Tag Archive for 'attorney'

“The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder” by Vincent Bugliosi

Published on October 30, 2008 in Podcast. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

I interview a lot of people that have made the rounds on the network and cable talk shows, but Vincent Bugliosi is not one of them. The guy that prosecuted Charles Manson for murder cannot get an interview in the mainstream media about his new book “The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder.” Boycotted, blackballed, whatever it is, what he has to say, the powers that be do not want to hear it.

Why? According to Bugliosi: FEAR! Fear of the “Right.” It is this fear, that has protected Bush from impeachment by Democrats since 2006. Fear is why Nancy Pelosi declared, before the Democrats won control of Congress, the Democrats would not seek to impeach Bush. Maybe, after November 4th we, as a nation, can cast off fear and focus a little more on hope and justice. It is precisely this atmosphere of fear that will be the eternal and despicable legacy of the Republican Right scrawled across the face of the American Constitution. A free people living in the greatest democracy the world has ever known, live with more fear than a paranoid schizophrenic on LSD! Who would have thought it possible?

Bugliosi lays out an open and shut case that Bush knowingly lied to Congress and the American people when he and his cronies suckered us into the Iraq War. (Of course, some of you out there won’t believe this is true.) Months before Bush’s intelligence source, the CIA, told him Iraq (Saddam) did not represent any immediate threat. Weeks before the war began, Bush was asking how he could provoke Iraq into starting the war. But the worst thing George Bush did was to release an intelligence report supporting his claim for war, after he deleted the report’s conclusion that Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction and was not a threat to anyone, other than the Iraqi people.

But that is not the whole story. Believe it or not, this story will live or die come November 4, 2008: Election Day! Do you know about candidate for Attorney General in Vermont? Charlotte Dennett has made a campaign promise: If she is elected Attorney General of Vermont, she will appoint Vincent Bugliosi a Special Prosecutor to indict, try and convict George W. Bush for murder.

Sounds like a plan to me.

As Vincent says and I believe: No one, including the President of the United States, is above the law.

Court TV will make millions, no billions!!!!

Vincent Bugliosi, Author and Attorney [ 31:47 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (819)

Sara Doyle, Candidate for Georgia Court of Appeals

Published on September 17, 2008 in Podcast. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , .

Sara Doyle is our 5th Court of Appeals candidate interviewed. After 4, I was concerned that it was going to sound like “been there, done that.” It was nothing of the kind and I encourage everyone to listen and not assume you have already heard it just because you listened to some other interview.

Sara went to law school at my alma mater, Mercer, and has been practicing law for about 15 years. Currently, she is a partner with Knight & Holland, one of those big, international firms, but she began her careet in a small 8-man firm in Atlanta that did what most small firms do: a variety of this and that. When the small law firm merged with Knight & Holland, Sara was on her way. Her focus is in civil litigation and education law. Education law? I remember when there wasn’t any such thing!

Sara must be doing something right. She has been recognized as one of the top female lawyers in Georgia. I asked Sara about this rather sexist accolade. I mean I don’t know what being female or male has to do with being a good lawyer. I suspect that Sara is one of the best, male and female. Anyway, Sara was gracious in not making this a big deal. A real life example of a judicial temperament.

Listen to the interview and visit her website.

THEN GO VOTE!!!!!

Sara-Doyle, Candidate, Georgia Court of Appeals [ 29:10 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (2439)

Bruce Edenfield, Candidate for Georgia Court of Appeals

Published on September 14, 2008 in Podcast. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

Bruce Edenfield has law in his blood; no wonder he is seeking election to the Georgia Court of Appeals. His father, Newell Edenfield, was appointed by President Johnson in 1967 as a Judge of the U. S. District Court, Northern District of Georgia where he served until his death in 1981. By the way, his father was born in Southeast Georgia, Swainsboro, Emanuel County. His cousin, Gerald Edenfield, practices law in Statesboro and his other cousin is the Honorable B. Avant Edenfield, Judge, U. S. District Court, Southern District of Georgia.

Bruce has practiced law for 35 years, starting out as an Assistant Attorney General under one of the best, Arthur K. Bolton. Since 1979 he has been in private practice in Atlanta. He currently lives in Dahlonega.

Bruce has signed the pledge to run an ethical judicial campaign, which is being encouraged nationwide in an effort to get politics out of the election of judges.

More importantly, he has not filled out that ludicrous questionaire sponsored by Georgia Right to Life.

Listen to the interview and make up your own mind!

Bruce Edenfield, Candidate, Georgia Court of Appeals [ 29:26 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1862)

Blowing the Whistle in America!

Published on May 25, 2008 in Podcast. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , .

When you were growing up, did anyone ever tell you “No one likes a tattletale!” Dictionary.com defines “whistleblower” as “a person who informs on another or makes public disclosure of corruption or wrongdoing.” The truth is, no one likes a whistleblower. That is why we have to have laws and programs to protect them.

Michael Sullivan is an Atlanta attorney with Finch McCranie, LLP who specializes in representing whistleblowers. In this interview Michael discusses several of the whistleblower statutes and what it takes to qualify as a whistleblower generally.

