Black's Law: A Criminal Lawyer Reveals His Defense Strategies in Four Cliffhanger Cases

by Roy Black

In Black's Law, one of America's toughest and shrewdest criminal defense lawyers shows us the life-and-death struggles that occur every day in our criminal courts. This book takes us behind the scenes of four difficult and dangerous cases to reveal the legal strategies, no-holds-barred tactics, and courtroom psychology Roy Black used to make sure his clients received every protection promised by the law.
Black demonstrates in riveting detail how a defense attorney must investigate criminal cases by sifting through evidence and preparing for trial. (It's like preparing for war.) He shows us how the principles of law, cross-examination, and evidence -- as well as careful jury selection and skillful use of expert witnesses -- can level the playing field to counter the enormous resources that state and federal prosecutors have at their disposal.
Black's Law makes resoundingly clear the crucial role that criminal defense lawyers play in safeguarding the basic right to a fair trial for all.

Genres: Law, Nonfiction, True Crime, Legal, Crime

320 pages, Paperback

First published April 2, 1999

Reviews

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book with four stories about famed Attorney Roy Black's most memorable cases of the 1980’s and early 1990’s. The first story is about a Miami police officer who was, for political reasons, prosecuted for Manslaughter after he shot and killed an armed black man in a Miami video arcade. The similarities between this case, and the case of Officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, MO, are uncanny, including rioting, looting and burning in the black community. The irresponsible and false reporting of the news media is also apparent in both cases. The turning point in the trial came when Black called Massad Ayoob to testify for the defense as an expert witness. Ayoob was able to successfully demonstrate to a prosecutor (and to the jury) that the technique being argued by the prosecutor that the officer should have used would have allowed the armed man to access, and to potentially shoot, his gun. The demonstration was dramatic, and it helped Black to win his case. The message of the story was to point out how politics influenced when and how somebody might be prosecuted, even when the evidence is very weak, as in the George Zimmerman case.

The second story is about a mentally ill, possibly insane, black man who had been convicted of murder in Florida and sentenced to death. Attorney Black handled the man's appeal of the sentence, and was able to demonstrate to a panel of Florida Supreme Court Justices that the man had not been adequately represented by his court-appointed attorneys. The death sentence was, ultimately, vacated and reduced to life in prison. The case highlighted the inadequacies of the public defense system, and the biases of some judges.

The third story is about a man who was accused of murdering his live-in girlfriend in Plantation, Florida, near Ft. Lauderdale. Attorney Black was able to show that the shooting was accidental, and that the police investigation was totally incompetent. Once again, he called Massad Ayoob as an expert witness to testify about the gun, and about how the police had failed to adequately test it for malfunction. Once again, the prosecutor demanded a demonstration, this time with a loaded gun in a courtroom. Ayoob did not want to conduct any kind of demonstrations with a loaded weapon, but was ordered to do so by the judge. Ayoob successfully demonstrated that loaded cartridges from a Dan Wesson .357 Magnum revolver might not always be easily removed from the cylinder, leaving one loaded round in an otherwise empty gun. In a further demonstration, the prosecutor demanded that Ayoob show the jury how the gun could possibly be taken away from him when he was holding it tightly, and Ayoob showed him. He took the gun away in less than one second and pointed it at the prosecutor's nose. Ayoob later told Black that he could have broken the prosecutor's finger but thought it probably wasn't a good idea to do so.

The last paragraph in this story tells us how important Ayoob’s testimony was to Black’s case:

“But the key was that dramatic moment when the prosecutor insisted that Ayoob try the demonstration. This was not some abstraction about bagging the hands of a corpse. This was something that all the jurors could see right in front of their eyes. When they saw it, the State’s case collapsed.”

The take-away from this story was to point out the fact that shoddy police investigations could cause innocent people to be prosecuted, and that cases could be lost by prosecutors who rely on those investigations. Too bad the LAPD and Marsha Clark had not been made aware of this case before the O.J. Simpson trial ...

