that? you know, at the heart of it i m trying to tell a good story and keep the readers turning pages if they re flying across country. but i do try to sneak in a little bit of gentle, social commentary. i think if you get up on a soapbox, you lose effectiveness. somebody was pointing out to me not long ago that i ve actually written books that deal with homelessness, that deal with corruption in the church. death penalty was a book that i wrote. the book that just came out, perfect alibi has a whole story line involving massage parlors here in san francisco and how young people from asia are being exploited. and, you know, somebody said to me, i read this whole book and realized you had covered that, had done it defendantly, and then i realized you were making a point there. so i try not to beat my readers over head, but i do try to get some of that in. because i think that s important. if you re writing books about lawyers and about crime, you know, there are victims.
what our clients were telling us were true. two four two. the videos are just a small sample of what some would say is clearly a culture or pattern. and i do want to say that even in my short tenure as defense attorney, i agree with stuart. there are so many good officers, but there are cultures that develop within certain units. i will put it right out there. many of the complaints we hear it involve plainclothes units, and perhaps there is a culture that develops and allows misconduct to happen and continue to happen. so, the public defender s role is unique and natural and i am confident that had we not been doing our jobs with respect to those brought residents of the henry hotel, those would never have surfaced and perhaps the officers would never have had to answer for that conduct. [applause] i would like to ask a question and anybody can answer this. you brought up this culture that sends to seems to bring it misconduct on. what is it about this culture that makes
functional standpoint it works. i mean, wall street law firms work. they do great work. they do the best practice of law that is done in the country. and if you don t believe that, you re just wrong. [laughing] no. the death penalty, appellate lawyers do the best work in the country. their objective is valid. and their industry matches your industry and the competency that you speak of. this could be fun. i disagree. ok. i think we can agree that, you know, when you re talking about the law, it s really a question of whose interest you serve. and when you talk about, you know, for example, defending poor people or the criminal courts, the resources just aren t there. it is interesting. i met the public defender in england. they told me he told me there that an indingon person can go to any of the big law firms, like morris and forestier, and ask them to represent you and the government will pay for it. they will pay every penny. and he told me that they spend someth
and although i would argue many of the things that were said today on the panel and i cannot believe i am going to say this i completely agree with john burris and stuart hanlon. [applause] thank you for giving my closing comments from me. i would like to thank the public defender s office for providing the public and anybody he wants to come to this forum, hearing from these experts, and they help you take away some good things from this and i hope you take away some good things you take away some good things from this panel. so many people here. this is the third and final panel for those of you who have stayed. this is going to be an incredible discussion. leading the panel, this is the chief attorney of the public defender s office, matt gonzalez. let me talk about how we decided to have a panel as part of this year is just a summit on the death penalty. san francisco is often known for being a large city, in this case, we have a unique history with the deat
get down to important issues. it has to start and meetings like this are a start to recognize. i think it is a real positive step. [applause] and although i would argue many of the things that were said today on the panel and i cannot believe i am going to say this i completely agree with john burris and stuart hanlon. [applause] thank you for giving my closing comments from me. i would like to thank the public defender s office for providing the public and anybody he wants to come to this forum, hearing from these experts, and they help you take away some good things from this and i hope you take away some good things you take away some good things from this panel. so many people here. this is the third and final panel for those of you who have stayed. this is going to be an incredible discussion. leading the panel, this is the chief attorney of the public defender s office, matt gonzalez. let me talk about how we decided to have a panel as part of this year is