Paul Bergran was the lawyer who could get you out of any sticky situation. Caught selling pirated videos like Queen Latifa was in nineteen ninety five, Better call Paul accused of lying to a jury during testimony like Lil Kim was in two thousand and three. Better call Paul caught stabbing your spouse ten times with a steak knife. No matter if you were innocent or guilty, Paul could get you off the hook. We see lawyers like this and the Sopranos are breaking bad. But what happens when those
fictitional lawyers cross over into the real world. At the peak of his career, Paul Bergeran was undefeated, a master lawyer who knew the system inside and out. But when an FBI agent finds traces of Bergran's involvement in a massive drug ring, questions start to arise. On the Lanks. Paul went to achieve his dominance in what he would
do to ensure that he stayed there. In wonder He's True crime podcast, criminal Attorney host Jens Jenkins will tell you the true story of how Paul Bergran went from representing others in court to representing himself. No one is better suited to breaking the law than those who know it the best. Paul Bergrin is a hot shot criminal defense attorney in Newark, New Jersey. Seemingly unstoppable and with unorthodox method, He's built a reputation for getting his clients
off the hook. But is Paul's legend grows, so do the suspicion swirling around him. When FBI agent Sean Brockos starts investigating a major drug ring, she makes a shocking discovery. The gang's most powerful player is none other than Newark star attorney. Has the ex federal prosecutor crossed the line
and started committing crimes himself? From wonderre comes a new series about a lawyer who breaks all the rules, the FBI agent determined to take him down at all costs, and the people caught in the middle who paid the ultimate price. I'm about to play a clip from Criminal Attorney. Follow Criminal Attorney on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcast. Listen to Criminal Attorney early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
From Wondering, I'm Brandon Drinks Jenkins and this is criminal term. It was two thousand and three and Sean Brocos was on her way to a Newerk apartment complex. She had received a tip that someone in that apartment had a gun that they shouldn't. Sean was in her early thirties, blonde and white and Newark. She'll pick a teacher, or a dentist, or someone with a desk job at a bank, which is actually what she'd been doing seven years earlier. She ran the loan department at a bank in El Paso.
So overseen who qualified for commercial loans, personal loans.
Car loans, until one day when federal agents came to the bank. They were investigating one of the bank's clients, who they suspected a money laundering. It wasn't like in the movies. It wasn't all that exciting, just two guys wearing suits serving a subpoena. Sean was fascinated.
She thought to herself, Wow, this sounds a whole lot more interesting than the work I'm doing. I literally walked down to the local FBI office, I put my name in, filled out an application, and before I knew it, I was off to Quantico for training for the FBI.
Fast forward to present day, and Sean was a full on, bona fide FBI agent.
It was something that I knew would be an adventure. Look Newer at that time was not a great place, but if you're in law enforcement, boy, there's no better place to be.
She was part of the gang squad.
We were always running cases on the Bloods and the Crips because at the time in Newark, those were the strongest street gangs.
And on this day the case involved someone affiliated with the Crips. The man's name was Chemo DeShawn McCrae. Kimo had been convicted of a felony, so it was illegal for him to have a gun and that was enough to take him down. When Shawn and her partner got to the apartment, they knocked on the door. They were let inside where they met Chemo and mother.
We said, hey, we know you have a gun in the apartment. We know that you cannot be in possession of a gun. We don't have a search warrant. We can get one, but if you turn that weapon over to us, that would be the best thing to do.
They went to the bedroom and opened the closet door.
And there was in the back of a closet. It was a sizeable shotgun, brown stock older model and slid off, meaning the barrel had been shortened.
They grabbed the shotgun and headed back to the living room.
Well, I immediately walked up to Chemo and I said, you're going to have to come with us, and I was holding him. I think it was on his forearm or maybe like his upper arm, and I remember he just literally slipped right out of the jacket. So in a split second, he's gone and I'm left holding this jacket and he's out the door.
Kimo and his mom were on the ground floor of the apartment building, so his escape was pretty simple, and he had another advantage.
I'm thinking, I'm not chasing him. I'm in skirting heels. I'm not going to chase after him through the projects.
As Sean watched Chemo run off, she also saw a lost opportunity. See Sean wasn't just there to get a gun off the street. Sean Brocos needed someone like Chemo, shared her eyes on some of the bigger players in Newark, and getting Chemo in the custody was just the next very important step in her plane. In this case, Keemo McCray was not the white whale she was looking to land, but he was connected and could lead her up the ladder. She needed someone to go inside the crew and feed
her information. That was why she needed Keema McCrae to agree to be a confidential informant. Now, let's be clear here, the FBI throughout its history has had a pretty bad reputation when it comes to informants.
They use a small fish to go catch the big fish.
But that feels more like big game hunting for optics more than any attempt to stop a problem or protect citizens, like how long ago did they start the war on drugs? And how's it going now? But that's the game Sewan's playing here. There is no FBI investigation without getting people on the street to talk. And that was why the fact that he was now out the door and down the block was such a bad look. Sean turned to
Chimo's mother. At first, she claimed the gun was hers, not Chemo's, but Sean wasn't buying it one bit.
I said, you cannot own this gun for your son. It is his, and you cannot do this. It's just not the right thing to do. And she said, yes, it is his gun. It is not my gun, but I don't want to get my son into trouble. So that's when I said, look, just come down to our office tomorrow. We can work through this.
Sure enough, the next morning, Kimo and his mother show up at the FBI field office in Newark. Chimo's a slim, black guy in his early thirties. He's been in and out of jail a few times at this point, petty stuff like weapons possession, robbery, and drugs. But now he's got kids. He's very close with his fan, and he does not want to do any more time. Sean remembers that Chimo's mom did a lot of the talking. He looked terrified in his mom's apartment. Kimo had gotten the
jump on Sean. But here in her office, with Kimo's mother by side, ready to do anything to secure his freedom, Sean had all the leverage. She'd been in this situation enough times before. She'd sat across other young men like Kimo and tried to flip them, so by now she had a whole speech worked out.
You don't have to answer any questions. I'm not going to ask any questions, but I'd like you to listen to me for the next five minutes.
Sean leaves it out. For Chimo, it's simple.
You can either join our team become part of team Government Mo, which means you're going to help us in our investigations. If you decide against that, you do know that I will have to arrest you for being a possession of this weapon. And what that's going to look like is you're going to do jail time. You have the previous conviction, you will be going to jail quite some time.
So go to jail or become an informant and risk your life trying to infiltrate a ruthless drug gang.
Rock Meet Hard Place,