Franklin County

As I have written about before, I handle most of the defense work for juveniles in Franklin County. In our county, juvenile court is held for half a day ten times a year--I guess that probably translates into the pleasant fact that there is not a lot of juvenile crime in the area. That is a good thing.

But whether or not it is prevalent or serious by big city standards, it is almost always heart-breaking. The purpose of the juvenile statutes is to rehabilitate and to that end I think of those of us who are part of the legal process as a team. The Judge who remembers the kids before her and who has high standards for their behavior both in her courtroom and in between court appearances, the Juvenile probation officer who knows each child individually and helps to formulate and execute a plan to assist them to help themselves, the District Attorney who has a good sense of humor and can be tough or tender as the situation warrants, and me the motherly defense attorney.

So, today is juvenile day. While I don't always look forward to dealing with the situations that the juveniles have managed to get themselves into, I always look forward to working with such a dedicated team and attempting to help untangle young lives.

Our District Attorney was featured several years ago in an award winning indie movie called Knee Deep. You can watch the trailer here. The movie is an extremely artistic documentary of a very unusual attempted murder case It has been on PBS a few times--I highly recommend this movie both for its content, its artistic value and the sociological issues that it raises.