Fast Food For Thought; Modern Legal Ethics; and What Would Florida Man Do? – Holiday Edition

Episode Notes

Transcript

Jared Correia:  I’d like to take a moment to thank my mom for listening to every episode.  Now, my mom is the real reason you’re listening to this show right now, but the sponsors have a little something to do with it as well.  So, I’d like to thank our sponsors too.  Clio, TimeSolv, Alert Communications and Scorpion.

Now more than ever, an effective marketing strategy is one of the most important things your law firm can have, and Scorpion can help.  With nearly 20 years of experience serving legal industry, Scorpion has proven methods to help you get the high value cases you deserve.  Join thousands of attorneys across the country that have turned to Scorpion for effective marketing and technology solutions.  For a better way to grow your practice, visit scorpionlegal.com.

[Music]

Intro:  This is the Legal Toolkit with Jared Correia with guest Mark Palmer.  The Return of What Would Florida Man Do Holiday Edition and then per tradition, we join Jared as he (00:01:01) following the annual Correia Thanksgiving get together.  But first, your host, Jared Correia.

Jared Correia:  Yes, yes, it’s the Legal Toolkit podcast. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the podcast, my friends.  It’s still called The Legal Toolkit, even though tools confuse me.  And when I see an eclipse, I think is the sun eating the moon?  I’m your host, Jared Correia.  Eric Morcom and Ernie Wise (ph) are unavailable, so you’re stuck with me and my American English accent.  I’m the CEO of Redcave Law Firm Consulting.  A business management consulting service for attorneys and bar associations.  Find us online at www.redcavelegal.com.  I’m the COO of Gideon Software, Inc.  We build chatbots so law firms can convert more leads and conversational document assembly tools so law firms can build documents faster and more accurately.  You can find out more about Gideon at www.gideonlegal.com. 

Now, before we get to our interview today with Mark Palmer of the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism about modern legal ethics, yes, that’s the thing.  I wanted to take a moment to talk about fast food and your law firm.  Michael Keaton is a really good actor and I’ve come to appreciate his work more as I’ve gotten older.  I probably saw him in Beetlejuice and Batman first when I was a little kid, and he was good in those two.  We’ll make those three movies, if you count the Batman sequels, and I feel like he was really fantastic as a Vulture in the first Spiderman movie with Tom Holland.

Word on the street, is that he’s filming more scenes for that role for future Marvel movies.  I’m pretty excited about that personally, but you know what?  I’m not here to talk about that.  One of my favorite Michael Keaton movies, which I think is sorely underrated, is called The Founder.  In that movie, he plays Ray Kroc.  Ray Kroc, as you may know, was a self-styled founder, hence the name of the movie of McDonald’s even though he largely usurped that title from the McDonald’s brothers.  They were the actual founders, and he bought that business from them in real life and in the movie.

In fact, Ray Kroc was kind of penis in real life, and the movie cleans up his image a little bit, though not all the way.  But I’m also not interested in relitigating how much of a dick Ray Kroc was.  Michael Keaton, as I said, great in that movie.  But the movie itself is really good.  More to the point of this conversation, at least, is that The Founder is one of the best movies I’ve ever seen for focusing on the entrepreneurial process, and that can be really instructive for law firms among other real-life events that get covered in the film.  The fact that McDonald’s actually became profitable as a real estate company, Kroc and one of his partners, Harry Sonneborn, created what was called the Franchise Realty Corporation, and that owned the land on which the McDonald’s franchise is set. 

That created an additional revenue stream because the land will be leased to franchisees.  Also, Ray Kroc opened new restaurants without getting the permission of the McDonald’s brothers per their agreement.  Just incidentally, McDonald’s is still one of the largest real estate companies in the world.  They have $28 billion in real estate assets worldwide, stepping on a par from the fast food that they sell.

Another thing featured in the movie when it becomes too expensive to store ice cream for milkshakes because they needed these big freezers and there was a cost of refrigerating all that.  Kroc decides to use a powder to make milkshakes instead, against the wishes of the McDonald’s brothers, and on the advice of his future second wife, Joan.  Joan, by the way, left her husband, who was a McDonald’s franchise owner for Ray.  Again, he was kind of a bastard.  Next, the movie covers Kroc’s decision to focus on middle class franchisees.  He started by going to golf clubs and trying to get wealthy investors to own McDonald’s franchises, but they don’t want to do anything because they already had money.  

(00:05:02)

So, he needed people who are willing to work at the building of the local business and who would adhere to the McDonald’’ philosophy.  That’s all really interesting stuff in its own right and those are things that entrepreneurs have to figure out all the time.  How do I do this at a lower cost?  How do I get people to invest in what I’m doing?  This type of thing is pretty common, but I think the best scene in the whole movie, one that lawyers should pay attention to, is when the McDonald’s brothers actually plan out their process, which they call the speedee system S-P-E-E-D-E-E.

