[parsimo2010]

These are interesting scenarios, but let's not forget that the rules are only binding under the threat of being caught and punished. They aren't like the laws of physics. So if a lawyer isn't supposed to engage in trickery, they might do so anyway, especially if they think they can get away with it and their client happens to be a rich criminal who pays them extra to do shady stuff.

Source: Lawyers wouldn't have the reputation they do if all the members of the club had integrity.

[ta1234567890]

> Lawyers wouldn't have the reputation they do if all the members of the club had integrity.

Some anecdotes:

- A company I started, hired a big-brand SV legal firm, super expensive. We thought they would be great. But we were so little to them, it was sometimes even hard to get a timely response. In the end we stopped using them, but not before we signed a bunch of documents they reviewed and told us were fine to sign, when in reality those contracts left us fatally exposed (and were in great part responsible for the downfall of the company later).

- Had a complaint filed against me personally earlier this year. The complaint has some truths twisted to paint a mostly false story, but it also has plenty of lies and omissions. The lawyer(s) that wrote the complaint knew what they were doing, yet no one is ever going to get punished for it.

- Looking for lawyers to defend the case (and in previous experiences), I realized that most lawyers have certain formulas or patterns they follow for specific types of situations that they already know how to address, if you don't fall into those, then they'll either pretty much fail at the job, not do what they actually should do (sometimes even if you ask them directly), or just refuse you as a client. It is very hard to find a lawyer that will actually take the time to really listen to you, understand your story/situation and then work on a personalized strategy/solution.

I think that any lawyer that intentionally mis-represents stuff in their work, or tries to shoehorn their clients into their formulas, or just half-asses their job, are seriously lacking in integrity. And by my experience, this seems to be the case for 50%+ of lawyers. A lot of them will probably do a ton of damage both to their clients and their counterparties, and they will never be held responsible.

[pc86]

Per your second point, if you can prove that a lawyer knowingly put lies in a civil complaint that's a slam dunk for the Bar to sanction them. Another way to say "truths twisted to paint a mostly false story [with] plenty of...omissions" is "making a legal argument."

Per your third point, I was once wrongly accused in a criminal case. I was a nobody, random person making like $30k a year at the time but was able to retain someone from K&L Gates. I think he felt bad for me because he basically lobbied the partners for permission to take me on at a reduced rate (like $1.5k total). A couple letters and a court appearance later and the misunderstanding was rectified. But the important part is I was obviously a nobody, the partners at this firm bill tens of thousands of dollars a day. $1500 is probably less than a single office location spends on coffee in a week. But this guy sat with me for hours going over the case and where the problems were.

[ikeboy]

There's a big difference between a lawyer who will take a case and a lawyer who can handle a case.

I agree 100%. One thing I do is look for similar cases and contact the lawyer on the winning side.

The "formulas" do save you money, though. Would you rather pay 5k for them to use an existing template slightly edited, or 25k to write a complaint from scratch? It depends on the case, there is no right answer.

You can also literally just look up a lawyer's cases on PACER and see how they write, see if they've won, and use your judgement as to whether they're an effective advocate. If you're dealing with a big case, this is absolutely worth doing.

[ta1234567890]

You have excellent points, and I hope I had known them many years ago.

One of the main issues for non-lawyers is that the first time you need to hire a lawyer, you have no idea what you are doing, so there's a huge learning curve and a lot of information asymmetry to overcome.

[dependenttypes]

I do not want to dismiss what you are saying (in fact I find it extremely interesting) but don't 80%+ of people in all professions (or even out in society) just suck? I am more surprised that you consider 50% to be the minimum of bad lawyers rather than a higher percentage.

[ikeboy]

80% of doctors don't suck.

It's not that lawyers suck, per se. It's that you're dealing with an adversary, and if you get a 50th percentile lawyer to go against a 90th percentile lawyer, well, you could still win if you've got a good case, but it's certainly not as likely as the reverse. In many cases you get what you pay for.

[srtjstjsj]

80% of doctors (especially cheap ones like the lawyers mentioned above) would fail to get optimal results in complex scenarios like presented above, just like the lawyers.

[ikeboy]

The doctors wouldn't be put in that position, though. While lawyers will often gladly take a case that they have a low chance of winning without fully disclosing that.

[dependenttypes]

> 80% of doctors don't suck.

You would be surprised. I do agree with the rest of your post however.

