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Mr. Defense Attorney is making these laughable arguments, for the purposes of teaching I’m guessing, and he’s being smug? Sheesh.
Nah, you’ve got it all wrong. Look at how readily they start squabbling, and how neither misses an opportunity to needle the other. It’s almost as if each one is purposefully creating opportunities for the other one to leap in and harass them.
There’s some serious unresolved sexual tension going on here, is what I’m saying. I think I ship Pi/Delta Counsel now.
(Okay not really, but I bet I can make Nathan’s wife snort her drink out her nose again.)
(Also, it looks like Pi may have misjudged where Delta Counsel was going with his argument.)
It doesn’t matter, really. I know this whole thing is for educational purposes and we’re getting the sound legal argument, then the rebuttal that explains why it doesn’t work like that. But really, it’s kind of funny how seriously smug the guy is acting, when the argument, “Yeah, the state can’t use the gun that was fired at them, then tossed in the bushes right in front of them” doesn’t really pass the laugh test.
See, I would have thought the prosecutor’s the one being all smug.
You’re right, though, that the defense attorney really doesn’t have much of an argument here. There are many reasons (apart from the pedagogical) why he might nevertheless be raising it. He may be doing it to satisfy some need of his client. He may be doing it to preserve issues in the event of an appeal. He may be doing it because he thinks the government should be put to the test every step of the way. He may be doing it for some tactical reason. Etc. etc.
Here at a pretrial hearing, many lawyers would say there’s really no downside to making at least a colorable argument. The worst that can happen is it’s rejected. (Contrast this with an appeal, where many of those same lawyers would advise leaving out the weaker arguments, because they can make your stronger arguments appear weak by association.)
Fair enough.
I figure the prosecutor can afford to act a bit smug here. The defense isn’t really in a position to.
He’s probably trying to argue that their is no evidence that the defendant owned a gun and it is only the cop that is claiming the gun was in the guy’s possession, or that it wasn’t used in the crime, so is irrelevant. There is a shred of legitimacy in the last point, but only a shred.
It was fired at the police. I believe in most states, that’s a crime.
At the very least, it was pointed at them. I think there probably are places where that’s against the law.
Ok, it’s been too many weeks since the start of this, so I didn’t remember that point.
Even pointing a gun can reasonably be construed as a threat and danger.
I believe the term is “assault with a deadly weapon” which is usually a bit serious.
If you abandon property by denying ownership, though, what can the police really do at that point? All you’ve told them is that it isn’t yours; it could belong to someone else, so now they need to find out who owns it and get their permission.
They don’t have to accept that it isn’t yours, you know. Patty clearly denied any connection to the drugs in her car, for all the good it did her.