10 years of Blogging

The other day I was browsing the internet and checking out some different blogs when I noticed that Scott Greenfield was celebrating his 11th year of legal blogging at Simple Justice.  First off, congratulations to Scott for writing the best legal blog on the web for 11 years.  He publishes several well-written, scholarly and insightful posts a day.  I am in no way, shape, or form comparing my blog to his here, but it did make me realize that I just passed my 10 year blogging anniversary and had failed to notice it.

My first blog post on this site was January 8, 2008.  Since then, I've written over 1200 posts, had almost 19,000 comments, and 3.5 million page hits.  Although the posts are all mine, some of those comments and page hits actually came from other people!  Looking back at some of my posts, a lot of the topics and a lot of the writing are cringeworthy.  Others are not so bad.  Every once in a while, I find one that I'm actually proud of.

I started the blog when I was a felony chief prosecutor in the 339th District Court under Judge Caprice Cosper.  I was married to a fellow prosecutor and we had a two year old son.  That seems like a different lifetime ago.  Today, I've been a defense attorney almost as long as my career as a prosecutor lasted, I've divorced and remarried, that 2 year old is now 12 and has a 4 year-old younger brother.

Blogging grizzles a man, I tell ya.  Makes him fat, too, apparently.

This blog began anonymously, shortly after the beginning of the e-mail scandal that would ultimately cost then-District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal his job.  The racist and sexist e-mails from our leader had led to a complete backlash against the District Attorney's Office as a whole.  We were getting slammed in the Chronicle and every other media outlet.  At one point, when picking a jury I started asking potential jurors if they already had decided that they hated the State because of who our elected D.A. was.  The answers were distressing.

The public perception of prosecutors had flipped from the "good guys" to the "bad guys" in the space of a few e-mails, and it just seemed to get worse every day.

So, I started writing in a small attempt to push back against all of the negative attention we were getting.  It started slowly at first -- like dipping a toe in the water to see how cold it was.  I didn't want to announce whether or not I was a prosecutor or a defense attorney, because I didn't want to get fired for what I was writing (that worked out well in the end, let me tell ya!)

But how do you publicize your blog without blowing your super secret identity?

Simple -- you just casually mention it to the most talkative person you know and then wait thirty minutes. (Thanks, Alexis Gilbert Bruegger!) By the end of the day, word of an Anonymous blogger was all over the CJC.  It was both exciting and terrifying.

And then came Mark Bennett.

Mark had been running his blog Defending People for some time before I wandered into the blogging neighborhood.  I enjoyed his articles and reading them very much made me want to write, as well.  I had a feeling that once he got word that there was an anonymous blogger out there, he would engage.  I was correct about that.  Mark absolutely engaged the anonymous blogger.

And then he threw out an ultimatum:  tell me who you are privately, or I'll find out on my own and out you publicly.

Well, shit.  That backfired.

So, I gave Mark a dollar.  Told him he was now my attorney and confessed my secret identity.  True to his word, he kept it a secret until I got fired went public.  Over the past ten years, Mark's writing has gone on to be recognized on the national level for some of the great work he's put together.  I've kept my writing on local topics for the most part.  I've semi-jokingly said that my blog was The National Enquirer compared to his Wall Street Journal.  But I would be very very remiss if I didn't point out that this blog would have never existed if it weren't for Mark.

And, of course, Pat Lykos.

During the 2008 election, this blog went nuts with comments on the D.A. race.  In the aftermath, when people would ask me if I was surprised that Lykos fired me, I would always respond, "Not really. I mean, I did compare her to a Bud Lite Lizard."  Politics are such nasty things.

The biggest misconception that I think people have had about my outlook on the Lykos Administration was that I just missed the "Old Guard Ways" of the Holmes/Rosenthal days.  That seems to be the standard refrain from people who disagree with what I write.  They forget that Lykos was an extremely controversial judge who brought her self-aggrandizing and paranoid tendencies to the D.A.'s Office.   And man, those tendencies gave me so much material to work with.