[drewmol]

Yes! Also, satisfaction scores are pretty low for people who've been indicated for aggrevated murder, same as if you're diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. If your goal is to walk away free and unharmed then just about everyone is gonna suck, most of the time. Also, you can't bribe cancer.

[ikeboy]

Difference is, your family doctor isn't going to try giving you chemo treatments.

[ta1234567890]

Not sure about percentages, but it is definitely true that for any professional service, most people are just trying to make some money and go about their they without being bothered or caring too much. So you almost always have to deal with people that don't care about you or your situation and will just give you some template solution that fits their situation and their past experiences (not yours).

In particular it is very evident with doctors when they see you for barely a few minutes and diagnose you. Sure, if it's something super common you'll be fine, but if it's not, good luck trying to convince them to keep digging. They seem to think they are always right and you have no idea what you are talking about because you are not a doctor.

[mleonhard]

Or most people do poor work 80% of the time and good work 20% of the time. I think most people are capable of doing good work, if they are motivated and free of distractions.

[bob33212]

I worked with a lawyer who thought his job was to negotiate a contract with the least amount of liability for us. In theory that sounds good. But these contracts ended up sounding ridiculous to customers with statements like:

"Under no circumstances will vendor be liable for any damages in excess of 10% of the purchase price of the vendor services"

Customers assume you are trying to scam them with language like that. But he didn't care, he just wanted to be able to be proud of how little liability we took on. I finally had to point out that the best way to reduce our liability is to shut the company down and end our need for legal services all together.

[sunstone]

I've dealt with almost two dozen lawyers over the past twenty years and I am quite knowledgeable about the practices of stock brokers. In both cases it seems that the chances of getting a practitioner, at random, who will work with you in good faith is closer to 20%. Getting both honesty and capable ability is lower.

And then there is the family law lawyers ("it's not family and it's not law" according to one) but it does line a lot of lawyer's pockets at the expense of the public, at least in the five eyes. Most other jurisdictions have opted for a saner system.

So, yes, it's jungle out there. Imagine if your doctor prescribed medicine that would make you sicker so that he could charge you more later. If you don't have good reliable connections going in you really need to be careful, shop around until you find someone who seems good and honest, and then pray.

[ovi256]

re "Had a complaint filed against me personally earlier this year." - unfortunately, the fact that the plaintiff's lawyer painted that picture is what's expected, and required of him. He advocates for his client, in the best way possible. Painting the most favourable picture for his client goes with that.

[dodobirdlord]

Yes, but in a reasonable world "lies and omissions" ought to result in disbarment.

[lmilcin]

Well... certainly not omissions. The job of a lawyer is not to lay down facts but to know and understand the law and use the knowledge to argue on behalf of their client. It is prosecutor's job to lay down facts without lying or omitting. In fact lawyers have obligation to omit facts when it is a wish of their client.

[dodobirdlord]

The scenario I’m quoting from seemed like it was a lawsuit. In that scenario I think it’s clear that omissions could reasonably be grounds for disbarment. I happen to think that filing a sufficiently brazenly frivolous lawsuit should result in the lawyer who filed it being disbarred. Whether or not a lawsuit is frivolous can easily hinge on omitting information, like suing someone for trespassing on your property but leaving out of the filing that they have an easement to travel on your land. If a lawyer agrees to file such a suit for their client, knowing that such an easement exists, they should be disbarred for it.

[lmilcin]

I am not versed in US law (I am neither a lawyer nor from US). Generally, lawyers are not exempt from the law and can face professional responsibility (called disbarment in US).

Lying to a judge is grounds for disbarment but in general a lawyer has no obligation to verify clients' statements.

It would usually be difficult to prove what the lawyer did or did not know but, hypothetically, if you could prove that the lawyer knew that there was no trespassing then a statement to the court to the contrary can be construed to be a lie and result in consequences.

[srtjstjsj]

Yes, that's why this thread is talking about lawyers being unethical in helping people break the law and escape justice.

[lmilcin]

I don't exactly see it this way.

Every person has a right to defend themselves. Even guilty ones, because until proven, how would you decide they are or they aren't guilty to figure out they have right to defend?

Most people don't know the law enough to adequately defend themselves. Even though you have the option, you would usually be well advised to use help of somebody that knows the law very well because knowing it is their profession and helping you is responsibility.

Just think about this, half of the population has intelligence below mean (ha! not average! but close). You need to generally be highly intelligent to be able to adequately dispute and represent yourself in a court.

So while I loath the fact that criminals use lawyers to escape prison I also recognize that this is their right and that lawyers serve an important function in a society the same way policemen who stop you for speeding or tax auditor looking through your papers do.

