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From Criminal Defense to Civil Rights with Austin Dove · Justice Team Podcast

• 0:02
  Welcome to this episode of the Justice Team Podcast on the Justice Team Network.
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  And today we're honored to have the Mr.
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  Austin Dove, who is a criminal defense lawyer specialist.
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  Or Raider extraordinaire also does civil rights trials, personal
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  injury trials and coming fresh.
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  We're shooting here on year of their, Lord, what is this?
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  August 21st.
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  Second 22nd shit.
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  Yeah.
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  . 'cause this morning, Austin was in Chicago at the, uh,
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  democratic National Convention.
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  Yes, yes.
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  Flew in on a red eye leg last night.
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  Got in just after midnight this morning.
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  So yeah, I'm, I'm fresh off of Chicago in the DNC, which was a blast.
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  Uh, saw some of the most, uh, talented people orators, which is
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  our business, storytellers, thinkers, uh, needle movers that exist.
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  And so that was really nice to be part of that.
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  Who was the, uh, the best by far?
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  It was Michelle.
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  Michelle Obama.
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  It's hard to say that when a night when, when Obama speaks, if we know how great
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  he is that Michelle stole the show, there were other great speakers there too.
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  I mean, AOC did great Jasmine Crockett, another, uh, person that's,
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  uh, getting some traction there.
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  Congresswoman other.
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  Uh, Dallas, Texas, uh, did phenomenal work.
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  She actually, she's a, a former public defender, and now she's a congress
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  member, and a lot of points can be learned about how she's structured.
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  The sort of arguments, the kind of Trump versus Biden or the
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  Dems versus Reeps kind of thing.
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  I think lawyers do make good politicians.
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  They do, they do, because the, the sort of um, having to, to story
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  tell and improvise and listen.
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  You know, I think the best, and I know you know this as well.
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  The best and sort of underrated skill for a trial lawyer is to listen because so
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  many things you pick up, if you write your questions, of course you have a format,
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  you have an idea of where you want to go.
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  But if you're not listening to the subtlety, to the small pieces and
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  the answer, little seeds they drop.
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  Sometimes the body language coupled with the statement, this tells
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  you so much about where you got to
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  go.
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  You know, in the trial scenario, you've got to be present dynamic
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  of the movement to pick up on those non verbals because guess what?
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  The jury's present.
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  They're listening.
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  Yes.
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  Right.
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  So you better be too.
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  Yeah.
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  Yeah.
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  So Austin comes to us, you know, like I said, he's a, he's
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  certified in the space that he is.
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  Not a lot of people can say that.
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  A lot of people say that they are.
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  You know, a specialist in XYZ, but the board of certain states
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  do recognize specialists.
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  Um, I know you went to law school in San Diego.
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  You practice well, all of California, but mostly Southern California.
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  Yeah.
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  It's mostly Southern California.
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  I've done a fair number of cases in Northern Cal.
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  The federal stuff is, you know, takes us outside of the state.
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  Sometimes it's always a mixed bag.
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  Cause you got to say, what are the low?
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  What's the local local?
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  Like it's, it's part of your, Assessment in taking a case is
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  what's the local flavor and feel?
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  Let's
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  walk us through that, because when you have, you know, criminal defense, Um,
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  it's different from whenever you have like a, a civil rights, civil case.
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  Yes.
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  It's different.
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  Yes.
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  Different laws, different dynamics.
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  Absolutely.
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  Yes.
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  Um, so walk us through, walk, walk our listeners through like, you
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  have a common fact pattern where say cops, um, do something improper.
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  They say somebody was doing something illegal.
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  that person dies.
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  Right.
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  You have to some, well, say they lived and they charged that person with a crime.
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  So this is the hybrid a lot of people don't know about.
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  I learned this recently.
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  So walk us through whenever you have to represent somebody criminally
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  because they're given pressing charges and they also severely injured them.
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  Yes.
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  Walk us through this.
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  Right.
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  Well, first of all, you are, we often know that the decision to charge
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  someone criminally is politically motivated in that circumstance.
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  Because very often when it gets to the point where the person has been severely
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  grotesquely injured, you point out maybe even the loss of life, then that's, uh,
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  probably disproportionate to whatever wrong they may have been doing, you know?
