For a lawyer to shade or slant his legal advice to advance a private agenda is among the gravest betrayals of his solemn duty as an attorney.
Well, I think that there is a connection between being a lawyer and a doctor and an actor. They kind of, in some ways, have the same appeal, I suppose.
When a criminal breaks into your home I’ll let the liberals call the lawyer. I’m going to call Smith & Wesson.
I view myself primarily as a trial lawyer who happens to be writing, as opposed to a writer who happens to be a trial lawyer, so the audience is like a jury to me.
It was one of those early mid-life crises, really. I started asking myself, ‘What is it that I want from my life?’ This question kept haunting me: ‘Do I want to be a lawyer who always wanted to be a writer, or do I actually want to be a writer?
I didn’t know anything about the fashion industry until I met the stylist Simon Foxton on a Tube. I was 16, on my way to Kingsway College, and then my whole world opened up. Before that, like in every African family, you are meant to be a lawyer.
I have to say that every white-collar criminal defense lawyer knows when the chief financial officer turns state’s evidence, everyone in the executive suite is in a lot of trouble because the chief financial officer knows exactly where the money is coming and going.
One of the reasons I love the law is because I was raised in family – my grandfather was a lawyer, but more importantly, my grandmother was his secretary. And she taught me that lawyers were some of the most civil, most courteous – and in those days, most courtly – people that she knew.
