Welcome to this episode of the Justice Team Podcast on the Justice Team Network. And today we're honored to have the Mr. Austin Dove, who is a criminal defense lawyer specialist. Or Raider extraordinaire also does civil rights trials, personal injury trials and coming fresh. We're shooting here on year of their, Lord, what is this? August 21st. Second 22nd shit. Yeah. . 'cause this morning, Austin was in Chicago at the, uh, democratic National Convention. Yes, yes.
Flew in on a red eye leg last night. Got in just after midnight this morning. So yeah, I'm, I'm fresh off of Chicago in the DNC, which was a blast. Uh, saw some of the most, uh, talented people orators, which is our business, storytellers, thinkers, uh, needle movers that exist. And so that was really nice to be part of that. Who was the, uh, the best by far? It was Michelle. Michelle Obama.
It's hard to say that when a night when, when Obama speaks, if we know how great he is that Michelle stole the show, there were other great speakers there too. I mean, AOC did great Jasmine Crockett, another, uh, person that's, uh, getting some traction there. Congresswoman other. Uh, Dallas, Texas, uh, did phenomenal work. She actually, she's a, a former public defender, and now she's a congress member, and a lot of points can be learned about how she's structured.
The sort of arguments, the kind of Trump versus Biden or the Dems versus Reeps kind of thing. I think lawyers do make good politicians. They do, they do, because the, the sort of um, having to, to story tell and improvise and listen. You know, I think the best, and I know you know this as well.
The best and sort of underrated skill for a trial lawyer is to listen because so many things you pick up, if you write your questions, of course you have a format, you have an idea of where you want to go. But if you're not listening to the subtlety, to the small pieces and the answer, little seeds they drop. Sometimes the body language coupled with the statement, this tells you so much about where you got to go.
You know, in the trial scenario, you've got to be present dynamic of the movement to pick up on those non verbals because guess what? The jury's present. They're listening. Yes. Right. So you better be too. Yeah. Yeah. So Austin comes to us, you know, like I said, he's a, he's certified in the space that he is. Not a lot of people can say that. A lot of people say that they are. You know, a specialist in XYZ, but the board of certain states do recognize specialists.
Um, I know you went to law school in San Diego. You practice well, all of California, but mostly Southern California. Yeah. It's mostly Southern California. I've done a fair number of cases in Northern Cal. The federal stuff is, you know, takes us outside of the state. Sometimes it's always a mixed bag. Cause you got to say, what are the low? What's the local local? Like it's, it's part of your, Assessment in taking a case is what's the local flavor and feel?
Let's walk us through that, because when you have, you know, criminal defense, Um, it's different from whenever you have like a, a civil rights, civil case. Yes. It's different. Yes. Different laws, different dynamics. Absolutely. Yes. Um, so walk us through, walk, walk our listeners through like, you have a common fact pattern where say cops, um, do something improper. They say somebody was doing something illegal. that person dies. Right.
You have to some, well, say they lived and they charged that person with a crime. So this is the hybrid a lot of people don't know about. I learned this recently. So walk us through whenever you have to represent somebody criminally because they're given pressing charges and they also severely injured them. Yes. Walk us through this. Right. Well, first of all, you are, we often know that the decision to charge someone criminally is politically motivated in that circumstance.
Because very often when it gets to the point where the person has been severely grotesquely injured, you point out maybe even the loss of life, then that's, uh, probably disproportionate to whatever wrong they may have been doing, you know? So the first thing you're doing is when you get to that criminal case court, and that's, as you point out, that, that is a place where I spent a lot of time.
I got tons of my stripes, my knots, my bruises going through the criminal courts in that process, which is, I think, an important and underrated cross training skill set for whatever you do. In the civil arena. Um, but yes, as you put out, the first step is to navigate your way through that criminal case and you've got to leverage whatever you can. Sometimes it's the sort of the moment that's happening around.