The fourth and final story in the book highlights the awesome and undefeatable power of the US Department of Justice. It highlights the ruthlessness with which the DOJ can, and will, trample provisions of the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights in order to pursue its aims. It is about an honest banker from Miami who is accused of laundering money for drug dealers and, in spite of being acquitted, is then charged with different crimes. Because Black beat the government in the first case, the US Attorney was able to take legal actions that prevented Roy Black from defending the banker a second time, and he was convicted and sent to prison. It is a story that will make you absolutely disgusted with the way that men, operating in the name of our government, sometimes abuse their power. I never would have believed that the government could prevent a criminal defendant from choosing his or her own attorney. Incredible!

[Chana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book fascinating. Miami defense lawyer Roy Black shares four of his cases with us, each case quite different than the others. The first is about a black 20 year old shot in an arcade by a Spanish cop. Miami goes crazy; we'll burn the city down if he is acquitted, we shall overcome etc. Roy Black wades into the furor and wins an acquittal. There are some riots but Miami doesn't burn, it is still there. The next case involves the cold blooded murder of two people by a man who is found cowering in a hole with the money he stole from the people he killed. We hear about the mental illness of the defendant and the life he had as a child and the severe beatings he was given which may have given him brain damage. Roy Black gets him acquitted. The third case involves a young man who shoots his girlfriend, leaves her body in her car at a drive through ATM. He claims it was an accident and he was so upset and he couldn't find the hospital ER and he just panicked. Roy Black gets him acquitted. The fourth case is a federal case against a Cuban banker accused of laundering drug money. Terrifying the power the federal prosecutor's office has. And all the drug dealers they give reduced sentences to in exchange for information. As Roy Black says, powerful inducement to lie. Roy Black gets him acquitted but the government goes after him again and this time won't let him hire Roy Black!
This is what Roy Black says about being a defense lawyer.
"When most people see me on the nightly news, I am striding into a courtroom beside a person who has been charged with an awful crime: murder, money laundering, rape at a historic mansion. Time and again I hear friends ask me, "How could you defend him?" Or: "Certainly he must have done something or he wouldn't have gotten in trouble, right?"
The answer is one that comes out of hard experience in the courts. Ours is an adversary system of justice. This means we determine truth through testing both sides of the story at a trial, not by means of a sixty-second news clip or a talk-radio rant or the latest CNN poll. We have INALIENABLE RIGHTS, meaning ones our government can't take away.
Rights are not self-executing. The don't exist unless you have a lawyer to enforce them. Article 125 of the Constitution of the U.S.S.R. issued by Stalin in 1936 provided that "the citizens ...are guaranteed by law a) freedom of speech b) freedom of the press c) freedom of assembly including the holding of mass meetings and d) freedom of street processions and demonstrations." But these were just so many words, because Stalin did not provide for attorneys independent of state control to speak for those rights vigorously. He did not offer his people our crucial Sixth Amendment, which allows the accused to "enjoy...the assistance of counsel for his defense." Lawyers are the ones who transform abstract rights into reality."

I recommend this book.

Upgrading my rating of this book because it is intelligent, thought provoking and stayed bright in my memory while so many other books were quickly forgotten.

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Considering we read like 1/3 of this in law

[potato · Rating 2 out of 5]

Only read the first 2 stories before giving up. It’s a lot of rambling and law talk that an average person would get confused by.

[Adebayo Oyagbola · Rating 4 out of 5]

American criminal justice warts and all. A riveting account of the extremely activist approach of lawyers in the USA to the defence of their clients. While the lawyer is always a major factor in criminal trials everywhere, this book gave me the extremely disheartening sense that outcomes in American criminal justice are very substantially dependent on the advocate retained. What I took away from reading this book is that the jurisprudence on appeals based on the ineptitude of counsel in the USA needs to be massively developed. Well written and gripping in parts.

[Miranda · Rating 2 out of 5]

A better bet with more trial prep detail, equivalent ego, and less preaching is And the Sea Will Tell by Vincent Bugliosi. There was significant bashing of federal prosecutors in the last chapter though, which was immensely enjoyable.

[Stacy · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of four intricately told memoirs from a lawyer who works hard for his clients. If you enjoy such stories, this is an interesting and engaging book that also highlights the overwhelmingly frightening power of big government.

[Mason · Rating 3 out of 5]

u have to like self-aggrandizing criminal defense attorneys to like this book...

[Troy Legette · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book was great it shared cases with people from
the southern Florida location. How he was able to help
some people facing serious time and operating professionally
as an attorney.