Vol.
72, No. 3, March 1999
Book Reviews
This Month's Featured Selections
The
Killing Season: A Summer Inside
an LAPD Homicide Division
By Miles Corwin
(New York, NY: Ballantine Publishing Group, 1998).
336 pgs. Paper. Retail: $6.99.
Reviewed by Jason Klimowicz
Miles Corwin, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times,
spent the summer of 1994 shadowing homicide detectives in South-Central
Los Angeles. What results is The Killing Season: A Summer
Inside An LAPD Homicide Division, a book that uses South-Central
LA to describe the battleground that many of America's inner
cities have become.
Corwin does a good job describing the work of several homicide
detectives. He follows each murder case beginning with the murder
call, to the detective's investigation at the murder scene,
and finally to the district attorney's decision whether
to charge the suspect. The life of a homicide detective in South-Central
can be demanding. Detectives often must spend up to 48 hours
at a stretch working on an investigation. The individual investigations
make for very interesting reading.
However, Corwin is at his best when he describes the anguishing
impact the murders have upon the victims' relatives and
friends. Corwin regularly sat in on therapy sessions held for
the relatives and friends of murder victims at a South-Central
counseling center.
He also excels when he describes the lives of the suspects
leading up to the murders. He describes how, by age 10, one suspect
often was left alone by his mother because she spent days away
smoking crack. He often went hungry, having only cereal to eat.
Without direction from his family, he joined a gang by age 14.
This inevitably led to a life of crime, and by age 20 he would
receive life without parole for a murder he committed during
a botched robbery.
Corwin's attention to detail is superior, bringing the reader
right to the murder scenes. His contrast of the paradisiacal
setting that the palm and jacaranda trees project to the grim
deteriorating apartments surrounded by the malt liquor billboards
in South-Central is surreal. In another scene, Corwin describes
a murder victim's last moments of life. While paramedics
try to save the victim's life, a Monday Night Football game
blares on the television in the background. The victim dies at
the same moment thousands of fans are roaring at a missed game-winning
field goal.
Corwin is not being flippant by describing a football game
while a victim dies. He uses this scene to demonstrate the main
theme of his book. While thousands of people are riveted nationwide
by a football game, an ignored war is raging in the inner city.
Corwin states it as "a quiet genocide that [is] taking place."
He reports that more than 400 murders occurred in South-Central
alone in 1993, few of which received any news coverage or attention.
He believes that if 400 American soldiers were killed during
a peacekeeping mission, it would be debated at the highest levels
of government and lead to major changes in foreign policy. However,
400 murders is business as usual in South-Central. He concludes
that a life in South-Central simply seems to have less value
than a life in other parts of Los Angeles.
Unfortunately, I believe Corwin's conclusion is correct.
Until the murders seriously affect the lives of those who vote
and hold real political power in this country, the inner cities
will be allowed to continue to deteriorate and war in America's
inner cities will go on - all but ignored by the general
population.
Jason H. Klimowicz, U.W. 1995, is a
solo practitioner in Madison practicing in tenant rights.
Environmental Statutes, 1998 Edition
Rockville, MD: Government Institutes Inc., 1998.
$208. To order, call (301) 921-2323.
Reviewed by Dennis Verhaagh
Over the last 30 years there has been a proliferation of federal
legislation adding acronyms to the language like a military manual
writer. We now have CAA, OSHA, CERCLA, TOSCA, and RECRA to name
the most significant federal acts. There is no one all-powerful
bureaucracy that is responsible for enforcing all the environmental
laws. Therefore, newcomers must tread lightly until they know
the limits of each agency.
Environmental Statutes, 1998 Edition is a powerful addition to the library
of any lawyer who practices corporate or environmental law and
needs immediate access to the broad scope of federal environmental
legislation. With the CD-ROM that accompanies the text, one can
easily search through the statutes for the enabling legislation,
definitions, the charge to the various federal regulatory agencies,
and other obscure provisions.
However, those who must have a court interpretation or an
explanatory overview may be disappointed. The text is raw statute
with no annotations. Also, even with the CD-ROM, one must be
familiar with the jargon of the environmental arena to know how
to frame a search. Newcomers to environmental law would benefit
from a digest or a good law review article to supplement this
edition.
Dennis Verhaagh, Minnesota 1972, is
an environmental engineer with the Wisconsin Department of Natural
Resources. He practices patent law in Green Bay.
Getting Started: Basics for a Successful
Law Firm
By Arthur G. Greene, Editor
(Chicago, IL: ABA Law Practice Management Section, 1996).
$74.95. To order, call (800) 285-2221.
