Confessions of a Public Defender

[ksen]

http://www.amren.com/features/2014/05/confessions-of-a-public-defender/

I am a public defender in a large southern metropolitan area. Fewer than ten percent of the people in the area I serve are black but over 90 per cent of my clients are black. The remaining ten percent are mainly Hispanics but there are a few whites.

I have no explanation for why this is, but crime has racial patterns. Hispanics usually commit two kinds of crime: sexual assault on children and driving under the influence. Blacks commit many violent crimes but very few sex crimes. The handful of whites I see commit all kinds of crimes. In my many years as a public defender I have represented only three Asians, and one was half black.

As a young lawyer, I believed the official story that blacks are law abiding, intelligent, family-oriented people, but are so poor they must turn to crime to survive. Actual black behavior was a shock to me.

The media invariably sugarcoat black behavior. Even the news reports of the very crimes I dealt with in court were slanted. Television news intentionally leaves out unflattering facts about the accused, and sometimes omits names that are obviously black. All this rocked my liberal, tolerant beliefs, but it took me years to set aside my illusions and accept the reality of what I see every day. I have now served thousands of blacks and their families, protecting their rights and defending them in court. What follow are my observations.

Although blacks are only a small percentage of our community, the courthouse is filled with them: the halls and gallery benches are overflowing with black defendants, families, and crime victims. Most whites with business in court arrive quietly, dress appropriately, and keep their heads down. They get in and get out–if they can–as fast as they can. For blacks, the courthouse is like a carnival. They all seem to know each other: hundreds and hundreds each day, gossiping, laughing loudly, waving, and crowding the halls.

When I am appointed to represent a client I introduce myself and explain that I am his lawyer. I explain the court process and my role in it, and I ask the client some basic questions about himself. At this stage, I can tell with great accuracy how people will react. Hispanics are extremely polite and deferential. An Hispanic will never call me by my first name and will answer my questions directly and with appropriate respect for my position. Whites are similarly respectful.

A black man will never call me Mr. Smith; I am always “Mike.” It is not unusual for a 19-year-old black to refer to me as “dog.” A black may mumble complaints about everything I say, and roll his eyes when I politely interrupt so I can continue with my explanation. Also, everything I say to blacks must be at about the third-grade level. If I slip and use adult language, they get angry because they think I am flaunting my superiority.

. . .

I am a liberal. I believe that those of us who are able to produce abundance have a moral duty to provide basic food, shelter, and medical care for those who cannot care for themselves. I believe we have this duty even to those who can care for themselves but don’t. This world view requires compassion and a willingness to act on it.

My experience has taught me that we live in a nation in which a jury is more likely to convict a black defendant who has committed a crime against a white. Even the dullest of blacks know this. There would be a lot more black-on-white crime if this were not the case.

However, my experience has also taught me that blacks are different by almost any measure to all other people. They cannot reason as well. They cannot communicate as well. They cannot control their impulses as well. They are a threat to all who cross their paths, black and non-black alike.

 

[Keith&Co.]

As a young lawyer, I believed the official story that blacks are law abiding, intelligent, family-oriented people, but are so poor they must turn to crime to survive. Actual black behavior was a shock to me.

Whoa, careful.

I remember having a good time in the Navy, by and large. And knowing lots of people that covered the spectrum of humanity, from saints to sinners to country-western music fans and a few other psychotics.

The Legalmen, however, saw a different Navy than i did. They saw scum. Day in, day out, people who were being processed out of the Navy for Federal crimes, personal crimes, insubordination, sex crimes, showing up for work naked, rape, rape of other sailors, homosexuality (a crime for my whole tour), and beating up homosexuals.
But then, their sample source was different than mine. I was with The Navy, they were with The Navy That's Causing Trouble. And a subset of those. They generally didn't see the troublemakers that got turned around at Captain's mast or lesser frames of punishment/rehabilitation. They certainly never got asked to professionally investigate anyone getting an award for their performance.

I got this far in the statement and wonder how this PD's sample of the city's humanity compares to the actual average of citizens? And how it compares ot the average of criminals?
Could his percentages be explained by the fact that he only sees the criminal element which cannot afford a private lawyer? And he only samples the people caught (or at least arrested) by the police. Could racial bias among the cops affect the observatoins he makes at his point in the legal process?

I question whether his description of the sub-sub group: 'the blacks that i see' really justifies a claim to be describing 'blacks.'

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Not only that, but the blacks also want to have sex with our fine white women all the time.