[kwanbix]

twisting the truth shouldn't be expected.

[throwaway_pdp09]

Do you disagree with "Painting the most favourable picture for his client goes with that"

Semi-related but very valuable advice, if well-known - when I was off sick the council brought a complaint against me. They actually lied and implied criminal behaviour (fraud) on my part (also not turning over all the evidence to the tribunal that followed). So here's the important bit:

DO IT IN WRITING AND KEEP COPIES OF EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING YOU WRITE, EVERYTHING THEY SEND YOU. INSIST ON IT BEING ON PAPER (NOT TELEPHONE), AND PRINT EMAILS OUT.

I could rebut almost everything bad they said about me. The tribunal threw out their case before I even turned up.

(I know this is obvious and everyone says get it in writing, but things would be smoother if people actually did).

[ovi256]

But there is no truth in an adversary justice system (and I'm not sure about the other systems either). There are only the parties' differing perspectives (if they were not differing there wouldn't be a complaint) and a court ruling at the end, which we take for impartial.

[michaelt]

Imagine I receive a letter from a lawyer saying "It appears your product A infringes our client's patents B and C"

That's fairly clearly a statement of fact - that in their professional opinion they believe their client has a reasonable chance of prevailing in court.

Do lawyers not have an obligation to display good faith and professional candour in making such statements of fact, even to their adversaries?

[smichel17]

I do not agree that's clearly a statement of fact. An unrelated example that demonstrates why: laat week, I was having a (text) conversation with two other people, and I made a comment to the effect of, "I think it's a waste of time for you to argue about X, figuring out how to do Y would be more productive instead." To which one of the other participants responded, "...but we were talking about Z, not X!"

The literal words we had written were the facts. Their meaning was up for interpretation. If something as basic as the subject of a conversation cannot be necessarily be agreed upon, something more complicated like "does this infringe on a patent?" certainly has room for disagreement.

[caro_douglos]

Lawyers love to send letters. They also can fold when your attorney responds letting them know that the letter’s assertions are incorrect.

[1vuio0pswjnm7]

Same could be said for software developers.

While I am aware of the audience here, I'm not trolling. There is a remarkable similarity between the "helplessness/vulnerability", for lack of a better term, of clients using a lawyer and the helplessness/vulnerability of users in using software authored by someone else (not to mention clients who hire software developers to write software for them). In each case, the client/user is required to trust the lawyer/developer.

One key difference is an issue sometimes discussed on HN:- there's no licensing requirement for developers. Lawyers have to be licensed, and the licensing requirements include ethical obligations, violations of which can result in losing one's license. While this system in practice may have some shortcomings, software developers do not have anything equivalent. There are states in the US where lawyers are disbarred every month, but I am not aware of any software developer who has been banned by a regulatory body from writing software for use by others.

Both lawyers and developers are probably subject to negative stigmas as as a result of the "bad apples". Not all are unethical.

[codesections]

> Same could be said for software developers.

I am licensed attorney and a full-time software developer and I agree 100% - there are remarkable similarities.

(And there are strong parallels between big tech and biglaw, especially for junior devs/associates, but that's a bit of a tangent)

[blaser-waffle]

> (And there are strong parallels between big tech and biglaw, especially for junior devs/associates, but that's a bit of a tangent)

Are there parallels? I mean to some degree all large, well paying orgs are going to have similarities, but a plucky undergrad coming out of CalTech will get $130k+ at a FAANGM or orgs that pay roughly in that continuum, and be able to jump to all sorts of other options, while most newly minted lawyers are looking at average salaries of $70-$80k USD while having huge law school debt on top of undergrad debt. This means ruthless wageslavery at BigLaw until you make partner or you pay off enough of that debt to walk.

As a dude with a PoliSci degree and a minor in IT, I did a good hard look at the cost benefits when I graduated... and went IT. As the bad tattoo says: "no regurts".

[bdowling]

> average salaries of $70-$80k USD

> ruthless wageslavery at BigLaw

Big law associates start at $190k, straight out of law school. Big law associates are, however, the top graduates from the top law schools. Most new law graduates don’t make that much, just like most new CS grads don’t make FAANG starting salaries.

[codesections]

> Big law associates start at $190k, straight out of law school.

Yeah, that was the sort of BigLaw I was comparing to big tech in the grandparent.

[bdowling]

Yeah, I just wouldn't call $190k "ruthless wageslavery at BigLaw".

