Slay Everyone, Trust No One, Sell Your Soul” In which I recount the story of the first time I got a phone call in jail. It's really not that amusing. But I had a little more to say about the general subject than my usual "just got here" post. Let's start here: In the US it is not very easy to end up in prison without first committing an act of violence. It's true in Canada too. I suppose this story can be used to explain this in part, but it's not the complete story. A few weeks ago I was doing some public speaking with a guy named Alex who's a criminal defence lawyer here. I knew he was in the business and that he is actually quite serious about it, but it still came as a surprise when he told me that he gets phone calls like these (or maybe not that surprising, given my past). A regular client of his who doesn't want to go public with it was arrested for a minor offence. As a result, Alex got a call from the police to arrange for bail, and when he tried to help his client negotiate the details of the bail he was advised that it's not his job to do that, that there are other people to talk to, etc. He was told not to get involved. So then he called the jail and talked to the administrator who seemed genuinely confused about why he had just been called. He went on to say that his client is not likely to be charged with a crime or serve more than 10 days. Bail was set. No bail posted. Client spends some nights in jail, spends more nights in jail, and so on. Client gets charged with a crime and spent 60 days in jail. The end result of all this? Alex lost $4000 in legal fees on a client he was quite fond of and who did not want to deal with jail, and there's no sign that things will get any better. I asked if he was charging the client and he said no. The moral of this story? Don't bother speaking to anyone at the jail unless you are willing to pay for a lawyer or have some significant connections to the jail staff that they should like. You can pay an extra few bucks to help the victim out if you like, but if you think there's any benefit to be had then I'm not sure how it can even begin to be compensated. This is the reality of our justice system. In addition to all the stuff I just wrote above, here's what happened next: the prisoner was not allowed to post bail and was moved to a jail with worse conditions than before. This was bad for him because it led him to run away and spend more time in jail. There was a public outcry about the whole thing because it seems to me that a lot of people (myself included) have a general misunderstanding that there are people who are in jail who are just there because they didn't commit a crime but haven't been convicted of one. What I didn't point out is that the reason some people can't post bail is because of a criminal record, and some of those people may have had absolutely nothing to do with the charges they are being accused of, or perhaps not even the "crimes" on their record. So what can you do? In general: 1) Get a lawyer if you can. If you are a small-time criminal you might not be able to afford it, and that's not your problem. If you have no money and don't speak English, well, that's your problem. But if you have any assets you should try to get the lawyer to do that (unless it's public defender or your public defender refuses). The lawyer is there to protect your rights and if you are caught off guard when you get arrested or put in jail the first thing you should do is call a lawyer. What is more important? Money? Or having a fair shot at keeping the prison population down? It is hard for me to imagine why people are surprised when this happens. 2) Call your consulate if you can. As to a fair shot at keeping the prison population down: maybe this one is just me, but I am not convinced that the best way to do that is to build more prisons. I know in the US they're saying it's for medical and other types of health care and rehabilitation, but when you take a look at the number of people who are in jail and who aren't getting any rehabilitation then I think there's a reason to be skeptical. But perhaps I just don't get it. But if you want to cut down on prison populations that means fewer people in jail. And when the jail population goes down crime goes down. So that's good. So the best way to have fewer people in jail is to not be there in the first place, or to have a very hard time getting there. There is one example of this that is pretty spectacular: the US State Department recently opened a consulate in one of the world's most dangerous cities to increase access to information from the US consulate in St. Petersburg, Russia. Now here is how the US Department of State describes this place: Since its establishment in 1996, the U.S. Embassy has opened a consulate general in St. Petersburg and in 2003 opened an Economic and Commercial Section to promote U.S. trade interests and increase business contacts in the region. The new structure has been critical in positioning the U.S. Embassy in St. Petersburg for an expanded U.S. presence in Russia and for promoting the U.S. commercial, cultural, and educational opportunities that are attracting thousands of Russians to the U.S. What about the US Consulate in Montreal? Nowhere to be seen. Yet a consulate was recently closed in Canada's only Muslim-majority province, the worst jail in Canada, so let's not get carried away with the idea that things like these are going to keep all Canadians out of prison. I think Alex would probably agree. The jail was only one part of my day (in case you think he just hangs out with me). I met with another lawyer that afternoon who I don't know all that well and who has a very high level of confidence in me. We met at a place he recommended, which I still have not tried because it's an order of magnitude more expensive than any other burger joint in town. The roommate's idea is "You know, if he said to buy a burger, buy a burger." I found this guy because he was recommended by his friend as a lawyer who really likes the things I write. Before meeting with the other lawyer I called a friend who is a lawyer and asked for advice on something. If he couldn't give me advice about the question I had, it's because he knows the person I was asking for advice about it. He knows I ask for advice because he knows I trust him and the advice he gives me will be worth my while. But what could I have done if he hadn't? What could I have done if he said, "Trust no one!"? The other lawyer had told me I shouldn't expect him to tell me anything. So I wasn't expecting anything. What was I supposed to do? Was I supposed to ask him if I could pay him for his help? Tell him I just wanted to see how good he is at his job and how much he was going to charge me for this piece of his advice? Or should I just be quiet? It's hard to be certain of anything without knowing anything about what's going on and what's going to happen next. By the way, if you read The Globe and Mail or The Province or The Wall Street Journal you're going to have a really hard time doing any of this because they don't have much of anything useful to say about anything. If you want to know something useful that you can use to your advantage then you have to pay, usually. But you can pay a lot of people for what they know and most of them don't even know themselves what they're paying for. They're playing you for their own gain, for god's sake! And that's going to cost you $50,000 and you get to know what the market is really like (the things the business people themselves don't know that cost them $50,000), and you get a very low chance of ever seeing those people ever again. It's an awful deal for both of us. I've been told that there are some good lawyers in St. John's, but from what I've seen I believe that the other lawyer in question is the only one around. The jail lawyer is one I've been to several times and I've met a few other people there. These lawyers are all either busy or don't want to talk to you at all. I asked another lawyer I know about this and he told me to just buy a lawyer, that there are only about a dozen of them in the whole city, and the price range is insane. So, in addition to all of the fees I'm probably going to have to pay because someone says that being on drugs makes you not responsible for all of your actions and I can't help that, I'll also be paying people at the very top of the market. Anyway, the people who work at the jail are nice and it's a nice environment. But if I have to tell people anything about my past they still seem confused. It seems to be much easier if I don't say anything.