Nothing a good lynching can't cure, though.

 

[Unbeatable]

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

That's the White Power emoticon.

It represents a skinhead looking down derisively at all the lesser races.

 

[ksen]

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

It's staring in shocked disbelief.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

Someone posted the excerpt over at Talk Rational and I thought it was so outrageous I wanted to share it with you guys.

 

[ksen]

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

That's the White Power emoticon.

It represents a skinhead looking down derisively at all the lesser races.

 

[Mageth]

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

That's the White Power emoticon.

It represents a skinhead looking down derisively at all the lesser races.

The lesser races? To a redneck, that could be "any race with a right-hand turn".

 

[Jarhyn]

I am glad in many ways that the underlying reality which racists use as an excuse for their proposed 'solutions' to the 'problem' of race is not supportive of their intended courses of action. That said, there is still a reality which is only a short step away from those misperceptions. It is driven not by race but by culture, particularly by cultures of ignorance which self-segregate on perceived lines of race. It's a sad reality that when I travel through mineappolis, I find myself in a veritable sea of melanin when I travel through certain neighborhoods, and a tragedy that those same neighborhoods are populated by people who act atrociously. The people living there are insulated in a layer of isolationism and terrible culture. They perceive their is as a product of the color of their skin, when it is today about the way they act and encourage their peers and children to act, also as a product of cultural perceptions of how people of a certain skin color 'should' act. As a result of a culture dynamic pidgeon-holing people based on complexion, a Bayesian logic is born which allows partial ignorance to drive complexion-based bias. Over time people not of the culture of ignorance culturalize the inference and teach it as-is to children, and then racism is born.

The solution to the very real problem of criminality in those cultures is to forcibly dissociate skin color from the equation. I would just as soon see people who want to have children be required to carry to term, and have a baby born on that day within 100 miles of them randomly assigned as 'theirs'. It is, as far as I can see, the only real way to crack the nut of cultural isolationism that develops on both sides of the 'race' issue.

 

[Valjean]

Keith&Co makes a good point. I'm not doubting the writer's sincerity, but I suspect some sampling errors.

I'd be interested in some supporting stats. He seems to be making extraordinarily global generalizations from a pretty narrow demographic.

 

[Unbeatable]

It's staring in shocked disbelief.

I also don't understand why you're posting an article from a white nationalist website.

Someone posted the excerpt over at Talk Rational and I thought it was so outrageous I wanted to share it with you guys.

I don't understand your reaction, then. To me, everything about the article was predictable.

This is a guy who, assuming he's actually real, appears to lack either the will or the skill to keep his cognitive biases in conjunction with the extremely demoralizing nature of his occupation from warping his worldview.. I'm not shocked by the nature of his experiences, or by the fact that he uses these experiences as the basis for overgeneralizations, or by the appearance of this article in a magazine aimed at white supremacists.

I don't understand what that emoticon means.

That's the White Power emoticon.

It represents a skinhead looking down derisively at all the lesser races.

But its skin is yellow, and its eyes aren't pointing downwards.

 

[Valjean]

Perhaps no mainstream publication would touch his article with a ten foot pole.

 

[Archimedes]

A black man will never call me Mr. Smith; I am always “Mike.”

Why should they? If I was arrested for a crime and was allocated a public lawyer, I wouldn't call him "Mr. Smith". I'd call him "Mike" if that's he introduced himself as Mike Smith.

It is not unusual for a 19-year-old black to refer to me as “dog.”

A person calls you by their vernacular for a generic term for referring to someone you're talking to like "bud" or "dude" or whatever. I'm shocked and appalled I am!

 

[Keith&Co.]

I am a liberal.

I tend to be labeled as a liberal, but....

I believe that those of us who are able to produce abundance have a moral duty to provide basic food, shelter, and medical care for those who cannot care for themselves.

Is this really a 'liberal' outlook? That the rich should support the poor? I would tend to think that 'all of us contribute' so that 'all of us benefit' would be a better attitude for a liberal. This? seems contrived. Esp. with the following added:

I believe we have this duty even to those who can care for themselves but don’t.

Yeah, see, i don't really accept that it's a liberal worldview to make sure that we identify people who CHOOSE to be on welfare. 'Can care for themselves but don't' seems a lot more like a conservative assumption about most welfare recepients. I would tend to think a true liberal would lean more towards phrases like 'those in need' and 'victims of social and/or economic injustices' and so on...