[nordsieck]

> Lawyers wouldn't have the reputation they do if all the members of the club had integrity.

While it's true that some lawyers are unethical some of the time, it seems highly unlikely that lawyers are unethical as often as their reputation suggests. A much more likely explanation is:

1. The complexity of the law.

2. The incongruity between the law and many people's ethical codes.

3. The skill gradient that exists among lawyers, as it does in any profession.

4. The limited resources afforded to public defenders.

5. The limited success pro se litigants typically have.

[bobbylarrybobby]

And that a lawyer's job isn't even to ensure that the law is enforced. A defense attorney's job is to get the defendant the least punishment possible, regardless of what the defendant actually did and the legality of such action. The prosecution's job is to seek the the most punishment possible. In a criminal case, a fair outcome hinges on the two lawyers being roughly equally skilled and resourced, but if this isn't the case then the case will be a blowout; but it's still the winning lawyer's job to crush their opponent without mercy, which in any other context (e.g., sports) would be considered scummy. Unfortunately, that's just the job.

[sokoloff]

It’s fairly clear to me that maximizing punishment ought not be the prosecution’s goal and I’m not even sure that it’s currently the goal. It seems like maximizing conviction rate is closer their apparent goal.

[jacquesm]

This view of prosecution and defense is geographically limited.

[srtjstjsj]

> The prosecution's job is to seek the the most punishment possible

This is absolutely false and is also unconstitutional.

[woofie11]

I know a lot of lawyers. Most lawyers in law firms are just as unethical just as often as their reputation suggests. There are high-integrity lawyers out there, and if you find one, cling onto them. They're out there, but they're rare.

A much more likely explanation are misaligned incentive structures, combined with a protective guild-like bar organization which lawyers belong to.

[srtjstjsj]

Any professional in a competitive field fakes immense selective pressure to be unethical. It doesn't matter how honest one is, the system will select for the cheater. This goes for lawyers, bicyclists, tradespeople, anywhere where the client or victims of externalities can't verify the quality of the work and hold them accountable.

[woofie11]

I think the "competitive" piece is more important than the "can't verify" piece. I'd add academics, politicians, and executives to that list.

A lot of professions are structured like pyramid schemes, with partner/tenure/presidency/CEO at the top, and crap at the bottom.

On the flip side, my experience is most tradespeople are quite scrupulous, not because I can verify the work, but due to lack of competition. If my handyman takes 30% longer to work, he perhaps makes 30% less money, but life goes on. If an academic misses tenure, or a politician gets knocked out of office, careers end.

[elliekelly]

And TV. Real life lawyering isn’t nearly interesting enough so writers have to zhush it up by having lawyer characters operate in the grey area or completely cross the line as a matter of course. It’s more exciting that way!

[woofie11]

The way real lawyers are unethical and the way TV lawyers are unethical is completely different.

Real lawyers will mostly do things like inflate hours, inflate conflicts, exaggerate expected outcomes, and generally blow things up so as to maximize billable hours rather than acting in the interests of their client. That doesn't make good TV either.

[umvi]

Yeah, I didn't realize how downright nefarious lawyers can be until I read "Bad Blood" and thought to myself "How is what David Boies does to help Theranos legal? This seems extremely unethical at the very least, and highly illegal at most"

[nmfisher]

As someone who (in an earlier life) started off in the profession, here's a dirty little secret - I'd say around 2/3 of lawyers get by on pure bluff, bluster and intimidation. I'm talking shouting on phone calls, slamming fists on tables, threatening letters, and so on.

Once you have the slightest clue about the law, it's easy to just laugh it off. The problem is, most people don't know any better, so these tactics are incredibly effective a lot of the time.

However, you do get a truly lethal combination when you combine an asshole lawyer with a well-funded client. That's not because it's some highly intelligent, sophisticated legal team who can craft superior legal arguments. Rather, it's because they can simply brute-force their way through by outspending you.

It doesn't matter how legally "right" you are if you're not willing/able to spend the money in court to prove it. A lot of people take advantage of that, including the asshole lawyer (who, of course, profits from it).

[blaser-waffle]

> As someone who (in an earlier life) started off in the profession, here's a dirty little secret - I'd say around 2/3 of lawyers get by on pure bluff, bluster and intimidation. I'm talking shouting on phone calls, slamming fists on tables, threatening letters, and so on.

"If you have the facts on your side, you pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, you pound the law.

