Defense attorneys are often forced to stand up for why they represent certain defendants

That’s the perception of many when the crime is heinous — such as the double slaying of Randy Newton Jr., 21, and Bryan Kilgore, 20, allegedly by Michael Jason Registe, who was extradited last month from the Caribbean island of St. Maarten.

But American criminal defense lawyers are trained to look past such passions, to defend and deliver vigorous legal defenses to our nation’s most unpopular defendants.

There was John Adams standing up for the perpetrators of the Boston Massacre. Robert Shapiro and Johnnie Cochran defended O.J. Simpson. August “Bud” Siemon defended Carlton Gary, Columbus’ infamous “Stocking Strangler.” Several attorneys defended Brian Nichols, Atlanta’s “Courthouse Shooter.” And shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, California big-firm lawyer James J. Brosnahan represented John Walker Lindh, who became known as the American Taliban.

Some of these cases ended in acquittal, some in conviction, and in Lindh’s case, with a plea to lesser charges.

“I think everyone deserves to be represented by good counsel, and gossip at a cocktail party just doesn’t matter,” said Columbus public defender Bob Wadkins. “It means nothing.”

Last week, former prosecutor Stacey Jackson was hired to represent Registe in the murder case. Jackson said a criminal trial is never a formality.

“It is a guaranteed right — not trial by media or public perception, but a trial by jury,” Jackson said.

The legal principle of “innocent until proven guilty” is encoded in Georgia law at OCGA 16-1-5, as well as cases under the United States Constitution. But accepting it and applying it to reality are two different issues, says defense attorney and former Columbus Mayor Frank Martin.

People see a suspected criminal on television or read about him in the newspaper. They see when he’s arrested and charged. The assumption that he’s guilty, Martin said, is made long before that person reaches a courtroom.

“And then comes the question, how can you represent someone who is guilty?” he added.

His standard answer: A charge against a suspect does not mean he or she is guilty. Only a conviction or a guilty plea means that.

Unpopular cause

Martin is familiar with representing the unpopular and the repercussions it can bring. He represented Michael Curry after the Aug. 29, 1985, deaths of Curry’s pregnant wife and two children. Curry’s indictment in May came almost 25 years after the slayings.

Some in Columbus have always believed that Curry was responsible for their deaths, even though he wasn’t charged in the wake of the high-profile killings.

The district attorney’s decision not to charge Curry years ago didn’t stop people from conducting an anti-Martin campaign during his ultimately successful run for Columbus mayor in 1990.

“It would be detrimental to the interests of all citizens if he is elected mayor,” Bernice Johnson, Ann Curry’s mother, told the Ledger-Enquirer. “He only served in the court in the interest of the criminal element.”

Michael Curry was indicted and charged with murder, aggravated assault and feticide for the deaths of 24-year-old Ann Curry, who was eight months pregnant when she and her children, Erika, 4, and Ryan, 18 months, were slain with a bush ax.

Should he have vigorous representation?

Martin likened it to a gunshot victim brought to the hospital. He needs surgery or will die, but the doctor believes the person is guilty of a crime and refuses treatment.

Martin has given that scenario to people before. Most times, they respond that the doctor has a duty to save lives.

“Well, it’s the lawyer’s duty in a courtroom to protect his client’s constitutional rights,” Martin said. “What’s the difference?”

Wadkins, Columbus’ public defender, said an attorney’s canon of ethics calls on lawyers to take on unpopular causes. He said he didn’t shun them in private practice, and his office has no choice in which cases it takes.

One of those was Todd West, one of 20 men swept up in the 2006 “To Catch a Predator” sting in Harris County. He was caught on video and there were transcripts of an online conversation with a decoy on file. West appeared guilty. According to the Georgia Department of Corrections Web site, West is currently serving a five-year sentence for attempted child molestation.

‘American Taliban’

Lindh, the American Taliban, initially faced accusations including conspiring to kill Americans.

This was only months after the 9/11 attacks, said Brosnahan, the California attorney who represented him. Everyone was concerned about the attacks and the possibility of future attacks, he said, and Lindh was castigated.

Brosnahan called the actions of then-U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft unfair. Ashcroft was explicit in his statement that Lindh was connected to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Brosnahan said.