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  So the first thing you're doing is when you get to that criminal case court,
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  and that's, as you point out, that, that is a place where I spent a lot of time.
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  I got tons of my stripes, my knots, my bruises going through the criminal
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  courts in that process, which is, I think, an important and underrated cross
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  training skill set for whatever you do.
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  In the civil arena.
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  Um, but yes, as you put out, the first step is to navigate your way
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  through that criminal case and you've got to leverage whatever you can.
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  Sometimes it's the sort of the moment that's happening around.
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  The person whether it was a publication, uh, where there are other factors
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  that you learned about the police harvesters involved precedent that is
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  also where this police department or these officers specifically have acted
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  improperly, who's the one pressing the needle to get a filing done?
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  Because so often that's a detective IO investigating
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  officer for the police department.
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  That's going to say, Hey, we got to get this because yeah.
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  Then you can get potential, uh, immunity from liability.
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  Well, that's what let's do that.
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  If they're convicted, if the person that they say was committing a crime in charge,
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  if they're convicted of that crime, there goes the civil lawsuit against,
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  right?
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  For the most part.
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  Yeah.
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  There's a, there's some case law that talks about, let's say they
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  were going to give the person, it was like, um, a resisting arrest.
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  That's a very common thing.
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  You're resisting arrest.
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  They were resisting, even resisting with force, right?
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  So there's a proportionality test still that applies.
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  True.
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  The conviction heck versus Humphreys is very hard to get over that in general,
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  but then you can, there's a piece of it in the federal court where you can pull out.
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  just what was the actual behavior that was being policed and what
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  did they say this person did wrong?
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  What are they convicted of?
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  And what is the, um, potential charge that, um, uh, how did,
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  how did the facts from that spill over to what the police did?
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  So maybe it was resisting on the one hand, but you have maybe one, two, or
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  even three officers who overreached that person may not have been resisting
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  against all three officers and only one.
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  So the claim could survive potentially against the other.
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  It's very difficult.
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  Yeah.
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  Because they, they want to make it a panacea.
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  And of course they hire really talented, very highly researched firms.
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  private law firms at the county under you've dealt with them too,
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  that the county or the public entity will hire to represent them.
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  And they're going to grind you down.
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  They
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  can save millions of dollars on the civil lawsuit by defeating the criminal law.
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  Yes.
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  Of course, you're up against the system and they have unlimited resources.
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  Resources,
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  unlimited funds, you know,
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  right.
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  Yeah.
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  So when it comes to that criminal defense side, though, we all kind of have a lane
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  that we've, we feel really comfortable in.
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  And that's what I just feel incredibly comfortable in, in a
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  criminal defense trial in many ways.
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  While we know that the most did you,
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  did you start out doing criminal defense or yeah, PD's office.
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  I'll tell you the whole, I'll tell you my
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  whole, my whole arc, a little thumbnail of my whole arc was I actually
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  started out at the DA's office.
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  I was a DA in Riverside, did that for a couple of years.
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  Then I went to a big law firm cause I was like, well, I got to kind of, I had worked
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  as a summer associate during law school.
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  So I said, well, let me, I might have to recapture this and go back to trying
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  to make me like the kind of money that you can make at these big firms.
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  So I did that.
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  Yeah.
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  For a few more years.
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  And then I realized I just wasn't really for me.
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  Uh, I missed the courtroom.
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  Um, I had a client that was going to go with me, a civil client for an
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  hourly thing, and I said, well, this is enough for me to pay the bill.
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  So I just took that case and I said, I got to bet on myself.
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  So, but the real, the first.
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  Experience in the criminal arena was in the DA's office.
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  And I kind of got to see how the sausage is made on that side.
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  How long have you had your own firm?
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  . Oof.
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  I, I started, really opened my doors.
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  I, I kind of moonlighted for a while when I was still doing big law.
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  'cause I just wanted to get back into court and I had cases, clients
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  call me criminal cases by the way.
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  And I said I, I just missed going in there.
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  But officially 2001 is when I started my own Wow.
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  Own shop, you know?
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  And you also, you mentor a lot of folks in the space.
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  Mm-Hmm.
