyers, you learned pretty quickly that it is a sham.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Come now, great friend. The lack of utopia is no excuse for this country to have acted as it has, neither in the past and nor in the case here with Gates. When I first heard this story, even before I had read any of the details about it, I pegged the circumstances quite closely. I saw that Gates had done no wrong and that this cop had trampled his rights. Now, how was it that I was able to see this before all of the super-smart folks here? It did not take utopia. I merely needed to have a bias for the rights of citizens and against the rights of government, a bias, mind you, that is quintessentially American.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>I definitely agree that you have a bias :p</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>You do not have to be a witness in order to lie. That’s a silly statement. </p>
<p>Lawyers lie all the time. When setting cases for trial, many will claim to have a conflict merely because they want more time to prepare. If a judge asks about the defendant’s background such as prior criminal behavior like convictions in other courts in other parts of the state or in other states, all of a sudden the attorney’s memory gets fuzzy. When presenting fee petitions to courts for the award of attorney’s fees, all of a sudden sitting at the baseball game watching your son play ball but thinking about the case become billable time.</p>
<p>Are all lawyers liars, of course not. But there are plenty who do lie.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>When did I ever say that? How could you possibly leap from a general statement I made to a specific case? Rather, respectfully, it was you who leaped from the specific negative example(s) – Gates and many others – to condemn the entire document and the entire judicial system. I never once made a comment or implied that Gates is an example of the law properly applied. Rather, I do not buy that singular injustices (breaches of that document) make principles, an ideal, and a document “a sham.”</p>
<p>razorsharp, did you ever listen to the 911 call recording? You can find it on the internet without too much trouble, and there’s an earlier post in this thread that links to it. Also if you google “abc news transcript 911 call Gates” the top link is the ABC News transcript of the call.</p>
<p>Dross -</p>
<p>Loved your last post, except for this:
</p>
<p>However, I appreciate you sharing this misperception, and I am sure you are correct that you are not alone in seeing things this way. I don’t have a difficult time imagining your life’s journey bringing you to where you are today. Still, I think you would be wise to consider that you may be prone to generalizing about how people think if their background is different than yours.</p>
<p>I still see that you are mixing up a few things when analyzing public response to the Gates story. </p>
<p>Not seeing evidence of racism in Professor Gates’ experience is not the same thing as denying that there is a problem, in general, with the way that law enforcement practices dovetail with the Constitution and the ideals of this nation.</p>
<p>When so many people chime in that they do not see the cop’s actions as out of the ordinary, they are saying that cops react strongly to resistence from anyone, of any color. This is not the same thing as denying that African Americans have been (and continue to be) disproportionately mistreated by law enforcement and the justice system. Instead, because we have experienced the same type of reaction or attitude from cops, we do not see proof that racism existed in this event.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That is the 500 thousand dollar question, one I keep coming back to in my mind over and over. Forget for a moment the question of whether Crowley was motivated by racism in his response to Gates that day. I want to know why, even in the face of contradictory evidence that calls aspects of his version of events in question, why so many Americans (and so many CCers) doggedly hold to the notion that Crowley is an exemplary example of humanity, who told the God’s honest truth, while Gates is his exact opposite. </p>
<p>You must understand—well no, I suppose you don’t have to do anything of the sort, and indeed many will stubbornly refuse to do so—that black people in this country have centuries-long experience with a cultural zeitgeist which has never ceased to exist: such being that for the most part, a white person’s testimony is instantly more credible than that of a black person. Heck, it was codified into law for well over a century, that a black man’s testimony wasn’t even admissible in a court of law. The innate morality of blacks as a race has long been impugned in this country. A distressing number of Americans continue to believe (or suspect to be true) the old and unapologetically stated belief that blacks are inherently criminal, violent, dishonest, over-sexed, and stupid. Some denizens of CC (the particular ones whom I have in mind have not, for the most part, participated in this thread) don’t even attempt to hide the fact that they hold this belief. </p>
<p>Again, like Drosselmeirer, I want to know why Gates is painted as a human being most reprehensible, while Crowley is painted as an unquestioningly fine and upstanding human being whose testimony is beyond reproach.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>What you are describing is not what is happening. </p>
<p>As far as the cop goes, I haven’t seen a lot of people portray him as an “unquestionably fine and upstanding human being” unless they know him personally. Giving him the benefit of the doubt however, is the logical thing to do. </p>
<p>I give Gates the benefit of the doubt that he wasn’t being disrespectful to the cops on purpose so that he could create a liberal brouhaha and garner attention for himself. I also give Gates the benefit of the doubt that he was not overreacting to the officer because of the officer’s skin color. </p>