Reviewed by Robert J. Kasieta
This book provides helpful guidance for lawyers considering
founding a new firm. The book's narrative text is helpful,
discussing issues important to law firm formation; but the book
justifies its $74.95 suggested retail price in its appendices.
There the reader finds helpful checklists and forms that are
far more significant than anything in the preceding chapters.
A model partnership agreement comes with the book on a computer
disk in ASCII and WordPerfect format for easy modification. Also
included is a comprehensive checklist of details to address before
opening a new office.
Getting Started offers useful suggestions in challenging
areas of law firm formation, like: How do I know whether there
is a sufficient market to justify another law firm in my area?
Or, how much capital do I need to see me through the startup
phase of my operation? It also addresses details of startup such
as sources of financing and organizational formations for the
new firm. Anyone contemplating starting a new firm would do well
to browse through this book.
Getting Started missed an opportunity to provide a
significant service to lawyers considering partnership by alerting
them to a pervasive potential pitfall even if everything else
in their planning was superlative. Readers would benefit from
more discussion of shared values and the way in which differences
in those values can be recognized prospectively by lawyers considering
partnership. The authors might have included a checklist of hypothetical
scenarios for partners to discuss to help them recognize differences
that might arise so that they might work out such differences
before they ripened into conflict. That might be the best service
the book could provide; because while most lawyers could locate
a form book of partnership agreements and are savvy enough in
financial matters to locate capital sources, many might not recognize
the need to fully explore differences in values that could destroy
the partnership.
Competent lawyers with complimentary practices should in all
instances be able to partner together. What, then, separates
those that succeed from those that merely survive, or worse,
fail? It is the capacity of the firm principals to share a common
view in all important areas, from firm sources of capital to
the kind of furniture in offices, from the choice of computer
systems to staff hiring decisions. Absent deeply held shared
values, there is little hope for success for any new firm made
up of partners.
Robert J. Kasieta, Marquette 1983, formed
Kasieta Legal Group LLC, a Martindale-Hubbell AV-rated firm,
in 1997. He is certified as a Civil Trial Specialist by the National
Board of Trial Advocates.
The Lawyer
Who Blew Up His Desk
and Other Tales of Legal Madness
By Joseph Matthews
(Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 1998).
241 pgs. Paper. Retail $11.95.
Reviewed by Peter E. Hans
Such a catchy title. The publisher says there's humor
inside. The author's introduction says that this mosaic
of observations illustrates the personal toll demanded from lawyers
engaged in the private practice of law. This book doesn't
contain any jokes, though, and the pace crawls whenever the author
writes about himself.
Fortunately, this book goes beyond the publisher's advertising
copy, and the author goes beyond self-analysis of his reasons
for leaving private practice. Actually, what we have here are
wonderful short tales populated by memorable characters, all
of whom have something to do with the legal system, and not all
of whom are disillusioned lawyers. The result is a mostly entertaining
volume worthy of lawyer and nonlawyer readers.
Joseph Matthews is a former criminal defense lawyer who practiced
in the San Francisco area. This book is based upon his experiences.
With expertly crafted sentences, he has taken people he actually
encountered and turned them into characters: Augie, the prisoner
who enjoyed gourmet meals; Willie, whose desk blew up, giving
him yet another excuse; Gabe, the lawyer who found religion;
and so many others remembered weeks after the cover has been
closed.
Don't read this book expecting to laugh; some of the passages are bleak.
Don't expect advice on how to leave the practice of law
and what to do next with your life; the author doesn't offer
solutions to the frustrations caused by the legal system. Read
the book to be entertained by characters so real that you'll
recognize some of them as characters you have met in your own
legal career.
This book supports the argument that while intellectual challenges
and earning money are satisfying, the most rewarding aspect of
the practice of law is opportunity to interact with so many different
people over the course of a legal career. So perhaps this book
is more tragedy than humor. Despite the joy that comes from associating
with people so unforgettable that they can become characters
remembered forever, the personal demands of the profession eventually
can cause talented and articulate lawyers to turn to other endeavors.
Peter E. Hans, U.W. 1980, is VP-operations
and general counsel of Mandli Communications Inc., Oregon, a
business that manufactures digital photolog systems for transportation
departments.
The Of Counsel Agreement:
A Guide for Law Firm and Practitioner, Second Edition
Harold G. Wren and Beverly J. Glascock
(Chicago, IL: ABA Senior Lawyers Division, 1998).
Retail $84.95.
Reviewed by Lawrence M. Knowles
Time was when the only people who needed to concern themselves
about the designation "Of Counsel" were those nearing
retirement. Things are not so simple anymore, and as law firms
struggle to make their anachronistic forms of organization fit
contemporary life and economics, the vague label "Of Counsel"
covers a multitude of essentially ad hoc arrangements, often
with little or no understanding of what the label means.