The brothers in the movie are played by John Carroll Lynch.  He is Twisty the clown for American Horror Story, and Nick Offerman, who you may know from playing Ron Swanson in Parks and Recreation.  Great TV show.  So, Kroc takes these guys out for dinner and they foolishly, by the way, get an NDA.  Everybody gives up the secret sauce, as it were, pun intended, telling him all about how they built their fast food system that would become an empire.

First, they closed the restaurant, which was doing pretty well because they wanted to revise all their processes and start from scratch.  People thought they were crazy, of course.  Then they brought their whole staff to a tennis court and started rebuilding the system from the ground up.  So, brother Dick, that’s guy who’s played by Swanson, used his chalk to map out the kitchen floor plan on the tennis court.  Once he’s got that floor plan mapped out, he brings on the staff and they pantomime, making up fake orders and moving around the imaginary kitchen equipment.  That doesn’t work very well the first several times everybody is bumping into each other, so they keep shooing everybody off the tennis court, and Dick starts again.  Eventually they come up with a symphony of efficiency.  It’s a fantastic clip, and you can watch it on YouTube for free.

With the speedee system in place, the brothers opened a new restaurant to rave reviews, no.  The opening is plagued by insects, and no one can actually figure out how to navigate the process.  The customers anticipate that the order is going to take a long time to arrive.  They don’t know that they can just take their order and go.  Nobody knew what fast food was at that point.  It’s a total disaster.  But the brothers don’t give up and eventually everybody catches on, and the rest, as they say, is history.  Lots of good stuff for law firm owners here, right?

Efficiency means more profits.  It’s okay to stop working for a little bit and think about your business.  Iterate on the process.  People may not get what you’re trying to do at first, but if you believe in the thesis, you should push ahead anyway.  Now, you’ll hear the statistic that most small businesses fail.  That’s true, but tenacity is the real difference between that sort of business and the one that succeeds widely.  Now, go grab a fucking McRib, they’re back.

Before we get to our fireside chat (ph), no actual fire will be deployed, with Mark Palmer, the Chief Counsel of the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism about legal ethics, let’s see what Joshua Lenon has under the heat lamp in this edition of the Clio Legal Trends Report Minute.

Joshua Lenon:  Did you know that in 2020, over 50% of legal professionals worried about the success of their law firm?  To think that over half of the legal service industry has experienced such to rest should be raising alarms.  I’m Joshua Lenon, lawyer and resident at Clio.  The good news is that industry data shows law firms are as busy as ever with new casework.  The bad news for most lawyers is that billable earnings continue to be down by six to eight percent.

Clio’s Legal Trends Report, based on data from tens of thousands of legal professionals, shows some lawyers have managed to earn $37,000 more than others.  What are they doing differently?  They’ve been using three key technologies:  Online payments, client portals and client intake solutions.  To learn more about these technologies and much more for free download Clio’s Legal Trends Report at www.clio.com/trend.   That’s Clio spelled C-L-I-O.

Jared Correia:  Let’s get to the Ranch dressing that’s just upon an inside of this podcast.  It’s time to interview our guest.  My guest today is Mark Palmer.  He’s the Chief Counsel at the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism.  Mark, thanks for coming in.

Mark Palmer:  Thanks, Jared.  I know that’s a mouthful and you got it perfect.

Jared Correia:  I was going to say you guys ran that as like 2Civility online, right?

Mark Palmer:  Yes.

Jared Correia:  Probably because of that very reason.

Mark Palmer:  Very much so.  Our organization is almost 15 years old and early on, that was a big mouthful, both delivering education.  But even in happy hours and the like or even trying to introduce where you work and so the 2Civility became a trademark about eight years ago or so, and it’s really caught on well.

Jared Correia:  Your whole team over there does a really great job.  I like the fact that you talk about ethics related issues, but you do it in a way that’s modernized and you’re heavily involved in social media.  I think all that’s great, and you guys have been doing that for a long time.

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Mark Palmer:  Our team really comes from – we’ve been all been practitioners beforehand.  We’ve worked at the small firms.  We’ve worked at, the big firms.  We’ve worked all types of civil criminal.  We’ve seen it all, so we hopefully bring that realistic background into the equation and deliver back to the audience we serve in Illinois and beyond hopefully.

Jared Correia:  Well, let’s go beyond Illinois today, but also including Illinois that’s why I want to talk to you about.  I get attorneys who have ethics questions a lot of the time.  If you go online and you try to find information on legal ethics, it’s always like, “Well, if it’s the technology question, you just need to compare it to this non-technology analog we came up with 30 years ago.”  Where it’s like I found an article on point about chat rooms and it’s like, who’s used a chat room in the last 20 years?  So, I think you do a great job talking about modern legal ethics questions that lawyers have, in that context, so I wanted to talk to you about some of those issues today. 

