A criminal defense attorney's spiritual journey: Alaleh Kamran's musings...: September 2014

Open Letter to my doe-eyed client who was so high in court today, he could not stand up in front of the Judge….

I know you are reading this. I know your mom will be reading this. There are hundreds like you on my page as they’re getting ready to shoot up, snort up, smoke out, or pop a pill. And there are hundreds like your mom, silently reading this, weeping and wondering how much more she could have done.

You are right. Life is not fair. Death of loved ones is not fair. The pain, neglect and abuse inflicted on us as children is not fair. I get it. I understand your pain. I understand how badly you need to numb yourself to extricate yourself from that painful existence which is your reality. The tracks on your arms are a road map of your pains and struggles. I am not minimizing them. I honor your pain. I recognize your struggles. I understand how you have bowed down, on your knees, to your addiction. I understand how desperate and lonely and lost you are.

I have seen you for years now.. I have walked with you from Juvenile court, into adult court… I have walked with you through felony arrests after strike arrests, … And through each case, with luck, with academics, with chambers conferences, with bamboozle, with motions, with tactics, I have walked you out of the doors of the courthouse, unscathed, untouched, and with a mere misdemeanor conviction.

Every time you’ve come to court, you were high. Heroin is your lover. Your mom is killing herself to keep you safe. You are burying your mother alive in your lust and passion for Heroin. You’re an addict. You know it. I know it. There is no escaping it. This is your life, and as fucked up as it, it is YOUR life, your gift on this earth for a short time, to make what you want of yourself.

Years ago, you sat in my office, excited over the fact that I had just obtained a dismissal on your transportation of a shit ton of Xanax, I looked at you and said: “you think it’s easy, ‘cause you got off easy… but be careful how you get slammed, because if you don’t clean up, you’ll pay karmic wages”

Your karmic wages are here… Today, I couldn’t save you… you were so fucking stoned, your eyes were floating, your body was rolling, you were flying so high in court, that the Bailiff’s eyes welled up.

The judge asked us to approach… she was going to ask the DA the charge you for being under the influence. She was going to kick up the bail on your open case, and increase the case on your pending probation violation. All I said was: “He has been like a son” because you have. Because I have seen you turn from a teen ager into a man, and because like how you love your fucking drugs, I have become fond of you… And it breaks my heart to see you spit your life away, as if you’re going to get a second chance at this merry go round….

You are now in the big boys’ court. This is big league. You either clean up your act, and decide that no matter how strong your addiction, you will be stronger. If you don’t clean up you have two choices. Either 1) You will do prison time. I guarantee that. You are a pretty boy. Prison will not suit you well. You won’t do well as someone’s bitch. You won’t survive the violence, sexual or otherwise. Or the other choice is 2) You will kill yourself and/or someone else. Chances are you will overdose on your own vomit and we’ll be left to bury you.

You are NOT a bad person. You are NOT a failure. You are NOT evil. You just have an addiction. And until such time as you learn to forgive yourself and love yourself, you cannot move on. I know there have been times you have hated me… Please know that regardless of your lies, deceptions, games, manipulations, all of which I have read through, I have loved you, as has your mother, unconditionally.

Please know that the world needs you. You have so much to give. You have so much to teach… Hug yourself. Look at yourself in the mirror, and make yourself the promise, that if not for your mother, then for the one person you miss the most, you will go to rehab…

Let me know when you’re ready, and we’ll check you in.

CDAK

Alaleh Kamran

9/5/2014

Alaleh Kamran, Attorney at Law

A Professional Corporation

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I'd rather be anywhere but here today... Parking is hell.. and there are no available spots for at least 3 blocks... I squeeze my car into a tiny hole, on badly mangled asphalt disfigured by mighty root trees that refuse to change their nature in the construct of man-made civilization. I stumble out of the driver seat by catching my heel on the ground.

The weight of my client's case carries heavier in my heart than my huge briefcase stacked with Jail records, Mental Hospital and psychiatrist reports. I walk by the railroad tracks, on my way to get to Courthouse. The train drags by along the tracks, lingering & hesitant... It too, is loathing arrival at the destination point.

I walk into this building, an old pickle factory, now transformed into the Mental Health Court. The hallways are packed with patients from different mental hospitals, accused of some type of a crime, or being placed on hold for being either a "danger to self" "danger to others" or "unable to provide for their own food shelter & clothing"....

Some are disheveled... others talk to themselves and respond to internal stimuli. Yet another is catatonic and is staring into the dead space... There is a distinct smell to Mental Illness, permeated in the hallways by the pungent odors of disillusionment and the putrid smells of confusion, disappointment and desperation.

I made the mistake of becoming emotionally involved with this case. I made the humoungous mistake of meeting family members in this wretched case of mine, and allowing my mothering instincts to gel with that of the mother. I am now twined to the case, twined to the defendant who is facing a life sentence, twined to his mother, and his family members .... and I have lost my footing.

I was up all last night. My insides writhing with anguish, struggling with strategy, policy, morality, and law. Yes, after 22 years of practice, there are still some cases that grapple my soul, and etch themselves to my inner fibers...

The tragedy of Mental Illness occurs when it collides with the defunct, bankrupt and dilapidated criminal justice system... Years ago, in an effort hailed by the Republicans as Reaganomics, all fundings were stripped from Mental Hospitals, Mental programs, outpatient and inpatient programs much like the way ISIS strips its prisoners dignity prior to killing them.

I walk to the back of the Courtroom towards that long hallway that leads to the holding areas. Walls are painted an ugly forest Green and the familiar smell of jail burns my nostrils. It smells like a dirty meat shop. The heart of this courthouse is the testament of our failure as a society. Alexis de Tocqueville, the French political philosopher of the 19^th Century once said that the best way to judge the success of any democracy is to measure how it treats the mentally ill and the incarcerated. And by what I have seen in the last 22 years and having worked a great part of my law school career in the mental health units of the criminal justice system, I know that we have failed. Utterly, absolutely, unequivocally and without a single doubt.

September 4, 2014