What was your “law school did not prepare me for this” moment?

[Hegdis 18596]

Was having this discussion with some colleagues and thought it would fun to continue it here. 

Mine continues to be when a client calmly cracked a beer in court while a cop was testifying. Think about how loud that sound is, and then amplify it by about a bajillion to account for the silence and decorum of the court against the backdrop of my total and utter lack of preparation for that moment. 

[Malicious Prosecutor 4581]

Running a trial in the morning.  One witness shows up for the start of the trial, but by the time it's his turn, he's vanished.  I have no idea what to do.  One of my constables says "Give me a few minutes", and goes to retrieve the witness from the bar around the corner.

First time I have a witness who is floridly delusional, so I rush to get him committed for a 30 day fitness assessment.  COmes back a month later a completely changed man.  He had been going through the DTs in court and was a massive alcoholic.

Five year old complainant on a youth sex assault allegation.  She's never going to be able to tell the court about this (she doesn't really even remember any more), but so we make plans to have her adopt her videotaped witness statement.  We make plans for there to be a screen, but the damn thing is about 3' by 4'.  So of course a five year old girl gets really bored being forced to watch a really boring movie, so she keeps playing peek-a-boo around the edge of her witness screen.

The evening I had a curling game, and realize the guy on the opposite team is a guy I'm in the midst of prosecuting for running a grow-op.  Game goes by without incident, but at the end he makes sure to shake my hand and say "Good game, MP".

 

[whoknows 673]

22 minutes ago, Malicious Prosecutor said:

The evening I had a curling game, and realize the guy on the opposite team is a guy I'm in the midst of prosecuting for running a grow-op.  Game goes by without incident, but at the end he makes sure to shake my hand and say "Good game, MP".

 

Did his team buy the beer? Did he pay cash? 

[Law Girl26 156]

Anything to do with the actual practice of law (classroom only courses).

[Malicious Prosecutor 4581]

@Hegdis I thought this would be an interesting topic, but I appear to have killed it.

Is this just another example that criminal lawyers just have better stories?  

[Hegdis 18596]

I imagine our civil colleagues have nightmare stories about sitting around in the boardroom and realizing that the complimentary ice water is tepid JUST before the client walks in. 

I really have no idea what the civil bar does. Except something something about Uriel pulling a fire alarm to shake things up back in the day. 

[cloud2010 54]

Solicitor's side:

BMO calls our office to send someone to pick up commercial mortgage in the form of a bank draft in a local branch at 4:15. Unfortunately that specific branch closed at 4 pm. Helplessly knock on BMO's door but no one answers.

truly a feels bad man moment.....

[Malicious Prosecutor 4581]

1 hour ago, Hegdis said:

I really have no idea what the civil bar does. Except something something about Uriel pulling a fire alarm to shake things up back in the day. 

Okay, so I have a civil/corporate story.  I'm a junior associate at a small town law firm.  Our firm represents a hotel.  An oil company is going through a CCAA reorganization.  The partner forgets to file whatever paperwork he should have filed in order to get the outstanding hotel bills paid by the oil company.  So he send me to the city.  Honestly we don't have a leg to stand on other than the fact our debt is really small potatoes compared to the overall re-org, and no one else is really challenging the re-org.

This was a long time ago so I forget a lot of the actual legal details.  We have to wait for the judge for awhile, and eventually we get told to appear after lunch.  The lawyer for the oil company agrees to just pay our hotel bill.  We come back after lunch... and the judge is gone.  We check with the judge's chambers, and he's left the building.  This is a problem - I have to get back to my small town practice (pretty sure this was a Friday afternoon), and this other guy wants to get this reorganization finalized and signed off on.

So the lawyer goes "I think I know where he is".  he takes me to this ritzy social and sports club.  We start wandering around the club, until we eventually find the judge in the men's change room.  So the judge signs off of the CCAA order in the change room at the club.

[Hesse 187]

^ Hope the judge had a towel on. 

[AnonLaw 62]

Man I don't have any fun judge stories other than "I saw Justice so-and-so on the street!"

