My friend, Robert Gasque Howe, Esquire, Bobby as everyone called him, didn’t practice law the way they teach in law school. He played by his own set of rules like as long as you and your client never show up in court at the same time, nothing bad can happen or, if you can get the judge to laugh, he’ll have a hard time sending your client to jail. His weren’t the kind of rules you’d find in any law book, but they served him well enough to make him the Plea King of the Charleston Court of General Sessions. The kind of lawyer you’d want if the last thing you wanted was a public trial. His practice required a unique kind of crazy, beyond a split personality verging on a multiple-personality disorder.
First, Bobby had to have a positive personality needed to convince hapless potential clients the right amount of fee could set them free. Nobody was better at convincing client’s her could work magic making charges disappear. Nobody was better at extricating fees than Bobby. But, then, after his legal razzle dazzle failed to deliver the promised freedom, Bobby had to have a negative personality to convince clients to take the plea bargain Bobby had finagled for him.
Once Bobby and I represented a client arrested when three kilos of cocaine, a whole stash of cash, and multiple guns were all found in his floor safe during the execution of a search warrant. Fortunately, his stash of cash in the safe wasn’t his only stash, so Bobby was able to extract an exorbitant fee. While lawyers following the usual rules would have been ethically bound to advise the client of the nature and seriousness of the offense and possible punishment, this client was facing Trafficking, First Degree, which carried a mandatory sentence of 25 years, no probation, no parole, and felt emphasizing the downside negatively impacted his ability his ability to extract a fee.
Bobby lucked up when the police didn’t want to burn the snitch and finagled a sweet heart deal to the lesser offense of Trafficking, Third Degree, carrying a maximum sentence of only ten years which was still eligible for parole. Unfortunately, Bobby had done such a good job signing the client up the client was still convinced the exorbitant fee he paid guaranteed his freedom and balked at taking the plea. This is where Bobby’s special brand of crazy really kicked in.
Bobby stopped trying to talk sense with the client. He put both hands on the table, rose up out of his chair, and glared across the table right into the client’s eyes.
“You ever watch the Super Bowl on t.v.?” he asked the reluctant client.
“Yeah,” the client muttered unsure where this was going.
“You ever see that guy with a rocket pack strapped on his back, take off from the fifty yard line and fly around the stadium?” Bobby asked dead serious.
“No,” was all the bewildered client could stammer.
“Oh, yeah. They strap that rocket pack right on the back of that guy in his star spangled jump suit and American flag helmet, and UP, UP, and away he flew,” Bobby said with a look of wonder in his eyes as he lifted his hands off the table and his eyes followed the imaginary flight. The client looked up too but didn’t see anything.
Then Bobby slammed his hands back down on the table top to focus the client’s attention and started right into the client’s eyes before saying, in a voice that left no room for doubt, his voice raising with every word, “If you don’t take this plea offer, by the time you get out of prison an old man, you’re gonna be the only motherfucker still walkin on the ground cause everyone else gonna be flying round in rocket packs!”
You could almost see the dim light go off in the client’s brain as he changed his mind and accepted the plea. The judge accepted the plea too and gave the client the full ten years but, as the lesser offense still eligible for parole, we knew he’d be out in closer to three. The plea bargain Bobby finagled for this ever so guilty client was the deal of the century and worth every penny he paid Bobby or it.
I never asked Bobby where the idea for the rocket pack came from but I’ve never heard of it being used anywhere before or since. I just chalked it up to another one of the Plea King’s rules. When all else fails, just get a little crazy and make something up.
trialadvocacy.blog 