March 15, 2026

Chapter 135: Felony Review-Tales of True Crime & Corruption in Chicago w/ Randy Barnett

Chapter 135: Felony Review-Tales of True Crime & Corruption in Chicago w/ Randy Barnett
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Interviews

Today, I sat down with Randy Barnett, professor of Constitutional Law at the Georgetown University Law Center, Director of the Georgetown Center for the Constitution and former prosecutor for the City of Chicago. He joins me to tell me all about his latest book, Felony Review: Tales of True Crime and Corruption that gives a behind the scenes look at what it was like to work in the thick of the violence and corruption running rampant in 1970s and 1980s Chicago.

Randy Barnett walked me through his time in the Felony Review Unit, the violent cases he worked on, and why exactly are some people so willing to spill it all to the police. Whether you love true crime, want to be a lawyer, or are currently studying law, this book, and this conversation, are for you.

Get your copy of Felony Review, out March 17th:
On Amazon
Encounter Books
Barnes & Noble


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If you enjoyed the episode, consider leaving a review or rating! It helps more than you know!
If you have a case suggestion, or want attention brought to a loved one's case, email me at bookofthedeadpod@gmail.com with Case Suggestion in the subject line.

Stay safe, stay curious, and stay vigilant.

WEBVTT

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Every story has a beginning, but not everyone has an ending.

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In the shadows of headlines and buried police reports lay

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the voices of the missing, the murdered, and the forgotten,

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waiting to be heard and have their stories told. This

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is The Book of the Dead, a true crime podcast

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where we remember forgotten victims of heinous crimes, reopen cold cases,

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re visit haunting disappearances, and uncover the truths buried beneath

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the years of silence. I'm your host, Courtney Liso, and

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every week we turn to another chapter, one victim, one mystery,

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one step closer to justice. Brought to you by Darkast

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Network in Deep Podcasts with the Twist. Hello, Hello, Welcome

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to the next chapter in the Book of the Dead.

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With me today, I have a very special guest. Randy

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Barnett is a professor of constitutional law at the Georgetown

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University Law Center and director of the Georgetown Center for

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the Constitution. He is also a former state prosecutor for

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the City of Chicago, and he's joining me today to

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discuss his newest book, Felony Review, Tales of True Crime

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and Corruption that gives an inside look at the rampant

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violence and corruption of nineteen seventies and eighties, Chicago. Randy,

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thank you so much for joining me today. I'm very

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excited to have you.

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Well, I'm very excited to be on this podcast. You

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have such interesting cases that you talk about, and I

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don't know if any of my cases rise to the

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level of the ones you talk about, but I have

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a lot of them.

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Well, based on what I read, you certainly have quite

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a few that definitely meet the level of some of

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the cases that I've covered. You have had a very

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interesting career, and that kind of leads me to my

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first question. You know, what led you to wanting to

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become a lawyer. Was this something you always wanted to do,

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or did your aspirations change as you got older.

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It's something I wanted to do since the age of

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ten years old, when a television show came on and

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I was a child of television. I watched a lot

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of TV as a kid, and a TV show came

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on called The Defenders. It was on CBS. I ran

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from nineteen sixty to sixty four, I think, and it

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was about a father son criminal defense team in New

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York City. Was filmed on location. It was very gritty,

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seemingly realistic. It wasn't like Perry Mason, which was already

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on the air when I was a kid, which was

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really about solving murders. This was a show about being

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a lawyer and the ethical challenges of being a defense

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lawyer in the criminal justice system in New York. It

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also explored a lot of social issues as well, and

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so I was fascinated by it, and so that's what

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I want to be. I never changed my focus, even

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when I went to law school and everybody was telling

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me that I shouldn't waste my degree by going into

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the criminal justice system. Something they say at Harvard, for example,

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become a clerk and then go to work for big

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law firm. And I said, look, I didn't go to

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law school to do something I don't want to do.

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I went to law school to do what I do

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want to do, and that isn't be a local criminal lawyer.

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Now.

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One of the things that shifted in the course of

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my life was over to the prosecution side from the

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defense side. And that happened when I was in law school.

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And I discovered in law school that the duty of

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a prosecutor is to do justice. The first duty of

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a defense attorney is the zealous defense of their client.

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And we absolutely need defense attorneys. They're essential to the

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truth finding function of our system, of our criminal justice system.

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But I was more comfortable with the justice commitment that

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prosecutors have their permitments to do justice, whether that results

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in the conviction or a release of a criminal. I

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also tend to be constructive in my approach. I'm not

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a deconstructionist. I like to build things, and prosecutors build cases.

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Defense attorneys tear them down and just dispositionally. I'm more

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suited to the building of cases. But probably first among

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all of these reasons is the fact that by the

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time I got to law school, I was convinced that

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the criminal justice system paid it inadequate attention to the

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victims of crime. And this was partly due to the

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fundamental principles of the criminal justice system, and that is

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that a crime is committed, and under our theory of

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criminal justice, it's committed against the people of the state

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or against the state. When I was a Cook County

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States Attorney in Illinois, my client I represented the people

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of the state of Illinois, not the government of the

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Illinois but the people of the state of Illinois. Well,

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where do victims fit into this? Believe it or not. Technically,

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victims are witnesses to a crime that has been committed

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against the people of the state, which is kind of

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a perverse way of looking at victims of a crime.

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And I was very, very focused on the victims of

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a crime and wrote a paper that was published by

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my third year of law school in Ethics, which is

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one of the premier philosophy journals in the country, called

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Restitution a New Paradigm of Criminal Justice, when I urged

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that our criminal justice system be organized around compensation of

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victims rather than punishing the criminal per se. By the

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time I graduated from law school, I was really single

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mindedly focused on becoming a prosecutor and my dream job

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was to do it in my hometown of Chicago. And

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I got to do my dream job and it was,

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as I say in the book, several places better than TV.

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You do mention that several times, and I do want

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to come back to that, because, of course, you know,

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law shows are prevalent. Now you know you have Law

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and Order, you have all sorts of shows like that,

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so you definitely want to come back to that. But

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I really love how you really wanted to focus on

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serving justice to the victims because and it's not with

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every lawyer, every prosecutor that are very focused on the

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job and getting the job done, where I feel like

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the victim kind of gets overlooked in the sense that

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it's all about getting the conviction, getting whoever the perpetrator

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was convicted of the crime, and they kind of forget

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that at the heart of it is the victim who

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was impacted by the perpetrator. So I love that justice

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was such a forefront of your mind, especially when I

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focus a lot of my episodes on giving a voice

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back to those victims.

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That's one of the reasons I was excited to be

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on your podcast, to be perfectly candid, that's one of

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the things that drew me to it.

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Oh well, thank you so much. That truly means a lot.

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That's something that resonated with you. So of course, corruption

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is a big theme in your book, and corruption was

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very rare in Chicago I've covered in the past. So

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you mentioned that it happens or you noticed it very

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early in your career. You know, what sort of things

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did you notice and how did you navigate that obstacle?

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Well, there are two kinds of corruptions. One is the

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one we think of, and the other one is the

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one people generally don't think of, and the second one

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is more pervasive. Frankly, the one that we think of

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is monetary corruption. People that get paid off or bought off,

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and that happens in the criminal justice system. It was

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happening in Cook County while I was there. The book

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tells the story about that corruption that I faced and

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what ultimately happened in response to that corruption, and the

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story has somewhat of a happy ending, which is kind

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of hard to believe you could have a happy ending

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in our criminal justice system. The other kind of corruption,

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which goes more unnoticed, is sort of the corruption of

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the soul, and that is a corruption that's based on

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people who know people. There was a saying in the

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criminal justice system you never know who you're talking to.

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That was a cautionary tale about speaking too candidly to people.

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And what you never know who you're talking to is

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a reference to is that I might be talking to you, Courtney,

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but I don't know who your father is. I don't

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know who your brother or sister is, your mom, your

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father or your mom might be somebody who I wouldn't

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want to be communicating with. But if I tell you something,

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you're going to tell them, and therefore you never know

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who you're talking to. There's one anecdote I talk about

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in the case where a notorious case fixer named Dean Wolfson.

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I was getting my haircut and he was at the

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same place that he was getting his haircut from, and

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he came up to me and he said, you know,

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you should stop bad mouthing me, meaning accusing him of

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being a corrupt lawyer. Well, this took me aback. I

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couldn't believe it for two reasons. It's number one is

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I didn't actually specifically remember bad mouthing him. I mean,

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if I did, it wasn't often to many people. Yet

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I didn't know who I was whoever I said it to.

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I was actually talking to Dean Wolfson unbeknownst to me.

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And the other thing that was funny was that he

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was so obviously well known to be corrupt. I mean,

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this was just widely known that it was surprising to

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me that he would care what I know one guy

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was saying about him, but obviously he did. So that

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was a good example of how I said something to

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somebody and it got back to him, So you never

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know who you're talking to. And that's the kind of corruption.

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So if you go up and I mean, here's the

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reason why, here's the payoff. When you're a prosecutor and

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you're pairing before a judge and there's a defense attorney

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standing next to you, what is the connection between the

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judge and the defense attorney. I mean, did they go

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to the same law school? They do they have relatives

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in common? You never know. And my job as a

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prosecutor is to ensure that whatever the connection is between

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the two of them, should there be any which I

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can't know about, I've got to prevent any kind of

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corrupt decision making happening out of favoritism, so kind of

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favoritism doing good things for the people that you know

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and you like, which is not the same thing as

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monetary corruption. Another form of corruption, one more form of

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corruption that I personally experienced and I talk about in

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the book. I think I even talk about it more

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in A Life for Liberty, which is the book that

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I published last year, which is about my overall career.

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And that is the corruption you face when you were

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a prosecutor and you have all this power. Being a

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prosecutor is an extremely powerful position and one of great

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influence in Cook County and elsewhere, though especially in Cook County,

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and so for example, I would know that if I

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ever got stopped for speeding and I identified myself respectfully,

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I should say to the officer who stopped me, as

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a Cook County States Attorney, there was a very very

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good chance that he would let me go. And knowing

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you had that kind of privilege is corrupting. That is,

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you come to like it, you enjoy having that kind

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of privilege. And I know when I left the office

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after four years, it was a good time to leave,

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because the longer you have that privilege, the more it

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becomes a part of you. I felt the absence of it,

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I felt the loss of it. It was a security

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in noing that because I was a Cook County States Attorney,

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I had certain privileges or prerogatives. Bad things were not

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going to happen to me as much as they might

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happen to the ordinary person because who I was. That's

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the thing that is that the phrase power tends to corrupt,

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and absolute power corrupts absolutely. That's the kind of corruption

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that that praise is about, and I personally experienced it,

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and I think it's something that people need to take

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seriously about the people who are in government for their

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whole lives.

