On the gaming side there is a long-standing rule to not use acronyms in the topic.
You really are a tough nut to crack Flowers.
:)
Fixed
I don’t know Allison Stokke personally. I don’t know her dad. I don’t know if his web crawling will ever find this forum.
That being said, Allison, I personally invite you to come bathe in the healing light of my cock. Who’s of consenting age? You are! Rebel from daddy!
There we go. No misinterpreting that.
As I understand it, any defense attorney, whether a public defender or in private practice, is legally and ethically obligated to provide their clients with the best legal defense they can which isn’t an outright lie. Some people are attacking Al Stokke’s morality here, but no one’s suggested an alternative argument he could have used in either case which would have been as or more effective than “blame the victim” but morally “better.” If a defense attorney has to choose between taking the moral high ground or using a “dastardly” yet effective defense, I’m pretty sure they’re obligated to go with the latter. Yes, attacking the victim is a morally scummy tactic, but it gets used because sometimes it’s effective: in Al Stokke’s cases, it apparently worked in the cop-jerking-off case and not in the gang-rape case.
We can talk all we like about how wonderful it would be if people didn’t fall for such sexist (or racist or whatever-ist) arguments; but a defense attorney doesn’t have the luxury of working in an ideal world. You can say it’s unfair to appeal to people’s prejudices that way; since when are trials about what’s fair? As bizarro as it sounds, attorneys aren’t required to believe their own arguments; they’re trying to convince the jury to believe it. Welcome to the legal system.
You wanna be a lawyer who always takes the high road and never uses these kinds of ugly tactics, go right ahead. But you better be damn good at it if you expect to drum up business. People hire lawyers to win their cases, not take moral stances. [Also, bear in mind that in the gang-rape case at least, he was part of a defense team: the attack-the-victim tactic was not drawn up solely by him.]
So what exactly is he being criticized for? For not rejecting such “obviously guilty” clients in the first place? That presumes that Stokke has the luxury of picking & choosing his clients: if he works for a firm, odds are his cases are assigned to him by his bosses; if he works solo, then chances are he can’t afford to turn away business just because he happens to suspect his clients are scum. Furthermore, it isn’t his job to determine his clients’ guilt or innocence; it’s the jury’s.
So is he being criticized for his chosen profession? After all, defense attorneys are inherently immoral, according to Flowers. [Sure you don’t mean “amoral?”] They get scum off the hook all the time, so fuck `em, right? But they also defend the wrongly accused and keep them from being sent to jail. Without knowing the rest of his trial history, how are we to judge if Al Stokke’s done more harm or good?
Really, though, I don’t know why this is being mentioned in regards to his daughter in the first place: they’re completely separate issues. What does his job have to do with how much he loves his daughter and wants to protect her? If he were a convicted felon - hell, if he was a rapist himself - is he automatically subhuman scum incapable of love, so we can discount his feelings on the matter?
Defense attorneys are one of those professions people like to rail on until they need one. Then they are your new best friend and get invited to all your BBQs!
Defenses still play on racism all the time. And if it’s the defense attorney’s job to get their client off, and that’s a viable approach, I still don’t see anything wrong with the attorney proferring that argument. If there is a problem with that argument (and there sure as hell is) it’s not the defense attorney’s job (or moral obligation) to not make it. It is instead the judge’s job (and the jury’s) to completely disregard that argument as bogus.
I’m not at all arguing that the argument Mr. Lawyerdude made is immoral. Nor am I arguing that the above one you make is, either. What I’m arguing is the fact that people are attaching the immorality to the person making the argument, which I find ludicrous. A defense attorney has a much stronger obligation to his client than he does to society at large, and as such making an immoral argument on behalf of his client doesn’t strike me as an immoral act in any way, shape, or form.
Basically, I think they’re scummy arguments. But if you have a problem with the morality, take it up with the society that lets them work. Don’t place the entire onus of changing society on Mr. Defense Attorney, and especially don’t expect him to do so at the possible expense of his client. That’s a hideous thing to ask anyone to do to our justice system. It might even be an immoral thing to ask someone to do to our justice system.
If he were a convicted felon - hell, if he was a rapist himself - is he automatically subhuman scum incapable of love, so we can discount his feelings on the matter?
No, but then we get to call him a hypocrite legitimately. You’re right about the role of lawyers, they’re there to win, not be nice or even decent.
At the same time being a repugnant asshole at your job (even when required) will get you that reputation in your personal life and it’s obvious you’re quite capable of it and likely enjoy it on some level, otherwise you’d quit. The fact is Al Stokke said those things, even if it’s in the context of defending his client he still has to accept the responsibility for it. There are still consequences for what people do, even when it’s required of them.
