Starting today, and continuing on a weekly basis, my law partner Scott Reep and I will be writing a legal information column for the Benicia Herald. The purpose of this column is to answer reader’s questions about various aspects of civil, commercial and estate law in simple language, in an effort to demystify the legal process. We will be assisted in this effort by attorneys Jeffrey Hall, Mark Mitchell, Duane Oliveira and Geoffrey Steele, all of whom work of-counsel with our firm, Gizzi & Reep, LLP. In addition, we will rely on local legal experts for responses to your suggested topics in practice areas that our firm does not specialize in, such as divorce or criminal law.
Legal answers can be a funny thing. As much as we would like them to be solid, indisputable conclusions, legal analysis rarely results in black and white, yes or no, definitive answers because the slightest variation in the facts or law can change everything. For example, on a recent road trip, I asked my kids if it was wrong for someone to steal from another person to which they quickly responded “Yes, absolutely.” When asked if their answer would change if they knew that the person had only stolen because she was lost in the woods and needed to steal from an unoccupied cabin in order to survive, their answer changed – the theft was OK in that case. But…again a different response resulted when asked if it was still OK to steal to survive if the person got lost because she was escaping from the police at the time, etc., etc. . . . You get the idea.
In the real world, these layers of changing facts, some very minute, most often determine the ultimate outcome of a case and it is the attorneys’ job to work with the best facts possible when advocating for a client. Therefore, because the answers to legal questions often change as more information becomes known, often the best answer for an attorney to give when prospective clients ask if s/he has a winning case is: “it depends.”
The point in discussing the fluid nature of legal answers and analysis is to establish your expectations for this column:
First, if all legal answers were black and white, we would just feed information into a computer and it would spit out the proper legal conclusion and there would be no need for judges, juries or (heaven forbid) lawyers.
Second, no matter what answer one of our attorneys provides, be assured that somewhere there is another lawyer who will have a different spin on things. That, and the fact that your individual circumstances will vary (like a fuel mileage disclaimer) explain the reason our responses will be general in nature and cannot be construed as legal advice in any particular circumstances.
Finally, Scott and I will be more like Click and Clack® than Dear Abby®. Sometimes we’ll have a different interpretation of the same facts and it is that kind of synergy and evaluation techniques of potential outcomes that we believe provides the best legal analysis and advocacy.
