Attorney Johnnie Cochran has died in California after an illness

[Rudy Huckleberry]

Oh yeh and I also think that you misconstrued unintentionally my sentence, 'you do not have to be to be respected' to 'you don't have to be respected'

lol.  Yep, I sure did.  Still jetlagged, I guess    

Carry on.

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

Alamss - you couldn't be more off base.  You're focussing on the high profile cases. Anybody who can take on what Johnnie Cochran did for the community IS a hero to be respected and who is respected in our community.  Obviously your community doesn't share that same sentiment, as evidenced by your representative statement.

[Victor]

Alamss - you couldn't be more off base.  You're focussing on the high profile cases. Anybody who can take on what Johnnie Cochran did for the community IS a hero to be respected and who is respected in our community.  Obviously your community doesn't share that same sentiment, as evidenced by your representative statement.

Nice.

[One Step Ahead]

sad day folks, sad day.
prayers go out to his family

[thefaceman]

I guess my main qualm with Mr. C is not the fact that he was a good litigator.  To say otherwise would be ignorant.  In thinking about his courtroom history, I think those that view him as tyrannical and only look at the surface of his work are missing somethng important.  Granted, Johnnie may have been "less than ethical" in some of his approaches to certain cases.  If anything, though, Mr. Cochran should be recognized for exploiting loopholes in the legal theater, and taking an anything goes approach to winning a case.  He showed that the same injustices used to put (black) people in jail, could be used to keep them out, forcing us to review the way we think about race and justice.  He showed that good lawyering was not only for the rich white man anymore, and I think that this is what tickles a lot of people the wrong way.  So, I believe that whether ethical in his tactics or not, Mr. Cochran should command a great deal of recognition for what he has accomplished.  Nevertheless, I don't believe that helping anyone who is guilty of murder go free is the most effective method to social change.

[Regal_Muse]

 Johnny Cochran was an amazing attorney who should be admired and respected for his accomplishments in the legal profession. I think it speaks volumes what kind of man he is considering the fact that he was practicing law where there weren't too many black attorneys around. I can only imagine what kind of discriminatory practices he faced as a black attorney.

[_BP_]

I guess my main qualm with Mr. C is not the fact that he was a good litigator. To say otherwise would be ignorant. In thinking about his courtroom history, I think those that view him as tyrannical and only look at the surface of his work are missing somethng important. Granted, Johnnie may have been "less than ethical" in some of his approaches to certain cases. If anything, though, Mr. Cochran should be recognized for exploiting loopholes in the legal theater, and taking an anything goes approach to winning a case. He showed that the same injustices used to put (black) people in jail, could be used to keep them out, forcing us to review the way we think about race and justice. He showed that good lawyering was not only for the rich white man anymore, and I think that this is what tickles a lot of people the wrong way. So, I believe that whether ethical in his tactics or not, Mr. Cochran should command a great deal of recognition for what he has accomplished. Nevertheless, I don't believe that helping anyone who is guilty of murder go free is the most effective method to social change.

You made some good points but still ended up judging him based on the O.J case, like that's all he ever did.  It's amazing how white people got so worked up over the O.J acquittal.  Where was the voices of dissension when so many black people were killed for just looking at a white woman, or wrongfully convicted by a flawed/corrupt system?  But let "justice not be served" and one black man get off, and all of a sudden...

Oh well, R.I.P Cochran.  Thanks.

[_BP_]

"If the glove doesn't fit, you must acquit." Those famous words are part of virtually every obituary about Johnnie Cochran, the attorney who died yesterday of a brain tumor at age 67.

The quote brings people back to the mid-1990s, when Cochran successfully defended O.J. Simpson from charges that he killed his wife, Nicole, and her friend Ronald Goldman.

Cochran, who already has established himself as one of the country's most well-known lawyers, rocketed to superstardom after the case. He was parodied on TV shows such as "Seinfeld" and "South Park." He also hosted his own show on Court TV.

The case also brought Cochran controversy. After the trial, Robert L. Shapiro, a member of Cochran's legal team, told Barbara Walters he regretted some of the team's tactics (registration required). "Not only did we play the race card," he said, "we dealt it from the bottom of the deck."

 

Cochran responded in his book. "The charge that I could convince black jurors to vote to acquit a man they believed to be guilty of two murders because he is black is an insult to all African Americans," he wrote.




The celebrity cases were just one part of Cochran's career. "Certainly, Johnnie's career will be noted as one marked by 'celebrity' cases and clientele," his family said in a statement. "But he and his family were most proud of the work he did on behalf of those in the community."

 

Cochran represented a Haitian immigrant tortured by New York police, a 19-year-old black woman who was shot a dozen times by police as she sat in a locked car and former Black Panther Elmer "Geronimo" Pratt, who spent 27 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit. He called the day he helped Pratt win his freedom "the happiest day of my life practicing law."


Of course, Cochran's client list included a host of celebrities, including football great Jim Brown, rapper Snoop Dog, hip-hop mogul Sean "P. Diddy" Combs and child actor Todd Bridges.

One of Cochran's most famous clients was Michael Jackson. The lawyer represented the King of Pop in the singer's first sexual-molestation case, which was settled in 1994.

 

In a statement, Jackson said Cochran "was a true gentleman who embodied class, brilliance, honesty and integrity. His fight for justice transcended color, age or economic status ... I loved him, and I will miss him. I am proud to have called him my friend."

 

In that case, the boy was represented by Larry Feldman, who Cochran later hired to represent him in a palimony case. Feldman said Cochran was a master at his craft. "When Johnnie was in a court room, everyone from jurors to courtroom personnel to the judges themselves would listen to every word that he said," he told Bloomberg News. "I'm not just talking about big cases—little cases, medium cases, he commanded a presence."

 

The great-grandson of slaves, Cochran was born Oct. 2, 1937, in Shreveport, La. In 1949, his family moved to Los Angeles, where Cochran was one of two dozen black students integrated into Los Angeles High School in the 1950s. After graduating from UCLA, Cochran earned a law degree from Loyola Law School.

 

His desire to practice law was evident when he was a child. He idolized Thurgood Marshall, the attorney who persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court to outlaw school segregation in Brown v. Board of Education. He would become the court's first black justice.

"I didn't know too much about what a lawyer did or how he worked, but I knew that if one man could cause this great stir, then the law must be a wondrous thing," Cochran said in his book, A Lawyer's Life. "I read everything I could find about Thurgood Marshall and confirmed that a single dedicated man could use the law to change society."

Whether Cochran changed society is up for debate, but he certainly changed lives. "He was a brilliant strategist who never lost touch with the common man," said Sanford Rubinstein, a former colleague. "He took particular pride in standing up with those who were wrongfully treated. He truly loved people and the public adored him."

[thefaceman]

You are right, I should have clarified it a little.  I don't think ANYONE should go free for killing someone, ever.  And, if we are going to commend Mr. C for promoting social justice, I would argue that two wrongs never make a right.  He did plenty of other things too which are very commendable, but his willingness to compramise those same principles that he used to free black men who were wrongly convicted or abused to let a black man go free for killing his wife is what troubles me.  I guess that is a question any defence attorney is faced with, though, no matter what the circumstances are.  How far will you go to defend someone who is obviously guilty?  This could stray into a whole other argument. I do, however, agree that he was a great litigator and orator.  His character on Seinfeld was also very funny.

[seu2002]

that was a great article to post, oracle.  where'd you get it?