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I agree, and especially because you would expect lawyers and

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judges to keep their ethics and justice and morals at

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the forefront. Do you think that the allure of power

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and the allure of that monetary gain or that bigger

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monetary gain flipped people more often than not towards corruption

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or do you think there were more people that held

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onto those morals.

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Oh, I think by far the overwhelming number of people

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held onto their morals without a question, especially in the

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Cook County States Attorney's office I served in. Notwithstanding all

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the corruption that was around me, there was virtually no

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corruption in the office I worked in, which which surprised me.

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I came into the system pretty cynical. It was cleaner

230
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than I expected, because my office was cleaner than I expected.

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So I definitely think it can be resisted. I definitely

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think most people in the system are trying to do

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the right thing, which is something else that doesn't get

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depicted in popular culture about the legal system. Enough the defenders.

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Now I've gone back and rewatched it recently, and in

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The Defenders, you do have many instances in which the

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defense attorney, the prosecutors, and the judge are getting together

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off the record, sometimes in like a club or a

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00:12:43.720 --> 00:12:46.279
like a workout club that they're in and they're trying

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to figure out what to do with some really difficult

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case and handle in an affair and way. And even

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though that was fiction, it does reflect a lot of

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what goes on in the system. I also like to

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say that My Cousin Vinnie is my second favorite lawyer's movie.

245
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And if you'll notice, they don't make the prosecutor out

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to be a bad guy in that case. He's doing

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his job. Vinnie's doing his job. At the end of

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the day, the prosecutor helps Vinnie do his job, and

249
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the prosecutor doesn't take it personally. When Vinnie ultimately beats him,

250
00:13:13.960 --> 00:13:16.519
the prosecutor stands up and says, you know, motion state

251
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dismissed very proudly because he was happy to do it.

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In that sense, and I think that more reflects the

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criminal justice system I was in than some of the

254
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more downbeat accounts or the criminal justice system.

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I agree. I think I think a lot of shows

256
00:13:31.519 --> 00:13:36.919
and movies now definitely portray prosecutors as being the bad guys,

257
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which of course makes for great TV. It does it's

258
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fun to watch. What I do think it casts a

259
00:13:43.639 --> 00:13:46.840
negative light on prosecutors and defense attorneys a light. Defense

260
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attorneys are always portrayed as kind of the seedier ones,

261
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the grettier ones, So I don't think it's necessarily fair,

262
00:13:54.240 --> 00:13:57.039
but it does make for good TV. But it's refreshing

263
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to see the shows and the books like yours that

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portray them how they're supposed to be, whether by firsthand

265
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experience or otherwise.

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Well, as you know, at the end of the book,

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I added as an appendix or as an afterward two

268
00:14:08.960 --> 00:14:12.360
letters that I wrote to MTM Productions, which was Mary

269
00:14:12.399 --> 00:14:16.320
Tyler Moore's production company run by her husband Grant Tinker,

270
00:14:16.720 --> 00:14:20.120
and they produced both Hill Street Blues and La Law

271
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And after Hillstreet Blues came on while I was still

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a prosecutor, I wrote like an eight page single space

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letter kind of criticizing their characterization of the prosecutor who

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had not yet made an appearance on screen yet, and

275
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went through the history of how prosecutors have been depicted

276
00:14:35.240 --> 00:14:38.799
in lawyer shows unrealistically. And then when years later, when

277
00:14:38.919 --> 00:14:40.919
LA Law came on, I was already a law professor,

278
00:14:40.960 --> 00:14:44.000
I sent a follow up letter arguing again about their

279
00:14:44.240 --> 00:14:47.159
mischaracterization of what the prosecutors are like, and I got

280
00:14:47.240 --> 00:14:49.919
very respectful responses from them. But I put the whole

281
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letter in my book because it's my breakdown of how

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00:14:53.440 --> 00:14:56.240
prosecutors or lawyers are depicted. And I would say to

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00:14:56.360 --> 00:14:59.559
generalize lawyer shows other than Law and Order, which is

284
00:14:59.559 --> 00:15:02.559
so much different. Lawyer shows, which are usually organized around

285
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the defense attorney being the hero, have prosecutors being the

286
00:15:05.480 --> 00:15:09.840
bad guy and usually the defendants are innocent, whereas cop

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shows are organized around the cops being the good guys,

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and usually the suspects are guilty, and the prosecutors, if

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they're there at all, are probably okay, they're neutral, they

290
00:15:19.120 --> 00:15:20.919
maybe they just get in the way of the cops

291
00:15:20.960 --> 00:15:23.639
doing their job, so to speak. And so if I'm

292
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going to pick a jury, I want jurors who like

293
00:15:25.639 --> 00:15:28.519
the cop shows, not jurors who like the lawyer shows.

294
00:15:29.519 --> 00:15:32.600
That makes a lot of sense, I agree. Where there

295
00:15:32.600 --> 00:15:36.080
are times where the corruption hit a little bit too

296
00:15:36.279 --> 00:15:39.519
close to home for you, and how did you handle

297
00:15:40.039 --> 00:15:45.360
processing that knowledge that many of your colleagues and judges

298
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that you were presenting cases to were corrupt.

299
00:15:49.279 --> 00:15:51.639
Well yeah, I mean I had a case fixed out

300
00:15:51.679 --> 00:15:54.759
from under me, which was pretty painful, and that made

301
00:15:54.759 --> 00:15:59.480
me so angry that I went down to my supervisor's

302
00:15:59.480 --> 00:16:02.279
office after this happened. It was an auto theft court,

303
00:16:02.360 --> 00:16:04.480
so it was a preliminary hearing in a felony auto

304
00:16:04.519 --> 00:16:07.320
theft case, and there was a finding of no probable

305
00:16:07.360 --> 00:16:09.759
cause as a result of the testimony given by a

306
00:16:09.799 --> 00:16:13.519
cop who testify to how illegal their search had been,

307
00:16:13.559 --> 00:16:16.120
which of course is not something cops typically testified to,

308
00:16:16.200 --> 00:16:18.480
but they do when they've been paid by the defense attorney.

309
00:16:18.720 --> 00:16:21.200
It turns out that, for reasons I explained in the book,

310
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we realized that the judge was in on this because

311
00:16:24.120 --> 00:16:26.039
he had to change his rules of evidence to allow

312
00:16:26.080 --> 00:16:28.360
the cop to say these things, and so that's how

313
00:16:28.399 --> 00:16:31.279
we knew he was implicated. So I was so angry.

314
00:16:31.360 --> 00:16:33.960
I went down and I said to my supervisor, who

315
00:16:33.960 --> 00:16:36.320
was a former Chicago police officer before he went to

316
00:16:36.399 --> 00:16:40.320
law school to become a prosecutor, I said, you know, Dennis,

317
00:16:41.200 --> 00:16:43.759
I'm so upset about this that I know this isn't

318
00:16:43.759 --> 00:16:45.840
good for me, and I know it's if you can

319
00:16:45.879 --> 00:16:49.399
give me some reason for me to calm down. I

320
00:16:49.440 --> 00:16:51.440
think I can do it, but I need some give

321
00:16:51.480 --> 00:16:53.919
me a reason. And he said, okay, he was a

322
00:16:54.000 --> 00:16:56.039
very gruff talking guy. I'll give you a reason. The

323
00:16:56.080 --> 00:16:59.120
reason is is that defense attorney ever finds out how

324
00:16:59.200 --> 00:17:01.840
upset you are him for having fixed this case, he

325
00:17:01.879 --> 00:17:04.440
will forever use it against you when you're in court

326
00:17:04.480 --> 00:17:07.039
against him. And he says something to the judge like, well,

327
00:17:07.119 --> 00:17:09.519
the prosecutor's not arguing this because he believes that he's

328
00:17:09.599 --> 00:17:12.079
arguing it because he doesn't like me, your honor, And

329
00:17:12.119 --> 00:17:15.599
I said, well, thank you, Dennis for that. That's all

330
00:17:15.599 --> 00:17:17.880
I needed. I now can calm down. And I did

331
00:17:17.920 --> 00:17:20.319
calm down after that. And there's another saying in the

332
00:17:20.319 --> 00:17:22.400
criminal justice system, and that is you don't get mad,

333
00:17:22.599 --> 00:17:25.920
get even. And the book tells a story about how,

334
00:17:25.960 --> 00:17:27.920
several weeks later I was able to get even with

335
00:17:28.000 --> 00:17:31.079
that defense attorney by depriving him of the opportunity to

336
00:17:31.119 --> 00:17:33.359
fix a second case out from under me.

337
00:17:34.559 --> 00:17:37.279
That was very satisfying to read about. I enjoyed that

338
00:17:37.480 --> 00:17:41.400
very much. A bulk of your book talks about your

339
00:17:41.440 --> 00:17:45.160
time in felony review. So for those that don't know,

340
00:17:45.200 --> 00:17:48.519
can you explain what that job entails and what are

341
00:17:48.599 --> 00:17:50.799
some of the things that you did in felony review.

342
00:17:51.480 --> 00:17:53.279
Well, I went to be a prosecutor, to be a

343
00:17:53.319 --> 00:17:55.240
trial lawyer, be a criminal trial lawyer, and I did

344
00:17:55.279 --> 00:17:57.880
get to I fortunately got to be a criminal trial lawyer,

345
00:17:57.920 --> 00:18:01.599
a felony trial lawyer, trying to for two years before

346
00:18:01.599 --> 00:18:03.839
I left the office. But along the way you have

347
00:18:03.920 --> 00:18:06.599
a lot of assignments, and one of them turned out

348
00:18:06.599 --> 00:18:08.680
to be very formative to me, and that is the

349
00:18:08.680 --> 00:18:12.400
Felony Review Unit in Chicago, which is quite unique. I

350
00:18:12.400 --> 00:18:14.960
don't really know whether this exists elsewhere in the country,

351
00:18:15.640 --> 00:18:18.319
but a deal was made between the elected States Attorney

352
00:18:18.559 --> 00:18:22.079
years before I became a prosecutor, and the Chicago Police Department,

353
00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:25.119
and that is that the police department would not be

354
00:18:25.160 --> 00:18:29.599
able to bring felony charges against anybody unless it had

355
00:18:29.680 --> 00:18:32.839
been approved by an assistant States Attorney by a member

356
00:18:32.839 --> 00:18:35.440
of the State's Attorney's office. Now, there were some exceptions

357
00:18:35.440 --> 00:18:37.799
to that. Drug cases were not included. For example, that

358
00:18:37.920 --> 00:18:40.599
it was the rule, and in order for the prosecutor's

359
00:18:40.599 --> 00:18:43.599
office to satisfy that rule, they had to create a

360
00:18:43.640 --> 00:18:47.920
special unit which did nothing but evaluate cases that were

361
00:18:47.920 --> 00:18:50.759
brought to it by the CPD by the Chicago Police Department,

362
00:18:50.799 --> 00:18:53.599
and the similar situation of BISUAI also exists in the

363
00:18:53.599 --> 00:18:56.440
suburbs the Coller counties that are part of Cook County

364
00:18:56.640 --> 00:18:59.680
around Chicago. I just was in Chicago myself, and so

365
00:19:00.079 --> 00:19:03.720
before a felony complaint can be filed, a felony review

366
00:19:03.720 --> 00:19:06.200
assistant has to review it. Now, in order to have

367
00:19:06.319 --> 00:19:09.119
this unit, you're signed to it full time, and you're

368
00:19:09.240 --> 00:19:13.119
signed in twelve hour shifts, twelve hours on, twelve hours off,

369
00:19:13.160 --> 00:19:15.640
twelve hours day shift on three days in a week.