“I never saw anything like it in my life,” Brosnahan added. “It was deliberate. It was repeated. Power is an amazing thing, and he had it.”

Brosnahan’s method of defending perhaps that year’s most unpopular defendant was to collect the facts. Those facts, he said, led him to say Lindh had been unfairly targeted by the administration.

It was his job to represent Lindh to the fullest extent of the law, Brosnahan said.

“When the public gets upset, that’s precisely when lawyers have to do the best they can, and that’s what they do,” Brosnahan said.

Lindh pleaded guilty to supplying service to the Taliban — what Brosnahan called a violation of an economic restriction — and to explosives used in the commission of a felony. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

So how could Brosnahan represent someone once accused of conspiring to kill Americans and who was working for the Taliban?

“It’s my job to represent that person,” Brosnahan said. “You have to have lawyers standing on their feet and questioning authority. In some quarters, the tolerance for that has worn thin.”

If someone is guilty and prosecutors have a good case, it’ll likely move through the courts and reach a disposition. In the environment that existed in America months after 9/11, and the dismissal of terrorism charges against Lindh, Brosnahan said it was appropriate to enter a plea.

“He’s just a young man — wrong place, wrong time,” Brosnahan said. “I think at some point, it’ll be appropriate that he be released.”

Proven innocent?

Friday was Registe’s first scheduled court appearance since he was returned to Georgia. In a Wednesday story on ledger-enquirer.com about Jackson becoming Registe’s attorney, some online commenters had already decided his fate.

“This man killed these two men, and he should be put away for the rest of his life,” wrote one person.

“Enough delays ... the deal for Registe to spend life in prison has already been made,” wrote another. “Put him away! What a shame it is he won’t receive the death penalty.”

Comments such as those are partly why Registe’s attorney filed for a change of venue on Friday.

“I was looking at ledger-enquirer.com even as recently as yesterday,” Jackson said, “and if anyone just looks at the (comments), individuals have made comments saying he should get the chair, that they believe that he’s already guilty. And these are potential jurors.

“How can he get a fair trial in the county if those potential jurors have already made up their minds when they haven’t even heard one piece of evidence yet?”

Kay L. Levine, an associate law professor at Emory Law School, said media attention weakens the idea of innocent until proven guilty.

“The perception of innocence is almost nil across the board,” she said. “The crime has already been tried in the media.”

But what’s the problem if a high-profile defendant really is guilty?

Levine said establishing factual guilt is different from legal guilt. To establish legal guilt, procedures must be followed, she said. The jury must be untainted, and the judge must be unbiased.

“If it was your life or your father, would you not want the government to follow all its procedures?” Levine said.

Wadkins said the concept of innocent until proven guilty sometimes gets lip service. Depending on the type of case, and the injury done, some jurors get it backwards and expect a defendant to prove himself innocent, Wadkins said.

“The defendant never has to prove anything,” he added.

Other protections defendants have include the exclusionary rule. People are guaranteed protection from unlawful searches and seizures by the Fourth Amendment. What’s known as the exclusionary rule stems from that amendment, Wadkins said. Any evidence gained from a violation of the Fourth Amendment must be excluded from a trial.

“How would you like, say 3 o’clock tomorrow morning, for a police officer to come through your door and say, ‘I’m from the police department, and I’m going to look through your drawers?’” Wadkins asked. “The police don’t have that right. It’s to protect each citizen from the intrusion of the government.”

Another tenet of law is known at “the fruit of the poisonous tree,” Wadkins said. If some evidence or access to that evidence is illegally gained, and that leads to more evidence, both must be excluded, he said.

“It’s really a thing of fairness,” Wadkins said.

The system works when jurors take the “innocent until proven guilty” concept to heart, Wadkins said. During the jury selection process, they must learn to leave behind the talking heads on TV, and defense attorneys must harp on the presumption of innocence.

Sometimes someone is arrested and guilty of a crime, but not guilty of what they were first charged with, Martin said. Lindh is one example. So are people in Columbus first charged with distributing drugs, but who end up pleading guilty to possession only.

So, after Martin explains to a naysayer that everyone is presumed innocent and entitled to a trial, he moves on to the subject of pleading to a lesser charge.

Even after all the explanations, sometimes it’s still not enough.

“Some people don’t get it,” he said.