Private attorneys are aghast at the conditions I describe at the Prosecutor s Office two weeks to prepare a trial, limited secretarial support. Sitting in an office all day is like a prison sentence to them. I used to feel confident that when I rode in to the courtroom, I wore a white hat. But now, more times than not, I feel that I am still wearing the white hat. The problem is that many times the good guy has also wronged the bad guy somehow, and disputes hinge on a matter of degrees.
Civil practice is the business of forging and dissolving relationships.
The guy who is your client s best hope today may be her worst nightmare tomorrow. Roles are much fuzzier, and the law can be less clear-cut. Perhaps the fact that civil law is so much more complex leads to the assumption that attorneys manipulate it to suit their client s advantage. In fact, what I see now is that civil practitioners also serve the law rather than merely manipulate it for their client s case. Today I try to wear the white hat, I think I wear the white hat, but just as often that hat is black, or even brown.