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  . I, I hear your name often of how you help them start their own firms or give them
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  guidance whenever they needed experience with some of the criminal cases.
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  that we're kind of like too small for you, I would say, because you have
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  more higher, higher profile stuff.
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  So walk us through if a young lawyers out there listening or watching,
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  and they want to get into this space, they're young and hungry.
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  How can Austin dove help them?
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  The most important thing is, it's almost like a litmus test before you get there.
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  Because is this something that looks sexy from the outside?
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  It's kind of a law and order interest?
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  Or do you really know how unpopular you're going to be as a defense lawyer?
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  It's almost like, Hey, They're often plaintiff's lawyers.
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  We walk in and we're the most unpopular person in the courtroom.
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  I
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  figure plaintiff, lawyer, civil side of the same defense.
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  We're hated.
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  And before we walk in,
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  everybody's like, why is this guy here?
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  Oh my God.
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  A plaintiff's lawyer, same old stuff.
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  Well, the defense lawyers, you might even be a.
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  A multiple or a sort of a exponent of that you can really get one thing that I've
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  seen that they've had a lot of shows and movies recently that have humanized
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  their criminal defense lawyers.
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  Yeah, a lot.
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  Yes.
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  So I like, I've just noticed a trend with that.
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  I think it's really cool.
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  I wish I would have been around when I first heard this stuff because they,
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  you're like a pariah when you walk in, but you get through that because you
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  learn how, and actually again, that does, that cross training skillset
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  does make you a lot stronger when you need to go over and do civil cases.
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  I know they're different animals, a whole lot to learn before you even begin to
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  practice an area that wasn't like your mainstay, but the cross training in
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  terms of the reps that you do for cross examination, for example, I mean, in,
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  uh, and I'll, I'll answer your question, but I know about the young folks, but I
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  really want the young folks to see the sort of process of a criminal case and
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  the way you have to come in prepared.
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  If you want to go into private practice as a criminal defense lawyer, Your
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  preparation level has to justify that person not using the usually free
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  services from the public defender.
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  Public defenders are often very well trained, very well resourced.
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  So you've got to be able to say, what can I do to add value to the case to
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  possibly get you a better outcome?
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  One factor of course is you've got to give a ton of time to that person.
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  You've got to sink your teeth deeply into the facts in a way that maybe the
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  public defender's time doesn't allow.
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  going to the scene, talking to different witnesses, kind of peeling
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  back other issues and then spending that time with your client, which
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  is really, really critical to being able to humanize them for whatever
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  part of advocacy you're doing.
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  Yeah.
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  And it's like same thing in our civil world is, You know, I tell you
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  what, if they come up with a huge, complicated case, and you're a first
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  year lawyer to start your firm, you have to realize your limitations.
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  Same thing if you get a capital murder case.
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  Yeah.
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  There's no way you can go in there and have the wherewithal to try.
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  That's why we see a lot of, in our space, and sometimes yours, law firms teaming up.
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  So I assume there's a lot of Right, yeah.
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  And what I mean by that is if you want to deal with young lawyers that you mentor
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  and show them how the ropes and how to use these cases, they're not bigger ones.
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  They work with you because of the complexity of it.
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  Yes.
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  The complexity is, is no joke.
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  I mean, in fact, just like judges kind of can, can get kind of weigh into
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  heavily on some of our civil cases.
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  Uh, they certainly get involved because the appellate rights are so stark and so
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  severe when you're representing someone on a potential life case or capital case
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  or any case that has significant exposure.
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  The judge is going to start testing you because there's certain
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  very particular motions you have to file in a particular order.
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  You have to engage expert witnesses.
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  Maybe you have to do a psych exam or a psych eval.
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  And numerous other pieces just to say, am I doing this right?
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  And as you, as you realize from doing this in this space, you know,
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  you don't know what you don't know.
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  So you can only, you can have, you can check every list out there and say,
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  follow this and this, and this, that's not going to really give you the insight.
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  So, so my process with the young folks is to really kind of have them
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  shadow me for a while and see if they really have the grit to do it.
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  And, and the ones that do, uh, then I sort of try to provide them
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  with, uh, uh, uh, an approach.
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  Okay.