370
00:19:15.759 --> 00:19:17.680
Then you have three days off, and then you switch

371
00:19:17.720 --> 00:19:19.839
to the night shift. You have twelve hours six pm

372
00:19:19.920 --> 00:19:22.480
to six am the next day. So you do it

373
00:19:22.519 --> 00:19:24.240
three days on three days off. It can be kind

374
00:19:24.240 --> 00:19:27.720
of a grueling experience. And your offices are not in

375
00:19:27.759 --> 00:19:31.279
the courthouses. They're in the police area headquarters. So you

376
00:19:31.319 --> 00:19:33.920
have your own office in the police area headquarters. And

377
00:19:33.920 --> 00:19:36.519
then you have your own squad car and you respond

378
00:19:36.559 --> 00:19:39.599
to whatever police district the person's been arrested at in

379
00:19:39.680 --> 00:19:41.599
order to evaluate the cases. Now it's not all you do.

380
00:19:41.640 --> 00:19:44.279
You also evaluate search warrants, and you also serve as

381
00:19:44.279 --> 00:19:46.599
an advisor to cops who come in and ask you

382
00:19:46.599 --> 00:19:49.759
your opinion about stuff, and so it was an extremely

383
00:19:49.839 --> 00:19:52.680
important job and one of the most interesting jobs I've

384
00:19:52.720 --> 00:19:54.240
had in my whole life. And this is the reason

385
00:19:54.279 --> 00:19:57.200
why I named the book Felony Review after that unit,

386
00:19:57.240 --> 00:19:59.440
even though the book is about both that and being

387
00:19:59.440 --> 00:20:00.200
a trial oil here.

388
00:20:01.240 --> 00:20:05.440
You evaluated some really interesting cases in Felony Review that

389
00:20:05.759 --> 00:20:08.920
I read about in the book. Can you talk about

390
00:20:08.920 --> 00:20:11.440
some of those cases that really made an impact on you?

391
00:20:11.759 --> 00:20:14.920
For me personally, the story of mister and Missus Kim

392
00:20:15.119 --> 00:20:17.839
and the liquor store, that that was quite a case

393
00:20:17.880 --> 00:20:20.559
to read about. And you had mentioned something in the

394
00:20:20.640 --> 00:20:22.319
end where she had said that you know, she hopes

395
00:20:22.319 --> 00:20:24.599
to bloom in America and that you hope she does,

396
00:20:24.680 --> 00:20:27.119
and that was just that was so beautiful and that

397
00:20:27.200 --> 00:20:30.279
resonated so much to me, especially just knowing the details

398
00:20:30.279 --> 00:20:34.200
of that story. So, what are some cases that really

399
00:20:34.240 --> 00:20:34.960
impacted you?

400
00:20:35.799 --> 00:20:38.880
Well, there's that one, and I should say for this book.

401
00:20:39.480 --> 00:20:42.599
One of the most satisfying parts about the book going back,

402
00:20:42.640 --> 00:20:45.599
and it was originally supposed to be several chapters of

403
00:20:45.640 --> 00:20:48.200
my previous book of Life for Liberty. But that book

404
00:20:48.240 --> 00:20:50.799
got too long, and I pulled these chapters out. And

405
00:20:50.839 --> 00:20:52.720
then because I pulled it out and made it into

406
00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:55.559
a freestanding book, one of the things I did was

407
00:20:55.640 --> 00:20:59.119
research the victims and what happened to them afterwards, more

408
00:20:59.160 --> 00:21:02.319
about them. I researched the other participants in the system,

409
00:21:02.400 --> 00:21:05.000
the other lawyers and the judges, so I got more background.

410
00:21:05.000 --> 00:21:06.359
I was able to put all this background in the

411
00:21:06.359 --> 00:21:08.680
book that wouldn't have fit in the other book. And

412
00:21:08.759 --> 00:21:10.839
one of the things I learned about was her because

413
00:21:10.880 --> 00:21:14.200
there was a Chicago newspaper columnist who did two stories

414
00:21:14.200 --> 00:21:16.480
about her and interviews with her, and I was not

415
00:21:16.519 --> 00:21:18.960
privy to that when I was dealing with the case.

416
00:21:19.240 --> 00:21:22.680
My involvement in that case ended in the police station

417
00:21:23.359 --> 00:21:25.759
after the defendant was charged. Because I was a felony

418
00:21:25.839 --> 00:21:28.240
review assistant. I was not the person who tried the case.

419
00:21:28.720 --> 00:21:32.559
And my participation consists and otherways. Tell you, your listeners,

420
00:21:32.599 --> 00:21:36.559
the facts of this case. The defendant, Seesar Marin, was

421
00:21:36.759 --> 00:21:40.559
a Colombian immigrant who was a patron of this liquor

422
00:21:40.559 --> 00:21:43.559
store that were run by this Korean couple, the Kyms,

423
00:21:43.720 --> 00:21:46.640
and one night he was on his own, and he

424
00:21:46.720 --> 00:21:49.319
got himself quite drunk, or at least according to him,

425
00:21:49.559 --> 00:21:51.599
he got himself quite drunk at the lake front, and

426
00:21:51.640 --> 00:21:54.440
he came back to buy some beer more beer at

427
00:21:54.440 --> 00:21:56.519
the liquor store before they closed. He saw they were

428
00:21:56.519 --> 00:21:59.240
closing up. He'd worked in that liquor store before, and

429
00:21:59.319 --> 00:22:02.119
so he knew what the layout was. And he realized

430
00:22:02.119 --> 00:22:03.920
that they were just the two of them, and he

431
00:22:04.039 --> 00:22:06.039
just pulled out a gun, which he brought with them

432
00:22:06.079 --> 00:22:08.759
to the lakefront, and he held them up. He telled

433
00:22:08.799 --> 00:22:12.000
them to go down and downstairs into the basement. And then,

434
00:22:12.519 --> 00:22:15.319
according to him, because I took the confession from him,

435
00:22:15.799 --> 00:22:18.480
so most of what we know about what happened, most

436
00:22:18.480 --> 00:22:21.480
of what I knew about what happened came from him. Afterwards,

437
00:22:21.480 --> 00:22:24.519
reading the story, I got Missus Kim's side of it better.

438
00:22:24.559 --> 00:22:26.240
And I'll say for a minute, why I didn't have

439
00:22:26.319 --> 00:22:29.000
her side? So head her downstairs, and he said he

440
00:22:29.079 --> 00:22:31.559
thought he saw mister Kim make a motion in his direction,

441
00:22:31.920 --> 00:22:35.680
so he started shooting at him, struck him. Mister Kim

442
00:22:35.720 --> 00:22:39.319
died of his wounds. He also shot Missus Kim, who

443
00:22:39.599 --> 00:22:43.759
he then left for dead, went upstairs, closed the door,

444
00:22:44.640 --> 00:22:47.839
put a piece of wood or bar to pry the

445
00:22:47.880 --> 00:22:50.519
door closed so it could not be opened from downstairs

446
00:22:50.799 --> 00:22:55.000
and left. Missus Kim survived the attack and crawled up

447
00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:58.359
the stairs, was able to somehow dig her way out

448
00:22:58.400 --> 00:23:01.240
through the wall by breaking out through the wall and

449
00:23:01.400 --> 00:23:03.839
to get help call up to get help for her

450
00:23:03.880 --> 00:23:06.279
and her dying husband, and she was then sent to

451
00:23:06.359 --> 00:23:08.759
the hospital. By the time I was involved in the case,

452
00:23:09.200 --> 00:23:12.200
she was hospitalized and really not all that able to communicate,

453
00:23:12.240 --> 00:23:14.319
so I didn't really get her whole side of the

454
00:23:14.359 --> 00:23:17.119
case until I read the article that I read to

455
00:23:17.160 --> 00:23:20.000
put this book together. One of the most noteworthy things

456
00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:23.400
about this case and the importance of felony review as

457
00:23:23.400 --> 00:23:26.400
a means of protecting the innocent, is that missus Kim

458
00:23:26.440 --> 00:23:29.000
did supply the name of her attacker. The cops went

459
00:23:29.000 --> 00:23:33.519
out and arrested Saesar. Marin Or arrested Saesar, and my

460
00:23:33.640 --> 00:23:37.279
supervisor said, well, has she identified him? And I said, well,

461
00:23:37.279 --> 00:23:39.720
not yet, she said my supervisor on all murder cases.

462
00:23:39.759 --> 00:23:43.799
We responded, we were basically in consultation with our supervisor

463
00:23:44.039 --> 00:23:46.440
for murder cases, and they said, well, you have to

464
00:23:46.440 --> 00:23:48.559
get a lineup, you have to get her a ID

465
00:23:48.720 --> 00:23:50.519
so I told the cops we have to get an ID,

466
00:23:50.920 --> 00:23:53.200
and they were a little reluctant. They had a guy

467
00:23:53.279 --> 00:23:55.839
that fit the description, had the right name, but they

468
00:23:55.839 --> 00:23:58.400
did it and we went to the hospital. That wasn't

469
00:23:58.400 --> 00:24:01.960
the right guy. It was the wrong caesar. They had

470
00:24:01.960 --> 00:24:04.440
to let him go. They went out and captured eventually

471
00:24:04.480 --> 00:24:07.200
the right guy. I then went back to the hospital

472
00:24:07.200 --> 00:24:09.000
to get the ID of the right guy. And that

473
00:24:09.079 --> 00:24:12.680
was a very dramatic scene worthy of TV. And that

474
00:24:12.799 --> 00:24:15.319
is missus. Kim is laying with a tube coming out

475
00:24:15.319 --> 00:24:18.200
of her nose and she's sitting in a hospital bed.

476
00:24:18.720 --> 00:24:21.079
She was kind of in a delirious state for weeks.

477
00:24:21.440 --> 00:24:24.119
And I handed her the five photographs. It was a

478
00:24:24.160 --> 00:24:27.079
five photograph lineup I d and she went through each

479
00:24:27.079 --> 00:24:29.319
photograph and then when she got to the one of

480
00:24:29.400 --> 00:24:34.160
Sesar Marin, she started reacting to it physically, and I

481
00:24:34.200 --> 00:24:36.880
remember the fluids started running out of the tube that

482
00:24:36.960 --> 00:24:41.559
was up her nose as she pointed her finger violently

483
00:24:42.079 --> 00:24:44.400
at that picture that that was him, that was him.