The person whether it was a publication, uh, where there are other factors that you learned about the police harvesters involved precedent that is also where this police department or these officers specifically have acted improperly, who's the one pressing the needle to get a filing done? Because so often that's a detective IO investigating officer for the police department. That's going to say, Hey, we got to get this because yeah. Then you can get potential, uh, immunity from liability.
Well, that's what let's do that. If they're convicted, if the person that they say was committing a crime in charge, if they're convicted of that crime, there goes the civil lawsuit against, right? For the most part. Yeah. There's a, there's some case law that talks about, let's say they were going to give the person, it was like, um, a resisting arrest. That's a very common thing. You're resisting arrest. They were resisting, even resisting with force, right?
So there's a proportionality test still that applies. True. The conviction heck versus Humphreys is very hard to get over that in general, but then you can, there's a piece of it in the federal court where you can pull out. just what was the actual behavior that was being policed and what did they say this person did wrong? What are they convicted of? And what is the, um, potential charge that, um, uh, how did, how did the facts from that spill over to what the police did?
So maybe it was resisting on the one hand, but you have maybe one, two, or even three officers who overreached that person may not have been resisting against all three officers and only one. So the claim could survive potentially against the other. It's very difficult. Yeah. Because they, they want to make it a panacea. And of course they hire really talented, very highly researched firms.
private law firms at the county under you've dealt with them too, that the county or the public entity will hire to represent them. And they're going to grind you down. They can save millions of dollars on the civil lawsuit by defeating the criminal law. Yes. Of course, you're up against the system and they have unlimited resources. Resources, unlimited funds, you know, right.
Yeah. So when it comes to that criminal defense side, though, we all kind of have a lane that we've, we feel really comfortable in. And that's what I just feel incredibly comfortable in, in a criminal defense trial in many ways. While we know that the most did you, did you start out doing criminal defense or yeah, PD's office. I'll tell you the whole, I'll tell you my whole, my whole arc, a little thumbnail of my whole arc was I actually started out at the DA's office.
I was a DA in Riverside, did that for a couple of years. Then I went to a big law firm cause I was like, well, I got to kind of, I had worked as a summer associate during law school. So I said, well, let me, I might have to recapture this and go back to trying to make me like the kind of money that you can make at these big firms. So I did that. Yeah. For a few more years. And then I realized I just wasn't really for me. Uh, I missed the courtroom.
Um, I had a client that was going to go with me, a civil client for an hourly thing, and I said, well, this is enough for me to pay the bill. So I just took that case and I said, I got to bet on myself. So, but the real, the first. Experience in the criminal arena was in the DA's office. And I kind of got to see how the sausage is made on that side. How long have you had your own firm? . Oof. I, I started, really opened my doors.
I, I kind of moonlighted for a while when I was still doing big law. 'cause I just wanted to get back into court and I had cases, clients call me criminal cases by the way. And I said I, I just missed going in there. But officially 2001 is when I started my own Wow. Own shop, you know? And you also, you mentor a lot of folks in the space. Mm-Hmm.
. I, I hear your name often of how you help them start their own firms or give them guidance whenever they needed experience with some of the criminal cases. that we're kind of like too small for you, I would say, because you have more higher, higher profile stuff. So walk us through if a young lawyers out there listening or watching, and they want to get into this space, they're young and hungry. How can Austin dove help them?
The most important thing is, it's almost like a litmus test before you get there. Because is this something that looks sexy from the outside? It's kind of a law and order interest? Or do you really know how unpopular you're going to be as a defense lawyer? It's almost like, Hey, They're often plaintiff's lawyers. We walk in and we're the most unpopular person in the courtroom. I figure plaintiff, lawyer, civil side of the same defense. We're hated.
And before we walk in, everybody's like, why is this guy here? Oh my God. A plaintiff's lawyer, same old stuff. Well, the defense lawyers, you might even be a. A multiple or a sort of a exponent of that you can really get one thing that I've seen that they've had a lot of shows and movies recently that have humanized their criminal defense lawyers. Yeah, a lot. Yes. So I like, I've just noticed a trend with that. I think it's really cool.