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  Uh, and a vehicle to, okay, well, this is how you might want to start
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  advertising, uh, connecting to other lawyers, being in a particular courtroom
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  on a regular basis, trying to perhaps get on as these panels in some courts
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  where you can get appointed by courts.
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  And
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  you're
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  on
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  some leadership panels too for that,
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  right?
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  Yeah, there's some panels that you can get.
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  Yes.
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  You can get appointed to, uh, as, and then they pay you kind of a, a basic rate.
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  It's not, you know, you don't, you don't get rich on that rate, but you
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  do get the experience and the reps.
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  And, and a lot of times we are, you know, this, uh, to there's this desire
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  by really everyone younger in this space.
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  I want to do shortcuts.
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  I probably did the same thing.
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  I just shortcut, how can I just get there fast?
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  I just want to try the big cases, right?
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  But the shortcuts don't work in this business.
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  So you have to be able to, to train the kind of block by block way to get there.
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  And then.
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  You can actually more competently and more confidently.
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  And you could be a rainmaker lawyer and be able to team up with people like Austin.
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  By the way, thank you for your mentorship at Justice HQ because you give an offering
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  to helping people doing this space.
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  Like for instance, I know there's a lot of lawyers that are here
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  that are in the mentorship track.
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  Don't do criminal law or doing what you're doing.
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  So first of all, thank you.
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  And you know, I know I've sent cases to Austin through attorney share and
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  I know other lawyers probably have too because I'm sure you're inundated.
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  Yeah.
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  Cases right now.
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  I get, I get lots of cases in that space.
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  So what, so what do you do with those cases that are not either within
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  your wheelhouse or that are not worth your, like literally your time
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  because this is where you sit today.
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  I have about five to six lawyers, some of whom, you know, that are
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  either moderately experienced.
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  Some of them very experienced.
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  Uh, and then some of them in the newer kind of stages of their practices.
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  And I try to be very, first of all, you got to really get to know the
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  client because referrals don't really, you have to get that sort of basic
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  kind of picture of what the situation for the client is as much as you
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  can in a sort of shorter timeframe and know who's the right person to
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  take it, take it over.
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  So, I mean, you probably are the right person for a lot of these, but.
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  Austin Duff can only be so many places so many times.
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  You're going to be in Chicago today at 1230.
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  I'm here in Los Angeles.
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  By what time is it?
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  Yeah, not even two o'clock.
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  Yeah.
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  20.
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  Yeah.
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  So, um, this is one, like a lot of lawyers that I know that are the best civil
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  rights lawyers also are criminal defense
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  lawyers.
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  And why is that?
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  The reason is there's an, there's a, uh, it starts off with just the
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  actual time that you're have police officers in front of you, right?
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  So in criminal court, you're going to be cross examining a lot of police
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  officers, whether it's at something.
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  I mean, the first cases I used to do were DUIs in the DA's office, then
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  something called toss cases, where literally the fact pattern was guy
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  had some narcotics, the cops came around the corner, he threw the bag.
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  Those cases sometimes go to preliminary trial.
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  We've all been there.
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  Yeah, exactly.
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  So then you're like, and then, uh, and then the other thing is that is the
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  timeframe that you have to prepare for.
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  It's criminal.
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  Doesn't.
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  Statutes are usually 60 days from start to finish, 72 days.
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  If you add the, which call, statutory time, so you could sometimes have a very
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  short window between the time that you get the case and some cases actual trial.
• 14:55
  Wow.
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  Between that on felonies have something called a preliminary hearing, and if you
• 15:00
  really are immersed in criminal law, you are gonna do, I've probably done well over
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  1500, maybe 2000 preliminary hearings.
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  Wow.
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  If not more.
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  A little bit more than a deposition, but different Oh yeah.
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  Because.
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  Then you have to make an argument about what's something called a holding order.
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  Well, typically one of the witnesses in almost every case is gonna be
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  either a police officer who responded to the scene or an investigating
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  officer slash detective who was involved in managing things.
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  And then you have civilian witnesses too very often who said
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  they're, they made the, made the call, or they were the victim.
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  And so those pieces you have to kind of get together really fast to cross
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  examine them and the standard and the stakes are very high because you miss
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  an issue that could be an element that you can argue to get the case
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  thrown out or this just wasn't there.