<p>I bet Gates was just a tired guy caught in the middle of an unfortunate situation, and on that particular night he was not in the mood to do what most of us know we need to do to come away unscathed from an interaction with cops (“Yes, Sir!”). It probably seemed unfathomable to him that he could be mistaken for a burglar in his own home. That he then was arrested for protesting this must have blown his mind. It would anyone, but especially someone who is African American. Still, the fact that the cop behaved exactly the way cops do in such a situation does not make a case for racism.</p>
<p>I do think some people rolled their eyes at hearing that Gates instantly jumped to the racism accusation. Still, most people would get that Gates’ life experiences understandably caused him to suspect racism. I just don’t think most people think he was correct (although I haven’t seen a poll on it). </p>
<p>While people empathize with getting angry at being unfairly detained and questioned by a cop, they’d probably also feel that they would themselves be increasing their chances of being arrested if they challenged any cop verbally or in attitude. Since Gates did very much challenge the cop, most people think he erred. I don’t see that this in any way demonstrates that the majority of Americans are racist.</p>
<p>On the other hand, there was an interesting study done once, which you can find here:
hulu.com/watch/10356/saturday-night-live-white-like-me</p>
<p>(it is a video, so I cannot provide it as a link – just cut and paste it into your browser window). </p>
<p>This is from so long ago that a lot of young people probably have not seen it. Sometimes even discussions like this one need a little levity.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Then I think you should go back and do a little re-reading of this thread spidey, because there are a lot of posts by people absolutely livid with outrage against Prof. Gates, using very condemnatory adjectives to describe him, while speaking of Sgt. Crowley as if his actions and testimony of that afternoon are beyond reproach. This, even when contradictory facts have come to light that don’t square with Crowley’s account. And people are positively dismissive of the 911 caller’s testimony, now that it doesn’t confirm that which they’ve committed to believing. This kind of thing is entirely too familiar to AfAms, who have seen it since time out of mind.</p>
<p>Page 131 of 131…Oh man, am I really going to do this? I will try.</p>
<p>BTW spidey, the video was funny. Ridiculous, but funny. Thanks.</p>
<p>Glad you enjoyed it. Eddie Murphy is so damn funny. </p>
<p>Anyway, I am up to about page four, and I have tell you that I am not seeing a preponderance of evidence in favor of your position. I started going page by page, cutting, pasting, cleaning up on notepad, and collecting everything which discusses the character of each man. This is taking an insane amount of time and for what? Just to prove that I am addicted to debating on CC? I think we already knew that. In any case, the task may be beyond even me. The thread is just too darn long.</p>
<p>I would like to clarify my position, which felt incomplete:</p>
<p>In my experience, it is almost impossible to go through life without being stopped & unnecessarily harrassed by a police officer who is overreacting & creating an escalation, artificially. It has happened to me more than once, & apparently to a number of other white people on this thread who were breaking no laws while police were behaving like jerks. Im talking here of the many situations where police abuse their authority to create conflict for the purpose of asserting power & domination. On such occasions the officer often makes it up as he goes along, falsifying or exaggerating citizen behavior, such as characterizing the behavior as uncooperative, threatening, belligerent, and even hysterical or out of control when he knows it was no such thing.</p>
<p>That said, I have personally witnessed enough & read enough to believe that the rate at which it happens to blacks greatly exceeds its incidence in the majority population.</p>
<p>It is equally unjust regardless of the identity of the person being artificially accused. However, I think because of racist assumptions (regarding criminality in particular), police & the public are much more inclined to rationalize such injustice when it happens to a black citizen than when it happens to a white citizen. Im sure that statistics can back me up on this and are supported by parallel statistics such as those involving DWB. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, those doing the rationalizing are not representing the U.S. Constitution when they are doing so. Not officially. Not unofficially. Rather, lawyers coming to the aid of such unjustly treated citizens are representing the U.S. Constitution.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Maybe some people are doing that. But I think in this particular matter most think that Gates was at fault not because he did anything wrong, but because he did something which was a stupid thing to do. To me, it is always a bad decision to be anything less than deferential to cops. I don’t think it is OK for cops to hassle us just because we fail to tip toe around them, but I have never seen any other way of being around them which is guaranteed to get me away unscathed. </p>
<p>I do have a lot of empathy for cops, because I think a lot of us forget what it might be like (literally - not on television where people get shot and then get up after the cameras stop rolling) to go through every day not knowing if someone is going to shoot you as you do your job. The stress involved with this profession is mind boggling. </p>
<p>We all seem to get what happens to soldiers when they spend a lot of time in combat. Cops are in a similar situation. It is not identical, but there are many parallels. For this reason, I defer to cops without feeling resentful (well, after an interaction the resentment eventually wears off). I am quite sure it would be a hell of a lot more challenging for me to do so if I were African American.</p>