484
00:24:44.480 --> 00:24:48.640
In addition to that ID, we also had the weapon

485
00:24:48.720 --> 00:24:51.400
and we had the proceeds of the robbery as well.

486
00:24:51.440 --> 00:24:54.599
But I was there then to take the confession, and

487
00:24:54.640 --> 00:24:58.480
so I took the confession from him. And as you'll

488
00:24:58.480 --> 00:25:00.799
know from reading the story, the reasons I tell the

489
00:25:00.799 --> 00:25:02.799
story of the full confession I took with all the

490
00:25:02.799 --> 00:25:07.799
details is that I almost blew the confession by not

491
00:25:08.119 --> 00:25:12.440
giving him his Miranda rights before the confession, and what happened,

492
00:25:12.440 --> 00:25:15.759
and how I was able to somehow fix that because

493
00:25:15.799 --> 00:25:18.359
of the advice of someone else I was training that day,

494
00:25:18.640 --> 00:25:20.680
and so that there wasn't even a motion to suppress

495
00:25:20.680 --> 00:25:23.119
the confession. It was all perfectly okay. But I had

496
00:25:23.279 --> 00:25:27.400
overlooked giving him his Miranda warnings because I was so

497
00:25:27.599 --> 00:25:30.440
conscious of the fact that later on defense attorneys would

498
00:25:30.440 --> 00:25:33.599
claim he didn't speak English, that I wanted to make

499
00:25:33.640 --> 00:25:36.920
sure that there was a Spanish speaking officer in the

500
00:25:37.000 --> 00:25:40.079
room that could translate anything he had a question about.

501
00:25:40.480 --> 00:25:42.559
And as I was explaining to him all that on

502
00:25:42.599 --> 00:25:45.640
the record, it interrupted my normal flow, and I then

503
00:25:45.680 --> 00:25:48.079
didn't go and give him his right to remain silent,

504
00:25:48.160 --> 00:25:50.640
right to have a counsel, all that stuff. So I

505
00:25:50.759 --> 00:25:53.400
just went past that, and I didn't discover it until

506
00:25:53.400 --> 00:25:56.119
the end of the confession, when I'm sitting there trying

507
00:25:56.160 --> 00:25:57.839
to think of is there anything I've forgotten. I realized,

508
00:25:57.880 --> 00:25:59.759
you know, I don't think I did that. I asked

509
00:25:59.759 --> 00:26:02.119
the the guy I was training, and I asked the

510
00:26:02.359 --> 00:26:05.240
investigating officer who was there, did I did I give

511
00:26:05.319 --> 00:26:07.200
him as Maranda rights? And they go, yeh, we think

512
00:26:07.240 --> 00:26:09.880
you did. And I asked the court reporter who was there,

513
00:26:09.920 --> 00:26:12.480
did I give him as Mariana rights? I think you did.

514
00:26:12.559 --> 00:26:14.680
I said, well, would you go back and look? So

515
00:26:14.720 --> 00:26:16.839
we went back in his tray with his print out

516
00:26:16.839 --> 00:26:19.319
and he said, you didn't do it. But I was

517
00:26:19.359 --> 00:26:21.920
at a complete loss now, I mean, I was like,

518
00:26:22.480 --> 00:26:24.160
you know, inside, it was kind of panicking, what do

519
00:26:24.200 --> 00:26:26.519
I do? And the guy I was training, who now

520
00:26:26.599 --> 00:26:28.160
is a circuit court judge. I think he might have

521
00:26:28.279 --> 00:26:30.160
just retired, but he was. He went on to be

522
00:26:30.200 --> 00:26:33.039
a circuit court judge. He said, he advised me how

523
00:26:33.039 --> 00:26:35.640
to fix it, and I did what he said and

524
00:26:35.640 --> 00:26:37.839
it fixed it. And what I did, if I'll give

525
00:26:37.839 --> 00:26:39.880
this one away, I'll give this ending away. What I

526
00:26:39.960 --> 00:26:42.880
did was because I had given him as Miranda warnings

527
00:26:43.240 --> 00:26:45.920
before he orally confessed to me. I just hadn't done

528
00:26:45.960 --> 00:26:48.480
it on the record for the court reporter confession. And

529
00:26:48.519 --> 00:26:51.400
so I said, well, Sazare prior to speaking with me

530
00:26:51.480 --> 00:26:53.599
the first time. Did I advise you that you had

531
00:26:53.599 --> 00:26:56.119
a right to remain silent? Yes? Did I advise you

532
00:26:56.160 --> 00:26:59.000
that anything that you said could be used against you? Yes?

533
00:26:59.279 --> 00:27:01.200
Did I advise you had to write to attorney? Yes?

534
00:27:01.240 --> 00:27:02.839
Did I advise you that should you not be forward

535
00:27:02.839 --> 00:27:04.720
to attorney, one could be a provider for you. Look old,

536
00:27:04.759 --> 00:27:07.359
Abitstrei Hira, I still remember the warnings, and he goes, yes,

537
00:27:07.440 --> 00:27:10.839
So I retroactively gave him his rights by pointing out

538
00:27:10.839 --> 00:27:13.920
how he had previously been advised, and that fixed the error.

539
00:27:13.920 --> 00:27:16.279
But in the book, I try to focus on the

540
00:27:16.279 --> 00:27:19.240
mistakes that I made as well as the good decisions

541
00:27:19.279 --> 00:27:22.119
that I made as learning exercises for the reader, especially

542
00:27:22.119 --> 00:27:24.319
if the reader is a law student or somebody who

543
00:27:24.359 --> 00:27:25.720
would like to be a lawyer one day.

544
00:27:27.119 --> 00:27:29.519
I really loved that you added in those moments where

545
00:27:29.559 --> 00:27:34.119
you made these errors, especially with the Miranda warning, And

546
00:27:34.200 --> 00:27:37.960
I remember reading that and you mentioning did I give

547
00:27:38.039 --> 00:27:43.640
him Miranda warning? And almost panicking for you, because you,

548
00:27:43.640 --> 00:27:46.880
you know, as just an average person, or besides the

549
00:27:46.880 --> 00:27:50.920
fact that I spend a bulk of my time researching

550
00:27:50.960 --> 00:27:54.680
true crime, like you know, how important, that is. But

551
00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:59.240
speaking of the Miranda warnings, you know, could you talk

552
00:27:59.279 --> 00:28:02.240
a little bit about out why they're so important and

553
00:28:02.359 --> 00:28:06.519
how they're so valuable to a court case.

554
00:28:07.559 --> 00:28:11.119
Absolutely. Now, the theory of miranda warnings are that you're

555
00:28:11.119 --> 00:28:14.599
not supposed to be compelled to testify against yourself under

556
00:28:14.599 --> 00:28:17.400
the Constitution, and so it's a violation of your Fifth

557
00:28:17.400 --> 00:28:21.480
Amendment rights if you've been coerced into talking to the police.

558
00:28:22.039 --> 00:28:24.839
So Miranda warnings are what are known in the business

559
00:28:24.839 --> 00:28:29.680
as prophylactic warnings. That is, they prevent misconduct by advising

560
00:28:30.160 --> 00:28:32.759
defendants who may not know what their constitutional rights are

561
00:28:32.839 --> 00:28:35.079
what they are, so that they can exercise their right

562
00:28:35.119 --> 00:28:37.640
to remain silent because they're being told they have such

563
00:28:37.640 --> 00:28:40.240
a right as being as opposed to not being told

564
00:28:40.279 --> 00:28:41.519
they have such a right say well, you got to

565
00:28:41.559 --> 00:28:43.759
talk to us. So that's the idea of them, and

566
00:28:43.960 --> 00:28:46.240
I think they do have that effect to some degree,

567
00:28:46.839 --> 00:28:49.799
maybe not as much as people might imagine. I think

568
00:28:49.839 --> 00:28:53.359
people talk to the police regardless of whether they've gotten

569
00:28:53.359 --> 00:28:55.240
their Miranda warnings if they feel like it's in their

570
00:28:55.240 --> 00:28:58.319
interest too. I talk a lot about why people confess

571
00:28:58.359 --> 00:29:00.880
to the police in the book, I think the biggest

572
00:29:00.880 --> 00:29:03.519
effect that Miranda warnings have is on the officers who

573
00:29:03.559 --> 00:29:08.599
have to recite them, because prior to that somewhat open

574
00:29:08.640 --> 00:29:12.880
season on police interrogation techniques. Pretty much anything was fair

575
00:29:12.960 --> 00:29:15.240
game in the bad old days, but prior to me

576
00:29:15.319 --> 00:29:17.920
being a prosecutor, because I was a prosecutor post Miranda,

577
00:29:18.039 --> 00:29:21.799
post the Constitutional rights Revolution. But I think what the

578
00:29:21.799 --> 00:29:26.599
Miranda warnings do is create a psychological state in the

579
00:29:26.599 --> 00:29:29.880
mind called cognitive dissonance, which is cops are saying to

580
00:29:29.960 --> 00:29:32.640
people all day long, you have a right to remain silent,

581
00:29:32.720 --> 00:29:35.720
you have a right to a lawyer, and that reminds

582
00:29:35.759 --> 00:29:38.119
the cops that people have a right to remain silent

583
00:29:38.160 --> 00:29:40.240
and a right to a lawyer, and so their behavior

584
00:29:40.359 --> 00:29:43.160
corresponds with what they say. That's what cognitive distance. It is.

585
00:29:43.440 --> 00:29:45.680
When we say one thing and do something different, it

586
00:29:45.680 --> 00:29:49.119
makes us uncomfortable. We like to reconcile that by making

587
00:29:49.119 --> 00:29:51.759
our actions consistent with what our words are. Sometimes it's

588
00:29:51.759 --> 00:29:54.720
by changing our ideas to conform to our actions, and

589
00:29:54.720 --> 00:29:58.200
sometimes it's by changing our actions to conform to our words.

