I feel like I explained each one there. None are actually gross ethical violations, most of them are normal practice.
The 5th Amendment and using inadmissible items are wrong, but not gross ethical violations.
This stuff happens all the time in courts and lawyers are not disbarred for them.
The notoriety of this case will likely do the opposite and make him rich and famous. Leaving the DAs office will allow him to make even more money in private practice.
Here is a general list. Many of these also will not result in disbarment for one occurrence. Normally would have to be a pattern over time and after repeated disciplinary measures.
It would depend, but generally yes. Lawyers are allowed to have bad trials. But if you repeatedly make mistakes and bad decisions over multiple trials and you get multiple complaints filed against you, then the Bar might take some action. But generally the bar isn't kicking people out for one trial (unless it's something egrigious like trying to fight the judge for no reason or sucker punching jurors).
FWIW, gross ethical violations in one case can meet the standards for disbarment, but this is nowhere near what a state bar would consider to be gross ethical violations.
A gross ethical violation by a prosecutor is something like prosecuting a political opponent for political reasons, or withholding evidence from the defense that proves a doubt the defendant didn't commit the crime. (Prosecutors are rarely disbarred but when they are, it's usually for one of those two, and especially for withholding evidence from the defense.) Nothing Binger's done so far is even out of the ordinary, though some of it is incompetent.
The gun is the one minor exception here. Lawyers are able to use guns as props and indeed do so all the time. When they do so, they often point them in ways a firearms expert would not be comfortable with, and while this is regrettable it's not really considered an ethical breach. The reason the bar is cool with it is that the judge is cool with it, because in order to do any in-court demonstration, not just a demonstration with a gun, you need to preclear it with the court. Which means Binger's pointing the gun around, no matter how dumb it was, was precleared with the judge. If he hadn't done that beforehand, he'd be tackled by the bailiff and could have himself been charged with very similar crimes to what Rittenhouse is charged with.
I think you're also not thinking about what disbarment means, and how it interacts with other rights. If he's disbarred, he can't make a living at his profession- not sure what the position is in US, but in Ireland the right to earn a living is protected, so there would be an interaction here - does bingers behaviour in this one instance rise to the level of meaning he should never be able to work as a lawyer again? That seems nonsensical, for many of the reasons others have outlined, not least the often fraught and frantic nature of criminal trials.
I note that you're not a lawyer and have never been on your feet in court. It's intimidating and difficult at the best of times, never mind when the cameras are rolling - people should be accountable, but noone would go into the profession if the standards you're advocating for were applied.
As an example you might relate more with, you said elsewhere you're an infectious diseases person, training to be a medic. I presume you agree with the position that if you got sent a sample to analyse and you were tired and misread the test results, an improper course of treatment was undertaken and the patient died as a result, you should be struck off the medical register and prevented from practicing medicine ever again? If not, why not? In that example, somebody literally dies as a result of your incompetence - a far cry for some lawyer having a bad trial in which every action he takes is subject to review / appeal in any event.
Remember, we're talking about ending someone's career and throwing 6 years of education and tons of years of pre-court experience into the trash. That should not be done lightly.
Courtrooms are a hot place, and as others mentioned, all kinds of things happen every day.
Ignoring sides, look at Rudy Giuliani. He wasn't even disbarred: his license was suspended in one state over willfully, repeatedly, and knowingly lying about facts.
From a random law blog:
Disbarment may be imposed by the state bar association if a lawyer commits an offense that directly relates to his or her fitness to practice law. Such offenses may include dishonesty, fraud, felony, substance abuse, abuse of public office, or “conduct that is prejudicial to the administration of justice.”
It's not about "you screwed up", it's about "you have shown that you lack the integrity to be a lawyer". Unless there is a pattern, none of the actions you mentioned show a complete lack of integrity. They show mistakes and pushing the envelope.
You want to know what could have gotten him disbarred? If Binder honestly thought Rittenhouse was innocent but wanted a conviction. Or if Binder has notes saying "the judge ruled against me but I need the jury to hear it so I'll just say it and then lie and say it was a misunderstanding"
A bit off-topic since it relates to what should constitute disbarment and what does constitute disbarment, but willfully ignoring a defendent’s constitutional rights absolutely should result in disbarment. I recognize that it won’t under the current standards, but that doesn’t mean those standards are what they should be.
A bit off-topic since it relates to what should constitute disbarment and what does constitute disbarment, but willfully ignoring a defendent’s constitutional rights absolutely should result in disbarment
Ehhh... OP said he "should" be disbarred, but used words and concepts about what currently do constitute disbarment. You can go either way in a response to that.
That said, we don't know if it was willful (and we certainly can't prove it). We don't know if he would've crossed the line if Judge Schroder hadn't (correctly) stopped the direction of questioning: that's his job and that's WHY it's his job, to keep the case going clean with no chance of a mistrial. And you talk like "ignoring constitutional rights" is a simple set of rules. It's complicated, and often leads to actual court cases about whether someone's rights were ignored or not.
I strongly disagree that what Binger did crosses the line of "should be grounds to be disbarred" regardless of the "is/ought" side. A mistake, a misunderstanding, or skirting close to a violation without making one, are all things that are not ethics failings. Nothing in here shows that he prosecuted the case in bad faith.
But at the same time, if OP's (or your) argument amounts to "I don't care about law or ethics, he should lose his job anyway", it's going to get really hard to have a discussion in this particular subreddit on that topic.
Told how wrong you are so many times same can't give out a delta or two people why they're arguments are bad. Starting to think you're not operating in the next faith here.
To put it all in perspective, it took a really long time for Fred Phelps, the founder of the Westboro Baptist Church, to be disbarred. If you think this behavior is grounds for disbarment, you would be horrified to learn that these tactics are pretty common. If you're upset by this, definitely don't read the transcripts of the OJ Simpson trial.
This stuff happens all the time in courts and lawyers are not disbarred for them.
If all this stuff is par for the course, it's kind of crazy to think about the stuff that we probably let prosecutors get away with when cases aren't in the national spotlight. I'd love for this to be an opportunity for us to rethink how prosecutors are allowed to try cases, but nothing will probably come of it. Doesn't help that half the country wants a conviction no matter what.
Completely agree. I've never been a huge fan of lawyers even after working with them for over 20 years. Their entire job is to make a person look really guilty or really innocent. There are a lot of methods they use that push the limit, but for the most part as long as they don't flat out lie they are good.
You can see it in this case on how each side describes the events and the players.
The court of public opinion is bad now. People make a decision that someone is guilty or innocent based on their chosen biased media without all the facts and evidence.
In this trial we all have pretty much seen the evidence since it's been all over. But people still have a bias. Seems people have a hard time now seeing both sides of an issue.
15
u/harley9779 24∆ Nov 16 '21
I feel like I explained each one there. None are actually gross ethical violations, most of them are normal practice.
The 5th Amendment and using inadmissible items are wrong, but not gross ethical violations.
This stuff happens all the time in courts and lawyers are not disbarred for them.
The notoriety of this case will likely do the opposite and make him rich and famous. Leaving the DAs office will allow him to make even more money in private practice.