Minnesota Criminal Defense Attorney Talks Rule of Law, DC Insurrection and George Floyd Trial.
What happens if people don’t buy into a system, legal, political or otherwise? What happens if some think it is fake and rigged. Simply put, they opt out. Director of FBI Christopher Wray testified before Congress yesterday about the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol and about a concept called Rule of Law.
As a former prosecutor and criminal defense attorney who tries a lot of criminal cases in Minnesota but also teaches Rule of Law to lawyers around the U.S. and across the world, I have a few thoughts of my own. Simply put, legitimacy is important and if people don’t buy in, its the beginning of the end. Its more than just taking your marbles and going home. Its often about taking the board, flipping it over and stomping on it and setting it on fire before you leave.
Some think the phrase Rule of Law sounds like a jack-boot totalitarian, top down concept of authority. Actually, they’d be wrong. Really, it is just the opposite. Rule of Law is really a bottom up concept of legitimacy and acceptance of a system that applies to all. Its as much about soft power as hard.
As a criminal defense attorney, it may seem counterintuitive but calling out a police officer when he lies in trial, and I have, is Rule of Law. Calling out a Judge when they mis-state the law, and I have, is also Rule of Law. It is about legitimacy.
As I think about the January 6th uprising, it does have its similarities to what happened here in Minneapolis/St. Paul after the death of George Floyd. Thousands in the streets, angry. Both represented people who decided the system was fake, that it was rigged and that Rule of Law was nothing but a sham. Of course, the similarities ended there but the underlying questions were very similar.
The George Floyd murder trial of Derek Chauvin is scheduled to begin on March 8th and the Twin Cities are collectively taking a breath to see what happens inside the courtroom and also what happens outside. However, in the end, the real question for all sides is a simple one: Is the system really legitimate or is it faked, is it rigged? Can Derek Chauvin get a fair trial? Should he? Or, do people want a quickly guilty verdict so we can move on with our lives? The answers to those questions also impact the Rule of Law.
As a Minnesota criminal defense attorney that spends his life inside of courtrooms and out in the world too trying to understand the very real question of Rule of Law, I appeared on a recent International news program to address exactly that.