I think that's why I'm so disappointed with the way that Kim Ogg has been running the Office lately.  Lykos took over like an enemy combatant and she wasn't wrong when she thought the rank and file disliked her.  Kim listened to Lykos too much when she took over, but she didn't need to.  The prosecutors didn't hate her like they hated Lykos.  At least, they didn't until she fired about 40 of their co-workers.

But I digress.

Over the years, this blog has had highs and lows.  The motivation to write has ebbed and flowed and the readers and commenters have done the same.  At times, I've thought of scrapping it because it served no real function anymore, only to have something come up that made me really motivated to write.  I've made some amazing friends through the blog and I've made some pretty angry enemies.  I hope that, on occasion, I've helped effect some positive changes here and there, but who knows?

In the end, I keep writing this blog for (more or less) the same reason that I started writing.  I think that the Criminal Justice World is the most fascinating aspect of American domestic life.  It is a convening of heroes and villains, tragedy and triumph, brilliance and profound stupidity, hilarity and bereavement.  I can't imagine being involved in any other profession.  Only those of us who practice within it (not just write about it from the outside looking in) can truly understand what it's like.

This blog just tries to show that to the outside world.  I know I may miss the mark on conveying that effectively more often than not.

But for the past ten years, it sure as hell has been fun trying.

Seeking a Police Blogger

As many of you know, I also do a little bit of blogging over at Mimesis Fault Lines.  Scott Greenfield and Lee Pacchia have a great line up of bloggers over there to write about the criminal justice system.

I was honored to be invited to be a writer for them, and I get to write alongside some of the best bloggers in the country.  Not that I want to boost Scott's ego anymore, but having him as an editor has been a tremendous gift that I couldn't have gotten anywhere else.

Scott and Lee are always looking for talented writers to join the ranks of Fault Lines, and they are looking for people who write from differing viewpoints.  We currently have a Federal judge, a card-carrying prosecutor, a former-police officer/defense attorney, along with some very prominent names from the defense blogging community.  Most recently, JoAnne Musick has joined the ranks as a regular contributing writer.

We are currently looking for a blogger to write from a police officer's perspective.  Retired or active.

It isn't a commitment to enter into lightly.  Anyone interested would be writing once or twice a week (depending on what you agree to with Scott and Lee).  They want a post that comes in around 1000 words and it needs to be on a topic that is relevant, current, and interesting to a national audience.  Most importantly, they want it to be smart and offer an insight that people don't get when just reading the newspaper.  Scott is a tough editor, but his corrections and suggestions will make you a better writer.

The deadlines that you commit to are firm. Having a bad day, the sniffles, or feeling just too tired to write something are not sufficient excuses for not having something on your scheduled day. Trust me, I've tried! If you are interested, please realize that they are very very serious about that.  You will also have to have a thick skin when people call you out when their opinions differ from yours.

On the plus side, the people that read your stuff are interested in your opinions.  Some of the things we've written have been quoted in newspapers across the world.  It is a fantastic opportunity to have your voice heard.

In short, it is a tough gig, but one that I'm proud as hell to have.

If you are interested or have any questions, feel free to shoot me an e-mail at murray@murraynewman.com or leave a comment.

Me, Greenfield and Bill Cosby

This week, I was invited to be a guest on Lawyer 2 Lawyer on the Legal Talk Network with Bob Ambrogi.  Scott Greenfield suggested my name as a co-guest with him, and we talked about the Cosby case.  It was a lot of fun and I enjoyed the hell out of doing it.

I think Scott and I should start our own reality show featuring a New York defense attorney and a former Texas prosecutor.

If you want to listen to the 30 minute broadcast, you can by clicking here.

An Interview With Scott Greenfield

My friend (as well as the Great Grandfather of Criminal Blogging) Scott Greenfield interviewed me for the Fault Lines blog that we work on together.  You can read it by clicking here.

A New Blogging Opportunity

I was recently invited by my friend, New York attorney and blogger, Scott Greenfield, to become a contributing blogger to a new project he has begun called Fault Lines.  The project incorporates several different attorneys from around the country who write about trending topics and news stories in the Criminal Justice arena.  He invited me because I'm semi-literate and can hopefully draw on my experiences from my prosecutor days for a different type of perspective.

