I’ll say right out that I love Bradley Whitford’s new show, The Good Guys. It’s funny and fresh, the actors are fantastic, and the writing is sharp. However, they missed the boat in the last episode I watched called Cop Killer. It was about an Internal Affairs officer who has it out for our main character, Dan Stark.
Of course, IA can indeed have vendetta on their minds. But this show got it all wrong, and it wouldn’t have hurt the plot one whit if they’d done it right. Maybe it bugged me so much because I do employment law, but the whole episode made me squirm.
Union Reps and Union Lawyers
Once a police officer is accused of misconduct, he’d have his union representative in with him on any questioning. This show is in Dallas, which has the Dallas Police Association representing officers there. The DPA has a law firm on retainer to represent its members. The Texas Municipal Police Officers Association also provides legal representation to members. (It took me 10 minutes and Google to find out the names of the organizations and the kinds of representation they offer, so why didn’t the writers bother?)
The officer wouldn’t be sitting alone with IA answering questions unless he’d lost his mind. And Stark and his partner wouldn’t be dithering about hiring a lawyer. Stark says he doesn’t want to pay, but he wouldn’t have to. Even my husband, a non-lawyer, was frustrated. He kept yelling at the screen, “Get a lawyer!”
The union contract (the collective bargaining agreement) will have details about what rights the officers have if questioned by IA, who can be present, what hoops they have to jump through to suspend the officer, and what appeal rights the officer has at each step. It’s unlikely that the union would allow IA to announce they were taking away the weapons of the two partners and that they were no longer police officers during the investigation. What union would agree to have so few rights for its members? Police unions are very politically powerful. They have the ability to negotiate lots of rights for their members, and their members know to invoke their rights.
DAs Don't Represent Perps, Even if They're Friends
When our hero Stark’s partner asked his girlfriend, the Assistant DA who prosecutes police misconduct, to represent Stark they really crossed over into the ridiculous. The Assistant DA would no way be involved in representing an accused cop. No officer with any sense at all would even ask her. To her credit, she said no, then helped off the record. But the fact that the writers had Stark refuse to lawyer up was off the wall. He’d be screaming for his rights, and the show would have been funnier having Mr. Law-And-Order-I-Hate-Lawyers suddenly best buds with a defense lawyer.
Disbarment is by the Bar
The IA guy (played by Joshua Malina of Sports Night and The West Wing) also threatened to have the Assistant DA disbarred. How on Earth could he do that? He’s not the State Bar of Texas. He could maybe file a complaint, but more likely he’d just go up the chain of command and seek to have her fired or disciplined by the prosecutor’s office. He’d have no authority over her whatsoever. The prosecutor’s office (Dallas County District Attorney’s Office) and the police department are completely separate entities. They have to be. Otherwise no prosecution would have any credibility. Can you imagine the defense arguments? What jury would believe the prosecutor wasn’t in the pocket of the police if the Police Chief could fire her?
An Easy Fix
The Good Guys is a show worth watching. It’s about a talented but off the wall cop, mentally stuck in the 70s, who has no concept of modern police procedure, computers, or civil rights. His partner is a young up-and-comer who balances Stark’s recklessness while learning to loosen up. I’ve adored Bradley Whitford since The West Wing and Colin Hanks (Tom Hanks’ son) as his partner is perfect casting.
Stark is always in trouble with the department because he breaks the rules. The IA character mentioned Stark’s last IA investigation, and Stark crowed that he was cleared. We’re supposed to believe he was cleared without representation? That all these years he breaks the rules and gets away with it with no union rep or lawyer helping? Horse hockey. He’d know his rights by heart and have his union rep and union lawyer on speed dial.
There’s an officer in the show who absolutely hates Stark – I’d have made him Stark’s union rep. Union representatives have to represent coworkers they hate all the time. It would have been hilarious.
Getting it Right
This episode bugged me to no end. I expected to enjoy it since Josh Malina has also been one of my favorite actors ever since Sports Night. He was wasted here, but I hope we’ll see him as a recurring character. The episode was so far off reality that it took me out of the story. Hopefully the writers will step up their game to their usual high standards going forward.
Getting it right is worth the trouble, even when it’s comedy. A little research can make a good story better and give you good plot twists. Maybe I should send the writers a copy of The Writer’s Guide to the Courtroom: Let’s Quill All the Lawyers.