There are more than a dozen federal laws that encourage whistleblowing and they all have different and specific requirements. Some of them make sense and some of them don’t. Like most federal laws, they are confusing as hell and take an expert, such as an attorney like Michael, to interpret. After talking with Michael, it seems pretty obvious that if a person working for or with the government believes they have information concerning some aspect of fraud or corruption, the first thing to do is contact a lawyer who handles whistleblower cases. Not all lawyers do.

The idea behind whistleblower statutes in general is that people need encouragement and protection in order for them to be willing to expose fraud and corruption. Whistleblowers always put their jobs on the line because in many instances they are getting their bosses and/or fellow employees in trouble. When a whistleblower comes forward, the reality that no one likes a tattletale becomes very personal. Sure, whistleblowers are entitled to protection from retaliation on the job, but that is a difficult thing to accomplish.

In addition to offering whistleblowers protection, the laws generally provide financial incentives to those who become whistleblowers. Generally, if they are fired, they are entitled to reinstatment and back pay, maybe double pay. They may also get their attorney fees paid. And in the right case, they might actually be entitled to receive various sums of money, kind of like a reward, based on the dollar value of the corruption they expose. The problem is that none of this is guaranteed and it takes a strong, determined person to be a whistleblower.

Pray for the whistleblowers among us—-and their attorneys.

Michael Sullivan, Attorney, Whistleblower Statutes [ 28:15 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1217)

The Shame of Forsyth County, Georgia

Published on May 24, 2008 in Podcast. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , , , , .

Tom, just like most of us trusted his doctor, Dr. John Robert Stripling, III. In this case, Dr. Stripling performed laser surgery on Tom’s prostate and within a few hours Tom was having significant problems. A few days later Tom was dead. Why did he die? What do you think? He had two holes in his bowel, which allowed feces to leak into his abdomen, which caused an infection to set in, which killed Tom.

With just these facts, who or what would any rational person think is responsible for the holes in Tom’s bowel? The laser surgery! What else! Ah, but a medical malpractice case is not so easily made. Logic does not necessarily govern the rules of law as applied the the negligence of doctors. The law requires proof. And to get that proof, you have to do two things that doctors and insurance companies hate: you have to hire a lawyer and and you have to sue the doctor.

And, I might add, based on what happened in the malpractice suit filed by Tom’s widow, the people of Forsyth County hate it, as well.

What Dr. Stripling did to Tom was negligent. What the people of Forsyth County did to his widow is shameful.

All the experts agreed that if Dr. Stripling burned the holes in Tom’s bowel, he was negligent. The only thing is, Dr. Stripling took the position that something other than his laser surgery caused the holes. And to “prove” this, Dr. Stripling’s insurance company hired an expert who testified that Tom must have swallowed Advil or Ibuprofen pills, because that is the only thing that could have done it. Imagine coming up with something that stupid!

Doctors, their lawyers and insurance companies do it all the time because they believe that jurors will believe something stupid before they will rule against a doctor. Fortunately, most jurors are not that stupid, at least not unless they come from Forsyth County, Georgia.

Twelve citizen jurors of Forsyth County, sworn to be fair and impartial, believed (against all logic) that there must have been such a “magic pill.”

Those good people of Forsyth County thought it was much more important to rule in favor of the doctor. than to do their sworn duty to decide the issue based on the “preponderance” of the evidence. The sad truth is that those misguided, pathetic citizens of Forsyth County would probably never award money to an injured person or family against a doctor. That is how deep their hatred of lawyers and lawsuits and courts and justice really is. What is worse, they are basically proud of their bias and prejudice. They admitted it when they were questioned during the jury selection process.

I don’t know any of those misguided jurors (thank goodness), but if any of them claim to be Christian, they really need to read the Bible a little more closely, particularly Deuteronomy 1:17 or Exodus 23:6 or Leviticus 19:15.

In this interview, Steve Lowery, the lawyer who represented Tom’s family, tells the story much better than I can summarize it hear.

Steve’s law firm had to file the lawsuit against Dr. Stripling in Forsyth County because that is where he lives, even though his office is in the metro Atlanta area. They would have preferred to have been in some other county, but the law requires you to sue people where they live.

I do not know what disease infects the people of Forsyth County. I don’t really care. All I know is that they made a mockery of everything the courts and our system of justice stands for. They cheated justice and truth. They cheated Tom’s family as well. They cheated all of us because they put their bias and prejudice above the law and justice. Jurors have the power to ignore their oaths, but they don’t have the right to do so.

The good citizens of Forsyth County have sown injustice. Now, the question is, when and how will they reap it.

Steve Lowery, Attorney [ 30:42 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1102)

Interview with Phil Henry

Published on May 4, 2006 in Podcast. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

Phil is an Atlanta lawyer who successfully attacked one provision of the infamous "tort reform" legislation passed by the Republican legislature in 2005. The provision at issue in his case concerned the law of "venue" which defines where (in which county) a lawsuit must be filed. Phil explains why the Supreme Court of Georgia held this provision of the law unconstitutional.

Standard Podcast [ 29:06 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (518)