The Of Counsel Agreement is a salutary caution to those
who might be tempted to treat "Of Counsel" as the functional
equivalent of "none-of-the-above" on the firm organizational
chart. The term does have meaning and content, outlined in the
ABA's Model Code of Professional Responsibility and refined
in several important ethics opinions. The authors give a helpful
and thorough summary of the standards governing the "Of
Counsel" relationship, highlighting troublesome issues and
making practical suggestions for those considering entering into
such an affiliation. Sample forms of agreement are included in
the text and on disk.
Stepping into the kitchen to prepare a meal, the first question you ask
is not likely to be "should I use baking soda today?"
The important planning decisions are at the level of menus and
recipes, not discrete reactive ingredients. For a law firm or
practitioner trying to formalize the more unusual working arrangements
presented today, this book is a bit like starting a menu plan
by consulting The Compleat Guide to Baking Soda.
Nevertheless, baking soda being a rather volatile ingredient,
anyone concocting a new recipe should become acquainted with
its properties before setting its chemical processes in motion.
So, too, lawyers who believe the "Of Counsel" label
is the right answer for a relationship that doesn't seem
to fit any of the conventional categories would do well to consult
this guide.
Lawrence M. Knowles, University of Chicago
1983, now practices with a Chicago firm on an ad hoc basis.
Angle of Impact
By Bonnie MacDougal
(New York, NY: Ballantine Publishing Group, 1998).
Paper. Retail $6.99.
Reviewed by Brenda Lewison
Attorney Dana Svenssen receives a call on her car cell phone
from a corporate client's CEO, who is calling from a helicopter
in flight. As they are talking, the helicopter collides with
a small plane. Thus begins Angle of Impact.
To protect her client, Svenssen points the finger of liability
at the airplane pilot. Of course, she fails to disclose that
she is a potential witness in the case and therefore cannot represent
the client. Svenssen runs the litigation by hiring numerous experts
to defend against a multi-million dollar lawsuit.
Enter the love interest. Svenssen's primary expert not
only assists her in stopping the lawsuit before it really begins,
but leads her to reexamine her personal priorities, including
the importance of her marriage.
The female author/female protagonist murder mystery is enjoying
immense popularity. Attorney-penned legal procedurals, such as
this, also are immensely popular. As a woman lawyer and murder
mystery fan, I expected to like this book. I didn't.
If the protagonist was a man and the "expert" was a woman,
we would all scream sexual harassment, because the power relationships
between the attorney and the expert are so clearly unequal. She
controls his job.
Someone once said that true equality would be when a mediocre
woman could get just as far as a mediocre man. It is unclear
to me whether the author was attempting to make a statement about
feminism or equal rights for women. However, the message I took
from this book is that the beautiful, capable woman attorney
protagonist had the power and authority to engage in conduct
that is easily as offensive as any engaged in by any male employer
I have ever encountered. This is not my idea of feminism.
Brenda Lewison, U. W. 1995, has a solo
practice in Milwaukee in employment law and tenant rights.
Mackerel
by Moonlight
By William F. Weld
(New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1998).
238 pgs. Retail: $23.
Reviewed by Malina R.P. Fischer
Touted as a "witty, surprising, first-hand, break-out
suspense novel by one of America's most provocative figures,"
Mackerel by Moonlight did not live up to its hype -
but it still is a worthy read. Author William F. Weld, former
two-term governor of Massachusetts and former federal prosecutor,
writes about what he knows best: politics and federal criminal
prosecution.
The story centers on Terry Mullaly, a former Brooklyn assistant
DA, who escapes to Boston and is persuaded to run for district
attorney there. Through his campaign to the DA's office,
the story behind his leaving Brooklyn is revealed.
Mullaly admits up front to the reader that he was basically
fired from his job as a federal prosecutor. Although he had obtained
some highly visible convictions (through "overly aggressive"
means), he finds himself unemployed due to his unwitting protection
of a few bad cops who happen to be his hunting buddies. The admitted
underclass Irishman lands on his feet in Boston (naturally),
hobnobs with the blue bloods, and ends up running for public
office despite the skeletons in his closet.
Keeping those skeletons hidden is the driving force behind Mullaly's
run for office, while his campaign manager's goal is to
use Mullaly's Brooklyn experience to get the vote. The obvious
conflict due to Mullaly's failure to come clean keeps the
story moving.