590
00:29:58.720 --> 00:30:01.799
And I think this makes cops more rights conscience that

591
00:30:01.880 --> 00:30:05.160
they ever were to respect people's rights. And it also

592
00:30:05.279 --> 00:30:08.519
bolsters the honest cop. So let's say that there's a

593
00:30:08.720 --> 00:30:10.880
you know, a station house full of cops, and many

594
00:30:10.920 --> 00:30:13.559
of them would respect people's rights. They're happy to others

595
00:30:13.559 --> 00:30:15.400
say no, no, no, we've got to be tough. We

596
00:30:15.440 --> 00:30:17.319
don't care about that. They're the bad guys. We can

597
00:30:17.319 --> 00:30:19.559
do what we want. Well, there's a certain amount of

598
00:30:19.599 --> 00:30:23.759
peer pressure involved in getting cops to act like the

599
00:30:23.799 --> 00:30:26.559
tougher Cops act, or you know, say you're not being

600
00:30:26.559 --> 00:30:29.319
tough enough. Well, if you have to say Miranda rights

601
00:30:29.319 --> 00:30:33.039
all day long, that bolsters the resolve of the cops

602
00:30:33.079 --> 00:30:35.559
that will respect the rights of the of the accused

603
00:30:35.960 --> 00:30:38.519
by saying, well, look, they have rights. You know, I

604
00:30:38.559 --> 00:30:39.720
have to say it, You have to say it, we

605
00:30:39.720 --> 00:30:41.559
all have to say it. And so I think it

606
00:30:41.599 --> 00:30:45.039
has definitely contributed to cleaning up the criminal justice system

607
00:30:45.079 --> 00:30:47.480
to the point where when that was something I didn't

608
00:30:47.519 --> 00:30:49.640
really see. When I was a prosecutor, I didn't see

609
00:30:49.680 --> 00:30:52.400
coerce confessions. Now, I'm not saying none of the confessions

610
00:30:52.400 --> 00:30:54.440
that ever made to me were not coerce. Before I

611
00:30:54.519 --> 00:30:57.799
got there, it's possible they were. So I can't claim

612
00:30:58.279 --> 00:31:03.160
that because my experience is a hundred true. But if

613
00:31:03.160 --> 00:31:06.160
there had been rampant coercion, I think I would have

614
00:31:06.240 --> 00:31:08.359
caught a wind of it in a way that I didn't.

615
00:31:08.680 --> 00:31:11.240
So again, I'm not saying cops don't do it. I'm

616
00:31:11.279 --> 00:31:14.519
just saying it had a very salutary effect on the

617
00:31:14.559 --> 00:31:17.200
criminal justice system, and I think it's a good thing.

618
00:31:17.240 --> 00:31:20.319
Having said that, I've just written an essay I talk

619
00:31:20.359 --> 00:31:23.880
about this in the book as well about the exclusionary rule,

620
00:31:24.200 --> 00:31:29.480
about how why violating these constitutional rules should not prevent

621
00:31:30.119 --> 00:31:33.119
law enforcement from being able to use the evidence. That's

622
00:31:33.119 --> 00:31:35.440
what the exclusionary rule says. If you get a statement

623
00:31:35.759 --> 00:31:38.440
that was coerced, you can't use the statement. Well, a

624
00:31:38.480 --> 00:31:40.599
core statement might not be reliable, so there might be

625
00:31:40.640 --> 00:31:42.039
a good reason not to use it. But if let's

626
00:31:42.039 --> 00:31:44.920
say you uncover physical evidence but you don't have probable

627
00:31:44.960 --> 00:31:47.880
cause for your search, but you find the murder weapon

628
00:31:47.880 --> 00:31:51.119
and the bloody remains of the victim and all the rest,

629
00:31:51.680 --> 00:31:53.440
but you didn't have probable cause for the search, well,

630
00:31:53.480 --> 00:31:55.680
all of that physical evidence has to be suppressed. There's

631
00:31:55.680 --> 00:31:57.480
another case in the book where I talk about the

632
00:31:57.519 --> 00:32:01.240
Henry Lee Thomas case in which all the physical evidence

633
00:32:01.279 --> 00:32:04.240
of him murdering his girlfriend, Dorothy Harrol in the middle

634
00:32:04.240 --> 00:32:06.039
of the night and dumping her body in a forest

635
00:32:06.119 --> 00:32:09.079
preserve later on had to be suppressed because the cops

636
00:32:09.079 --> 00:32:12.079
didn't have probable cause for their search. My view is

637
00:32:12.119 --> 00:32:15.160
that that evidence should be available to prosecute them, but

638
00:32:15.200 --> 00:32:19.119
we should have a separate system solely dedicated to compensating

639
00:32:19.240 --> 00:32:22.440
victims of police misconduct who've had their rights violated with

640
00:32:22.640 --> 00:32:26.119
monetary compensation. And so one of the problems of the

641
00:32:26.160 --> 00:32:28.759
exclusionary rule is only the guilty get to assert it.

642
00:32:28.799 --> 00:32:32.200
Only if there's evidence of guilt. Do you get to

643
00:32:32.240 --> 00:32:34.759
suppress the evidence of guilt. The remedy's suppression, Well, they've

644
00:32:34.759 --> 00:32:37.680
got to suppress something. And if the person's completely innocent

645
00:32:37.960 --> 00:32:40.240
and they've been searched, that driving down the street and

646
00:32:40.279 --> 00:32:43.720
their search and nothing's found, they've got no remedy because

647
00:32:43.759 --> 00:32:46.799
nothing was found. So only the guilty get this remedy,

648
00:32:46.799 --> 00:32:48.720
the innocent don't. And I would like a system in

649
00:32:48.759 --> 00:32:52.359
which innocent and guilty alike can get a compensatory remedy,

650
00:32:52.839 --> 00:32:55.200
while at the same time the criminal justice system can

651
00:32:55.240 --> 00:32:56.920
make use of the evidence that's found.

652
00:32:57.920 --> 00:33:01.920
I agree with that. I don't think it's fair and

653
00:33:02.279 --> 00:33:05.880
that you know, this evidence can be suppressed, can't be

654
00:33:06.079 --> 00:33:09.000
used because of if it was on ethical and how

655
00:33:09.039 --> 00:33:11.240
it was obtained, or you know, there was no probable cause.

656
00:33:11.759 --> 00:33:16.440
But it's impacting the victim in a negative way, either

657
00:33:16.519 --> 00:33:22.559
by completely ruining the case or it is, like you said,

658
00:33:22.759 --> 00:33:27.039
impacting someone who may have been innocent, but there's nothing

659
00:33:27.119 --> 00:33:31.960
to suppress. So I do agree that that would be

660
00:33:33.119 --> 00:33:36.839
a very good solution because in the end you could

661
00:33:36.960 --> 00:33:41.960
still use this evidence within specific constraints, but also the

662
00:33:42.000 --> 00:33:45.319
person that it's impacted directly gets compensated in some way

663
00:33:45.480 --> 00:33:47.640
for having their case impacted so deeply.

664
00:33:47.759 --> 00:33:50.400
Right, And of course the general public pays by having

665
00:33:50.680 --> 00:33:54.039
guilty dangerous people re released into the community.

666
00:33:54.559 --> 00:33:59.759
Absolutely, and that at the core is what no one wants. Right,

667
00:34:00.240 --> 00:34:03.160
as you mentioned, you speak openly about suspects being so

668
00:34:03.319 --> 00:34:07.559
willing to give confessions to police, you know, innocent or guilty.

669
00:34:08.119 --> 00:34:11.760
Can you kind of explain why that is why someone

670
00:34:11.800 --> 00:34:14.639
is so willing to talk, especially now when you hear

671
00:34:14.719 --> 00:34:16.360
a lot of people say, you know, don't talk to

672
00:34:16.360 --> 00:34:18.360
the police, get a lawyer, Get a lawyer, Get a lawyer.

673
00:34:18.599 --> 00:34:22.599
So what is your perspective on that, Well, that by

674
00:34:22.599 --> 00:34:24.559
the way, is the advice I give people too, don't

675
00:34:24.559 --> 00:34:26.199
talk to the police, get a lawyer. Get a lawyer

676
00:34:26.239 --> 00:34:29.360
for lots of reasons, And that's a different topic for

677
00:34:29.400 --> 00:34:31.960
a different show. So I think that's usually good advice

678
00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:34.039
to follow, except where it's not. I mean, there's exceptions

679
00:34:34.039 --> 00:34:36.960
to every rule, but generally speaking it's good advice. But

680
00:34:37.000 --> 00:34:39.119
why do they Well, I found there were several different

681
00:34:39.159 --> 00:34:41.840
reasons I got from sort of an observation observing people

682
00:34:41.920 --> 00:34:45.280
talking to me. The most important reason why people talk

683
00:34:45.320 --> 00:34:47.920
to the police who are guilty is that they think

684
00:34:47.960 --> 00:34:51.719
they're talking themselves out of the crime, when they're really

685
00:34:51.960 --> 00:34:56.159
making the job of the prosecutor easier. So, for example,

686
00:34:56.719 --> 00:34:59.079
if in order to talk themselves out of a murder,

687
00:34:59.119 --> 00:35:02.360
let's say a person is and killed and it's part

688
00:35:02.400 --> 00:35:04.440
of a group thing or something, and the person that's

689
00:35:04.519 --> 00:35:08.440
arrested says, well, I was there, but I didn't shoot anybody,

690
00:35:08.480 --> 00:35:11.679
and I didn't kill anybody. Well, what that person has

691
00:35:11.719 --> 00:35:14.760
just done is eliminated identification as an issue in the case.

692
00:35:14.880 --> 00:35:17.000
No longer we have to worry about fingerprints, no longer

693
00:35:17.039 --> 00:35:19.920
we have to worry about the reliability of eyewitness identification.

694
00:35:20.400 --> 00:35:24.360
They've admitted they were there. Now we just have to decide,

695
00:35:24.920 --> 00:35:27.119
you know, were they culpable for whatever happened. You know,

696
00:35:27.119 --> 00:35:29.000
maybe they did pull the weapon, maybe they didn't. But

697
00:35:29.079 --> 00:35:30.760
I mean, I have the case of the King brothers

698
00:35:30.960 --> 00:35:33.639
who killed the former cell mate of Robert King. George

699
00:35:33.719 --> 00:35:36.800
and Robert with the brothers, and they killed the former

700
00:35:37.199 --> 00:35:39.960
cell mate in Illinois State Penitentiary of robber King named

701
00:35:39.960 --> 00:35:43.320
Gregory Perkins. And each brother confessed to the police and

702
00:35:43.360 --> 00:35:45.960
each said the other guy did it. Each said, yeah,

703
00:35:45.960 --> 00:35:48.199
I was there. We robbed the guy, but my brother

704
00:35:48.280 --> 00:35:50.159
is the one that stabbed them to death with the scissors.

705
00:35:50.480 --> 00:35:53.239
And so I tried both of those cases separately. You

706
00:35:53.239 --> 00:35:57.000
can't use a statement that accuses somebody a co defendant

707
00:35:57.039 --> 00:35:59.599
of guilt because the co defendant can't cross examine the

708
00:35:59.599 --> 00:36:02.119
maker of the statement because you're defended. So you have

709
00:36:02.199 --> 00:36:04.320
to try those cases separately. For so, first I tried

710
00:36:04.400 --> 00:36:08.079
Robert and then I tried George, And so those confessions

711
00:36:08.079 --> 00:36:10.840
put them both at the scene, both participating in the robbery.

