defense attorney

luber: alright, you�ve seen him on cnn andtrue tv�s in session and today he�s here with us to help you. our guest today is joeyjackson and he�s a criminal defense lawyer with the new york firm of koehler and isaacswhere he serves as senior trial counsel. as you may already know, at jdcot we help youfind and succeed in fulfilling careers using a law degree by exploring career paths bothin and out of law. today we�re looking at the path of being a criminal defense lawyer,so let�s meet joey and get started! joey, welcome to jdcot. joey: pleasure and a privilege to be withyou. luber: definitely - i�m really glad you�rehere. there�s lots to talk about. we�re

going to want to hear all about what you doon cable news networks like cnn, but really we want to dig in deep to learning about beinga criminal defense lawyer - so joey, let�s start with the basics first. tell us aboutyour practice and an overview of what you do as a criminal defense lawyer. joey: absolutely. well i�m at a firm andwe�re a full service firm. we represent people in a variety of ways - whether they�reclosing on a house, whether they�re getting a divorce, whether they have issues in laborand employment and discrimination. and then of course we have an extensive criminal practice- and that�s what i do. and as the senior trial counsel here, what i handle are mattersof some import, meaning if someone gets involved

in something significant, whether it be acase involving vehicular manslaughter, whether it be reckless endangerment, shootings withthe police, whether it be enterprise corruption; no matter what the criminal matter is, oftentimes i�m called in to address it. and what that entails is going to court, representingthe client�s interests - i like to say that criminal defense lawyers represent the rightsof the falsely accused. not that that�s always the case - but there are some peoplewho are truly innocent. but by and large, you go to court and in going to court youargue with the prosecution. and what you�re doing is you�re preserving your client�srights and you�re arguing and attempting to hold the state to its burden of proof,which they�re establishing or attempting

to establish that your client is guilty ofa variety of things. so whether it�s enterprise corruption or where people engage in conspiracies,whether it�s a rape case, whether it�s murder, attempted murder, vehicular manslaughter,driving while intoxicated, those are matters that we resolve. and that oftentimes is notonly going to court, but a lot of motion practice - meaning sometimes you want to write on papersto get yourself a certain hearing, to suppress evidence and that type of thing, but it�sa lot of fun stuff. people�s lives are in the balance and you want to do what you cando for them which is the best you can at all times. luber: that sounds great! i�m really curiousto learn about that, the fact that people�s

lives are in the balance - so this is a bigthing. we�ve talked to several trial lawyers here. very often it�s money that�s atstake. you�re dealing with people�s freedoms being at stake. explain the pressure that�son your shoulders when you�re going to trial and representing somebody. joey: well i love this, i love this job. iwould do it if i weren�t paid to do it, so i don�t feel pressured and that�s true.i mean, i like to go to court; i live for the thrill of it. there are a lot of clientswho are involved in some pretty significant things and i would never put a client�slife or liberty at stake without attempting in all means to resolve something with thedistrict attorney, and what does that mean?

it means if i can cut a deal that�s favorableto my client and preserves his life and his freedom, i�ll do it - but sometimes you�releft with no choice - and when you�re left with no choice, you have to fight. so you�regiven the discovery by the state, which are all the police reports, all the records, allthe transcripts, all the information, whatever they have - and you have to put together acase. and so you�re defending a client�s rights and so the stakes are very high. andoftentimes tempers flare in court because you�re doing the best you can, but i thinkit�s just something i�m passionate about; i enjoy it. and as a result of that, i don�tget too stressed out about it. i get stressed when i�m not in court, so there you go.

luber: ha, ha, ha! that�s great! alrightif you�re on youtube, please give us the thumbs up if this was helpful. and if youwant to see the full interview with joey, come visit us at jdcot.com where joey�sgonna tell us all about his tv work and he�s gonna tell us lots more about being a criminaldefense lawyer: like what�s a typical day, who makes the right fit for this path, howto break in and how to succeed. if you�re already at the site, you can just scroll downto the full video. make sure you join the membership so you get access to all the helpfulvideo content on the site. thanks again for watching everybody. i�m marc luber and i�llsee you soon.