If you don't have facts or law on your side, you pound the table"

[spaetzleesser]

Totally agree about Boies. This behavior should have consequences. He behaved like a mafia hitman who doesn’t care who he is bringing down as long as the money keeps flowing. Basically he is a psychopath with no ethics.

[daniel-thompson]

> Source: Lawyers wouldn't have the reputation they do if all the members of the club had integrity.

Somewhat off-topic, but here's a mind-boggling example of a lawyer's lack of integrity:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Murphy

[jldugger]

Is that the best you can do? One can almost argue if you have been disbarred, you are no longer a lawyer. Though I guess that didn't stop the Air Force from hiring the guy to be a lawyer, then praising and promoting him multiple times.

Here's a more recent and IMO better one: https://appleinsider.com/articles/20/04/28/former-apple-lawy...

> Former Apple lawyer Gene Levoff, who oversaw the company's Insider Trading Policy as corporate secretary and senior director of corporate law, was on Thursday indicted for insider trading and faces a maximum penalty of 120 years in prison. > Ironically, Levoff was in charge of enforcing the blackout period as part of Apple's wider trading policy and would sometimes conduct illicit trades after notifying others of the restrictions.

[ctheb]

> According to prosecutors, he used that information to seek unjust enrichment through a series of beneficial stock trades that generated $227,000 in profits and avoided $377,000 in potential losses.

This seems like a trivial amount of money for someone that high up to jeopardize their career or spend years of their life in prison for. I would maybe even understand the risk/reward if it was in the tens of millions but this sounds nowhere close.

I am genuinely curious to know if this happens regularly - what is the real motivation for committing a crime that barely pays relative to the penalties?

[shakna]

It doesn't even need to be due to "poor" intentions, either.

For example, a lawyer who thought she was doing the right thing and protecting many people has caused endless problems, both legal and moral, and likely ended up protecting (by tainting the case against) the very people she sought to bring to justice.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicola_Gobbo#Lawyer_X_scandal

[vkou]

Given that she became an informant after the police gave her the choice of becoming a snitch, or getting the book thrown at her, I don't think she had any illusions about whether or not she was a scumbag.

[harlanji]

I’m in this very situation.

OpenTable vs. Iverson, 4/20/2020, Santa Clara.

It’s been a saga of massaging the optics, very interesting to see the 3 requests evolve. #1 I was never served, #2 they bluffed and didn’t show up, #3 was utter slander and filed in a new county (SC, first 2 in SF proper over the course of a year). Head screw, it hurts to try to recall it all. It’s also extremely offensive to read. It’s put a serious mark on me, both credibility and also the private investigator(s) following me everywhere, hence being homeless and isolated. The original issue was an improper firing (where UI was granted, and it was improper compared to their own training).

[e-mail]. I have the latter 2/3 of the filings, and my response that I couldn’t file and a BAR complaint written (I wasn’t seved #1 but #2 references it).

[rayiner]

There are a number of structural mechanisms that make “getting away with it” difficult. First, the process is adversarial—there is another side with huge incentives to discover any fabrication. Second, there is an ethical duty to reveal misconduct in your knowledge, under punishment of penalties to yourself. It’s not enough for a rich criminal to pay off a lawyer; they have to pay off everyone else who might know. Third, ethics proceedings can destroy a person’s entire livelihood, and the standard is not “proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” but “more likely than not.” And there’s no statute of limitations—misconduct can come back to bite you decades later.

[CobrastanJorji]

What is this "destroy a person's entire livelihood" thing? For prosecutorial misconduct, it's nearly impossible to sue the prosecutor. They have the same qualified immunity police officers enjoy, and incidents of state bars punishing prosecutors for misconduct are nearly nonexistent.

[woofie11]

Have you ever tried filing a misconduct compliant with a bar association? You'll get just about as far as a police violence compliant with the local PD. The bar is there to serve the lawyers, like any guild or union. For the most part, there are no checks on lawyer ethics.

[gamblor956]

I've actually served on the ethics committee for the bar association. We discipline lawyers all the time.

The bar does not exist to serve lawyers, it exists to regulate them.

[elgenie]

> The bar does not exist to serve lawyers, it exists to regulate them.

Those are far from being in opposition. A cynic might say the bar exists to serve lawyers as a class by doing the bare minimum to appear to be regulating them.

[justinclift]

From the perspective of a lay person, it doesn't to be effective in doing so.

eg. Places like Prenda Law being able to operate openly for years before being shut down, etc.

[srtjstjsj]

Prenda Law operated for 1 year before they were caught, and then. Disbarred and imprisoned.