712
00:36:10.920 --> 00:36:14.840
It legally speaking, it didn't matter which one actually did

713
00:36:14.840 --> 00:36:17.119
the stabbing as long as one of them did. So

714
00:36:17.280 --> 00:36:19.800
those guys were trying to talk themselves out of a

715
00:36:19.880 --> 00:36:23.719
murder cards and they talked themselves in to a murder conviction.

716
00:36:23.920 --> 00:36:26.280
And now that's the first reason. People think they're talking

717
00:36:26.320 --> 00:36:28.760
themselves out, but they're talking themselves in. The second reason

718
00:36:29.559 --> 00:36:32.159
is Caesar Marin, the one I already talked about. My

719
00:36:32.239 --> 00:36:34.599
impression of Saesar was and from what he told me,

720
00:36:35.159 --> 00:36:37.679
he felt really bad. He felt bad about what he did.

721
00:36:37.719 --> 00:36:40.519
There are criminals, and there are criminals there. Criminals are diverse.

722
00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:43.639
Even said in his statement to me that's in the book,

723
00:36:44.079 --> 00:36:46.639
that he lost sleep, and he said, I just kept

724
00:36:46.639 --> 00:36:48.519
thinking about the man. I kept thinking about the man.

725
00:36:49.119 --> 00:36:51.760
Confessing was like confessing to a priest. It was like

726
00:36:52.079 --> 00:36:56.519
a way of alleviating guilt was to confess. And that's

727
00:36:56.519 --> 00:36:58.880
the impression I got from him. And then there was

728
00:36:59.039 --> 00:37:01.159
Juan Caballero, the first case I talk about it at the

729
00:37:01.199 --> 00:37:03.280
beginning of the book. We won't go into the details now,

730
00:37:03.559 --> 00:37:06.639
perhaps the most memorable of all the cases that I

731
00:37:06.679 --> 00:37:09.400
took statements from. And I think Wan, who was a young,

732
00:37:09.679 --> 00:37:12.599
clean cut kid, I can't remember now, twenty years old,

733
00:37:12.599 --> 00:37:14.159
I say in the book how old he was. I

734
00:37:14.199 --> 00:37:17.000
had very little record, hardly any record at all, and

735
00:37:17.079 --> 00:37:21.239
yet he full confession to a brutal slaying of three

736
00:37:21.960 --> 00:37:25.000
young men by four members of the Latin Kings, of

737
00:37:25.039 --> 00:37:27.920
which Juan was a member. I think he would have

738
00:37:28.000 --> 00:37:30.519
considered it to be unmanly to not admit to what

739
00:37:30.559 --> 00:37:32.039
he had done. I mean, he was sort of proud

740
00:37:32.039 --> 00:37:33.199
of what he did. He sort of thought he did

741
00:37:33.239 --> 00:37:36.119
the right thing, given the fact that these kids had

742
00:37:36.159 --> 00:37:38.840
claimed to be Latin Eagles and written on hits to

743
00:37:38.920 --> 00:37:41.760
Latin Kings, and so he was not ashamed of what

744
00:37:41.800 --> 00:37:45.440
he did, and to have denied it would have been

745
00:37:45.480 --> 00:37:47.400
to sort of indicate that he was ashamed. That he

746
00:37:47.440 --> 00:37:50.199
wasn't ashamed, and so being proud of what they did.

747
00:37:50.400 --> 00:37:53.079
By what you do is a third reason. It's pretty unusual,

748
00:37:53.159 --> 00:37:56.119
but I think his confession was a good example of that.

749
00:37:57.599 --> 00:38:01.880
I agree, And I think it's interesting saying because of course,

750
00:38:01.920 --> 00:38:05.079
you see the people that you know, they talk because

751
00:38:05.119 --> 00:38:07.280
they're trying to talk themselves out of it. You have

752
00:38:07.960 --> 00:38:12.840
those like Cizar Marin who obviously felt a deep sense

753
00:38:12.880 --> 00:38:16.920
of guilt. I think he felt remorse, yes, and I

754
00:38:16.960 --> 00:38:19.599
do believe he was absolutely looking for some sense of

755
00:38:19.679 --> 00:38:22.639
absolution in what he had done. And I think that's

756
00:38:22.760 --> 00:38:26.679
very common as well. But those that do it as

757
00:38:28.119 --> 00:38:30.760
kind of like a way to brag about what they

758
00:38:30.800 --> 00:38:34.440
had done is always just so astounding to me that

759
00:38:34.559 --> 00:38:40.079
someone could have just such a deep sense of anti morality.

760
00:38:40.519 --> 00:38:44.760
It's astounding, but it's motivated, I think in that case

761
00:38:44.800 --> 00:38:48.320
by kind of a code that the guys that got killed,

762
00:38:48.360 --> 00:38:51.320
while you know they were they committed an affront against

763
00:38:51.320 --> 00:38:53.840
the Latin kings, and they kind of deserve what they

764
00:38:53.880 --> 00:38:56.400
got and that's why we did it. And so that

765
00:38:56.480 --> 00:38:59.039
he was adhering to a code. Again, I think that's

766
00:38:59.039 --> 00:39:02.079
somewhat unusual. The people that don't talk to the police

767
00:39:02.679 --> 00:39:05.519
are generally people who have done hard time. They got

768
00:39:05.559 --> 00:39:07.840
hard time because they did talk to the police, and

769
00:39:07.840 --> 00:39:11.199
they've had years to kick themselves and be told by

770
00:39:11.239 --> 00:39:13.920
everybody else whatdo in the prenitentiary, what idiots they were

771
00:39:13.920 --> 00:39:16.320
for talking to the police that by the time they

772
00:39:16.320 --> 00:39:18.159
get out, you know, when they hear to see a cop,

773
00:39:18.199 --> 00:39:20.760
they just clam up. I couldn't get to square one

774
00:39:20.800 --> 00:39:23.840
with those guys when I was faced with a hardcore

775
00:39:24.719 --> 00:39:27.599
having been to the penitentiary for many years, repeat offender,

776
00:39:27.920 --> 00:39:29.800
they were stone cold and they just looked at me,

777
00:39:29.840 --> 00:39:31.320
and there was nothing I could do to get them

778
00:39:31.320 --> 00:39:31.679
to talk.

779
00:39:32.440 --> 00:39:35.239
I believe that. I believe that they learned their lesson.

780
00:39:35.840 --> 00:39:36.840
They learned their lesson.

781
00:39:37.159 --> 00:39:41.199
After you left Felonie Review and you became a prosecutor

782
00:39:41.400 --> 00:39:44.760
for the state, what sort of cases did you try?

783
00:39:44.840 --> 00:39:47.320
Were they similar to what she's out with in Felony

784
00:39:47.400 --> 00:39:48.920
Review or were they vastly different?

785
00:39:49.039 --> 00:39:51.639
Oh, they were similar. I started off before I went

786
00:39:51.639 --> 00:39:55.079
to fellow In Review as a misdemeanor courtroom lawyer, trying

787
00:39:55.119 --> 00:39:57.599
misdemeanor cases, which are I think very serious. I think

788
00:39:57.639 --> 00:39:59.719
one of the problems with our criminal justice system then

789
00:40:00.519 --> 00:40:03.840
is that we don't take misdemeanor seriously enough. Their crimes

790
00:40:03.840 --> 00:40:06.280
punishable by up to one year in jail, and yet

791
00:40:06.280 --> 00:40:09.159
they're treated as like sometimes like traffic offenses, and they

792
00:40:09.199 --> 00:40:12.239
really I think if we took misdemeanors more seriously, we'd

793
00:40:12.239 --> 00:40:15.119
have fewer felonies to worry about down the road. But

794
00:40:15.199 --> 00:40:16.239
that was my first experience.

795
00:40:16.280 --> 00:40:16.360
Then.

796
00:40:16.360 --> 00:40:18.519
When I got out of Felony Review, I was a

797
00:40:18.519 --> 00:40:21.400
felony trial court prosecutor prosecuting the cases that had come

798
00:40:21.400 --> 00:40:23.760
out of Felony Review by that had been vetted by

799
00:40:23.760 --> 00:40:26.760
somebody else, And so yeah, I got to take pick

800
00:40:26.840 --> 00:40:30.280
up the ball from whoever the felony review assistant was

801
00:40:30.519 --> 00:40:33.480
and run with it in court and hope the felony

802
00:40:33.519 --> 00:40:36.000
review assistant had done a good job in making sure

803
00:40:36.039 --> 00:40:38.840
that all the evidence that was available that could have

804
00:40:38.880 --> 00:40:41.519
been made available back in the police station, was made

805
00:40:41.559 --> 00:40:44.400
available to me as the prosecutor. So I had lots

806
00:40:44.400 --> 00:40:46.719
and lots of bench trials, but the jury trials I had,

807
00:40:46.760 --> 00:40:48.920
I had half of my jury trials were murder cases

808
00:40:49.280 --> 00:40:52.119
and of the remaining half, they were sexual assault or

809
00:40:52.199 --> 00:40:54.800
rape cases. So that was the mix of cases I

810
00:40:54.840 --> 00:40:56.480
had as a felony trial assistant.

811
00:40:57.400 --> 00:41:00.199
Were there any cases that you came across as as

812
00:41:00.480 --> 00:41:04.559
a prosecutor that came from telling a review that when

813
00:41:04.559 --> 00:41:08.119
you were looking over it, did you find any problems? Like,

814
00:41:08.199 --> 00:41:09.639
you know, it's not how you would have done it,

815
00:41:09.719 --> 00:41:11.760
or it wouldn't have passed you if you had come

816
00:41:11.760 --> 00:41:12.960
across it in felling your right?

817
00:41:13.039 --> 00:41:15.199
None? None came to mind when I wrote the book,

818
00:41:15.320 --> 00:41:17.199
and so I would have to say, as I sit here,

819
00:41:17.320 --> 00:41:21.840
I cannot recall that ever happening. I recall people bitching

820
00:41:22.000 --> 00:41:25.679
about other cases they had, and you know, calling up

821
00:41:25.679 --> 00:41:27.840
a reassistant, and that was the thing when I was

822
00:41:27.880 --> 00:41:30.639
on Felony Review. The last thing you want to have

823
00:41:30.840 --> 00:41:33.760
happened is get a bad phone call from the guy

824
00:41:33.800 --> 00:41:36.400
who catches the case that you vetted and say, what

825
00:41:36.519 --> 00:41:38.960
the heck were you thinking? How could you do this?

826
00:41:39.719 --> 00:41:42.119
We never we on Felony Review never wanted to get

827
00:41:42.119 --> 00:41:44.480
that phone call, and I never got that phone call.

