Belligerent & Sneaky – When a Judge Accidentally Saves the Day

What's up, my A&Gers?

We got another dope episode coming your way starring two public defenders from Snohomish County, Washington, along with A&G fan fave George as our co-host.

Also, I just want to say thank you to all the people out there who sent me requests to be on the show.

I've received them, and we will be in touch with you sooner than later.

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So I do love doing this podcast, and I'm glad to be back this year, which wouldn't be happening if it weren't for my awesome team helping me out on the production side of things.

Special thanks to Matt Swyontek, a Minnesota public defender, for taking the time to edit this episode, despite himself being in the trenches.

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And with that said...

Without further ado, here's this week's episode of another Not Guilty.

And I said, you got your transcript, I've got mine, we're going to go through this here.

Didn't brake, didn't slow down, didn't speed up.

Kept pace with traffic.

And you even added, at the speed limit.

He said, yes.

Now suddenly, though, you testified that the car had to brake hard to avoid a crash.

He goes, oh, that was a different car.

I said, excuse me, wait, that was a different car.

So the car that we discussed for a good five to ten minutes in the interview, the one that didn't do anything, there was a completely different car that had the brake hard.

And for some reason, he just didn't mention that car whatsoever during the interview.

Welcome to Another Not Guilty.

I'm David Moore, here along with my fellow public defenders, presenting to you the untold stories of the criminal justice system.

That assumes there's justice in the system, which there ain't.

I prefer calling it the American criminal system.

These stories are about the not-guilty as public defenders get on a daily basis.

In an unjust criminal system.

With a deck stacked against us.

The not-guilty.

Welcome back, everybody, to Another Not Guilty.

It's your boy here, Davey D, bringing you the freshest hot takes, the freshest hot not-guilties across America.

One day at a time.

If you guys are out there to hear the real stories, the real true crime stories of the criminal justice system, you might know that the real crime is that what you hear in the media and the lamestream media is fucking bullshit.

If you want the real stories, you get it right here, straight from the trenches, from the people that are in there day and out making it happen.

Us public defenders and some defense attorneys.

You guys are great, too.

Private defense attorneys.

We love you, too.

Public defenders are better, though.

Anyways, with that being said, co-hosting today is one of my favorite co-hosts, my good friend, George.

How you doing, buddy?

I'm doing pretty well.

You know, just had me a little bit of water.

And I'm interested to hear what this story is.

This sounds fascinating.

I mean, George, every day you're in the trenches.

You're in and out.

You're making, you know, your blood, sweat, tears, making it happen.

And you still want to co-host this episode and hear more?

Listen, I do so love a trial.

I do so, so love a trial.

It's weird, but I love it.

I really, really love it.

You know, it's like I was telling some people, it's kind of like karaoke, right?

Like you get 12 strangers in there and you just start singing.

See who they like the best, right?

I love it.

And the hits never get old, right?

Never.

Such as not enough evidence, the police are lying.

Everybody loves those good hits.

Yeah, exactly right.

Speaking of another Not Guilty, guys, we have as a guest today, a previous guest from a couple

years ago with another Not Guilty to share.

It's our good buddy, Gabe.

Gabe Rothstein, public defender from Snohomish County.

What's up, Gabe?

How you doing?

How's it going?

I'm good.

It's a, you know, it's a pleasant, rainy Thursday in Seattle.

So, you know, pretty normal for us.

Gabe, you had a co-host in this case?

I had a co-chair, Anna Faiaro.

She's right here.

Hello.

Go ahead and introduce yourself, Anna.

Oh, I'm Anna.

I'm also a public defender in Snohomish County.

And who was sort of the lead attorney in this case?

It was my case.

I had it from the beginning.

Because of some circumstances that I can get into in a bit, I brought someone else on

and I, you know, talked to my lead, Cassie Trueblood, also an A&G alum.

And she said, you know, I think Anna is ready and she needs to have another case to be Class

A qualified.

So let's bring Anna on.

And I was like, that's wonderful.

Sounds perfect.

And it worked out fantastically well.

All right.

All right.

So take us from the top, Gabe.

Tell us about this not guilty.

What was your client charged with?

Well, he was charged with attempting to elude a pursuing police vehicle.

Eventually, they added a special allegation, which would add it a bunch more time.

And he was also charged with the gross misdemeanor of hit and run of an attended vehicle.

So he's charged with eluding a police vehicle and then hit and run of an attended vehicle?

Like, what's attended mean?

Someone was in it.

I think, like, hit and run of an unattended vehicle in L.A. is just every day, really.

It's Tuesday in Los Angeles.

Tuesday.

It's your bad.

It's your bad, man.

You shouldn't have parked there.

Your fault.

All right.

So, Gabe, what did your client allegedly do?

Well, the allegation is that he gets lit up by the cops and he takes off and drives in a reckless manner.

I mean, the state's facts are essentially police officer is in an unmarked police truck and it's designed to blend in fully with traffic.

So it's a pickup truck.

Yeah, so if you're thinking, why is it a pickup truck, Snohomish County might be more pickup truck country, but it's designed to look exactly like any other pickup truck on the road.

He's sitting directly behind my client who's in a, oh gosh.

Crown Vic.

Crown Vic.

Okay, so client is in a late 90s Green Crown Victoria, and he sees client directly in front of him and sees that registration is expired.

Now, three things, according to the state's case, happen at the same time.

The officer calls in, you know, the expired registration.

He turns on his lights and the traffic light that they're directly, you know, in front of turns green.

He says at this point, the client looks into the rear view mirror where he can see that it's a blackmail driving and the only person in the car.

He says that client accelerates, changes lanes, cuts off other cars in traffic.

And based on that, he cuts off the pursuit right away and basically notes in the police report that he cut off the whole pursuit was only about two blocks long.

Now, the important thing about an attempt to elude charge, you have to have two things at the same time.

You have to simultaneously be driving recklessly and be attempting to elude a pursuing lights-on police vehicle.

If you don't have both at the same time, you don't have the felony offense.

I want to just summarize a little bit just to make sure we're all clear.

So, allegedly, your client is in a car, a Crown Victoria, which is kind of an old school police car.

That's a police car.

He's a black man in a police car.

Yeah.

Black man in a police car.

Thank you, George.

And then the actual cop is in the pickup truck.

That's an undercover pickup truck, you know.

An undercover pickup truck.

And he sees that the Crown Vic has an expired registration.

He pulls out his own.

And a black man in it.

With a black man in it.

So, he pulls out his own police light.

He doesn't need to take any.

I mean, he basically just turns on his lights.

It's an undercover car.

Strangely enough, he's in uniform.

He has to be in uniform, otherwise you can't get an attempt to elude unless he's in uniform.

So, he's in full uniform with tinted windows, but it does have lights and siren.

You just can't see them from, you know, a passerby.

You couldn't be able to tell.

And, in fact, he even testified during the trial of, no, the entire point is that I blend in.

And unless you are law enforcement, you would not be able to tell that that is a car-equipped lights and siren.

Oh, so the lights are inside and not on top of the car.

Yeah, like in the windshield.

Wow.

Oh, okay.

And the law, the law actually changed in Washington, I think like 15 years ago.

Before, it couldn't be an elude unless you were in a marked car.

But then they changed that one.

So, it can still be an elude if you're in an unmarked car, but the cop still has to be wearing a uniform.

But tinted, but in a tinted uniform, so you can't tell until it gets out of the car.

Well, no, the uniform's not tinted.

The windows are tinted.

Well, yeah, you can't tell until it gets out of the car.

So, in Snohomish County, essentially, you have to assume that everybody in the pickup is the police.

I started doing so after this case, yes.

There is an affirmative defense if you didn't think the person was a cop, but we didn't have that here.

So, he lights him up, and then he takes off.

Oh, no, yeah, the truck lights him up.

The car that your client's allegedly in, or it's allegedly your client, takes off, cuts off somebody, and then what happens after that?

He hits a car?

No, I mean, that's pretty much it.

I mean, the officer in his report says that he cuts off another car and continues going.

But once he sees that my client's car is accelerating, he terminates the pursuit, mostly because in Washington, you really cannot do a pursuit in any type of non-highway setting because it's incredibly dangerous.

So, the cop makes sure that he cuts off the pursuit.

The cop says he then drives at the speed limit, and he follows the road, it bends to the right, bends back to the left, then does pretty much a 90-degree curve south.

And about half a mile from the place where he initially saw my client, there he sees my client has crashed into another car.

So, we're a good half mile away from what I would consider the attempt to elude scene.

Now, at that point, the police officer, you know, pulls around traffic, and there he sees a black guy running in the street.

The cop says, oh, well, that's got to be the guy.

So, he basically, you know, pulls out his taser.

Client is arrested.

Client says multiple things.

He says, I was not driving this vehicle.

He tells the cop he was smoking blues, otherwise known as fentanyl or car fentanyl, all day.

And the officer says that he appeared to be high on drugs.

There are blues found in the car.

Client is arrested and taken to jail.

They later find, after they run his name, that he has warrants out for his arrest.

So, he's, I mean, that pretty much explains what the charges are.

Did they see him in the car?

Well, the officer says that when he lit him up, you know, the guy, the client looked through the rearview mirror from, you know, from the back.

And he could see that it was a black male, and that was the only person in the car.

Any black man will do, I guess?

Any black man.

I saw a black guy in there, and I saw another guy walking.

He was black.

They got to be the same person.

Yeah, that's it.

So, you've been to Snomish County.

I'm not, but I live in America.

Okay, just to make sure.

So, when the cop arrives on the scene, the car is crashed into another car, and your client is now, is running, is, it's in the general vicinity and running, right?

He, the cop made it sound.

Is the car registered to your, no, no.

