Point on, pointy!

One has occasion to think about shit in law school that you don’t think about anywhere else, except maybe third grade. As kids, we are taught not to point. Later, like 4th grade, we learn that when you point, three fingers are pointing back at you. Or maybe we learn that in therapy later, which we need because we weren’t picking up on the appropriate social lessons in fourth grade. But then, we learned that there were times to point. The question “who farted?” inevitably gets a point to some poor, unsuspecting kid from the kid who really farted, because if he says “Timmy did it!” Timmy will say ‘no I didn’t, you did!” real quick then there’s a fight and the would-be pointer is suspected of having, in fact, farted. With the point, the pointer gets off the hook; then, where I’m from at least, the other kids say “A fox smells his own hole first!” to the kid who smelled the fart, and the smeller is deemed to be the farter. But then I was born in a single wide trailer in the backyard of my grandmother’s house and one of my first chores was to feed the pigs, so I don’t know that my perspective is all that great.

Now in law school there is the whole question as to whether it is appropriate for a prosecutor to point at the defendant. We all pretty much agree it’s not appropriate to call him "that guilty fucker" or “sticky fingers over there” but the pointing is still an issue. A sub issue is whether it is OK to walk over to the defendant’s table during closing and knock on the table for dramatic effect, indicating “this guilty fucker” while saying something more acceptable like “guilty on all counts” or whatever. My friend’s teammates tell her not to point. I think some of them are young guys though; for a discussion of that, see the previous entry. I do not know that she has beaten anyone in the head with a shoe.

My coach encourages us to point and even told me today to try walking over to the defendant’s table during closing argument, asking the jury to hold him guilty and then turning and looking at the defendant meaningfully. This would be easier if there was really a defendant there, but this is a mock competition so I have to stare meaningfully at an empty chair. My teammate does opening and does this sort of Vanna White indication toward the defendant’s table, and the coach tells her to point his guilty ass out. Of course, she is not to refer to him as his guilty ass. We do observe a sort of decorum in the courtroom, even if the defendant is imaginary.

I don’t know that this will be resolved, and suspect in practice that we will continue to have opinions as to whether to point, and knock, and how to say ‘that guilty fucker’ without getting ourselves a mistrial. But folks, there is a lot of room for creativity in the legal profession. Maybe I’ll just stand by the defendant’s table and ask “who farted?”