I do think it should be taken with a grain of salt as it may not be what he personally believes, however at the moment we have nothing else to go on.
You mean other than the WoW and NWN threads, just off the top of my head?
Defense is immoral, prosecution is amoral, judges are pretty decent.
I’ve had acquaintances who are cops and after hearing some of their stories, I will never trust a cop again, on or off the stand. I’m well aware that cops and prosecutors are capable of insane scumbaggery. But that just means they are bastards too, but it doesn’t excuse it.
It’s the mentality that by everyone going to the extremes we somehow end up in the middle, and most of the time that just doesn’t work. Instead it tends to just leave everything fucked up. Business uses the same justifications. It’s not a matter of whether the action is ethical, it’s a matter of is it the best way to compete.
It’s the compartmentalizing of morality that leads to, “I was just making sure the trains ran on time,” to “Well it aint my kids that’ll get cancer from those power lines and we’re providing power to millions of people!!”
We are not just cogs in a machine and we are accountable for our behavior. Blaming it on the machine is a cop out.
Edit: Flowers, thanks for sparing me the verbal beat down. I’m sure you could have layed waste to me. I’m more railing against a state of society that Stokke represents rather than all defense attorneys. Well, I still think Stokke and his team are a bunch of jackasses.
sigh Yes, yes it is.
Yeah FUCK DA POLICE!
I am shamed!
You should change your QT3 nick to “Belkar.”
I’m really curious about the other inicdent mentioned on that site, the cop and the stripper. I mean, didn’t his cop cam film the whole thing? They make it sound like he pulled over a car, discovered a stripper was driving it, got an erection then OOPS it somehow popped out of his pants and he blew his wad on her sweater. WTF? Did he offer to let her go if she allowed this? Was it her suggestion? I fit was the former, and she wasn’t interested, why didn’t she just take the ticket, or at least roll up the window (ouch!) and call 911 to report him? So many questions, inquiring minds want to know!
That’s his job, not his choice. If you’re not willing to do that for your clients then it would be unethical of you to be a defense attorney at all. Taking the client was the moment of choice, not defending him past the point of distastefulness.
Inquiring enough to read the court record? It’s a pretty high bar, those things aren’t super exciting.
See what I mean?
Marcus, I’ve heard all of this from the same person:
[ul]
[li]Sitting idly by while watching someone is assaulted because said officer believed they deserved it.[/li][li]Continuing to assault a suspect that had already stopped resisting.[/li][li]The legal harassment of persons who just annoyed him or made his job difficult.[/li][li]Actively obtaining evidence against judges for blackmail if he ever felt he needed a warrant super quick.[/li][li]Planting evidence.[/li][li]Playing cop games like going out and seeing who can make the quickest arrest (goal is within 5 minutes).[/li][li]In the process of doing said action, stopping people without cause. His words, “You never have a reason before hand, you can always find something after the fact.”[/li][li]Judged his job performance by the number of arrests he made.[/li][li]Referred to his uniform as his “Superman” outfit.[/ul][/li]
Keep in mind, he was not alone in most of these actions. He was also promoted because he was such a good cop.
I don’t know how much of the above is just his bravado, but honestly, it doesn’t matter. The fact that he’s bragging says more than enough about his personality.
So yeah, I don’t trust cops. They aren’t there to help people, they are there to arrest them.
To Flowers: You obviously take your job and your responsibility very seriously. I also understand there’s a lot of moral ambiguity inherent in the system. Even with (and probably in part because of) your zaniness you come across as one of the most genuine people on this board, so I don’t think you’re faking it. Not that this means anything, but if I ever heard you pull the same kind of shit that Stokke did, I’d call you out on it. That’s when the ambiguity stops for me at least.
If this thread was a Guitar Hero Face-off mode, the little arrow would be pointing a little ways onto Flower’s side, because of the riff he just pulled off, even though I don’t like the song he’s playing.
I hope Mr Stokke joins this forum, so he can:
- join the debate about the inherent conflict between the public obligations and private morality of lawyers
- Get ElGuapo’s personal info, send him to court as a stalker.
- Proceed to defend ElGuapo in court, proving to the world that he is capable of completely seperating his public and private life in a legal version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
Mordrak you are insane. Most of the stuff you are describing is what we in america like to call illegal.
You know when you heard the stuff you could have like gone and ratted the guy out /shrug.
If someone tells me they do that kinda stuff I have no problem turning them in and most of the people I work with would do the same.