Or they could just ask me questions here, in the comments section, like you can. I’m glad to help.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Monday, December 13, 2010
Who Might Your Murderer Character Want to Kill Off (Besides Lawyers)? Six People Who May Just Need to be Murdered
When I teach at writers conferences about using the law in stories, sometimes writers have no idea how helpful the law can be. One of the ways the law can really help your story is the characters. If you’re writing a murder mystery, you need a victim. Who gets killed and why are central to your story. Now, everybody knows the first thing you do is kill all the lawyers (at least if you want to overthrow a government, as was the context of Shakespeare’s quote). So I won’t bore you with why lawyers make good murder victims. Res ipsa loquitur (the thing speaks for itself).
I want to talk about some other people operating in the legal system who move around enough or who have enough information that they might be asking to be killed off. I’m going to tell you about six of them, but my book, The Writer’s Guide to the Courtroom: Let’s Quill All the Lawyers, has loads of suggestions if you need more.
1. Legal secretaries handle scheduling, prepare some court notices, draft some minor court documents, prepare letters, type (although this is becoming less of the job now that most attorneys prepare their initial drafts on their own computers), transcribe (again, more and more rare), file, deal with client and opposing counsel calls, and keep the lawyer’s office running smoothly. You could have a legal secretary who steals a trust account check and the lawyer faces disbarment, or who knows the lawyer is the perpetrator of a giant ponzi scheme. Legal secretaries know everything about the attorney, so they make great witnesses, or blackmailers. Which makes them excellent murder victims.
2. Office managers handle the business and human resources end of the law practice. If your paralegal or legal secretary character starts mouthing off to the boss, the office manager may be the one to step in. Maybe he steps in front of a two-by-four wielded by a disgruntled secretary. Office managers can also be used in your story to do the dirty work: getting rid of staff, hiding documents, moving people from department to department to keep any one person from knowing too much. Does this get them killed? Do they embezzle the trust money? They will probably have passwords and access to the firm’s accounts. Frequently seen in larger firms, this role is now being handled in midsize and smaller firms by someone trained in either accounting or administration. Could your office manager character be quietly figuring out how to retire? Could she be undercover trying to bring in a crooked attorney? Or did she fail to end up in witness protection before the mobster client whacked her?
3. Notaries witness and put their seal on signatures to verify that they obtained good identification from the person signing and that the signature is true, and certify copies of documents as being true copies. They can give oaths and perform wedding ceremonies. Banks, law firms, and copy centers frequently have staff notaries. Did your dishonest notary put a piece of property in their own name? Did they notarize a document with lots of white space and turn it into a will in their favor? Or, do they know uncover a forgery? Notaries can be witnesses to all kinds of fraud in your stories. They could be on the run, in witness protection, or a murder victim.
Unscrupulous notaries can use the Spanish translation, “notario” to bilk unsuspecting immigrants. The term notario can refer to a lawyer or someone of similar stature in some countries. Many notarios engage in the unauthorized practice of law here in the U.S. This comes up frequently in immigration fraud scams. Is your character an illegal immigrant who thought they were legal? Did the notario’s scam get them deported? Might be a motive for murder.
4. The judicial assistant, or JA, handles scheduling of hearings, trials, and other court proceedings. They usually handle and mark the evidence when it is admitted. In other words, they are the judge’s right arm. The demeanor of a judicial assistant is usually a good reflection of the demeanor of the judge. Dealing with a great JA is one of the great pleasures of legal secretaries, paralegals and lawyers. A nasty or incompetent JA can make legal life miserable. Your characters can show up to hearings that aren’t on the calendar, sit in the courtroom for hours as proceedings run late, have courtesy copies of motions and cases that were sent to the judge well in advance suddenly lost, and other JA-caused tribulations. Could drive anyone over the brink, couldn’t it? The JA could also witness bribery, threats, or jury tampering, which means they could blackmail a lawyer or judge. We know what happens to blackmailers and people who know too much, don’t we?