I wish I would have been around when I first heard this stuff because they, you're like a pariah when you walk in, but you get through that because you learn how, and actually again, that does, that cross training skillset does make you a lot stronger when you need to go over and do civil cases.
I know they're different animals, a whole lot to learn before you even begin to practice an area that wasn't like your mainstay, but the cross training in terms of the reps that you do for cross examination, for example, I mean, in, uh, and I'll, I'll answer your question, but I know about the young folks, but I really want the young folks to see the sort of process of a criminal case and the way you have to come in prepared.
If you want to go into private practice as a criminal defense lawyer, Your preparation level has to justify that person not using the usually free services from the public defender. Public defenders are often very well trained, very well resourced. So you've got to be able to say, what can I do to add value to the case to possibly get you a better outcome? One factor of course is you've got to give a ton of time to that person.
You've got to sink your teeth deeply into the facts in a way that maybe the public defender's time doesn't allow. going to the scene, talking to different witnesses, kind of peeling back other issues and then spending that time with your client, which is really, really critical to being able to humanize them for whatever part of advocacy you're doing.
Yeah. And it's like same thing in our civil world is, You know, I tell you what, if they come up with a huge, complicated case, and you're a first year lawyer to start your firm, you have to realize your limitations. Same thing if you get a capital murder case. Yeah. There's no way you can go in there and have the wherewithal to try. That's why we see a lot of, in our space, and sometimes yours, law firms teaming up. So I assume there's a lot of Right, yeah.
And what I mean by that is if you want to deal with young lawyers that you mentor and show them how the ropes and how to use these cases, they're not bigger ones. They work with you because of the complexity of it. Yes. The complexity is, is no joke. I mean, in fact, just like judges kind of can, can get kind of weigh into heavily on some of our civil cases.
Uh, they certainly get involved because the appellate rights are so stark and so severe when you're representing someone on a potential life case or capital case or any case that has significant exposure. The judge is going to start testing you because there's certain very particular motions you have to file in a particular order. You have to engage expert witnesses. Maybe you have to do a psych exam or a psych eval. And numerous other pieces just to say, am I doing this right?
And as you, as you realize from doing this in this space, you know, you don't know what you don't know. So you can only, you can have, you can check every list out there and say, follow this and this, and this, that's not going to really give you the insight. So, so my process with the young folks is to really kind of have them shadow me for a while and see if they really have the grit to do it. And, and the ones that do, uh, then I sort of try to provide them with, uh, uh, uh, an approach.
Okay. Uh, and a vehicle to, okay, well, this is how you might want to start advertising, uh, connecting to other lawyers, being in a particular courtroom on a regular basis, trying to perhaps get on as these panels in some courts where you can get appointed by courts. And you're on some leadership panels too for that, right? Yeah, there's some panels that you can get. Yes. You can get appointed to, uh, as, and then they pay you kind of a, a basic rate.
It's not, you know, you don't, you don't get rich on that rate, but you do get the experience and the reps. And, and a lot of times we are, you know, this, uh, to there's this desire by really everyone younger in this space. I want to do shortcuts. I probably did the same thing. I just shortcut, how can I just get there fast? I just want to try the big cases, right? But the shortcuts don't work in this business. So you have to be able to, to train the kind of block by block way to get there.
And then. You can actually more competently and more confidently. And you could be a rainmaker lawyer and be able to team up with people like Austin. By the way, thank you for your mentorship at Justice HQ because you give an offering to helping people doing this space. Like for instance, I know there's a lot of lawyers that are here that are in the mentorship track. Don't do criminal law or doing what you're doing. So first of all, thank you.
And you know, I know I've sent cases to Austin through attorney share and I know other lawyers probably have too because I'm sure you're inundated. Yeah. Cases right now. I get, I get lots of cases in that space. So what, so what do you do with those cases that are not either within your wheelhouse or that are not worth your, like literally your time because this is where you sit today. I have about five to six lawyers, some of whom, you know, that are either moderately experienced.