In fact, when the cop ran the initial registration, it was not registered to my client.

And when the cop comes around the corner, he sees, you know, black male running in the street.

Got to be the same guy.

Client is booked on the attempt to elude, as well as a hit and run, as well as he's got three warrants out.

So, actually, you met the client, right?

I did.

In lockup, I assume?

Okay, so can you tell us about that?

Well, I probably met him first on a video visit, and we have a good video visit system.

Okay.

So, before I might have met him in custody, I would have done a video visit.

We usually just kind of have a chat.

You know, I talked to him about what we have going on.

You know, he was a nice, affable guy, easy to get along with.

You know, I think, you know, I initially said, look, let's kind of just do a skinny on each one of the warrant cases.

You know, let me see if I can get you out on those.

Because, you know, once you can get somebody out of it, they're like, okay, that's my man.

I like, you know, we've got something good going on.

And then I said, well, let's talk about, you know, the attempt to elude.

And I was like, look, we've got a case here.

We've got a fightable case.

If they don't reduce it for us, we're going to fight it.

And I think a lot of clients are really like, you know, they like to hear that.

So, Gabe, let me ask you this, though.

So, you met the client.

He has two warrants in a different courtroom, right, with a different judge.

What were those warrants for?

He had three warrants.

One was for an assault in the third degree, which is really what we call a shoplift gone wrong.

You know, you're doing a shoplift and historic security kind of, you know, hassles you a bit.

And, you know, you might have committed a very light assault to keep the property.

They could be charged as a robbery second degree.

They charge as an assault third degree.

But we call it a shoplift gone wrong, really, really just a shoplift defense.

I don't believe anyone was injured in that.

He had two identity theft cases.

One, the judge refused to even find probable cause for.

So that I kind of put that to the side.

The third one was a little was a little more active.

Now, interestingly enough, the way my court works is a little strange.

On the warrant charges, he's already been filed on at Superior Court.

So in that, so in those cases, he goes in front of a particular judge, the judge goes, well, you know, he had no notice of his arraignment.

These are all nonviolent property offenses.

Yeah, there's an assault three, but I'm going to release him.

So he gets released on the three warrant charges.

Now, because the allude is in front of a different judge, it's a different – for whatever reason, it's a completely different standard.

Now, your fearless hero defense attorney makes a PC argument of, well, wait a second.

What is the PC for this charge?

You have to have the same point that you have pursuit.

You also have to have at the exact same time you have to have reckless driving.

There's no reckless driving here.

I mean what you're talking about is a car having to – cutting off a car is what it said in the report.

I was like, cutting off a car, if you think that's reckless driving, we've got a big problem on our roads today because I cut off people – I cut off six people just on my way to the courthouse.

So after making that argument – so we make the argument in the jail court and I make this argument that that's not an attempt to elude, no PC for attempt to elude.

Two of the jail guards, who I know well because as defense attorneys, we know the jail guards, start giving me some shit.

You know, like that was it.

That's what you got.

That was your argument.

Just basically kind of making fun of me a bit about it.

And I was like, all right.

Really?

So you mean to tell me that police officers were saying that they always follow all the rules of the road and never cut anyone off?

Sure.

Part of it was one of the – one of the jail guards was you making fun of the other jail guard for being a terrible driver and that he cuts people off all the time.

And I was like, well, then why aren't you guys with me?

You guys should be agreeing with me.

Like, we all know, you know, he's a terrible driver.

It's utterly ridiculous.

I mean, I would love to hear – like, of all – I'm just thinking about all the Porsches that all the judges in Los Angeles County drive and how impatient they are.

And I'd love to hear one of them say that cutting someone off on your way to work is somehow reckless driving.

Because if that's true, then almost the entire bench in Los Angeles Superior Court needs to be convicted of said charge.

Every one of them.

So, all right.

So, Gabe, your client's stuck in custody on this case.

You got to move fast because you got to – it looks like you're saying it's a pretty defensible case.

Tell us about the development of the defense in this case.

I mean, interesting enough, he had – he's got – he had three separate prosecutors because of the warrant cases and because of this case.

So, you know, I had initially suggested to one of the prosecutors, look, why don't we put all the cases together and we can put them into drug court?

They tell me, no, no, no, we're not going that route.

I said, okay, well, how about this?

Why don't we do a global resolution where, you know, he's got a case out of county.

He's got a couple here.

You knock these two down to misdemeanors.

You drop one here, drop one there, and now he's eligible for a residential treatment alternative.

So, he goes to inpatient treatment for three to six months, and he's on probation for another 18 months.

Rather than going to prison.

And you get convictions, all of them.

Well, on the ones, you know, that we get.

But they tell me, no, no, no, no, we don't think that's appropriate.

Look at you trying to be reasonable.

Exactly.

And I – they never actually make any offer.

In any of the cases, there is no offer.

So, I advised the client.

I said, you know, at this point, we might as well take the allude to trial because, you know, it's the only case you're actually being held on.

It's a fightable case.

And maybe if we actually kind of bowled over the trial right away, maybe they'll make a deal.

Or maybe they'll just simply agree to PR you and release you.

And he's like, that's a great idea.

Because at this point, he's just thinking, all right, well, if you get me out, you know, we can talk.

Now, the trial date was set for January 17th, and I had another case set for trial, a hard set for the exact same day.

And that case was years old.

It was a robbery.

And I was like, I can't be two places at the same time.

And so, seeing the writing on the wall at that point, I was like, you know what, I want a second lawyer assigned to, you know, client number one's case so that if I have to go to the robbery case for client number two, if I have to do that one, client number one can still get his speedy trial date.

We can still put the state, you know, right up to the wall.

And so, I asked, you know, Cassie Trueblood, who, you know, is A&G alum.

And I said, you know, she's my supervisor right now.

I said, you know, who can I bring on?

Can I get a second lawyer if I can't do it?

And enter Ana Fajaro, and she could tell, you know, she could explain what happened.

She came out of the case.

Okay, yeah.

So, tell us about that.

So, Ana, tell us about you coming onto the case.

Yeah.

I mean, Gabe's like, you're on this case now.

And I was like, great.

I don't have any other cases that day.

Works for me.

I think I come on, like, the day before the omnibus hearing, which is when a bunch of shenanigans happen.

So, I'm real glad I was there for that.

And, yeah, I think I met client, like, the day before trial.

And he was fine with me being on the case.

And we just kept going.

Was there any investigation done on the case?

The defense, yeah, the defense preparation.

Like, what are you looking into?

Like, how are you developing your defense?

Well, the state had eight witnesses on the case.

And, like, the way we saw it, we really saw two separate incidents.

We saw the attempt to elude over here, and half a mile down the road was the hit and run.

We knew right away we were ready to plead guilty to the hit and run, if not conceded, at trial.

So, we were like, there's eight witnesses.

Only one matters.

The only guy that matters is the guy in the secret truck.

That's the only cop that matters.

Everyone else, even the civilians, don't matter to us because, yeah, he hit and run way down, you know, half a mile down the road.

So, we have our – we do our interview of the officer because we're normally – a lot of times, I mean, pre-COVID, we do all our interviews in person.

During COVID, most of them are on video.

This one we did by phone in part because our thought – my thought was I don't – no delays.

No delays.

This case is going out.

First call.

You know, no way around that.

So, we do a phone interview.

Our investigator, Marlon Torres, was the investigator.

He was – I don't think he did this on purpose, but he was perfect because he was so slow and so deliberate in asking so many annoying questions that this cop was just – the cop would get – cop got a little pissy.

And we'd get pissy with him and just get impatient, and he would get annoyed, and he would talk down to him as if, like, how stupid are you asking me this question?

And at one point, you know, Marlon was asking him, so the car, you know, that the client – the car that he went around.

You know, you talk about it.

He cut this guy off the car that he went around, and the guy – and the cop's like, the car didn't do anything.

It didn't accelerate.

It didn't decelerate.

It just – he just went around it.

Normal speed of traffic at the posted speed limit.

And I was like, oh, I mean, remember the – what was the word that the cop used in the report?

Cutting off other cars?

Well, what you just described was pretty much not that.

So we were like, oh, money.

Like, this sounds fantastic.

And, you know, we had him confirm that, you know, our client's car never went into oncoming traffic, never went on the shoulder, never went on the turn lane.

And the only – and the cop at the end was like, no.

All he did was speed the limit.

He went around cars, and he didn't stop for my license limit.

That's what he did.

And I was like, so when we were done with that interview, you know, I – you know, I messaged with Anna and with Marlon.

I was like, ah, we got this.

Like, this – this is – I mean, we – we're done.

I mean, like, this is – and the prosecutor was on the call.

So we're like, okay, well, this is – now, now, now, now.

Can we call it a day?

We call it now?

That's what I thought.

That's what I – I was like, they must know they have no case now, right?

And Gabe's like, mm, just you wait.

Can we – I mean, we're not going to go forward with this, are we?

Oh, just hang on there, George.

Now they're ready to play ball, though.

Now they want to settle the case.

Now they want to offer you that global disposition for a drug program for your addicted client on a nonviolent offense.

Negative, Ghost Rider.

Yeah, that would be too reasonable of them.

So we – instead we have our – I guess it's a pretrial hearing.

It's called an omnibus hearing where the court really wants to know where are we going.

You know, is this case – you know, are we going to the trial date that we have set?

Are we doing something else?

And that was on January 4th and the day before, you know, the new prosecutor of the case.

And, you know, I don't – to the extent the prosecutors in our office – in the office of the prosecutor's office, I believe they work hard.

And I think that they're dedicated to their jobs.

But they are way – like they are way overworked right now.

Like they've got way too many cases.