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  That experience, time after time again, it's just unparalleled.
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  And that's like when I tell young
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  lawyers, like, I was trying, the people are like, Oh, you tried these big cases.
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  You do all these big results.
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  Like, you know, the stuff that I was trying when I first started,
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  my first one was a dog bite case in Compton, which like, they were
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  disputing who the owners were.
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  They said they didn't have insurance.
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  I mean, these are the kinds of things you literally cut your teeth on.
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  Um, one thing that you, you touched on earlier, I wanted to like to sink
• 16:10
  back on is how important it is when you choose your venue, if you can
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  take a case and it's important, not only who the demographic, the jury
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  is, who the judge is going to be.
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  You have to do that.
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  Deep dive.
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  Thank God.
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  Now there's additional resources.
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  Thank God.
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  To list serves, through background research, you can do about the judge.
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  You can actually look at their prior filings.
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  You know, nowadays on Westlaw, you can do all kinds of stuff, look at the prior
• 16:33
  trial court orders, just to kind of know what the judge's tendency is, and
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  then talk to other lawyers about it.
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  Um, but also what's the demographic of the fact finder, right?
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  Cause ultimately this case you have the, your mindset has to be, as it is for you.
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  I know.
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  What if this case goes to trial and very often as trial lawyers, it's kind of what
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  you want, but you want it in the sense that you prepare for it to that level,
• 16:57
  knowing that your best outcome is going to be if you prepare for it to that degree.
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  So then you got to know.
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  So then in that preparation process, you're kind of pulling what if
• 17:07
  jurors have, would have jurors done with this type of case, where
• 17:09
  are we going to be pulling from?
• 17:10
  I go to, I was in Northern Cal and there's all these little pocket areas, different.
• 17:15
  Okay.
• 17:15
  So this neighborhood has this type and you've got a jury panel.
• 17:18
  You're, you're picking in federal court and you're going, well, that
• 17:21
  neighborhood's actually sounds similar, but it's very different from here.
• 17:24
  So what are they, what do they tend to be like?
• 17:26
  Are they red?
• 17:27
  Are they blue?
• 17:27
  Which is partly telling, uh, the income, all that kind of stuff.
• 17:31
  So before you go outside of your wheelhouse, your common area, where you
• 17:35
  familiar with those things, you better damn well familiarize yourself with like.
• 17:39
  What's happening
• 17:40
  there.
• 17:40
  And that's the, I mean, you talk about federal court, we talk about
• 17:43
  judges and this is why, you know, for every trial lawyer that's out
• 17:47
  there, I think it's very important for you to encourage your community
• 17:50
  to vote because judges are, especially federal judges are appointed and
• 17:56
  sometimes lifetime appointments, right?
• 17:58
  And I'll give you an example.
• 17:59
  Like I tried a case in federal court and this was a long time, I mean,
• 18:02
  this guy was a Reagan appointee.
• 18:05
  And we knew going in trying a federal torts claim act.
• 18:08
  Yeah
• 18:08
  federal torts claim act means The person was hit by a postal worker.
• 18:12
  Yeah, and guess what that means You get no jury no punitives.
• 18:16
  No punitives Your your attorney's fees are capped And the judge is the final
• 18:22
  decision maker on everything and guess what a reagan appointee judge Who
• 18:26
  used to be a federal prosecutor and whenever you're going up against the?
• 18:29
  The, uh, the U.
• 18:30
  S.
• 18:30
  Attorney's Office on the other side, how do
• 18:32
  you think that case is going to end up when the judge, the jury, and the
• 18:34
  executioner are paid by the same person?
• 18:36
  Absolutely, yeah.
• 18:37
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 18:38
  So, yeah, you better know, like you said, even some of those fact
• 18:41
  patterns you might say, maybe there's another vehicle to try to avoid.
• 18:45
  That particular end result, because that is really, really
• 18:49
  almost impossible to overcome.
• 18:50
  And
• 18:50
  it is, and like, judges can literally just be the decision maker that throws
• 18:54
  your case out because of a political tilt.
• 18:57
  Yes.
• 18:57
  Same thing in criminal.
• 18:58
  So a lot of times, the judges on, that get criminal assignments
• 19:02
  are former prosecutors.