Some of them very experienced. Uh, and then some of them in the newer kind of stages of their practices. And I try to be very, first of all, you got to really get to know the client because referrals don't really, you have to get that sort of basic kind of picture of what the situation for the client is as much as you can in a sort of shorter timeframe and know who's the right person to take it, take it over. So, I mean, you probably are the right person for a lot of these, but.
Austin Duff can only be so many places so many times. You're going to be in Chicago today at 1230. I'm here in Los Angeles. By what time is it? Yeah, not even two o'clock. Yeah. 20. Yeah. So, um, this is one, like a lot of lawyers that I know that are the best civil rights lawyers also are criminal defense lawyers. And why is that? The reason is there's an, there's a, uh, it starts off with just the actual time that you're have police officers in front of you, right?
So in criminal court, you're going to be cross examining a lot of police officers, whether it's at something. I mean, the first cases I used to do were DUIs in the DA's office, then something called toss cases, where literally the fact pattern was guy had some narcotics, the cops came around the corner, he threw the bag. Those cases sometimes go to preliminary trial. We've all been there. Yeah, exactly.
So then you're like, and then, uh, and then the other thing is that is the timeframe that you have to prepare for. It's criminal. Doesn't. Statutes are usually 60 days from start to finish, 72 days. If you add the, which call, statutory time, so you could sometimes have a very short window between the time that you get the case and some cases actual trial.
Wow. Between that on felonies have something called a preliminary hearing, and if you really are immersed in criminal law, you are gonna do, I've probably done well over 1500, maybe 2000 preliminary hearings. Wow. If not more. A little bit more than a deposition, but different Oh yeah. Because. Then you have to make an argument about what's something called a holding order.
Well, typically one of the witnesses in almost every case is gonna be either a police officer who responded to the scene or an investigating officer slash detective who was involved in managing things. And then you have civilian witnesses too very often who said they're, they made the, made the call, or they were the victim.
And so those pieces you have to kind of get together really fast to cross examine them and the standard and the stakes are very high because you miss an issue that could be an element that you can argue to get the case thrown out or this just wasn't there. That experience, time after time again, it's just unparalleled. And that's like when I tell young lawyers, like, I was trying, the people are like, Oh, you tried these big cases. You do all these big results.
Like, you know, the stuff that I was trying when I first started, my first one was a dog bite case in Compton, which like, they were disputing who the owners were. They said they didn't have insurance. I mean, these are the kinds of things you literally cut your teeth on.
Um, one thing that you, you touched on earlier, I wanted to like to sink back on is how important it is when you choose your venue, if you can take a case and it's important, not only who the demographic, the jury is, who the judge is going to be. You have to do that. Deep dive. Thank God. Now there's additional resources. Thank God. To list serves, through background research, you can do about the judge. You can actually look at their prior filings.
You know, nowadays on Westlaw, you can do all kinds of stuff, look at the prior trial court orders, just to kind of know what the judge's tendency is, and then talk to other lawyers about it. Um, but also what's the demographic of the fact finder, right? Cause ultimately this case you have the, your mindset has to be, as it is for you. I know.
What if this case goes to trial and very often as trial lawyers, it's kind of what you want, but you want it in the sense that you prepare for it to that level, knowing that your best outcome is going to be if you prepare for it to that degree. So then you got to know. So then in that preparation process, you're kind of pulling what if jurors have, would have jurors done with this type of case, where are we going to be pulling from?
I go to, I was in Northern Cal and there's all these little pocket areas, different. Okay. So this neighborhood has this type and you've got a jury panel. You're, you're picking in federal court and you're going, well, that neighborhood's actually sounds similar, but it's very different from here. So what are they, what do they tend to be like? Are they red? Are they blue? Which is partly telling, uh, the income, all that kind of stuff.