Followers of this blog know that I don't normally comment on national news stories here, sticking to what I know best: Harris County Criminal Justice.

However, the opportunity to work with Scott on a project is too good to pass up.  He is the preeminent criminal law blogger and I'm honored to be invited.

And I'm not just saying that because he bought me a beer once at Char Bar.

So, here's my first shot at it.  I hope you'll contribute to the discussion over there.

Hey, I Won Something!

Shortly after I wrote my post this morning about my goal of writing more in 2015, I got an e-mail from my Uncle John congratulating me on winning Scott Greenfield's 2014 Jdog Memorial Best Blog Post Award.

I didn't even know that I had been nominated, much less that I had won anything.

To say that I'm happy about the award is an understatement.  Scott is a friend that I met through blogging.  He's an amazing writer with a mind that works overtime.  To win a blogging award coming from somebody who writes like he does means quite a bit to me.

I was also very flattered to learn that I had been nominated by Harris County Public Defender Alex Bunin, which is also an honor.  Alex is also a friend that I have a tremendous amount of respect for.

You guys made my day and I can't thank you enough.  It was a great way to start out the New Year.

P.S.  I also have to thank my wife who edits my posts and catches the vast majority of my grammatical train wrecks.

Blog Spammers [UPDATED]

When I first started blogging, I realized very quickly that I could not run a blog that had no filtering process for the comments.  Back then, there was some Pat-Lykos-supporting-jackass named Kimberly Ann White that kept attempting to post Kelly Siegler's home address on my blog and Mark Bennett's blog.

Over the years, there have been pros and cons to moderating comments.  I try to post everything that people write in as long as it isn't personal and it isn't flat-out lying.  One of the other things that I don't publish is blatant spamming.

Not a day goes by when I don't get some attempt to publish a comment on the blog that reads like it was written by a graduate of Don Hooper's School of Spelling & Grammar.
For example:

Usually, the spamming author will have a link back to an attorney or bail bond company that is nowhere near the Houston area.  The attorney web sites will generally be some sort of mass marketing "DWI lawyer" from Chicago or something or other.  It is annoying, but not really a big deal.

Recently,  I've been getting bombarded by spam blog comments (including the ones shown above) that link back to a local attorney.  I e-mailed both Mark Bennett (who has consistently waged war against attorneys who outsource their advertising) and Paul Kennedy to see if they had been getting similar e-mails.  Paul said he had not, but would be excited to get an additional reader of his blog besides just me.

Mark encouraged me to both publish the comments as well as do a post on the lawyer.  I was torn, because I don't like rewarding bad behavior or giving publicity to somebody who is just shamelessly trying to get some free advertising.  However, Mark correctly pointed out that the idiocy of the website needed to be exposed.

UPDATE:

So I wrote a post about that attorney and it got very mixed reactions.  Some said I went over the top.  Others said it was the only way to make a point.  I spoke with the attorney in question, and ultimately he fired the company that was doing the blog spamming.

I was glad to hear that, so I took out the part of this post that criticized the content of his website.  I'm sure that will get mixed reactions, as well.  Oh well.  That's my call.

In the meantime, I hope that all attorneys who read this blog will remember that our profession takes enough hits in the reputation department as it is without the help of internet marketers who engage in spamming.  

Scott Greenfield's post on Casey Anthony

As most of you realize by now, the Casey Anthony jury is out deliberating her fate in Florida at the time of this writing.  I haven't commented on it for a variety of reasons -- the two primary ones being that it has nothing to do with Harris County and I haven't been following it in the slightest.  I didn't even realize until about two weeks ago that the pathologist on the case, Dr. Jan Garavaglia (AKA Dr. G) was someone I knew back when she worked for the Bexar County Medical Examiner's Office back in the 1990s.

But, I also don't like talking about big media cases that I have no personal knowledge about.  Something about it just doesn't sit right with me.

My friend (and absolutely-excellent-writer-you-really-should-be-reading-his-stuff-every-day), Scott Greenfield just published a post on his thoughts about the Casey Anthony case, and I couldn't agree with his position more.  I highly recommend you check it out by clicking here.