5. Process servers hand court documents to people who don’t want them. Lawsuits, orders to testify in court or bring documents, or orders to stop doing something, your characters won’t be happy to see a process server. Many people try to evade process servers, who have to get clever to serve those individuals. Fake pizza deliveries, exterminators, pulling fire alarms, could be used to humorous advantage in a story. Or get your process server killed. Most people realize that the process server is just doing their job. The likely reaction of your character served with a suit is to thank the process server. Boring, but accurate. But maybe they see the character with a mistress. Many process servers are also private investigators, and some have law enforcement backgrounds. Having a character who moves around lots, who is observant, and who knows something about the law could come in handy in all kinds of creative ways, couldn’t it? Or do they know too much?
6. A court reporter’s job is to write down every word said in court, listen to every word of every legal proceeding they cover, and be able to write it down accurately. A missed word can be catastrophic to a trial. Imagine the deposition transcript in your story with an omitted “not” or “no.” Or with the wrong speaker listed. What if a court reporter hates your attorney character because he broke up with her? She might decide to change the words. Court reporters are almost invisible. During breaks, lawyers and witnesses forget they’re even there, so court reporters hear all kinds of things they probably shouldn’t. You can have one hear a death threat or blackmail. If someone prone to murderous rage suddenly realizes the court reporter was present, who knows what might happen?
Some others who might be in a position to blackmail or witness something they shouldn’t have seen are bailiffs, runners/messengers, and paralegals. We all know that the motives for murder can be complex or simple, funny or horrible. Murder mystery writers need to choose their victims carefully.
Hopefully now you have some more ideas on who your murderer needs to knock off. The rest, my friends, is up to you. Happy writing!
I want to talk about some other people operating in the legal system who move around enough or who have enough information that they might be asking to be killed off. I’m going to tell you about six of them, but my book, The Writer’s Guide to the Courtroom: Let’s Quill All the Lawyers, has loads of suggestions if you need more.
1. Legal secretaries handle scheduling, prepare some court notices, draft some minor court documents, prepare letters, type (although this is becoming less of the job now that most attorneys prepare their initial drafts on their own computers), transcribe (again, more and more rare), file, deal with client and opposing counsel calls, and keep the lawyer’s office running smoothly. You could have a legal secretary who steals a trust account check and the lawyer faces disbarment, or who knows the lawyer is the perpetrator of a giant ponzi scheme. Legal secretaries know everything about the attorney, so they make great witnesses, or blackmailers. Which makes them excellent murder victims.
2. Office managers handle the business and human resources end of the law practice. If your paralegal or legal secretary character starts mouthing off to the boss, the office manager may be the one to step in. Maybe he steps in front of a two-by-four wielded by a disgruntled secretary. Office managers can also be used in your story to do the dirty work: getting rid of staff, hiding documents, moving people from department to department to keep any one person from knowing too much. Does this get them killed? Do they embezzle the trust money? They will probably have passwords and access to the firm’s accounts. Frequently seen in larger firms, this role is now being handled in midsize and smaller firms by someone trained in either accounting or administration. Could your office manager character be quietly figuring out how to retire? Could she be undercover trying to bring in a crooked attorney? Or did she fail to end up in witness protection before the mobster client whacked her?
3. Notaries witness and put their seal on signatures to verify that they obtained good identification from the person signing and that the signature is true, and certify copies of documents as being true copies. They can give oaths and perform wedding ceremonies. Banks, law firms, and copy centers frequently have staff notaries. Did your dishonest notary put a piece of property in their own name? Did they notarize a document with lots of white space and turn it into a will in their favor? Or, do they know uncover a forgery? Notaries can be witnesses to all kinds of fraud in your stories. They could be on the run, in witness protection, or a murder victim.
Unscrupulous notaries can use the Spanish translation, “notario” to bilk unsuspecting immigrants. The term notario can refer to a lawyer or someone of similar stature in some countries. Many notarios engage in the unauthorized practice of law here in the U.S. This comes up frequently in immigration fraud scams. Is your character an illegal immigrant who thought they were legal? Did the notario’s scam get them deported? Might be a motive for murder.