Anyone else who tends to sit on the Liberal side of the aisle think we have a duty to support people who 'Can care for themselves but don't'?? Or is this a conservative pretending to be liberal?

 

[dx713]

Assuming that guy exists and what he writes is true, I see it more as proof of the existence of a race problem in the US (and a slew of other countries including mine, but this discussion is about the US) than a proof for "scientific racism".
He's a public defender! If it works in the US as around here, that means he doesn't see the average criminal, who's able to pay for his own lawyer. He only sees the destitute. How come they are 90% black?

 

[doubtingt]

Yeah, this smells a lot like those testimonies of fundamentalists claiming to be former atheists. There seem to be more atheists turned fundy than actual atheists, which is quite suspicious.

But lets assume everything he says is sincere and his perceptions are fairly accurate. What do they imply. As Keith pointed out its a highly biased sample. But of course, it is a biased sample of all the races and he claims that white and hispanic defendants act quite differently.
So, how could we explain these differences based upon some rather well established empirical facts? I think the below well known facts could explain most of the observations he is making, and they are the very things that divide liberals and conservatives in terms of how they account for these facts (i.e, whether they attribute these differences to historical and immediate environment versus to innate features of race) .

Compared to white and hispanic defendants, a black defendant is more likely to:
1) have been in the justice system previously
2) have parents, siblings, friends, and other relations who have been in or still are in the justice system
3) be a high school dropout
4) distrust the justice system, including the public defenders are against them

Conservatives and liberals likely would agree with the reality of all these facts and they can explain the behavioral differences described in the OP. The disagreement is over the ultimate source of differences like the 4 listed, and whether they are the result of current and historical differences in environment and injustice versus innate features of race. Even if the OP perceptions are accurate they do nothing to address that question and thus couldn't persuade and remotely reasonable liberal to endorse conservative racism as the OP does.

 

[Togo]

I tend to be labeled as a liberal, but....

I believe that those of us who are able to produce abundance have a moral duty to provide basic food, shelter, and medical care for those who cannot care for themselves.

Is this really a 'liberal' outlook? That the rich should support the poor? I would tend to think that 'all of us contribute' so that 'all of us benefit' would be a better attitude for a liberal. This? seems contrived. Esp. with the following added:

I believe we have this duty even to those who can care for themselves but don’t.

Yeah, see, i don't really accept that it's a liberal worldview to make sure that we identify people who CHOOSE to be on welfare. 'Can care for themselves but don't' seems a lot more like a conservative assumption about most welfare recepients. I would tend to think a true liberal would lean more towards phrases like 'those in need' and 'victims of social and/or economic injustices' and so on...

Anyone else who tends to sit on the Liberal side of the aisle think we have a duty to support people who 'Can care for themselves but don't'?? Or is this a conservative pretending to be liberal?

Conservative pretending to be liberal.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

It also may be a case of that when whites get charged with a crime, they figure it's because they did something wrong, so they're somewhat ashamed about it. If black people just keep getting arrested for bullshit then after a while they're going to stop giving so much of a shit about it and just treat the courthouse as a place that they have to go from time to time, so why not enjoy yourselves?

 

[Keith&Co.]

It also may be a case of that when whites get charged with a crime, they figure it's because they did something wrong, so they're somewhat ashamed about it.

Or they're subdued because they're not sure what's going to happen to them, what impact it'll have on their life.

If the blacks stuck with a public defender are already bone-certain they're going to get screwed, it takes a lot of the anxiety off. You'll get a more natural response to stimulus. Basic human nature.

At the advancement exams, guys that knew the material cold were about as relaxed as the guys that knew that no matter what they put on the paper, there was no chance of advancement.
It's the guys who weren't sure if they had a chance or not, they were the nervous ones.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The Legalmen, however, saw a different Navy than i did. They saw scum. Day in, day out, people who were being processed out of the Navy for Federal crimes, personal crimes, insubordination, sex crimes, showing up for work naked, rape, rape of other sailors, homosexuality (a crime for my whole tour), and beating up homosexuals.
But then, their sample source was different than mine. I was with The Navy, they were with The Navy That's Causing Trouble. And a subset of those. They generally didn't see the troublemakers that got turned around at Captain's mast or lesser frames of punishment/rehabilitation. They certainly never got asked to professionally investigate anyone getting an award for their performance.

Exactly. This guy is giving a pretty good description of how the black criminal class operates and what causes them to behave that way. Where he's going badly wrong is generalizing that to blacks in general.