In fact, I always usually believe that we know our cases a lot better than they do.

I don't – a lot of times I feel like – I'm always like – I may – you know, I sent you this big email about, like,

what I'm arguing and I feel like you don't even know what I'm talking about.

So I pretty much stopped doing that.

Like if you don't know what's wrong with your case, we're not – there's no point in me trying to explain to you because you're not – you didn't read it and you don't know it.

But, I mean, I don't think that way about our – about some of the prosecutors in this case.

And they – you know, I think they were dedicated.

But our prosecutors knew she had never done an adult felony trial.

And I honestly think that she wanted to do, you know, right by her superiors.

You know, if they're saying, no, no, you take this one, she's – you know, she's going to take it.

So we have – she sends me an email saying, hey, can we continue the trial date?

You know, we have omnibus tomorrow and she needs more time to subpoena her witnesses.

And I'm thinking to myself, well, thank you for the admission that you're unprepared for trial and for – thank you again for putting it in writing.

But, you know, you have to know I'm not going to agree to continue the trial date unless you agree to release him on PR or, you know, plead him guilty to some most gross misdemeanors with time served.

Because I thought both of those were pretty good arguments.

Look, he'll plead guilty to multiple – you know, a couple misdemeanors and out or just agree to his PR.

We could deal with this case down the road the same as the other ones.

So –

You are a kind and reasonable man.

I keep telling everyone this and they seem to act like – so the next day, he's got all of his cases on the calendar.

Now, we continued all of the cases that he's out of custody on.

That was no problem.

We continued those.

No issue.

Now, I – and I – the last case, the attempt to elude, I'm sitting in this little side office in the courthouse.

I had been doing a video visit with my client.

And at this point, all three of the prosecutors now, two of them are outside the door and one of them, the new one, is right in the doorway.

And she's got the continuance form, you know, kind of – and keeps kind of putting it, you know, right at me.

They wanted me to agree to a three-week continuance.

And there's three of them, and I'm sitting in the title office.

She's in the doorway, and I was like, well, wait.

I first assumed that they wanted me to agree to the continuance with inside Speedy trial, that we'd somehow convince the judge that Speedy should not move.

And we would just put the trial date on the very last date of trial.

And then I realized, no, no.

They wanted me to agree to – to agree to just a straight-up continuance, a waiving Speedy.

And I said – I was like, well, hey, guys.

I mean, are you willing to release him?

Is that part of the deal?

They said, no.

And I said, well, are you willing to do – how about we do, you know, a global – like a global agreement?

How about that?

They said, no.

And I said, you know, I don't – guys, what – why would I agree?

And I said, they said, we need to do the continuance so we can continue to negotiate.

And I said, negotiate what?

I go, I keep suggesting things.

You keep saying no.

There's been no negotiation.

You've never even made an offer on this case.

So what – I don't know what the negotiation is that we need to continue to keep doing.

So – and then I – and as the new prosecutor keeps shoving the continuance form in my face, I said, look, just explain to me why my client would agree to continue this case.

You know, you've already told me that you haven't subpoenaed your witnesses.

And the 3-5 hearing, the Miranda hearing, it's too late for you to schedule.

So the case looks great for me.

Why would I agree to a continuance to let you do those things?

Help me understand.

So they disagreed.

Yeah, they disagreed.

They said, we need to continue to negotiate.

And I was like –

You do.

You do need to continue.

I was like, what?

What negotiation?

I've been negotiating with myself, and you just keep saying no.

And I said, in fact, you've made me no offers, none whatsoever on any of the cases.

So what are we going to do?

So I honestly –

We need more time to put your client in prison.

Will your client agree to give us more time to put him in prison?

Because we're not ready to put him in prison.

Will he give us the time?

It's unethical for me to continue.

Now, I thought this whole conversation was a very normal conversation.

I was sitting in a chair.

I never got out of my chair.

I never raised my voice.

They laughed.

I said, we're not agreeing to continue, and they laughed.

I go downstairs to take care of another matter, and I get an angry email from their supervisors.

They're telling me that I need to control myself, that I was borderline belligerent with this new DPA, that I spoke to her like a child.

And I was like, wait.

The conversation that I just had, I was almost – I was baffled.

I was like – and I thought – my initial response was, you mean me?

Like today?

Like I was like, why would I be upset?

I was the one just saying, just saying, no, thank you.

Like they were the ones trying to get me to talk.

And I talked to my leads, my supervisors about it.

They were like, you know what?

There's nothing you could – let it go.

Don't even respond.

I said, okay.

Gabe, you did talk to her like a child because she was saying something stupid.

And, you know, sometimes it's just like we can't say dumb shit, you know?

Like you can't help but talk, point out the logical flaws.

Like, okay, why would I do that?

Does that make sense?

I find myself saying, stop, please repeat what you said out loud and tell me if it makes sense.

Just stop and repeat what you just said out loud and to yourself and tell me if it makes sense.

So the only thing – we all did agree on this fact that had I said, okay, I will agree to continue,

then we believe I would have been described as pleasant and reasonable as opposed to belligerent.

Like had I agreed to the continuance, I have a funny feeling, my demeanor would have been seen as very different.

So the state then attempts later that week to file what we call a 3.5 hearing.

We have court rule 3.5, which essentially is if you're going to introduce a client's statements,

they have to abide by the Miranda rule.

As in we actually have an official hearing where the state has to call, you know,

the Mirandaizing officer and basically says, you know, would have to say he was – you know,

you have to show he was in custody and that Miranda was properly applied.

Now, because our judges can get a little prickly, they set up a local rule that you – the week of trial,

if your trial is set to confirm the 17th, you cannot have that Miranda hearing that week of trial.

It's got to be done in advance.

You need to put your ducks in a row.

You cannot do it this way.

Which is, you know – so then, you know, the prosecutor is trying to get it filed on a motion to shorten time.

She's basically trying to get it, you know, shoved in there for next week.

And, you know, we basically said, hey, no, like we're objecting to that.

And what you're allowed to do is you're allowed to put it before the motions, judge.

And at a Friday hearing, the judge will decide whether or not to – yes, we'll set it for that hearing next week or no, I won't.

You know, just sometimes I just want to like summarize or clarify what's being said.

So the client – so the prosecutor wants to introduce your client's statements that what?

He was high on blue or something like that?

That he was high on –

Are those specific?

Well, two things.

One, the fact that my client said he was not driving, which I think it was pretty clear they were going to be able to show that he was.

So him saying that he wasn't just – it's not – it doesn't make him look good.

The second one is the fact that he was smoking fentanyl all day and they found a bunch of fentanyl in a car.

Now, in order to get his statements in, they have to hold this hearing.

If they don't hold this hearing, the judge is going to say, uh-uh.

You're not getting any of his statements yet.

So –

You know, that's a – it seems like defendants get a lot more protection in Washington.

Like, it's almost like for the prosecution to introduce statements, they have the burden of scheduling a hearing.

And they have to be organized to do it in advance.

And if they can't do that, then the statements automatically don't come in.

Here in California, the statements come in unless we object under Miranda, and then a Miranda hearing is held.

You know, so –

Don't tell Washington they're trying to change the law.

Prosecutors are actively trying to change the law.

Anna, go ahead.

And, like, that's the local rule that it's supposed to be set more than a week before trial.

But the local rule also says, like, with good cause, you can set it within a week of trial or even during trial itself.

And so that's what most judges do.

They just find some reason for good cause and they're like, it's whatever.

It can be set close to trial.

It's whatever.

It can be heard the first day of trial.

And so we don't usually win this issue, even though it's something we argue about a lot.

Wait a minute.

So you mean to tell me that judges are willing to bend the rules and change the rules because the –

You heard that right.

Because the prosecution asks?

I've never heard such a thing.

And, like, we come to this hearing and I bring a copy of the local court rule.

Because I'm like, I don't think anyone's actually read this rule because they always just said it within a week of the trial anyway.

So I bring a copy, I hand one to the judge, I hand one to the court clerk, I try to hand one to the state.

They're like, we're good.

We don't need it.

And I was like, read the rule, your honor.

There's no good cause here.

We don't need to – like, don't set this hearing.

Tell me what happened here.

The state says the reason – like, the good cause is they thought we were negotiating.

So they didn't think they needed to set this hearing.

And Gabe and I are like, what are you talking about?

What?

I wrote a declaration.

I wrote – because the state submitted their brief – honestly – did you submit a brief, Anna?

I can't remember.

Are you objecting?

No.

I think I just submitted an objection.

I don't think I submitted it.

I think maybe I quoted the rule.

I submitted a declaration kind of going through the chain of they asked me to continue.

I said no.

They asked me to continue.

I said no.

And I basically kind of – I completed – I didn't include emails, but I included summaries of the emails in which I clearly said we are – my client will not agree to a continuance so that they couldn't get up there.

Because during the hearing, the prosecutor seemed to be like, I had to do this because of the defense.

See, they did this tricky thing.

And I think Anna was all over that argument.

That was her argument.

She's like, we had no choice.

We had to set it now because we didn't know it was necessary until now.

So I also – I added into my declaration the negotiations that we had, which is me asking for things and them saying no so that the judge could see that this – I thought we were negotiating.

Because sometimes oftentimes that's – you could show up at trial call and say, Your Honor, I thought we're still deep in negotiations, and sometimes the judge will do a continuance.

But I thought this was – and also at the end of her argument, she was like, I had to do this because of what the defense did.

She would have been better off by just – she could have jumped on her sword and said, You know what, judge, I'm brand new, and I – you know what, there's no harm if we do this hearing next week.

And Mr. Rothstein's right about this.

If she'd done something like that, I think it might have come out on better years.