The reason they continued their crimes for 3 years was that it's impossible to prevent someone from doing paperwork crimes if they aren't in prison.

[justinclift]

> Prenda Law operated for 1 year ...

While technically yes. They just opened another company and kept on going. Guess I should have said "Prenda Law and it's various incarnations". ;)

> ... it's impossible to prevent someone from doing paperwork crimes if they aren't in prison.

That's the whole point. ;)

On that note, it looks like Paul Hansmeier is now attempting to start that racket back up again, even from behind bars.

[jacquesm]

It exists to avoid the courts stepping in to regulate them. If it weren't for the bar association keeping the worst out of view there would be a lot more lawyers reprimanded by judges instead. This is probably efficient, but not a sign that the bar association serves individual lawyers. It serves them collectively by keeping the dirty laundry within the organization rather than to submit to outside regulation.

[tptacek]

Isn't the bar association a guild or union? The state court system hears serious ethics complaints.

[woofie11]

For the most part, complaints are handled through the Bar. Unless something is a press-worthy scandal, they are promptly ignored by most Bars. The goal is to protect lawyers, not clients. A press-worthy case hurts lawyers. Normal scams are, well, what most lawyers do.

Suing a lawyer for malpractice in courts is very tough. There are all sorts of barriers. For example, let's say your lawyer fails to file legal paperwork on-time, and you lose a case. You can sue, but to collect damages:

* You have to show that in the alternative case, you would have won. The lawyer will argue you would have lost in either case.

* The case against your lawyer will likely impact your main case, and not in ways you like.

If your lawyer charges billable hours without actually working -- something which is standard practice among lawyers in my community -- you need to be able to prove that. It's the culture here:

* I've been to lunch with lawyers who bragged they were billing someone else for the time

* Lawyers routinely double-bill if e.g. handling client emails on a cell phone while in court for another client. ). How do you do that?

So it happens all the time, and I've gotten insane bills when nothing was done. You can't prove that in court, though. There's no case. And so on.

[srtjstjsj]

Each state delegates much of the legal oversight of lawyers to the $State Bar Association, from initial licensing to disbarrment.

[rayiner]

It depends on the state. In New York and Illinois, the bar is an organ of the court system, and bar associations are separate private organizations.

[AmericanChopper]

If you think defence lawyers are tricky, wait until you find out about prosecutors...

[ROARosen]

>These are interesting scenarios, but let's not forget that the rules are only binding under the threat of being caught and punished

This reasoning can be used for anything ranging from speeding to stealing to even murder.

Obviously the article was examining the intersection between "the law as written" and the ethics surrounding this issue.

[airstrike]

> Source: Lawyers wouldn't have the reputation they do if all the members of the club had integrity.

Calling that "source" is a bit of a stretch, no? More like "hypothesis"

[kovac]

I once asked a high-school acquaintance of mine who had just graduated with a law degree, if she knew someone committed a violent crime, if she would still represent that person in court. Her answer was that even a violent criminal has a right for a fair trial. That sounded to me as evasive as it was rehearsed. I reckoned that this is something they have been taught/justified in law school.

[fouc]

The ethics behind this is has been deeply studied and debated, and the "right to representation" is an important right. The system is based on checks and balances, and there's no certainty the violent criminal is guilty for the specific crime they're being charged with.

This is likely related to the adversarial nature of the courts, prosecutors vs defenders. Defenders ethically need to defend equally, basic game theory, aka Prisoner's Dilemma.

[implements]

Have a read of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cab-rank_rule

In a nutshell, English barristers must accept cases from anyone regardless of their circumstances or character otherwise “an unpopular person might not get legal representation; barristers who acted for them might be criticised for doing so”.

“Justice” is the result of the process by which trials are fair - is one way of looking at it. Contrasted with the view that once we know who the bad people are (how?) guilt is presumed and summary punishment is all they’re entitled to.

[tuukkah]

Isn't that the right answer though?

[kovac]

Yeah it is. But what I was more interested in is what an individual lawyer might be thinking in that scenario. What I asked was a more specific question. Place where I live in, first degree murder carries death penalty. So, I was wondering what a lawyer would do/think if she knew for certain that her client committed an act that qualifies as first degree murder (e.g. He confessed to her). Because then as far as the justice system concerned, the outcome of a fair trial would be death penalty and she as the defendant would be trying to circumvent that. Not sure why I'm down voted, I genuinely asked her out of curiosity.