Development

The updates will be quick - I have lunch to eat soon. First, my lawyer is a fine fellow, though this day, the first time I met him, he did what he could to make the opposite impression. I made it to my required appearance on time, and he called me to tell me that he had a "family emergency" and would be about a half hour late. I later learned that he has a girlfriend, and he did not talk of family with me again. This half hour of tardiness moved me to the back of the queue in the day's docket. Strangely, the father of a previous live-in girlfriend was present in the courtroom. We waved hello. I saw proceedings for many of the other required attendees, including:

1) A girl who received a deferred judgement on the felony of stabbing her boyfriend after an argument. Her probation would not begin until the ex-boyfriend was notified of the judgment and sentence.

2) An older gentlman, in custody, who had somehow filed enough motions on his crime (which is unknown to me) and had enough testimony and evidence, etc., to amass 32,000 pages of discovery. This mountain of documentation would need to be reviewed by any state-appointed attorney before they could represent him, under some code or standard. The young woman who was appointed to him, however, caused him significant grief and he requested his council be appointed under several very auspicious conditions. This was very confusing and the man spoke in as much legalese as possible, even if it made no sense, in his prison garb. In the end, I believe he will represent himself, though the court frowns on this practice.

3) One man owed $20k in restitution and requested that his probation does not include drug tests and the like. I believe that he got off pretty easy.

4) Three men were released from custody, one having served about 5 months in jail on a charge for which he would have likely been sentenced to 90 days. He was set free today. These men all seemed happy. The kid who had been in jail for 5 months had his family there.

My specific issue was not resolved, but progress was made. The girl whose coat I mistook for my own was apparently "not very mad" at me, so my attorney feels that we can reach some kind of plea agreement. He spoke at length about alcoholism with me and suggested I start going to AA meetings, to have something to show the judge that I am addressing the problem I have, or at least trying to figure out whether I have a problem. I will get these meeting attendances signed off and they will be presented in my 'defense.' Leo himself is a recovered, sober alcoholic, who has attended AA meetings with some of the most powerful men in the metro area, apparently. He knew a kid who died too young from being an alcoholic, but also being somehow a millionaire at 30 and into cocaine and owning yachts and running from the law and the like. One AA meeting Leo had attended had people in the room of a combined net worth north of $100 million, according to Leo. I would not like for my net worth to be measured in dollars, I decided after having this conversation.