• 19:03
  The vast majority of them who take criminal assignments as
• 19:06
  judges are former prosecutors.
• 19:07
  So at the preliminary hearing level, which is that threshold evidentiary hearing to
• 19:11
  see whether there's enough for the case to be bound over for trial, That part, you're
• 19:16
  in front of very often a prosecutor.
• 19:18
  So how are you going to make your record?
• 19:20
  And sometimes, nevermind the holding order where they say there's
• 19:23
  enough for this case to keep going.
• 19:25
  The other piece about that is, is just the, um, what kind of rulings
• 19:30
  you're making along the way.
• 19:31
  They might cut you off.
• 19:32
  You say, I want to cross examine this subject.
• 19:34
  Oh, no, there's no space for cross examination on that.
• 19:37
  You got to just not do that.
• 19:38
  Go somewhere else.
• 19:39
  Counsel.
• 19:39
  So it really can be impactful.
• 19:41
  Like whenever I go to vote for judges, if I don't know the person
• 19:44
  to research and if it's public defender versus I just default.
• 19:49
  Because public defenders.
• 19:50
  Yeah, they do.
• 19:50
  We do need a more diverse range of representation.
• 19:55
  Public defenders are some of
• 19:56
  the best lawyers out there and they're grind and they it's the.
• 20:01
  It's a, it's a, it's a, what I call a heart job.
• 20:03
  It's a job you have to have a big heart to do.
• 20:05
  It's
• 20:05
  a job you gotta have.
• 20:06
  You got to have some like, yeah, you have to walk in as a person
• 20:09
  that is almost inherently unpopular.
• 20:12
  And then, you know, we talk about labels, so criminal defense lawyer,
• 20:15
  okay, private, maybe, you know, you get a little bit more, I don't know,
• 20:18
  a deference or something like that.
• 20:20
  You say public defender, one of the challenges there is they're
• 20:23
  in that same courtroom every day.
• 20:25
  So imagine you have to make the same creative argument 12, 15 times a day.
• 20:30
  It just starts going to start falling on deaf ears.
• 20:32
  Okay.
• 20:32
  I know your stick, you know.
• 20:34
  So they really do have a heavy lift sometimes, but it's a
• 20:37
  highly important role they play.
• 20:38
  Well, Austin, I want to thank you for coming on.
• 20:40
  We're at the end of this, this show, but I would love for our listeners
• 20:44
  and viewers to let us know if we want to hear more of Austin's story and do
• 20:46
  an hour long bourbon approved show, which I think it'd be very good on.
• 20:49
  I was looking for the bourbon of the day.
• 20:50
  I saw
• 20:51
  the table's got a plant and no bourbon.
• 20:52
  Back here on the shelf.
• 20:54
  We just put our Lottie girl edition, uh, two of them that we had back
• 20:57
  there, a single barrel that we bought.
• 20:59
  We have some whiskey back there.
• 21:00
  Austin, how do folks read you?
• 21:02
  They can reach me on my Instagram is at Austin dove law, uh, Facebook,
• 21:06
  all those kinds of things, same way.
• 21:08
  Um, and of course, um, I've got, uh, but Austin dove law is everywhere.
• 21:12
  It's where there's my website.
• 21:13
  You guys just do website off in the law.
• 21:15
  Um, phone numbers, 213 487 8300.
• 21:19
  Uh, you can find me.
• 21:20
  I'm actually now developing, finally, with some assistance from some younger
• 21:24
  folks, a social media presence.
• 21:26
  There you go.
• 21:26
  So this will play into that.
• 21:27
  And of course, I post to you and I know you've been supportive
• 21:29
  of the work we've done, so.
• 21:30
  Yeah,
• 21:30
  we're going to.
• 21:31
  Thanks very much for that to be fun.
• 21:32
  So Austin Dove, thank you for coming on.
• 21:34
  Find him, just Google Austin Dove and you can find him everywhere now.
• 21:37
  That's the way,
• 21:37
  yeah.
• 21:37
  Um, thank you for coming on this episode of the Justice Team Podcast
• 21:41
  on the Justice Team Network.
• 21:42
  Reach out.
• 21:42
  And Austin, thank you for coming on, brother.