96% Lawyer

I have exactly 22 days remaining in law school. Technically I need to pass the bar to be a practicing attorney, but the end is in sight like concrete to a bungee-free bungee jumper. If graduation wasn't sobering enough, I recently had another reminder of how close I am to working for the next 35-40 years of my life.

This summer I worked as a clerk for the district attorney's office. It was somewhat shocking to me that they would let a law student enter the courtroom, pick a jury, argue a case, and essentially play grown-up for an entire summer. Surprisingly, most states allow law students to appear in court with certain qualifications. In addition to my trials and court experience, I also wrote a legal brief responding to a defendant's constitutionally protected right to appeal his conviction. I took up the case to uphold [please read in your best James Earl Jones voice] truth, justice, and the American Way.

The document I produced was about eleven pages long and dealt with alleged prosecutorial misconduct. The defendant broke into a golf course at night and the alarms quickly brought the cops to the hapless criminal. They found him with tools, a flashlight (still turned-on and shining through his shirt), stolen money, and the obligatory marijuana pipe. After he was convicted, it was my job – nay my duty – to keep this dangerous miscreant behind bars. The County filed my brief back in August and the quickly-churning wheels of justice produced an answer this spring. A couple weeks ago, I pulled up the court case online and was pleased to see that we had won. Here's a brief excerpt for your reading pleasure:

Court of Appeals of Kansas.
STATE of Kansas, Appellee,
v.
Robert L. KIRK, Appellant.
No. 95,711.
Feb. 9, 2007.

Appeal from Sedgwick District Court; David J. Kaufman, judge. Opinion filed February 9, 2007. Affirmed.
Rick Kittel, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, for appellant.
Nathan Eberline, legal intern, Lesley A. Isherwood, assistant district attorney, Nola Foulston, district attorney, and Phill Kline, attorney general, for appellee.

Robert Lee Kirk was convicted of burglary and theft. He argues to us that the prosecutor made improper comments during the course of closing argument and we should therefore overturn Kirk's convictions. Basically, the prosecutor made comments about what Kirk was doing at the scene and his failure to explain to the police why he was on the golf course at 3 a.m., which we find to be fair comment on the evidence. Therefore, we conclude that there has been no prosecutorial misconduct in this case. Accordingly, we affirm.

I am not quite sure how I managed to slip through three years of law school, but the process is almost complete and suddenly my name is on a legal document as a representative of the state. Granted, I had direct supervision (as emphasized by my sexy "legal intern" status), but seeing my name attached to the court case was quite jarring in a bittersweet sort of way.

At least in my little world, there is great comfort in being a student. Certainly there are annoyances that accompany school—no income being foremost. But there is something I truly value that doesn't seem apparent in the real world. Potential.

Most everyone loves law students based on their dedication to academia and hard work. But people don't like lawyers. People seem to think the second a law student transitions to the real world, he suddenly devolves into a money-grabbing shark so often caricatured in mass media. I, like so many of my peers, entered law school with visions of "truth, justice, and the American Way." Law students quickly realize, however, that the law rarely deals with truth and justice, at least in the camelotian sense. Between my remaining 22 days of school and suddenly seeing my name as part of the legal system, I feel a great foreboding of not making a difference at the beginning of my career. It is more likely that I will bear resemblance to the shark than really make a difference. Or worse, considering my abhorrence to embracing shark-hood, I will merely be irrelevant. I suppose I could take to donning a cape and tights in the courtroom, but I don't expect superman status to accompany my work.

Unfortunately, I only have 22 days left of potential. After that, I have to spend the next 35 years trying to fulfill whatever idealistic and blurred sense of potential I have contrived for myself. It seems unfortunate, but despite 26 years of learning and education, I simply have no idea how to proceed. The only step that makes sense is finishing this writing with a pithy punch line and hope for greatness to be thrust upon me. While I wait, I happily raise a glass to those of you enjoying your respective job and making a difference in the world. Cheers to the teachers, social workers, and bartenders; tip of the hat to you.