So before you go outside of your wheelhouse, your common area, where you familiar with those things, you better damn well familiarize yourself with like. What's happening there. And that's the, I mean, you talk about federal court, we talk about judges and this is why, you know, for every trial lawyer that's out there, I think it's very important for you to encourage your community to vote because judges are, especially federal judges are appointed and sometimes lifetime appointments, right?
And I'll give you an example. Like I tried a case in federal court and this was a long time, I mean, this guy was a Reagan appointee. And we knew going in trying a federal torts claim act. Yeah federal torts claim act means The person was hit by a postal worker. Yeah, and guess what that means You get no jury no punitives.
No punitives Your your attorney's fees are capped And the judge is the final decision maker on everything and guess what a reagan appointee judge Who used to be a federal prosecutor and whenever you're going up against the? The, uh, the U. S. Attorney's Office on the other side, how do you think that case is going to end up when the judge, the jury, and the executioner are paid by the same person? Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So, yeah, you better know, like you said, even some of those fact patterns you might say, maybe there's another vehicle to try to avoid. That particular end result, because that is really, really almost impossible to overcome. And it is, and like, judges can literally just be the decision maker that throws your case out because of a political tilt. Yes. Same thing in criminal. So a lot of times, the judges on, that get criminal assignments are former prosecutors.
The vast majority of them who take criminal assignments as judges are former prosecutors. So at the preliminary hearing level, which is that threshold evidentiary hearing to see whether there's enough for the case to be bound over for trial, That part, you're in front of very often a prosecutor. So how are you going to make your record? And sometimes, nevermind the holding order where they say there's enough for this case to keep going.
The other piece about that is, is just the, um, what kind of rulings you're making along the way. They might cut you off. You say, I want to cross examine this subject. Oh, no, there's no space for cross examination on that. You got to just not do that. Go somewhere else. Counsel. So it really can be impactful. Like whenever I go to vote for judges, if I don't know the person to research and if it's public defender versus I just default. Because public defenders. Yeah, they do.
We do need a more diverse range of representation. Public defenders are some of the best lawyers out there and they're grind and they it's the. It's a, it's a, it's a, what I call a heart job. It's a job you have to have a big heart to do. It's a job you gotta have. You got to have some like, yeah, you have to walk in as a person that is almost inherently unpopular.
And then, you know, we talk about labels, so criminal defense lawyer, okay, private, maybe, you know, you get a little bit more, I don't know, a deference or something like that. You say public defender, one of the challenges there is they're in that same courtroom every day. So imagine you have to make the same creative argument 12, 15 times a day. It just starts going to start falling on deaf ears. Okay. I know your stick, you know.
So they really do have a heavy lift sometimes, but it's a highly important role they play. Well, Austin, I want to thank you for coming on. We're at the end of this, this show, but I would love for our listeners and viewers to let us know if we want to hear more of Austin's story and do an hour long bourbon approved show, which I think it'd be very good on. I was looking for the bourbon of the day. I saw the table's got a plant and no bourbon. Back here on the shelf.
We just put our Lottie girl edition, uh, two of them that we had back there, a single barrel that we bought. We have some whiskey back there. Austin, how do folks read you? They can reach me on my Instagram is at Austin dove law, uh, Facebook, all those kinds of things, same way. Um, and of course, um, I've got, uh, but Austin dove law is everywhere. It's where there's my website. You guys just do website off in the law. Um, phone numbers, 213 487 8300. Uh, you can find me.
I'm actually now developing, finally, with some assistance from some younger folks, a social media presence. There you go. So this will play into that. And of course, I post to you and I know you've been supportive of the work we've done, so. Yeah, we're going to. Thanks very much for that to be fun. So Austin Dove, thank you for coming on. Find him, just Google Austin Dove and you can find him everywhere now. That's the way, yeah.
Um, thank you for coming on this episode of the Justice Team Podcast on the Justice Team Network. Reach out. And Austin, thank you for coming on, brother.