But I think – and I also think bringing the actual statute and having the judge like – you have to now read it, judge, I think really kind of made a big difference.

I'm sorry.

I may have missed it.

So then did the judge rule on the 3.5 hearing or whatever it was called?

The judge didn't set it.

She refused to set it, and she kind of gave the prosecutor a little warning like, You better watch how you handle your cases.

Wow.

So client statements are not coming in to evidence.

Great.

So now we've got this kick-ass interview with the recorded interview, got the fat transcript in my hand.

The state is not going to be able to bring in the evidence that my client was high as fuck.

He said that he was high as fuck and said he was a driver.

So the state's case is seriously weakened.

So, Ana, what did you tell me?

What did you think was going to happen next?

I was like, Now they've got to give us a deal.

Like, they've got to give us the deal we want.

There's no way around it.

There's no way around it.

And Gabe's like, Just wait.

Just you watch.

I was like, First rodeo?

I was like, Oh, no, no, no, no.

I was like, What they're probably going to do is they're probably going to add charges.

If they have anything they can add, they will add it.

If, you know, like a booger flicking, whatever they got.

In fact, they're going to try to add the special allegation on the elude.

In our state, if you have an attempt to elude and you are a danger to like, if there's, I'd have to look at the statue again.

But essentially, if someone is almost injured or could have been injured.

It's a danger to anyone, anyone other than a law enforcement officer.

So, like, you go on a sidewalk, you almost hit a car, anyone, they can add that enhancement.

But we weren't worried about the enhancement because we knew that the officer was going to stay.

We knew the officer was going to stay.

Like, yeah, the car didn't move.

So, we were like, Add whatever you want.

Like, you're never going to get anything.

But the enhancement is a serious bullying tactic because it adds 12 months to your sentence.

So, they always try to add that to just get you to plead guilty.

So, the case gets less serious, it gets weak, and they want to make it more serious with the charges.

What, can they just add charges like that with no factual basis?

Or is there a factual basis in a police report?

Or is there something, like, can they just add that right before trial?

With enhancements are weird.

The state can add an enhancement.

Gabe argued about this at trial when they tried to add this, but, or when they did add it.

But the law says that as long as the state has a basis for the underlying charge, they can add the enhancement.

So, you can't argue probable cause on just the enhancement unless you're arguing probable cause and win on the underlying charge, unfortunately.

So, what I had said to the judge was, Your Honor, let me get this straight.

We have a murder, too, in which all the evidence shows my client strangled this guy.

You were telling me the state can add a firearm enhancement?

And the judge goes, Well, that's what the law says.

And I was like, That's, no.

Like, the answer is no.

Like, I'm not accepting that as the answer.

Unfortunately, I don't get to choose what is accepted as the answer.

But we, so we have our trial calls on Friday morning, and then we get a signed out.

We got a signed out to a presiding judge who is a bit of a, I mean, we were a little, we were iffy.

And later that afternoon, we all came to court, and that was when we knew the state was going

to amend the charge to add this special allegation, at which point we had our plan to then plead

to count two, which was the hit and run.

So, the state moves to amend their charge.

We go to plead to count two, and the judge goes, Wait, what's happening here?

And at first, the judge was like, I was like, Well, it's, it's, we're at arraignment.

My client gets to plead.

Once the judge realized that we weren't pleading to the, to the allegation that was being amended,

suddenly, he's like, Oh, I see what you're trying to do here.

And we're like, trying to do what?

I was like, I mean, take it, take it the worst way you want.

We're pleading guilty to this charge.

We're saving seven, you know, seven out of eight witnesses.

And we're saving everybody time.

What?

We're pleading guilty to it.

What seems to be the trouble?

And the judge is like, well, I think there's a reason why the state might not want you to.

I was like, what, what is it?

What is the principle that you're defending that?

So, I think.

So, okay.

Let me, let me see if I can, let me just get that right.

So, because they're adding a charge, your client now has to be arraigned on the new charge,

on the new charging document, which means he has to be arraigned on all of the charges.

So, he has to enter a plea of not guilty or guilty to all charges.

So, just on your own, you've decided to plead guilty to the hit and run.

Is that right?

That is correct.

I mean, your analysis is our analysis.

Unfortunately, the judge did not think the same thing as us.

Wait, wait, wait, wait.

And he basically did not.

Go ahead.

Wait a minute.

Now, this is, now we're starting to get into kangaroo stuff here.

This is fun.

This is kind of fun.

This is fun.

Wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

So, now we're in a situation where the defense is saying, my client wants to plead guilty

to a count, and the judge is saying he doesn't have the right to plead guilty to a count?

No, he agreed that he had discretion, but he was exercising his discretion not to do so.

It was clear that.

And the way.

Go ahead.

Go ahead.

Oh, sorry.

The way around that was he said, well, I'm just going to arraign him on this new count.

He's already been arraigned on count two.

And I was like, your honor, it's one document.

What's happening here?

But he's like, nope, that's what's happening.

I'm just arraigning him on this count, and I'm guessing you're pleading not guilty.

Like, what in all hell is going on?

Like, what are you?

Okay.

You know, I will say this, right?

You know, you said this was a newer prosecutor.

Is that what you're saying?

And it's sad because one of the things that we talk about in defense work is sometimes we

have to train prosecutors, right?

It really is sad, but it's true because you've got to ask the question, what are you going

to say to 12 strangers?

Like, what is your argument going to be?

And think about this.

You're adding stuff, right?

So you're going to add more stuff that you know you can't prove.

So you're going to lose credibility, Goofy.

Like, but I'm sorry, you were being unreasonable and mean and talking to her like a child.

Like, well, George, you're being belligerent now.

You're being belligerent.

You can't have that.

The response should have been, see, the belligerent response would have been, it's a damn shame

that I have to train your lawyers and not get paid for it.

Shouldn't you be doing that?

I'm ready for trial.

Oh, and I guess, Gabe, you didn't mention you didn't get sent out on the other trial.

So you're on this trial.

We're both on this trial.

Oh, that's true.

There was a bunch of fun drama the morning of trial call because I was all, in the week

that was proceeding, at first, I had an issue with trial number two, and I thought that was

not going to go out.

And then I was told, no, no, no, no, we are going out.

I was like, all right.

So my head now gets into this one.

I said, Anna, you're on your own on the elude case.

She's like, great.

I got it.

Morning of trial, it turns out things get a little different.

And the next thing I know, I get spun around like a top and no, we're going to continue

the robbery trial and you're in the elude trial, which was fine.

But you know, you know how when you get, when you were the last couple of days before the

trial, I don't know about to tell you guys, but my brain gets, that's it.

Let's, I lock in.

It's a complete myopia.

Yeah.

I'm not thinking about anything else.

So having to kind of spin around like that was a little, was a little tough.

I think that, and I don't know if you've been split up witnesses.

I mean, in this case, there was one witness that mattered and seven witnesses that were

whatever.

So we were like, okay, one of us will take, you know, the only witness that we think counts

and the other person gets everything, you know, all the other witnesses, because that seemed

like a fair deal.

And I think, I cannot remember if I'd already, if I'd already agreed to take the lieutenant

or not, the main witness, but you know, it was fine.

It was, it worked out, it worked out just fine.

And once, you know, okay, then I had a few minutes to get my head around it.

I mean, on the morning of trial or on it, on it, as far as she knows, she's going to

be the only person, only defense attorney on this case, because you're going to be in

a different trial, but that trial for some reason gets kicked over or put over for one

reason.

So then you have to jump into this new trial and, but you have Anna there who is ready

to do the trial, right?

Anna, are you ready to go proceed on your own there?

Yeah.

Jeff, I mean, I'd only recently met client, but he was on board.

He understood the whole, like wanting to go within speedy and like trying to go as soon

as possible.

The state's not ready.

We went over the plea paperwork for the hit and run count that morning.

Cause we thought we'd be able to plead guilty.

Um, and so, yeah, I mean, I was ready to go.

Like I had my arguments ready about why we should get to plead guilty to count two.

I had my arguments ready about why they shouldn't get a continuance.

Um, this is only my third felony trial.

So I still feel pretty new.

So I have all my scripts ready with everything I want to say.

Um, but I felt ready, but I was happy that Gabe was able to do it with me cause I thought

it was going to be fun and Gabe's fun too.

So.

Is Gabe like a rock star in the Snohomish County PD's office?

Like what's the, what's the rep over there?

Like who are you working with?

Well, like a court jester, I think maybe.

Yeah, Gabe, Gabe's, yeah, Gabe's belligerent.

Number one.

Uh, but two, he's been around.

He's a friendly guy.

Um, you know, I, Gabe and I actually live really close to one another.

Uh, we've hung out like socially a couple of times too.

Uh, but I was excited to get to work with him.

Um, you know, we, we don't always get to work with, uh, attorneys that are like much more

senior than us.

I'm not calling you old Gabe, but kind of what I'm doing.

I'm still spry.

Gabe, let me hear a little bit about, so what about Anna?

You know, you've heard a lot of young lawyers probably come in the office, come and go, you

know, like, uh, had you worked with Anna before?

We, so because we live about, uh, a 25, it's about 30 minute drive to our court.

She's one of our crew who live in my neighborhood down here.

So like when, like when we have our parties up, up, you know, up North, she's immediately

in, in, in the crew.

Cause we all need to figure out how we're getting home safely.

So like, so like there's, it's like we, it was, we had a prearranged like crew of us.

All right.

Who's driving?

Usually it's a newbies.

All right.

You're new.

Yeah.

You're new.

You're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna truck us all up there and truck us all back.

You can start drinking once we get back, get back to Seattle.

Um, but I, I, I, I was one of the, um, she was newer to the felony unit.