Opposing counsel was high on cocaine in court once. He lost.

[Adrian 1858]

It's not rare probably but there is the "oh shit" moment when someone threatens you with physical violence. 

[TheScientist101 992]

Having a partner congratulate me (very loudly) in the office for "GRABBING THE BULL BY THE FUCKING HORNS!". 

Apparently a lot of lawyers have potty mouths. 

[Rumpy 1188]

Finding out that the "girlfriend" of a client I needed to get an affidavit from was the spouse of another client.

[beyondsection17 990]

I was preparing my insured for an examination for discovery and he says "don't worry, I've been to discovery tons of times. What do you want me to say?" and then winks. 

We subsequently admitted liability.

Edited January 31, 2019 by beyondsection17

[DariaMorgendorfer 38]

When I was articling a client canned an exceedingly well compensated employee for cause.

Client assured senior associate on file that manager will swear employee told him he was starting competing business. Senior associate sends me to interview manager and draft affidavit.

Client sits with me and manager for five hours putting words in manager's mouth. Manager's recollections are impossibly vague. What is clear is that any cross of manager on this affidavit would be disastrous.

I explain this to senior associate, who instructs me to draft as specific an affidavit as I can based on what manager did recall. Might as well pin that down in case, right? I do it, senior associate sends it to client.

Client sends us an email response ripping into me for how shitty the affidavit is. Insists manager recalls x y and z and these should go in the affidavit. Calls me incompetent, demands I be taken off file. 

The senior associate was really kind to me and made sure I knew I hadn't done anything wrong, but I was NOT prepared for that shit.  

Edited January 31, 2019 by DariaMorgendorfer

[realpseudonym 2535]

I was interviewing a client and she's talking about how she had been diagnosed with breast cancer. I asked her whether she had evidence with her and she unbuttoned her top two buttons, before I'm like "wait no what are you doing stop I meant medical evidence, like documents from your doctors or something, stop." 

Also,  the "oh shit" moment when someone threatens you with physical violence.

 

[serdog 161]

Having to decide on mode of trial in a week for a trial that is 7 weeks out and I'm newly retained (after comittal to the Supreme Court so it is  judge alone v Judge and jury deadline is because of jury summons)

[Hegdis 18596]

Had a fun one from bail court. Accused in the dock kept referring to the Crown as “Mitt Romney over there”. This Crown doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to Mitt Romeny. 

About ninety percent of the way through the bail hearing for a relatively serious allegation, the accused realizes something and raises his hand. The Judge patiently suggests he let duty counsel speak for him, but he interjects:

Accused: “Sorry your Honour, I just wanted to say I meant to be calling him-“ [gestures to the Crown] “Matlock.”

Judge: “Ah. Well, I am glad we got that cleared up.”

Accused: “I guess that wasn’t making a lot of sense.”

Judge: “No, well - Mr [Crown] is a fine lawyer so it’s not really -“

Accused (interrupting): “Well, I guess I want my lawyer to be Matlock, not him.”

Judge: “Yes-“

Accused: “I didn’t really think this through.”

[darkangel45422 45]

Walking into cells as an articling student in my first week in bail court to speak to a newly arrested accused person and having the accused tell me "Oh it's alright, I'm not worried - I own the courthouse and I pay all your salaries so I can walk out of here at any moment, I'm just chilling for now." Law school DEFINITELY did not prepare me for trying to get instructions out of a guy who suffers delusions that he pays my salary lol.

 

Also definitely the threats of physical violence. Nothing quite prepares you for clients vividly detailing how they plan to kill you if you don't get them bail/out of a jail sentence/adjourned back to the jail THIS INSTANT so they can make pizza night. -sigh-

[Aureliuse 319]

Client has a mental breakdown and causes a scene 5 minutes before we walk in on a motion. Ex walks along and apologies profusely to everyone and tries to calm client.

I lost that day btw. Ex was nice enough not to ask for costs.

Guess what area of law I practice?

Edited October 2, 2019 by Aureliuse