Now I Can Finish

Read my other post first because this is Part II

Well, that was the first time I've ever been in a real court case. Good lord, it was boring. If I ever become a lawyer, I'm definitely going to be the kind of lawyer that sits in the offices of the law firm and does research, because at least then you can zone out or play Pac-Man on your laptop if you wanted to.

I'm not sure what the law is regarding talking about court cases in progress, so I'll leave out any major details, but basically, this guy got hauled up on murder charges. Apparently though, we missed the day of all the testimony about the murder, and we were treated to an hour and a half of the prosecution lawyers asking him about shoot-ups that occured some years ago. I can't say he gave the most convincing answers: apparently, he didn't remember what gun he had, whether it was an automatic, whether he used the whole clip, or whether he hit anyone, but he did remember the exact motion he used to jump out of the car. As Dr. Evil would say: Riiiiiiiiiiight.

Anyway, that particular experience really didn't help me to answer my essential question, but it was interesting (even though it was boring).

Before we went there, we went to a huge law firm were a New Hampton alum worked. That was pretty cool: being New Hampshire bumkins, we were all dazzled by the enormous building with all the fancy modern art inside and shiny tables. (We actually got yelled at by security for not going in the visitor's entrace. It was funny.) Anyway, I learned a couple interesting things regarding my Question, such as:

• Most corporations use law firms as a go-between between them and their lobbyists in Washington. The law firms keep it legal, mostly.
• Large firms charge large hourly rates for their services, as opposed to solo practitioners, who mostly work on a contingency basis (i.e., if I don't win, you don't have to pay me)
• Basically, this means that only big businesses and very rich private individuals can afford the services of a large law firm
• Very few civil cases involving businesses have a grand jury: most times it's just a judge. Also, it's usually a judge specifically for business matters, to help eliminate the possibility of bias.
• The main difference between large law firms and solo individuals is the amount of manpower that can be devoted to a case, not the quality of the lawyers. Big cases like patent violations need a lot more people than small civil suits, because there is so much more info to go over

The problem is, all this info seems to both answer "Yes" and "No" for my essential question. Oh, well. More will come.

- _alexander_zero

P.S. I'd post pictures, but we don't have a sync cable for the camera. They'll come later, when we get back.