Um, I guess there was a bunch of new people that came up that, you know, they're all

really, they're, they're working, they're really hard workers.

They're really kind of sticklers for a lot of stuff.

And the best part about a new, uh, someone who's newer is they, they will, they'll bust

out this thing called the statute and they will start like pulling, you know, annotated

codes.

And you're sort of like, well, I'm going to let you do those three arguments and I'm

going to sit over here and I'm going to make this argument because I just sort of feel

like they're, they're, they're, um, they're eager beavers and, and, and they're

really hardworking.

And I think that Anna's, Anna's incredibly hardworking.

She's incredibly fun, you know, to work with.

And I, and I think those two things together, you know, really kind of made, made it a good

fit.

Also, I think she has very much the same, uh, ethos that a lot of our office does is, you

know, we don't believe in, in, in the criminal system.

And we think of this pretty fucked up and you know what people like, how can you represent

this guilty person?

You're looking at it the wrong way.

Here's my beef.

Why should this person go to prison for two and a half years?

That's that's, let's start there.

Or, or why, you know, why are we doing this?

Why are we doing that?

Why, why is everything looked at through the lens of punishment and more punishment?

Why aren't we looking at things?

And I think that Anna is definitely one of the newer people who is, you know, you know,

is believes as, as I believe, you know, is that most public defenders believe, you know,

that we are, we are here fighting for our clients, doing what our clients want.

And I think that we're doing something for the greater good.

So yeah, I mean, I think that, I think it was a good, I think it was a very good, it

was a good match and a good pairing.

So we're, we're ready for trial then, right?

Are we ready?

Yeah.

We got motions to eliminate first, but you guys, you guys call those what, 402s?

Is that what you guys call those?

Yeah.

402s.

Yeah.

Gabe knows the lingo.

Yeah.

What were the motions to exclude evidence, the limit evidence?

So once we weren't able to plead guilty to the hit and run, those bad facts were coming

in.

And we were worried that, you know, the state would argue, well, look, he got into an

accident.

That means he must've been driving recklessly up here.

And so we were trying to get away from that, but we wanted to exclude the warrants.

We wanted to exclude the drugs in the car.

Cause obviously those are like, obviously motives to run.

Um, and we didn't want that in, but they're also super prejudicial and he's not charged

with the drugs.

And, uh, the officer didn't even know he had warrants when he lit them up.

Um, so there's a big fight about that.

Um, the court reserved ruling and asked for additional briefing the next day.

Uh, which I thought it was, I thought these were very obvious issues.

So I was a little frustrated, but we provide extra briefing.

Um, I give him all the reasons why I can't even remember them now.

All the reasons why these shouldn't come in.

He disregards all the reasons I give him, but still excludes them on, on, on his own ground.

So that's good.

Um, but the whole time, yeah, the whole time there's this common theme of like that Gabe

and I are being sneaky, like we're hiding something.

We're trying to sneak something by the court and the state.

And it's like, this is trial.

It's called strategy.

Like, what are you?

So that theme kind of kept going throughout all our emotions and limb and, and throughout

a lot of the lines of questioning.

Who's saying, who's saying you're being, first off, let me just say like, you know, sounds

like the judge ruled, made a ruling saying like, I want to be the smartest person in the

room.

So I'm not going to rule in your favor for what you said, but you missed this one reason.

So I'm going to say that reason instead.

Cause I'm smart.

I'm the bench officer.

I'm in the black robe.

Is that I've, I've had a case dismissed like that before.

It's like, Oh, okay.

Whatever reason you want, judge, just dismiss it.

We thought the warrant shouldn't come in.

Cause I thought, we thought there were the prejudice of the warrants was overwhelming.

I mean, this guy's accused of fleeing from the police and you're going to say, well, he

has three other crimes.

That's also just seemed logical that also this black guy has three other crimes.

We thought would just seem very like that's prejudice.

The definition of prejudice.

The judge had, didn't judge was like, nah, I mean, I see it as very probative of why he

might run.

I'm not so sure it's prejudicial, but then ruled actually, and I thought he ruled in your

favor that yes, he had the warrants, but he didn't know he had them.

And the state want, we all know why the state want the warrants in.

They wanted a warrant to show he's a criminal.

He's running for the cops.

But part of the argument was, did he know he had them?

Cause all, and judge even was like, wait a second, each one of these warrants is for

missing an arraignment.

Is there any evidence that he actually knew that he had them?

And I was like, your honor, if you look at, look at what he said, at no point does

he say, I knew I had warrants.

And the judge basically said, you know, without more information, I, because, and, and, and

on, I had said, well, I mean, there's a lot of reasons why you could run.

I mean, this is a black man in 2000, you know, 2023 running, you know, from the police.

And he's like, oh, do you think the state would argue that?

And I was like, I said, judge, you're, you seem very protective of the state's case here.

You know, you, you never wants to look at my client and say, you know, do you feel safe

with your attorneys arguing this yet?

You, I mean, he was, he seemed to be very proactive in any, in every single, I thought

on the racial issues, I did not think he was very receptive to any of them.

And I thought, we thought that was kind of like, oh, okay, well, so we're not, we're

not going to go down, down that road.

If you were not going to be receptive to me, you're not going to listen to it.

Maybe the jury might disagree that the issue, the other issue is we, it was very clear to

us that these are two separate incidents.

And the judge basically said, no, this is one long continuation of, you know, the allude

over here and, you know, attempt to allude allegation over here.

And then the hit road over here.

And I said, well, wait a second, the only thing I don't want you to allow them to do

is I, they can't infer reckless driving, you know, over here with his, you know, the fact

that he got an accident over here.

The judge goes, no, I'm going to let them do that.

And I was like, well, well, all right.

Okay.

So, so he rules against us.

Afterwards, when, when we're done, when the hearing was over, I looked at the two prosecutors

because they brought on a second prosecutor who was more, who was more seasoned to, you

know, to, to be with the new prosecutor and I, and I, and I said to her, I go, just, just,

just so we're clear, you're not going to try to argue that the poor driving half a mile

away is not the driving that constitutes the reckless driving over here.

And the more senior prosecutor looks at me and goes, I know exactly what you're saying.

Yeah, no, that's not what we're doing.

And the other, the new prosecutors are like, well, I need to look at the law a little more.

I need to look into that.

And I was like, cause our belief is because they didn't go near it at trial.

They might've talked to their appellate unit who said, don't go near that or otherwise

this case is coming back.

That's, that's our belief is because during the trial, they never even made that.

Cause I was like, look, you're lying in the bootstrap, this thing that we would have pled

guilty to.

We actually thought after we made that argument, the judge would say, oh, no, I'm gonna let

you plead guilty.

But he still didn't.

He was just still like, you gotta, gotta protect the state.

Gotta let them get their case in there.

Gabe, you said that the judge also was not, or was not receptive to the racial issues.

Was this a motion in limine or not, or just because a black man running, was there, was

there anything more to that?

Well, I think I, I kind of feel that our argument was the warrants themselves.

Like this is a, this is someone who's being accused of running from the police.

If you allow the jury to hear that he has multiple warrants, this is a black man in, in America.

Like what, what are you doing?

I mean, I think this is, this is a, you're appealing to the prejudice of a jury.

If, you know, if, if they're thinking that way of, oh yeah, yeah.

Guy with warrants, he's black guy.

Of course he is.

Our thought is you're compounding this thing.

And that's what we thought was, was a prejudicial issue.

And I was really surprised that he was, did not, did not say the warrants is prejudicial.

And I was like, I was like, you know, I think Ana made the argument that warrants means crimes.

Like you're basically saying this guy's a criminal.

And he's like, no, it just means you missed court.

And I was like, well, well, can we say it was, it was, it was for traffic?

Like, can we say it was for, you know, for running a stop sign?

Like, as opposed to, you know, something else?

Like.

The state has, like, could have picked multiple motives.

They could have picked, and one of them could have been, this is a black man in America.

Of course he doesn't want to interact with, with law enforcement.

And, but they're picking the one that makes this black man look like a criminal.

And they're doing that on purpose.

And why would we let them do that?

And the judge is like, well, here's why.

There's, there's one thing I want to point out to, to our listeners, some, or some people

out there is like that the system, I don't think, I mean, even down here,

like there's, people get warrants, arrest warrants, whatever it is, and don't even know

about it.

Like, they never get noticed that they're, that the police have filed a case, that the

case has been filed against them.

They just, they just, the, the, the prosecutors just go to the judge and they ask for a warrant.

And then this individual has no idea that there's a case on them, that they're, that the police

could just, if they come to contact with the police, that they're going to get arrested.

And then they, all of a sudden they'll just be driving to, to work, be driving to the airport

to go on vacation, wherever it is.

And they get stopped by the police and they miss their flight.

They don't show up to work because there's a warrant that they had no idea about.

That is a very common thing.

And, and, and I will add, I have a little story about that myself.

I had a client accused of gun possession.

He was like 60 years old.

Uh, they took the gun.

Uh, they, he went to jail, got out of custody three days later and they decided to file on

him, but you know, a year later, right?

He had gone to the police station.

So they issued a warrant cause he never showed up cause they never gave him notice.

He in the, and it was, I got it like maybe 15 years later, right?

He had gone to the police station three times requesting to get his gun back.

They had him on video in the police station requesting to get his gun back and, and he had a warrant

for his arrest.

So most times people, in many, many cases, people have no knowledge.

I guess I was just going to say that there's so many reasons why the, our, our client might

have run, but the warrants is the, is the one that's hurts his case.

Like everything, there's so many other things that it could be, but you daily state only

want to introduce this one that, that we thought was highly prejudicial.

And I, I just really thought it was disingenuous of the state to make the argument and of the

court to really accept the argument.