828
00:41:44.960 --> 00:41:46.840
But when I got to the Felly trial course, I

829
00:41:46.840 --> 00:41:49.360
can't think of an example of when that happened. Frankly,

830
00:41:50.039 --> 00:41:52.079
but I think one of the things that I do

831
00:41:52.199 --> 00:41:55.159
make I do stress in the book about Felony Review,

832
00:41:55.400 --> 00:41:57.480
and I already alluded to it earlier a bit, and

833
00:41:57.519 --> 00:42:00.800
that is my job was to figure out what would

834
00:42:00.840 --> 00:42:04.119
a criminal defense attorney do with this case? What are

835
00:42:04.159 --> 00:42:07.519
they likely to do now? For example, because I thought,

836
00:42:08.000 --> 00:42:12.760
even though Sezar Maarin spoke good English, I could imagine

837
00:42:13.079 --> 00:42:15.880
in a confession case that later on a defense attorney

838
00:42:15.880 --> 00:42:17.960
would say, oh, well, that he didn't speak English, that

839
00:42:18.440 --> 00:42:21.119
confession was made up by the cops. Because my client

840
00:42:21.159 --> 00:42:24.599
doesn't speak English, and at trial, there's not going to

841
00:42:24.599 --> 00:42:27.599
be any way we can prove easily he speaks English,

842
00:42:27.639 --> 00:42:29.840
because he's not going to say anything. He's just going

843
00:42:29.920 --> 00:42:32.639
to sit in court, right. Well, that's the reason why

844
00:42:32.679 --> 00:42:36.079
I went to great lengths because I anticipated that as

845
00:42:36.079 --> 00:42:38.480
a possible thing for the defense to say. I went

846
00:42:38.519 --> 00:42:41.639
to great lengths to have a Spanish speaking officer in

847
00:42:41.679 --> 00:42:44.719
the room for this person to talk to in case

848
00:42:44.800 --> 00:42:47.079
he didn't understand anything I was saying. And by just

849
00:42:47.239 --> 00:42:50.880
introducing that element, it would help prevent a defense attorney

850
00:42:50.920 --> 00:42:53.199
from making up that kind of defense later on. In

851
00:42:53.239 --> 00:42:56.400
the case of Juan Caballero, my concern was, this is

852
00:42:56.440 --> 00:43:01.800
a good looking, clean cut guy, young man with very

853
00:43:01.840 --> 00:43:05.360
hardly any criminal record, and he would the defense was

854
00:43:05.360 --> 00:43:08.880
going to be that, well, you know, he just got

855
00:43:08.880 --> 00:43:11.000
swept up in the moment. You know it. It was

856
00:43:11.039 --> 00:43:13.760
the other guys, and he just got swept up in

857
00:43:13.760 --> 00:43:15.320
the moment, and you know, go easy. I mean, maybe

858
00:43:15.320 --> 00:43:17.559
he's guilty of something, but go easy on him. It

859
00:43:17.559 --> 00:43:19.679
was a death penalty case, so maybe, you know, I

860
00:43:19.719 --> 00:43:22.079
was anticipating that would be the defense, or that would

861
00:43:22.119 --> 00:43:24.360
be that could be a defense. And so after I

862
00:43:24.360 --> 00:43:27.360
wrapped up his court reporter confession he'd signed it, initialed

863
00:43:27.400 --> 00:43:30.199
every page, which is what they do, I turned to

864
00:43:30.280 --> 00:43:31.679
him and I said, well one, if you had it

865
00:43:31.719 --> 00:43:33.280
to do all over again, would you do it again?

866
00:43:33.719 --> 00:43:35.519
And he said, well, if it was a sure thing.

867
00:43:36.559 --> 00:43:38.280
And I said, well, there ain't no such thing as

868
00:43:38.280 --> 00:43:40.440
a sure thing. And he said, well, a lot of

869
00:43:40.519 --> 00:43:42.880
kings have killed people without getting caught by kings. He

870
00:43:42.880 --> 00:43:45.599
met Latin kings. And I said, but you got caught.

871
00:43:45.639 --> 00:43:48.280
Would you do it again? And then his answer was, well,

872
00:43:48.320 --> 00:43:50.400
I'd have killed Michael. It was the first person, the

873
00:43:50.440 --> 00:43:52.840
guy who had the big mouth. I'd have killed Michael

874
00:43:52.880 --> 00:43:55.480
for sure. I don't know about the other two. And

875
00:43:55.559 --> 00:43:58.199
not only did that play with the jury who had

876
00:43:58.199 --> 00:44:00.840
to decide the case. But as you saw from the book,

877
00:44:00.880 --> 00:44:03.960
it was I find I discovered when I researching the

878
00:44:03.960 --> 00:44:06.599
book that the Court of Appeals denied his appeal. The

879
00:44:06.599 --> 00:44:09.519
Supreme Court of Illinois denied his appeal of the death

880
00:44:09.519 --> 00:44:12.920
penalty sentence in part because of that testimony, which they

881
00:44:12.960 --> 00:44:16.480
quoted verbatim in their opinion, which.

882
00:44:16.320 --> 00:44:18.719
Was another very satisfying moment to read about.

883
00:44:18.920 --> 00:44:20.239
I have to do. I want to give all the

884
00:44:20.280 --> 00:44:21.519
satisfying moments away.

885
00:44:22.199 --> 00:44:25.000
There are plenty. There are plenty in the book, and

886
00:44:25.320 --> 00:44:29.159
there's I already know we're not going over it because

887
00:44:29.199 --> 00:44:33.440
it's just it's too important. But it was. It was astounding,

888
00:44:34.599 --> 00:44:38.800
So talking about the surprise ending. Yes, So for those listening,

889
00:44:38.880 --> 00:44:40.920
you have to really do. You have to read the book.

890
00:44:40.960 --> 00:44:45.119
It is quite literally better than TV. After your career

891
00:44:45.360 --> 00:44:48.559
as a prosecutor, you moved on to being a scholar.

892
00:44:48.719 --> 00:44:55.000
What led to that transition, Well, it actually predated that ambition,

893
00:44:55.119 --> 00:44:58.440
predated my becoming a lawyer, and that is when I

894
00:44:58.519 --> 00:45:02.440
was in college, came enamored with philosophy. Where I grew

895
00:45:02.519 --> 00:45:04.760
up in the South suburbs of Chicago, I'd never heard

896
00:45:04.800 --> 00:45:06.960
of philosophy. I didn't know what it was. I got

897
00:45:06.960 --> 00:45:11.480
to college because I was interested in justice and politics.

898
00:45:11.519 --> 00:45:13.960
I became a political science major at Northwestern until I

899
00:45:14.000 --> 00:45:18.519
discovered that polysci was all about statistics and empirical studies

900
00:45:18.599 --> 00:45:21.480
and stuff that wasn't what I was interested in. And then,

901
00:45:21.519 --> 00:45:23.880
for whatever reason, I took an intro to philosophy class

902
00:45:24.480 --> 00:45:27.199
in my second quarter and I discovered there's actually a

903
00:45:27.199 --> 00:45:30.239
discipline about justice. Now, remember, justice is what motivates me,

904
00:45:30.559 --> 00:45:33.320
has motivated me since I was ten years old, and

905
00:45:33.360 --> 00:45:36.599
it turns out there's a whole discipline ethics and political

906
00:45:36.639 --> 00:45:40.679
theory that's all about justice. So I switched my major

907
00:45:40.760 --> 00:45:43.039
and became a philosophy major, and was tempted by the

908
00:45:43.119 --> 00:45:45.079
idea that instead of being a lawyer, maybe I should

909
00:45:45.079 --> 00:45:47.840
become a philosophy professor and I could write about justice.

910
00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:51.000
But for whatever reason, reasons I outline actually in Life

911
00:45:51.000 --> 00:45:53.960
for Liberty, I tell the specific reasons why I didn't

912
00:45:54.000 --> 00:45:56.199
do that, and I stuck with plan A and became

913
00:45:56.239 --> 00:45:59.079
a lawyer. But by the time I applied to law school,

914
00:45:59.880 --> 00:46:01.760
and I'd forgotten this. When I went to write that book,

915
00:46:01.800 --> 00:46:03.599
I thought, I thought I had the idea to become

916
00:46:03.599 --> 00:46:05.800
a professor sometime while I was a law student. But

917
00:46:06.480 --> 00:46:09.239
I found my law school applications, and I see that

918
00:46:09.280 --> 00:46:11.440
in my law school applications, I told the law schools

919
00:46:11.440 --> 00:46:13.679
I wanted to be a law professor one day when

920
00:46:13.679 --> 00:46:17.360
I would teach about jurisprudence and justice. So apparently I

921
00:46:17.400 --> 00:46:19.719
had that idea going into law school, and so it

922
00:46:19.760 --> 00:46:22.360
was a matter of time in which I would one

923
00:46:22.400 --> 00:46:25.519
day segue out of being a criminal lawyer, which is

924
00:46:25.559 --> 00:46:27.440
what I went to law school to be my dream job,

925
00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:30.960
into being a law professor. But that's because my interest

926
00:46:31.039 --> 00:46:34.199
is the same. Instead of doing justice, case by case retail.

927
00:46:34.880 --> 00:46:37.480
My goal is to try to make the legal system

928
00:46:37.559 --> 00:46:40.239
more just as a whole by talking about that as

929
00:46:40.239 --> 00:46:42.920
a scholar. An academic trying to improve the legal system

930
00:46:43.039 --> 00:46:46.159
so we get more justice for everybody. That's the core

931
00:46:46.559 --> 00:46:48.360
thing that motivates all my scholarship.

932
00:46:49.239 --> 00:46:52.719
And I think that's an amazing way to go about it, because,

933
00:46:52.760 --> 00:46:55.440
as you said, instead of going case by case, you

934
00:46:56.440 --> 00:46:59.000
kind of work on it as a whole for the

935
00:46:59.039 --> 00:47:00.239
bigger picture.

936
00:47:00.239 --> 00:47:03.519
In the system, there's nothing you can do about the system.

937
00:47:04.440 --> 00:47:06.119
The best you can do is try to play the

938
00:47:06.159 --> 00:47:09.719
system as well as you can to get a just result.

939
00:47:09.800 --> 00:47:13.119
But you can't change the system. Everybody knows that as

940
00:47:13.119 --> 00:47:17.119
an academic you can advocate radical changes to the system,

941
00:47:17.119 --> 00:47:18.039
and that's what I do.

942
00:47:19.000 --> 00:47:22.800
Which is an amazing thing to do. For any budding

943
00:47:22.880 --> 00:47:26.280
lawyers out there, whether they're in law school or you know,

944
00:47:26.320 --> 00:47:29.079
they're thinking about entering law school or being a lawyer,

945
00:47:29.199 --> 00:47:31.320
what advice would you give them?

946
00:47:31.719 --> 00:47:34.079
First of all, it's great, it's not for everybody, and

947
00:47:34.159 --> 00:47:36.840
so don't just do it because people telld you yo,

948
00:47:37.039 --> 00:47:38.760
you know, you like to argue you should be a lawyer.