4. The judicial assistant, or JA, handles scheduling of hearings, trials, and other court proceedings. They usually handle and mark the evidence when it is admitted. In other words, they are the judge’s right arm. The demeanor of a judicial assistant is usually a good reflection of the demeanor of the judge. Dealing with a great JA is one of the great pleasures of legal secretaries, paralegals and lawyers. A nasty or incompetent JA can make legal life miserable. Your characters can show up to hearings that aren’t on the calendar, sit in the courtroom for hours as proceedings run late, have courtesy copies of motions and cases that were sent to the judge well in advance suddenly lost, and other JA-caused tribulations. Could drive anyone over the brink, couldn’t it? The JA could also witness bribery, threats, or jury tampering, which means they could blackmail a lawyer or judge. We know what happens to blackmailers and people who know too much, don’t we?
5. Process servers hand court documents to people who don’t want them. Lawsuits, orders to testify in court or bring documents, or orders to stop doing something, your characters won’t be happy to see a process server. Many people try to evade process servers, who have to get clever to serve those individuals. Fake pizza deliveries, exterminators, pulling fire alarms, could be used to humorous advantage in a story. Or get your process server killed. Most people realize that the process server is just doing their job. The likely reaction of your character served with a suit is to thank the process server. Boring, but accurate. But maybe they see the character with a mistress. Many process servers are also private investigators, and some have law enforcement backgrounds. Having a character who moves around lots, who is observant, and who knows something about the law could come in handy in all kinds of creative ways, couldn’t it? Or do they know too much?
6. A court reporter’s job is to write down every word said in court, listen to every word of every legal proceeding they cover, and be able to write it down accurately. A missed word can be catastrophic to a trial. Imagine the deposition transcript in your story with an omitted “not” or “no.” Or with the wrong speaker listed. What if a court reporter hates your attorney character because he broke up with her? She might decide to change the words. Court reporters are almost invisible. During breaks, lawyers and witnesses forget they’re even there, so court reporters hear all kinds of things they probably shouldn’t. You can have one hear a death threat or blackmail. If someone prone to murderous rage suddenly realizes the court reporter was present, who knows what might happen?
Some others who might be in a position to blackmail or witness something they shouldn’t have seen are bailiffs, runners/messengers, and paralegals. We all know that the motives for murder can be complex or simple, funny or horrible. Murder mystery writers need to choose their victims carefully.
Hopefully now you have some more ideas on who your murderer needs to knock off. The rest, my friends, is up to you. Happy writing!
Friday, December 10, 2010
Need a Character? The Top Five Characters Who Might Be Watching
When I teach at writers conferences about using the law in stories, sometimes writers have no idea how helpful the law can be. One of the ways the law can really help your story is the characters. The great part about lawyers is they don’t have just one background. Where doctors have to have studied certain things, lawyers can study absolutely anything in undergraduate school. So they make great characters who can give you infinite possibilities. If you’re writing a murder mystery, you need witnesses. But many other stories need someone to see something happening to move the plot forward.
I want to talk about some other people operating in the legal system who move around enough or who have enough information that they might be useful to your stories. I’m going to tell you about five of them, but my book, The Writer’s Guide to the Courtroom: Let’s Quill All the Lawyers, has loads of suggestions if you need more.
1. Bailiffs: Bailiffs keep order in the court. They see and hear everything that goes on in court, so it’s their job is to observe. As characters, they can be witnesses, blackmailers, or heroes. They are the ones who protect the judges if there is any violence, and they protect the jurors, witnesses, and lawyers as well. They frequently have to lend a hand checking lawyers in for hearings, handling evidence, calling witnesses in, and other administrative tasks. They escort the jury to and from the jury room, and stay outside the door to make sure they stay safe, sequestered, and get what they need. Maybe they overhear jurors discussing a case with a reporter. Or they witness their judge accepting a bribe. They may be the one person who can identify the guy who delivered the poisoned lunch to the jury.
2. Runners and messengers make deliveries, do copies and run errands for the attorneys. This puts them in a place where they can move around and observe activities of all your characters. Courier services will usually handle most same-day deliveries, but many larger firms have in-house people dealing with deliveries. Did the runner in your story deliver flowers to a prosecutor with whom a defense lawyer is having an affair? Did they have the package of incriminating tapes they were supposed to mail but took home and listened to instead? In-house runners or messengers will also assist with copying and other more menial tasks. These make great characters because they know all the office gossip. And maybe what evidence was destroyed.