Cause I was like, there's lots of reasons why this man at this time might, might not want

to stop the police.

And the only one that you're, that it could be the drugs in the car, it could be all these

other things, but the only one that, that helps them is this one.

And that's the one you're going to let them put in front of a jury.

And I just don't, I didn't think that was right.

So the drugs in the car was going to come in.

That was coming in the evidence.

Oh, suppressed.

Oh, that's out.

The drugs didn't come in.

Anna, you argued the drugs, right?

They never tested them.

So we didn't even know if they were drugs, which not the best argument ever, but it worked.

So the DUI driving while under the influence is not coming in.

That's the reason why he was running, right?

He's under the influence.

I knew the DUI was coming in, but here's what I was worried about.

I was worried that the judge would let them testify to what the client's demeanor was and

what he looked like.

But Anna made a really fantastic argument to keep that out.

Oh, yeah.

So in Washington, anyone, if you think someone's drunk on alcohol, like that's a lay opinion.

You can say you thought they're intoxicated on alcohol.

But drugs are different and you need an expert opinion for that.

And I know this because in misdemeanor court, we do DUIs all the time.

And I was pretty fresh out of misdemeanor court.

So I knew that law backwards and forwards.

And so the court held on to that and they were like, yeah, nope, you need an expert.

You didn't disclose one.

You don't have one.

So drugs aren't coming in and intoxication isn't coming in either.

So that's your sneakiness right there.

You're sneaking in the law.

You're being tricky.

You're tricky with this law.

You know, you're trying to bring in, you know, it wasn't Gabe.

It was Anna.

Anna was the tricky one.

You're being sneaky, bringing in the law.

You're trying to sneak in the law.

How dare you?

All right.

So now it's time for the jury trial, which means I imagine that's jury selection, right?

Is that how it goes in Snohomish?

We requested extra time than the court was going to give us.

And one of the reasons was, like, there are issues here.

One is accidents and the other is race.

Like, these are issues we need to develop with potential jurors.

And the judge offered, he's like, well, you know, sometimes those are sensitive topics.

If you would like me to voir dire on one of those topics, let me know.

And I was like, based on your rulings and our arguments on race before, I think I'll handle this one.

Thanks, though, Your Honor.

So that was just a little preface going into jury selection.

How long did the whole process take?

We got 45 minutes each.

And Gabe and I used all our time.

The state was, or the court was going to give us 30.

We asked for an hour and he gave us 45.

Can you tell us about your voir dire?

Was there any points you were making with the jurors, like, your approach, like, some interesting jurors you may have talked to or anything like that that sticks out to you?

Oh, it was the two loudest sneezes I've ever heard in my entire life.

I swear the transport officers reached for their guns.

Like, it was scary.

It was a violent sneeze.

So who did the sneeze then?

Who did the sneezes?

That was juror number 44, like, the last juror.

We never even talked to her yet.

Oh, yeah.

She was a little, she was a small, I wouldn't say she was petite, but she was short, kind of stout woman.

It just, it was the kind of thing where you, it was like, what's happening?

Earthquake?

It was like a bombing?

Like, it was, the transport detail, you know, like, jumps, I mean, those guys usually just on their phones, jump up, like, you know, hands on their guns, like, what's happening?

What's happening?

And it happened twice, and both times it was just like, what the fuck is going on here?

It was violent.

Whoa, violent.

Wow.

Gabe and I's office, we do mostly deselection questions, so we did a lot of that, but the judge had already deselected a lot of the jurors for us.

There was one juror who was an elderly gentleman, kind of, he was in the box, he could hear all of the judge's questions, he could hear all of Gabe's questions, he could hear all the state's questions, and then I ask him a question, and he just looks straight through me.

And, like, I'm close to him, I'm making eye contact with him, and it's just straight through me.

And so I asked the court to get him a hearing device, and they do, and so once I see he's all set up with that, I come back, and I'm like, sir, how much of today have you heard?

And he, again, just straight through me.

And it was so weird, because he had heard everyone else, but for some reason he just, like, couldn't register my voice.

It was very odd, but he got struck.

I did something, any time I'm in an attempt to elude case where I'm arguing you need to have the two things at the same time.

I always did this little fun thing with, I talk about, let's say we create our statute, and it's called the running with scissors statute.

And it says it's illegal, you know, it says running with scissors is illegal.

I said, but the statute reads like this.

It's illegal to, you know, open and close a pair of scissors while you're running.

So I'd say, all right, juror number five, I'm going to stand here, and I'm going to open and close my pair of scissors.

Am I violating the statute?

No, you are not.

Great.

Now, I'm going to keep my scissors closed, and I'm going to run.

Am I violating the statute?

No.

Why not?

Well, because the statute says it's got to be open and closed.

I said, all right.

Juror number seven, what do I have to be doing?

She said, well, you've got to be running and open and closing.

I go, but even though it says running with scissors, I mean, I'm running with scissors with the clothes.

She said, nope, it's got to be both.

So that's not a deselection, but that's my, folks, closing, I'm going to bring us back around.

You've got to have the running.

You've got to have the open and closing at the same time.

Otherwise, you don't have a violation.

So that's something I always do in that, on an attempt to elude.

So jury understands both things, same time.

Even though the statute says it's called this, it doesn't matter.

All right.

So we've got our jury now.

Time for opening statements.

Who did that?

That was me.

It was fine.

We decided pretty early on we were just going to concede the hit and run.

So in my opening, I was like, he for sure hit and ran.

You can convict him of that.

But I made a big show of how you're not going to hear anything about any dangerous driving during the period of pursuit.

I showed the exhibit where the period of pursuit is, that's the phrase Gabe and I decided to use, is it's 0.1 miles.

It's so short.

It's a single city block.

And during that entire time, you're not going to hear about any dangerous driving.

And I said that a lot of times because that is what the officer said in his interview.

I have a question, though.

Aren't you trying to get promoted?

Isn't that why you're doing this trial?

Like you need to get the experience to get promoted in your office and you're just conceding charges in your opening statement?

Well, it's not really a promotion.

It's to get qualified.

So you're trying to get qualified here and you're admitting your client's guilty in your opening statement?

I also tried to get him to plead guilty at arraignment, but that didn't work either.

All right.

What about the DA or the process?

Is it a DA, the district attorneys?

What was their opening statement like?

We called DPAs, Deputy Prosecutting Attorneys.

It was the short – if it was more than five minutes, I'd be shocked.

I don't think so.

Yeah, no.

Yeah.

There wasn't much to it.

I mean, I just – I don't – you know, they're generally kind of put it up there.

Interestingly enough, though, we both had exhibits of the area.

As in, we had a cutout of the very short Portman miles that the client was driving.

So you could clearly see how many lanes there were, what the intersection was.

And the state's was much bigger.

It had that little section and then, you know, over the river, through the woods by Grandma's house.

It has the entire thing.

Their exhibit actually was helpful to us in many ways, especially when the officer testified.

And now it's time for the prosecution's case.

So let's talk about that.

Well, they put up there – he's a newly lieutenant.

He was formerly, I believe, a sergeant, and he was the one who was in that – the phantom – the ghost truck.

He was the one in the unmarked pickup truck.

And, you know, suddenly for the first time, he said that when the client – when our client changed lanes, you know, he has the fact that, you know, he lights them up, he accelerates, and he calls it in all at the same time.

He has that.

He has the fact that they were at an intersection.

But what you have to understand is in the interview, there was so much I don't remember, as in how close to the light were you?

You know, you were directly behind him, but how many cars was he close to?

And that was – that to me was actually very important, especially because I kind of – I drove the route a couple days before, and I really knew – I mean, it was on a steep hill, and it was just a bunch of stuff that was in there.

And so suddenly for the first time, he said that when our client changed lanes to get around, you know, a car in front of him, that a car had to brake hard to avoid a crash.

And I was like, what did you just say?

I mean, we talked about the interview.

We talked about the interview in which the guy was very clear that there was no, you know, there was no crazy driving or anything like that.

But he says – he says, no, the other – the car had to drive cautiously and brake hard to avoid a crash.

And I kind of swore he looked at me with a smug when he said it.

Now, I was like – I was like, what the – we broke – I believe we broke for the day and started the next day.

Wait a minute.

This isn't the same officer that you had an interview with, is it?

Yes, sir.

That isn't the same one who was annoyed by the investigator asking him all of these questions and him saying that there was – he was doing the speed limit and all.

That is – there's no way that's the same guy, right?

It's a different way.

There's no way that's the same guy.

Same guy.

And he looked right at you and smirked.

I felt that's what he was doing.

I could be wrong.

I felt that he turned and looked at me like a little smear.

And you say – and you say this person got promoted?

Oh, I'm sure he's in charge of the whole force now.

But even a halfway office – intelligent officer knows you can't lie about things that have been recorded.

And you can't lie when you've said something different before.

Like, don't you understand that that's what we – that's like the most beautiful thing in the whole world to a defense attorney.

He had the most fun explanation for his lies.

It was amazing.

I – like, it's the sweetest nectar to be able to prove that someone is lying.

It's like – it brings my heart joy when they lie and we have proof that they lie.

So, Gabe, you know, you're doing the cross-examination here at the COP, right?

Yeah.

So, I start in the way that we often do with law enforcement.

And we are trained to what we call tie them to the report.

So, the first, you know, 10 or 15 questions are really about, you know, you're a police officer, you have a very busy job, you know, you do this, you do that.

And part of this – part of this training and the stuff you do is writing the report.

Yes.

And that report is very important because if you got to testify two years later, six months later, three months later, this is how you remember it, right?

And so, it's – you know, you are trained to put all the important details into the report, right?

So, if it's something that's important, you put it in there.

Exactly.