949
00:47:39.039 --> 00:47:41.519
You have no idea how many people I've heard tell

950
00:47:41.519 --> 00:47:41.800
me that.

951
00:47:42.159 --> 00:47:44.480
I've been told that many times. You should be a lawyer.

952
00:47:44.519 --> 00:47:45.320
You love arguing.

953
00:47:45.559 --> 00:47:48.719
Yeah, that's not a good enough reason, you know. So

954
00:47:49.320 --> 00:47:51.400
there's lots of other places you can argue it's a

955
00:47:51.440 --> 00:47:54.599
great career. There's so many different things that lawyers do.

956
00:47:54.880 --> 00:47:56.960
But so there's lots of advice I could give. So

957
00:47:56.960 --> 00:47:59.960
I guess the one that's relevant to this podcast is if,

958
00:48:00.159 --> 00:48:02.880
like me, you go to law school because you think

959
00:48:02.920 --> 00:48:06.119
being a criminal lawyer is what being a lawyer really

960
00:48:06.199 --> 00:48:08.880
is about, which is what I thought, don't let them

961
00:48:08.880 --> 00:48:12.559
talk you out of it, because it is better than TV.

962
00:48:13.039 --> 00:48:16.159
And if that's really what your passion is, don't let

963
00:48:16.239 --> 00:48:19.440
them convince you that you're wasting your degree. Again, that's

964
00:48:19.440 --> 00:48:20.960
what they told me at Harvard Law School. I'd be

965
00:48:21.000 --> 00:48:23.480
wasting my degree if I went and bought became a

966
00:48:23.519 --> 00:48:27.000
county prosecutor in the Cook County State's Attorney's Office rather

967
00:48:27.079 --> 00:48:30.119
than something a lot more prestigious than that. That's way

968
00:48:30.159 --> 00:48:34.119
down the hierarchy of prestige assignments in the academic world.

969
00:48:34.440 --> 00:48:37.280
In Cook County it's way up the ladder of being

970
00:48:37.280 --> 00:48:40.599
an extremely important thing. But in academia it's way down

971
00:48:40.599 --> 00:48:42.360
the ladder. Don't let them talk you out of it.

972
00:48:42.679 --> 00:48:45.079
Do what I did, and that is do what is

973
00:48:45.119 --> 00:48:48.239
going to make you happy. Do what your passion tells

974
00:48:48.239 --> 00:48:51.199
you to do. But there's one other little piece of advice.

975
00:48:51.239 --> 00:48:53.800
This is actually serious advice. Even if you're going to

976
00:48:53.880 --> 00:48:57.679
do that, contemplate what your excess strategy is going to be.

977
00:48:58.199 --> 00:49:01.119
My excess strategy was to me to be a law professor.

978
00:49:01.280 --> 00:49:03.599
And what I didn't know is how hard a job

979
00:49:03.639 --> 00:49:05.840
that is to get. And I was barely able to

980
00:49:05.880 --> 00:49:08.559
become a law professor. I just snuck in by the

981
00:49:08.559 --> 00:49:11.320
skin of my teeth. Most people that's not their option.

982
00:49:12.599 --> 00:49:14.880
Think about what it is you want to do afterwards,

983
00:49:14.960 --> 00:49:17.679
because that might influence your choice going in. Once you

984
00:49:17.760 --> 00:49:20.519
become a criminal lawyer, you've not limited your options. If

985
00:49:20.559 --> 00:49:23.039
what you can be later on and you can be

986
00:49:23.079 --> 00:49:25.119
a judge, you know, you could be a defense attorney

987
00:49:25.159 --> 00:49:28.920
after you're a prosecutor. There's things you can do, but

988
00:49:29.000 --> 00:49:31.280
you can't do everything, and so think about what your

989
00:49:31.320 --> 00:49:34.639
long term future is and if you make this immediate choice,

990
00:49:34.679 --> 00:49:36.079
that's something else you need to think about.

991
00:49:37.280 --> 00:49:40.280
I think that's really good advice that people need to

992
00:49:40.320 --> 00:49:45.440
look towards what happens after as opposed to their immediate future.

993
00:49:46.199 --> 00:49:51.920
So Felony Review comes out on March seventeenth, when it releases,

994
00:49:52.199 --> 00:49:53.400
where can people find it?

995
00:49:54.079 --> 00:49:57.119
Well, at all places where you would normally buy books.

996
00:49:57.159 --> 00:49:59.039
Of course, I buy most of my books from Amazon,

997
00:49:59.079 --> 00:50:01.840
and it will be on AM. I believe the presale

998
00:50:01.840 --> 00:50:04.280
price is twenty nine ninety five. You can lock that

999
00:50:04.360 --> 00:50:07.440
in and it's got pictures. I also I always liked

1000
00:50:07.440 --> 00:50:10.000
to I have books with pictures, and it has a

1001
00:50:10.199 --> 00:50:12.039
If you go on Amazon, you'll see the picture of

1002
00:50:12.119 --> 00:50:16.159
me on the cover. When I was in Felony Review,

1003
00:50:16.239 --> 00:50:18.760
I was so it was like, you know, if you

1004
00:50:18.800 --> 00:50:20.760
write a book like this, you would sort of like

1005
00:50:20.880 --> 00:50:23.079
you think if I had had a time machine and

1006
00:50:23.119 --> 00:50:24.840
I could go back in time and take a picture

1007
00:50:24.880 --> 00:50:27.800
of myself in this job, so I could put it

1008
00:50:27.840 --> 00:50:29.440
on the cover of this book. I wrote, Well, it

1009
00:50:29.519 --> 00:50:33.119
just so happens. There is a professional picture taken of

1010
00:50:33.159 --> 00:50:36.400
me by a very well known Chicago photographer, Kathy Rischlin,

1011
00:50:36.719 --> 00:50:39.000
who took this picture of me for a cover story

1012
00:50:39.039 --> 00:50:42.159
that was being done on Felony Review for The Chicago Reader.

1013
00:50:42.559 --> 00:50:44.000
And it's a picture of me in front of a

1014
00:50:44.000 --> 00:50:46.480
police station that I put on the cover. For some reason,

1015
00:50:46.480 --> 00:50:48.239
my publisher didn't want to put it on the cover,

1016
00:50:48.320 --> 00:50:50.679
and I said, this has to go on the cover.

1017
00:50:51.239 --> 00:50:53.400
It's on the cover. And I'll tell you just one

1018
00:50:53.440 --> 00:50:55.719
story about that picture, and that is she took me

1019
00:50:56.239 --> 00:50:59.920
to this police station had a very old police station FACI.

1020
00:51:00.239 --> 00:51:02.159
That police station was not a working police station at

1021
00:51:02.199 --> 00:51:04.639
the time. It was being used for some other purpose,

1022
00:51:04.639 --> 00:51:06.559
but it still had this facade. She knew about it.

1023
00:51:06.639 --> 00:51:08.039
She took me in front of it, and when I

1024
00:51:08.079 --> 00:51:10.119
was standing there getting my picture taken, she didn't like

1025
00:51:10.159 --> 00:51:12.519
the way I was standing because I wasn't standing in

1026
00:51:12.559 --> 00:51:15.639
a macho enough way. So she told me to just,

1027
00:51:15.719 --> 00:51:18.599
you know, separate my feet and sort of stick out

1028
00:51:18.639 --> 00:51:21.239
my pelvis a little bit. And so the pose that

1029
00:51:21.320 --> 00:51:24.800
you see on that picture was how I was posed

1030
00:51:24.880 --> 00:51:28.639
by the female photographer. This was not necessarily the way

1031
00:51:28.679 --> 00:51:30.039
I would have It was not the way I was

1032
00:51:30.119 --> 00:51:33.000
naturally posing myself. So that's kind of the backstory of

1033
00:51:33.000 --> 00:51:36.360
that picture. That's a good story as well.

1034
00:51:36.360 --> 00:51:39.920
But all of the stories in Felony Review were so

1035
00:51:40.159 --> 00:51:43.199
fascinating to read about. I thoroughly enjoyed my time reading

1036
00:51:43.239 --> 00:51:47.079
it and For those interested in getting a copy, the

1037
00:51:47.199 --> 00:51:49.920
link to purchase will be in this worst notes below.

1038
00:51:50.360 --> 00:51:51.880
I urge you to get a copy. It's a really

1039
00:51:51.880 --> 00:51:54.440
great read, especially if you're interested in true crime and

1040
00:51:54.480 --> 00:51:57.400
you're interested in just practicing law or what it's like

1041
00:51:57.440 --> 00:52:00.199
to be a lawyer. But Randy, I think you so

1042
00:52:00.280 --> 00:52:02.599
much for joining me today. It has been an absolute

1043
00:52:02.639 --> 00:52:03.960
pleasure talking with you.

1044
00:52:04.480 --> 00:52:07.440
Well, Courtney. I so enjoyed it, and I feel very

1045
00:52:07.440 --> 00:52:10.039
privileged that you decided to include me in your real

1046
00:52:10.760 --> 00:52:14.280
pantheon of amazing stories that you sell on this podcast

1047
00:52:14.320 --> 00:52:14.840
every week.

1048
00:52:15.360 --> 00:52:17.599
That just means really, that means so much to me.

1049
00:52:17.760 --> 00:52:21.079
Thank you so much for everyone else listening as always.

1050
00:52:21.119 --> 00:52:23.760
I hope you have a wonderful week and I will

1051
00:52:23.800 --> 00:52:26.320
see you in the next chapter of the Book of

1052
00:52:26.360 --> 00:52:31.719
the Dead. Bye, guys. Another page closed. But the story

1053
00:52:31.880 --> 00:52:36.159
isn't over for the families left behind. The pain doesn't

1054
00:52:36.280 --> 00:52:39.760
end when the headline's fade. And for the victims, we

1055
00:52:39.880 --> 00:52:43.760
owe them more than silence. For our on salt cases.

1056
00:52:44.360 --> 00:52:47.199
If you have any information, please reach out to local

1057
00:52:47.239 --> 00:52:50.440
authorities or visit our show notes for links and resources.

1058
00:52:51.639 --> 00:52:57.079
Someone out there knows something, maybe it's you. Thank you

1059
00:52:57.159 --> 00:52:59.719
for listening to the Book of the Dead. If this

1060
00:53:00.000 --> 00:53:02.800
glory moved or spoke to you in some way, talk

1061
00:53:02.840 --> 00:53:07.880
about it, share it, keep their names alive. Until next time,

1062
00:53:08.119 --> 00:53:13.519
I'm Courtney Liso. Stay safe, stay curious, and stay vigilant,

1063
00:53:14.239 --> 00:53:17.960
and remember the dead may be gone, but their stories

1064
00:53:18.000 --> 00:53:19.400
will not be forgotten,