BRADY’s LAWYER DEAD at 90

So, Brady’s lawyer died at 90, a good age, time to do enough and live. Didn’t you want to know what some of these lawyers and defendants looked like? How many times do you ask for Brady material? Did you ever read the original case and then look to see how it has been eviscerated?

Don’t forget Brady applies to stuff that inculates and exculpates, though prosecutors are loathe to say anything positive about those they think to indict and convict. One might ask the latest SCOTUS nominee what he thinks of it, too.

Wolfgang Suschitzky, Dead at 104

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How prophetic of Wolfie! Great eye and great mind. Named his brand of photography “documentary.” Now it’s in the common lexicon.

I look at his work and say we have the same Jewish photographer gene. I share it with him, Arbus, Bernstein, Myerwitz, Model, Annie, Wegee, and all the great ones. All these photographers were witnesses and there cameras documented what they saw to enable them later on to see it.

As voyeurs interested in the human race, they saw the ordinary and the unusual. Sometimes to mock. Sometimes to inform. But mostly to do social good, introducing us to those whom we might not know and whom we might not hold in as high respect as they are worth. Their images made the subjects part of our family, maybe not close enough to invite for dinner, but close enough to not be afraid of our differences.

Just sad I didn’t become a photographer first, before becoming a lawyer and a judge. So, I have to conclude that there must be some other more dominant gene in my system.

Amy Beede, Dead in Burlington VT

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My heart breaks inside. I shed tears for her. I shed tears for all of them.

I knew her, you could say, as well as you can know anyone you meet on the street, Church Street. Bought her paints and paper for her art. Bought her coffee. May have loaned her a buck or two or three. Never got them back. Didn’t know Amos. Can’t know too much about someone you meet on the street, either.

Beaten to death for not a good reason. And, in a homeless camp where she spent the night, because she missed the bus back to Milton where she had a place to live and family. I hope the killing wasn’t motivated by gender animus, but who knows?

No way to die; especially when you don’t want to and aren’t ready to. So many I knew on the street suffered undignified deaths as they struggled to understand life. She was always looking up, even when she wasn’t.

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Amy tried to help others, despite her own personal problems, as much as she tried to help herself. Knew a ton of people and didn’t like a whole lot of them. A noble person she was. And that isn’t easy when you don’t have comfort zones to hide out in or a complete understanding of whom you are.

Before I left Burlington, we spoke. I suggested that she not come down from Milton every day and that she find things and people up there who would be of interest. “Nope,” she said, “Burlington was where her life was.” And, that is where it ended. Badly.

 

Anything Helps

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So, my friend, Tom, lost his hotel room. Says that SSI doesn’t cover it and Howard cannot help him. Last night, he tells me, he slept on this bench that sits in front of the Parks and Recreation Building on Pine Street.

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I brought him some water as he sat on the curb eating, but someone had already beaten me to it. He had juice and a sandwich; didn’t want anything else. He said he’d sleep on the bench again.

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I found an old sign of his on the ground, in some flowers. I bought it for $1. It was written on and Arm and Hammer box.

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Skippy Makes A Bail Application

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In Court to see one of the guys I follow on the Street. To me, he’s Skippy, a light hearted alcoholic who has a certain joie to vie, singing, laughing and carrying on. In Court, he’s He’s Phillip Searles, charged with an aggravated domestic assault. Held on no bail due to the nature of the act and maybe his record. The State alleges that he is a habitual offender, but they haven’t filed all the paper work. As for the charge, the complaining witness, his wife, died, but whether he did it probably cannot be proven. So, they charged him with the assault based on the fact that he made an admission, gave some contradictory answers to the investigating officer and some other evidence.

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He’s asking for bail, not that he could make $25 were it to be set. He lives in the woods, when he’s free, a residence courts don’t usually recognize in determining whether he will return to face the charges. No bail package has been submitted as an alternative to jail. But the lawyer’s obligation is to assert his rights, here his right to bail. In addition to have probable cause for the charges, the State has to allege that he poses a threat to the community. The best they could allege, without statutory or case support, was that as a person charged with domestic abuse, he may well injure another woman were he to come into contact one upon his release.

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In a hallway interview after the hearing concluded with the Judge taking the matter into chambers to decide, Bill Norful, his attorney, talked about how difficult it would be to investigate the case due to the lifestyle of his client. He suggested that others could have injured her. Could have been another person whom she was seeing.

Molly Needs A Valentine

As Chet Baker sings, … everyday is Valentine’s Day.” Not for Molly. She’s still on the street. Hard enough not having a place to live.

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David’s back, too. He’s still lost and adrift. But, he thinks he’s cool.

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Bill Traveller doesn’t get any older; his lines grow deeper, hiding years of travail. Where has he been? Where have they all been? Places I’d never go.

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And, Katie looks like she’s Catherine the Great, just off a barge ride down the Volga.

Johnny Vegas

Had never seen the guy before. He sat with a traditionally messaged sign on the wrong side of the street, on the heavily trafficked corner across from Ben and Jerry’s where no one sits. Bright shoes. Big camp back pack. Hardly someone who doesn’t want to be noticed.

With the wind, snow and cold, I couldn’t go out. We must have emerged at the same time after two weeks in hibernation. First guy I saw after stepping out of my car into long missed but not forgotten sun. He stood behind the fence at Rite Aid, one of the City’s dingiest spots. Had to ask about the tattoo. “Got it in Las Vegas. It’s a coverup. Lost a bet that three girls that I was running could make more money in a night than another guys. The payoff was the tattoo: Lost in Vegas. And a telephone number. My girls took the money, bought drugs and spent the night getting high. Couldn’t get them to work. So, I lost. Got the tattoo and left. Then I got it covered up.”

Richard North – Lost on Main

So, Richard North has given up. But, who knows? He disappeared for a few days. Skippy told me he went to the hospital. Richard said they advised him to stop drinking and to take his heart medicine. I offered to take him to pick up the medicine. “Not now.”

Two kids passed, telling me to pay Richard for the priviledge of taking his picture. “Like, who the fuck are you? Will you help me?” They kept walking. Richard: “…, they are kids, leave them alone.”

Larkin Forney Lived a Life

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Ten years ago I worked as a Public Defender in Middlebury. People in custody were kept in a basement holding area that allowed for safe transfers from cars to the jail, but unhealthy and borderline unconstitutionally improper cells. There was plenty of room for counsel visits, with no privacy, no windows and claustrophobic pens. When a prisoner arrived financially unable to afford counsel, a lawyer would be assigned to the case. Almost no one, except for the DUI, out-of-towners, had retained lawyers, most of whom could plead out a drunk but not try a case. The Deputy Sheriff would find the on-duty PD or call out the name of the defendant. One day, I heard, “whose got Larkin Forney?” Frankly, I thought it was a sandwich or a condition. I said, “what’s a Larkin Forney?” “You’re client, you idiot. He’s downstairs, with a pile of papers and he wants to talk with you.”

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Larkin had papers, all right. He had motions he had written which he wanted to file and he had a full statement of facts, his version, and he had pages of a book he was writing. And he was pissed that I hadn’t familiarized myself with all the nuances of the case before we met. I had to excuse his vituperativeness, given the fact I would leave the cell and he would stay. He may not have known I only just got the papers and barely had looked at them as I walked down the stairs. And, poor communication between offices of the Public Defender and the general malaise of some of the attorneys prevented me from knowing he had fired his previous PD after writing a complaint to the disciplinary committee accusing the lawyer who is now a judge or magistrate or something or all sorts of unethical conduct, asserting that the representation was less than adequate and unconstitutionally defective.

[MORE To Come]