And so, you know, nothing you have to miss, right?

I mean, obviously, little things you might miss.

Yeah, of course.

Okay, so he agrees with me up, down, center, left, right, that yes, that's what we're doing.

And at the beginning, they're so cautious.

They're so – you know, the thing that the defense is going to attack them that they're like, yes, yes, yes, yes.

And you're like, all right, here we go.

Okay, so I said – so I said, all right.

And it just – you know, you just testified that the car that you saw, you know, client goes around the car and that car has to brake hard to avoid a crash.

And he goes, yes.

And I was like, that sounds pretty serious.

And he's like, it is.

And I go, that sounds really dangerous, in fact.

He goes, it is.

That's kind of scary.

He's like, yes, definitely scary.

I was like, that's pretty important.

He goes, right.

I go, but it didn't make it in a report, did it?

Well, right.

So then you – now you've got that.

Right, now you've got that.

So then I said – and then I said, okay, Ed, you know, we interviewed you for an hour.

Mr. Torres, my investigator, asked you a bunch of questions.

And I remember during that interview, you know, the prosecutor, she was there, and I was there, and Ms. Farrow was there.

And in the interview, we asked you a lot about the car that, you know, that my client went around, and you said that car did nothing.

I said – and he said – and I said, I'm going to – you got your transcript.

I've got mine.

We're going to go through this here.

Didn't break, didn't slow down, didn't speed up, kept pace with traffic, and you even added at the speed limit.

So, like, not just kept pace, but you said at the speed limit.

He said, yes.

Now, suddenly, though, you testified that the car had to brake hard to avoid a crash.

He goes, oh, that was a different car.

I said, excuse me?

Wait, that was a different car.

So, the car that we discussed for a good five to ten minutes in the interview, the one that didn't do anything, there was a completely different car that had the brake hard, and for some reason, he just didn't mention that car whatsoever during the interview.

No.

And his response, I go – his response, why?

Why would you not say that?

Well, you didn't ask.

That's it.

That's your answer today.

I didn't ask.

That's the answer.

We didn't ask.

That's your answer to the question.

We have a detailed conversation about the car that does nothing, and you completely neglect to mention the phantom car, the brake car to avoid the crash.

And your answer is, we didn't ask.

That you didn't ask.

All right.

Okay.

And then it occurs to me.

Then it occurs to me.

I said, you know what?

You didn't put it in the report.

You didn't mention the interview.

You didn't even tell the prosecutors, did you?

This is a complete surprise to them, too.

And now, here's the thing.

This, to me, was a – there's no right answer.

Because if he says, yes, I told them.

Now, that's a discovery violation for not telling us.

And this – our judge might – and our judge probably would have let it go, but he still would have been like, yeah, what – wait.

Why didn't you tell – you know, why didn't you tell Gabe and Ana about this?

That's – you have a duty to do that.

At least it would have been something.

But the other option is – or he just says, no, I didn't tell them.

And then it's even more of, well, why didn't you tell them, buddy?

So –

Ana, what was – you're observing this impeachment by Gabe of the officer.

How does that look like in the courtroom?

Gabe's belligerent first and foremost.

And then – just kidding.

Don't be so emotional.

Gabe's kind of funny.

Gabe has a very funny court persona just because it's very different than his out-of-court persona.

He's a lot more serious in court.

And so, like, I know his little questions of, like, you didn't put that in the report.

I know – like, he comes across very serious.

But I know it's, I guess, a little sarcastic, too.

But I keep my eyes on the jurors because I want to see what they're doing.

And they're eating this up.

They're looking at each other.

They're looking at Gabe.

They're looking at me.

I'm looking at client.

Client's like, what's happening?

Yeah, it was fun.

Ana, they only called two other witnesses.

Is that right?

I think they called two civilians who were relevant to the crash.

And I basically just asked them, okay, that happened down here.

That didn't happen on this street where the elude happened.

And that was essentially all I asked them.

And then maybe they called one more officer that helped investigate the crash.

But, again, we didn't have that many questions for him because we had already conceded the hit and run.

But he became – that last officer kind of became important, and here's why.

Our argument to the jury was that the driving during the pursuit period was not reckless.

The state had to prove that it was reckless.

And our argument was, look, maybe it was negligent.

Passing a car, cutting someone off could have been negligent, but that's really all it is.

This driving over here where it gets in the crash, now that – maybe that was reckless, but the state didn't charge it that way.

And this was important because that officer, the second officer, issued our client a citation for negligent driving over there.

So the reason why this company becomes important is I get to argue in closing.

So that driving was much worse than this driving.

And if that driving was only negligence, you can't – this one can't possibly be reckless.

And you want to tell the story of whether or not we were going to shoot that in there or not?

We thought it might be a discovery violation to try to pull the – like, in Washington, we have the website that has someone's criminal history.

And it doesn't have, like, all the documents on there, but there's tickets on there.

And so we thought, one, the officer might forget he issued this ticket and then ID'd to refresh his recollection with the ticket itself.

But we never turned over the ticket because we didn't think of this until the middle of trial.

So we were all worried there'd be some sort of argument, it shouldn't come in.

Again, that we were being sneaky somehow.

You know me, the sneakiest.

But then I just asked the officer, like, and you issued him a ticket for negligent driving in the second degree.

And the officer's like, yeah.

No one blinks an eye.

Easy breezy right in there.

But Gabe and I stressed about it for probably three hours over the course of the evening.

So clearly, like I've said before, you're clearly sneaky because not only do you know the law, but now you're talking about investigation.

Like, look at you, you're sneaky.

Sneaky, I see it, I see it.

Okay, so that's it for the state's case.

So it's time for a motion to dismiss, right?

Granted, right?

We didn't know.

We didn't make a motion to dismiss.

We contemplated a halftime motion, and we just didn't, we just didn't do it.

I just didn't, I didn't, I mean, the judge was hostile to, when the state added the enhancement, the judge was, you know, judge barely let him do it.

And I thought about, it was just a lot of, I just, I didn't see the judge granting it.

I didn't see.

You wanted to not guilty.

You wanted to go for the jugular.

I didn't want to preview my closing to the state.

That was just, I just didn't.

Yeah, I hate making the motion to dismiss.

I hate it, because it's never, it's rarely granted.

I mean, it's like once or twice in your career.

All right, so then, time for the defense, right?

You guys ready to put on your defense?

Ready to trounce some prosecution evidence?

Ready to just.

Oh, it consisted of me walking over to the prosecutors and saying, all right, who's doing the cross of Mr. Client?

And them saying, oh, she's going to do it.

I go, oh, you thought I was serious.

Like, there's, like, there was no way in the world he was going to testify.

Like, no, like, I couldn't, I couldn't, I think, I think they had thought, and maybe, actually, Ana did this to them.

Ana was a bit sneaky and made them think that we were arguing that he was not the driver.

And I think that's why they thought he might testify.

But, yeah, but I think that was, that was, we conceded in opening that he was driving.

So, there was no, there was absolutely no reason why the client would testify.

He, you know, of course, you know, you go through the colloquy, you talk to him about it, let the judge know, and the judge talks to him as well.

And he was like, no, I think I'm, I think I'm good.

I'm going to stick with, stick with these guys.

And that was pretty much it.

We argued over some jury instructions.

I don't think there was any real peace with the instructions.

I, was there, Ana, did we, did we propose anything different than normal?

Yeah, we tried to propose the definition of, of negligent because he got that negligent driving ticket.

Um, that was denied.

Um, well, we tried to, we tried to work it into reckless, the reckless manner definition.

So, like, there's the definition of reckless manner, that's an essential element.

And then I threw in a line about what isn't reckless manner, what is negligent.

He didn't like that, and it was not granted.

Man, that's too bad, man.

Like I said, that's some more appealable stuff, man.

That, that, you guys really messed up a beautiful appeal.

Like, it's messed up.

Left it all up.

Your fault.

Sneaky.

Sneaky.

And belligerent, don't forget.

Belligerent.

So, let's, uh, let's hear about the closing arguments then.

Who, who did that?

I did.

I did.

Got it.

All right.

All right, Gabe.

So, let's, tell us about your closing argument.

I think I really just highlighted, um, you know, over and over again that, that, that

the officer was not credible, that he had that brand new, you know, the brand new testimony

of hard breaking to avoid a crash.

Never in the report.

Never in the interview.

Never even told it to the two prosecutors.

Um, and I, I kind of made a front of an excuse.

I said, you know what, when his explanation of why he didn't say it, what did he say?

He said, well, you didn't ask.

And I was like, does that remind you of what a child says when they get caught in a lie?

Isn't that, isn't that, isn't that what, isn't that what it sounds like?

You could, you caught the seventh grader doing something they shouldn't be doing.

And they go, well, you didn't ask me about that.

Like, I was like, that's kind of what that looked like to me.

And I, I don't know.

I, I'm always very, you know, the jury's deadpan.

You know, I, you get one or two nodders, but everyone else is looking at your deadpan.

And I don't know.

I, I, I was done.

And I, the worst part is when you sit down from the closing, you want everyone to be

like, oh, that was awesome.

That was awesome.

But you know, I was just, I was, and I'm like, I don't know, what'd you say?

What'd you think?

Like, did I, did I, did I, did I, did I, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, what did the

prosecutor say?

I think she focused on, on it as if this cop was telling the truth.

This is the testimony you heard.

He said this person break card.

So that's what happened.

Gabe reads from the transcript from our interview during his closing because he impeached him

on it.

So all that came in, that was in the trial.

But then the state in their rebuttal tries to read from the police report where, and she's

trying to bolster what his testimony was by saying, well, in his police report, he did

say, you know, someone got cut off.