3. Process servers hand official documents to people who don’t want them. Lawsuits, orders to testify in court or bring documents, and orders to stop doing something are items your characters won’t be happy about. Many people try to evade process servers, who have to get clever to serve those individuals. Fake flower deliveries, disguises, sneaking in the back, could be used for humor or get your process server killed. Maybe they see the character with a prostitute. Having a character who moves around lots, who is observant and who sometimes has a law enforcement background could come in handy in your story, couldn’t it?
4. A court reporter’s job is to write down every word said in court, listen to every word of every legal proceeding they cover, and write it down accurately. A missed word can be catastrophic to a trial. What if one of these reporters hates your attorney character because he yelled at her? They’re almost invisible, which makes them great witnesses. During breaks, lawyers and witnesses forget they’re even there. Court reporters hear all kinds of things they probably shouldn’t. You can have one hear a bribe during a break. Or a death threat during a deposition.
5. Paralegals assist lawyers in investigation and research, prepare documents, organize and review client files, draft court documents, interview clients and witnesses, and assist at trials. The fact that the paralegal works so closely with the attorney puts them in a unique position for your story. They may know about a bribe, malpractice, or perjury. Maybe they were instructed to shred documents in the middle of a trial. Remember the paralegal character in The Riches? She found out Doug Rich may not be who or what he said he was.
So next time you say the law can’t help with your story, think about characters you need to observe something in your story. It doesn’t have to be a murder. Characters who are in a position to observe are handy in any type of story.
I want to talk about some other people operating in the legal system who move around enough or who have enough information that they might be useful to your stories. I’m going to tell you about five of them, but my book, The Writer’s Guide to the Courtroom: Let’s Quill All the Lawyers, has loads of suggestions if you need more.
1. Bailiffs: Bailiffs keep order in the court. They see and hear everything that goes on in court, so it’s their job is to observe. As characters, they can be witnesses, blackmailers, or heroes. They are the ones who protect the judges if there is any violence, and they protect the jurors, witnesses, and lawyers as well. They frequently have to lend a hand checking lawyers in for hearings, handling evidence, calling witnesses in, and other administrative tasks. They escort the jury to and from the jury room, and stay outside the door to make sure they stay safe, sequestered, and get what they need. Maybe they overhear jurors discussing a case with a reporter. Or they witness their judge accepting a bribe. They may be the one person who can identify the guy who delivered the poisoned lunch to the jury.
2. Runners and messengers make deliveries, do copies and run errands for the attorneys. This puts them in a place where they can move around and observe activities of all your characters. Courier services will usually handle most same-day deliveries, but many larger firms have in-house people dealing with deliveries. Did the runner in your story deliver flowers to a prosecutor with whom a defense lawyer is having an affair? Did they have the package of incriminating tapes they were supposed to mail but took home and listened to instead? In-house runners or messengers will also assist with copying and other more menial tasks. These make great characters because they know all the office gossip. And maybe what evidence was destroyed.
3. Process servers hand official documents to people who don’t want them. Lawsuits, orders to testify in court or bring documents, and orders to stop doing something are items your characters won’t be happy about. Many people try to evade process servers, who have to get clever to serve those individuals. Fake flower deliveries, disguises, sneaking in the back, could be used for humor or get your process server killed. Maybe they see the character with a prostitute. Having a character who moves around lots, who is observant and who sometimes has a law enforcement background could come in handy in your story, couldn’t it?
4. A court reporter’s job is to write down every word said in court, listen to every word of every legal proceeding they cover, and write it down accurately. A missed word can be catastrophic to a trial. What if one of these reporters hates your attorney character because he yelled at her? They’re almost invisible, which makes them great witnesses. During breaks, lawyers and witnesses forget they’re even there. Court reporters hear all kinds of things they probably shouldn’t. You can have one hear a bribe during a break. Or a death threat during a deposition.
5. Paralegals assist lawyers in investigation and research, prepare documents, organize and review client files, draft court documents, interview clients and witnesses, and assist at trials. The fact that the paralegal works so closely with the attorney puts them in a unique position for your story. They may know about a bribe, malpractice, or perjury. Maybe they were instructed to shred documents in the middle of a trial. Remember the paralegal character in The Riches? She found out Doug Rich may not be who or what he said he was.
So next time you say the law can’t help with your story, think about characters you need to observe something in your story. It doesn’t have to be a murder. Characters who are in a position to observe are handy in any type of story.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)