While this reader found that Weld's propensity for name-dropping
and excessive use of large words kept the novel from being a
real page-turner, it is an interesting story with an unusual
twist. The story combines all the necessary elements a reader
could want in light reading: money, politics, sex, love, and
the quest for power.
Malina R.P. Fischer, U.W. 1991, is a
partner with Lathrop & Clark. She practices in labor and
employment law.
Naked Justice
By William Bernhardt
(New York, NY: Ballantine Publishing Group, 1997).
408 pgs. Paper. Retail $6.99.
Reviewed by Laura C. Suess
Ben Kincaid is a solo practitioner who has, until now, handled
small stakes cases in his criminal defense practice. Early into
the novel Naked Justice, the author depicts the type of
man and lawyer Kincaid is: though honest and passionate about
his clients, who often are unable to pay his bills, his law practice
is falling apart. What's more, Kincaid must care for his
abandoned, infant nephew. In Naked Justice, Kincaid's abilities
are challenged for the first time to defend the city mayor in
a high-profile case that involves the gruesome triple murders
of the mayor's wife and two young daughters.
Some of the story line is unoriginal in that it closely resembles
the O.J. Simpson murders, including the media circus, the police
chase with live television coverage, and the proffered motive
for the murders as a case of domestic abuse that escalated out
of control. In any event, the mayor knows Kincaid's reputation
as a lawyer and wants Kincaid's help. Kincaid hesitates
to represent the mayor because many facts establish the mayor's
guilt: A neighbor saw him leaving the scene of the murder covered
with blood, and it was well known they were unhappily married.
Despite his better judgment, Kincaid eventually agrees to represent
the mayor, and soon after it is apparent the mayor may not be
guilty after all. As Kincaid delves into his investigation, he
learns that the police tampered with evidence, suspects were
not interviewed, and others who dealt with the mayor had their
own reasons for wanting him dead. Kincaid becomes convinced that
the mayor is not guilty as he receives death threats from a stranger
and discovers clues that convince him someone other than the
accused is responsible for the triple murders, with a much more
evil motive.
As the trial progresses, Naked Justice draws readers into
the courtroom drama, allowing them to wonder what the outcome
of the trial will be. In a surprise ending, the identity of the
murderer and Kincaid's stalker is revealed. More importantly,
one learns that regardless of the facts in a given case, things
are never as they seem.
Naked Justice addresses realistic problems an attorney
faces while searching for the truth to save his client's
life. Though some of the similarities to the O.J. Simpson case
detract from the story, the author still manages to effectively
portray a high-profile murder case with a suspenseful outcome.
The novel contains enough truth and criminal procedure to spark
the interest of an attorney, yet is sufficiently readable to
capture the interest of a nonlawyer.
Laura C. Suess, William Mitchell 1997,
is a solo general practitioner in Hales Corners.
9 Scorpions
By Paul Levine
(New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1998).
373 pgs. Hard. Retail $23.
Reviewed by Michael T. Mahoney
A urrent genre of novels involves the U.S. Supreme Court and
its secret inner workings. This book follows Lisa Fremont, Justice
Truitt, and an air crash case, Laubach v. Atlantica Airlines
Inc.
With apologies to the feminists among us, Fremont is an American
success story. Assisted by a Machiavellian character, Fremont
leaves stripping behind, graduates at the top of her class from
Stanford, and pursues a Supreme Court clerkship with Justice
Truitt. Fremont has to keep her dancing past and the fact that
she is employed by Atlantica Airlines Inc. secret from the justice
and presumably the FBI agent who did her background check.
Justice Truitt is the junior justice on the court. We follow
his struggle in deciding to hire Fremont - she is gorgeous
and he doesn't feel his spouse will understand the clerk
selection process. Fremont's brains and interpersonal skills
overcome her physical attributes and she is hired. Truitt struggles
with his failing marriage, the Court politics, and Atlantica
Airlines.
The parties to the suit are the widow of a passenger and Atlantica.
The case is dismissed via summary judgment and the court has
to decide whether to grant certiorari. The legal procedure in
the book is well written.
The many intricacies of the plot are far reaching and include homicide,
extortion, obstruction of justice, and judicial activism to the
nth degree. The plot devices are overbroad; Levine obviously
wants to keep us all interested, but this also is the novel's
only shortcoming.
Oliver Wendell Holmes' description of the U.S. Supreme
Court provides the title to this work. It also aptly describes
the difficulties of the clerk and justice. The book is worth
reading for entertainment value, as a primer on potential ethical
violations, and examples of close employer/employee relations.
Michael T. Mahoney, North Dakota 1983,
is a Milwaukee County ADA. He formerly was a prosecutor in Washington
and Kenosha counties.
|