And so Gabe objects, um, the jury gets sent out and we have a little discussion about why

Gabe objected because I don't think it was understood.

And he's like, well, you know, he made the implication that what Gabe had done in his

closing also was objectionable, which I think Gabe and I disagree with, but that there was

no objection.

So if like, that's why Gabe got to do it, but you don't get to just read from a police

report.

What was objectionable that Gabe did?

So the judge was saying, judge was saying that, that me, because I was deliberate to

go over, grab the transcript and read directly from the transcript, which normally would be,

but for the fact that when he was on cross, I, you know, I impeached him with the transcript

saying, well, you know, okay, let's, let's look at the transcript together.

We're on page 17 lines, 15 to 25.

Um, and I read into the record, uh, you know, Mr. Torres asked you this, you responded this.

So I, my thought was, I was well within my rights to grab the transcript and read directly

from it because that had been entered into evidence as opposed to the police report, which

had not been.

And I mean, it wasn't the transcript was entered into evidence, but that, that portion

of it had been read to the jury.

So when the judge, the judge was like, well, Mr. Rossi, you did the same thing, but he

wasn't objective.

I was like, no, I did not do the same thing, but neither here nor there.

Suppose I did.

They didn't object and I'm objecting.

So, and the judge was like, yeah, you can't, not going to let you do it.

Not, not, you know, they're not going to let you do it.

You're stuck with what the person actually said on the stand, which I was kind of like,

yeah, right.

What he said on the stand, which is what I, I was right from.

So that was that.

Basically, her whole rebuttal was just trying to bolster the officer's testimony again.

It was like, no, he said this before.

He said it the whole time.

There was always someone that was getting cut off.

I guess it's time for jury deliberations, right?

How long did the jurors deliberate for?

We got that at 3.40 on Thursday.

So we actually go all the way back to our office, which is about 15 minutes away.

And, you know, the pace, pacing around.

Wado's office is down the hall from mine.

I'm always kind of popping my head in.

All right, what's going on here?

And then at 4.20, I'm like, well, we're going to go home.

We'll come back tomorrow.

4.21, they had a verdict.

So that's 3.40 to 4.20.

That's 40 minutes.

And that's not including, you know, pee time or looking at exhibits or doing something.

So that's a pretty – and that's, you know, 40-minute verdict is not always good for the good guys.

But in this situation – so we walk into the court – we walk into the courtroom.

They bring my guy.

And there is like five or six, seven, eight prosecutors all there for – to watch the verdict.

And I'm like, why?

You know, they're there to support their colleague.

You know, good for them, you know, whatever.

But I'm thinking to myself, oh, they must think that this is it, you know.

You know, young prosecutors ready to take – you know, get her first win.

You know, and with the enhancement, going to take down, you know, Gabe and Ana.

And they were there to see her triumph.

I think it's what they showed up for.

So wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute.

Okay.

So they thought they were going to win?

Listen, I don't know why they were there.

It's certainly possible that they – it's very possible that they were there to support their colleague.

I don't.

But they did all scatter very quickly after the jury came back not guilty.

Oh, that's not true, though.

Of course they did.

But as we learned the next day, the prosecutor did point out to one of our colleagues that, you know, hey, you know, we each got – we each won one count.

Each one – you know, we –

The one you tried to plead guilty to at a raiment.

That's the one they won.

The one we could see – the one I opened to my – the one that they conceded.

I started my closing with – I started my closing with, he's dead guilty of that charge.

Let's move that – let's slice that chunk off and move it to the side.

He's definitely guilty of it.

Move it on.

Let's talk about the one that said it.

He did it.

Yeah.

Yes, that's – that was the one.

So talk about the reading of the verdict when the jurors came in.

What was that like?

It was great.

The jurors didn't look at us, which I – that's true.

Which I never think is a good thing.

They didn't look at us.

They didn't look at client.

And that always makes me nervous.

So I wasn't feeling great.

Yeah, I know.

I know.

But sometimes it seems like it's like these, like, dumb cases where, you know, they're just kind of like, all right, we're just going to move on.

They're not really – they're not really friendly with anybody or they didn't really – you know, they're just like, ah, this process is just garbage.

These people are like, I spent all of this time and y'all couldn't take care of that?

This is what I'm getting.

Like, because that 45 minutes that it took for them to deliberate, you know what the 45 minutes – I can tell you what they were doing.

First of all, they had to pick a four-person.

That takes about 20 minutes.

Second, they had to read the jury instructions.

That takes about another five to ten.

And then after that, they were like, so what y'all doing this weekend?

Like, there's no question about, like, I don't understand what we're doing here.

I'm sure they didn't sit around and wait for you guys to talk to you guys afterwards, did they?

No.

No, they super didn't.

They bounced.

I wanted to hear from them.

Oh, I wanted to – I usually don't – I wanted to hear from them.

I wanted to hear what they had to say.

What was the client like when Not Guilty was read on the big charge?

He was very happy.

He knew that this was the only case he was being held on.

He had – I mean, he had a warrant in another county, so he knew there was a chance.

First of all, we would have to set the case over to do sentencing because we weren't going to do sentencing right then and there.

So he knew he'd be in custody for just a little bit longer.

I had – so part of this was I had a vacation that was starting on Monday.

So I – that's another reason why I had to have someone else on.

So I had to get out of there.

Also, when I get my verdicts, I'm a hugger.

I like to hug my client.

I like to hug my co-counsel.

Couldn't get any of that in because the client had a cold, and I wasn't about to hug him, well, you know, if I was about to go on vacation.

So I didn't get my post hug, which I always – that's always my favorite.

Like, you know, like, we got that.

But he was really happy.

We sat over with the sentencing.

Ana took care of the sentencing.

Yeah, which was disappointing, to say the least, because he was only convicted of a gross misdemeanor.

And, you know, we get deals for that type of charge zero days all the time.

And at this point, he'd served over 90 days.

And so I figured I'd go in asking for 60.

Even if he gets a little more than that, he's a time served.

Get him down to the other county where he has a warrant.

The state comes in and asks for 120 days, which was pretty frustrating because we had come to some sort of understanding.

I thought that we would come in with a time served joint recommendation.

And then they send an email saying they're asking for 120 days, which is just a week more in custody for a client.

But still, a week I didn't think he deserved as the judge made a comment that he's giving 120 days because that's what the state asked for.

But he was planning on doing 180.

And it felt it just felt wrong because I know those cases in district court get zero days all the time.

Yeah, that's, you know, it's like, it's like, judge, the prosecution's like, judge, we've carefully weighed this case and all the considerations, all the facts, all the mitigation, all the aggravating facts.

And we feel like 120 days, one more week in custody is the right amount of punishment for public safety.

Well, and his range on the allude, if he if he got convicted on the allude, his range was two to six months.

Okay, guys, well, let me just let's just close it up here.

I want to say thank you for being on the show.

And before we wrap it up, we I have one more question.

It's a question I ask all our guests on every episode.

We can start with we'll start with Ana because Gabe has been on the show before.

So he's answered this question before.

Ana, you've been within the public defender's office for four years now.

Why did you want to be a public defender?

My mom, my mom was a public defender for 15 years.

I always wanted to be like her.

I followed in her footsteps and took after her.

Now I like to fight the system.

I tell my clients it's like getting paid by the man to stick it to the man.

And I love that.

What's that like growing up with the with your your parent being a public defender?

Or like, does she come home and share those like war stories with you or jury trials?

And what's she indoctrinating you with?

Both my parents are lawyers, actually, which made for interesting arguments growing up.

But, you know, she she was a public defender for 15 years.

So she stopped, I think, when I was in elementary school.

So I remember them always talking about court and talking about their cases at dinner and stuff like that.

But I don't think I really understood what she did.

I just knew I wanted to be like my mom.

And then in high school, college, I realized that, like, this is this system I want to fight.

And it made perfect sense.

So, yeah, she inspired me.

And then also just all the good work public defenders do inspired me further.

So I'm married to a public defender and I'm like, oh, man, does that mean we have a daughter?

She's three years old.

I'm like, is she going to be a public defender, too, now?

Oh, I don't know.

I hope I.

Yeah.

And then I'm going to, like, be upset when, like, they have, like, the dare week, the just say no to drugs week.

I'll be like, the war on drugs is ruining this country.

Don't listen to your elementary school, Vivian.

OK, don't trust that officer that came to school with the friendly dog.

Don't trust them.

You know, my parents were more like, what are you doing?

Like, are you kidding me?

You know this is hard, right?

And I was like, yeah, I want to do it.

Kids coming to school with a get a warrant shirt on.

All right, Gabe.

So you've been on the show before.

You've already told us why you became a public defender.

How long have you been a public defender for?

18 years as of January.

18 years as of January 3rd.

How do you feel about the 18 years you've served as a public defender?

I often say that the four days out of the week, I have the best job in the world and I love it.

And the fifth day, I'm looking for a bridge to jump off of or a way to get out of it.

I think that it's so many times it's such a great job and so much fun.

But that other day, you're like, please let me do anything else.

Nice, nice.

I'm glad to have you.

What's funny is in listening to your interview, it was reminding me of our previous interview.

If you guys want to check out Gabe before, I think he did season three episode somewhere in like around August.

I don't know.

But it was like zero to not guilty in 1.37 seconds.

That was the title, right?

So you guys want to check out Gabe?

I just wanted to say I had a great time talking to Sneaky and Belligerent.

Sneaky and Belligerent.

Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of Another Not Guilty.

Shout out to Daniel Mark, original A&G theme music composer, and Mike Grimm for the remix.

And guess what?

We'll be back in two weeks with Another Not Guilty straight from the trenches.

We'll be back in two weeks with Another Not Guilty straight from the trenches.