Mark Palmer:  Absolutely, let’s do it.

Jared Correia:  I got a lot of questions for you.  I frankly don’t think we’re going to get through them all, so I’m going to reserve maybe a part two at some point.  But I know you write articles every now and then for Attorney at Work, which is a publication I write for as well.  They do a nice job.

Once you came out with recently maybe it’s today or yesterday was on texting, legal ethics around texting.  I get these questions all the time.  So many lawyers are texting with their clients, and they have no record of it at all.  It’s like in the ether.  I know that’s probably one issue that you’ll discuss, but give me your take on texting legal ethics.

Mark Palmer:  Yeah.  Well, I think the big picture that we always got reminded of is for your attorneys listening, it’s like, oh, you’ve crossed that bridge or you’ve come very close to crossing that bridge of like, I just don’t want to break that seal, that seal of personal communication.  It’s literally in our pocket 24/7 or literally sitting on our bedstand at night, and you just have that extreme reservation and rightfully so to not break that personal barrier and you’re thinking that’s just going to hurt more of “my at home life and so on, and I’m already doing that too much paying attention to my phone with emails coming in.  Why in the world would I do that with texting, right?”

Jared Correia:  Right.

Mark Palmer:  So, the simple answer is, I’m not going to do it.  Well, I think that, “I’m not going to do it” answer has come and gone.  That’s not how we serve our clients and especially if you’re going to have high value clients or high attention clients, people who are repeat visitors give you big books of business and also spread the word to help you out, whether you’re a solo or small firm attorney or even at a large organization.  It’s just not realistic to say no to it;

Jared Correia:  This is kind of like when people say, “I’m going to use Fax machines because they’re now data Privacy loss.”

Mark Palmer:  Yes, right.  Then it becomes okay, you’ve opened the floodgate let’s say what’s next?  I think you made the initial point is the scary point is, “Oh, my gosh. We have all this communiqué, how am I going to pay for my file as I know I should.  I’ve been taught for years and years.  It’s been ingrained in me that I must keep all this not only to keep it confidential, but I must keep a record.  We’re such great record keeping industry.  At least we should be and our rules require us to be.  How in the world am I going to get it from that picture on my phone to a file?”  It reminds me of one of my old partner law partners when I was in private practice, he still would print out all his emails and not just the original email, but then the subsequent reply to the email.

Jared Correia:  You got to get the whole thread.

Mark Palmer:  I’d be pulling my head out walking by his desk and seeing the stacks of paper.  But like I said before, Jared, it’s very much about applying your modern rules of professional conduct or whatever rules you adhere to in your jurisdiction, in your state.  It’s not reinventing the wheel.  You got the same issues.  You got confidentiality like I mentioned, you got communiqué.  You must keep your client informed, and that’s a two-way street, and then you must document it somehow.  Like I said, get it from the phone to that.

I think the best answer, frankly and we can talk more about this is, what’s an alternative to texting but to the client, they see it as texting.  For example, using a portal.  Using some type of secure, enclosed communiqué that you can make that record easily.  You can still make the client happy because they’re easily accessing you and you’re doing it in a secure environment at the same time, right?

Jared Correia:  Yes, so you’re talking about client portals there, right?

Mark Palmer:  Yeah, big time.

Jared Correia:  Can you talk a little bit about what client portals are and then some of the ethics components because I’m not even sure at this point if everybody that’s listening has used one before or is aware of how they work?

Mark Palmer:  Yes, they may sound very simply put, scary.  They may sound like, “Oh, my gosh I don’t have the technical know-how.  I can’t and barely text.  How in the world Mark, am I going to get on a portal?  What is this portal world?”

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Jared Correia:  It sounds like some Star Trek shit.

Mark Palmer:  Yes, it’s the new internet that’s coming.  I’m keep hearing about this new internet and new worlds.

Jared Correia:  Hopefully, it’s better than the old internet.

Mark Palmer:  But many times, you’re going to find these already exist.  You’re probably already paying for partial service, or at least an optional add on to what you’re doing if you have any type of client management software.

Jared Correia:  Yes, all the case management software’s have it.

Mark Palmer:  They recognize that this is where the future is going and frankly, the future is now.  It’s the theme of our wonderful annual tech conference we host in Chicago (00:15:39).  Isn’t that great?  I worked that in.

Jared Correia:  Well, done.  I’m impressed.

Mark Palmer:  If you can put that into an enclosed environment where even on the end of customer, the consumer to them, it probably can still look as a text coming in, but you have complete control of that communication.  It goes not even by a click of a mouse.  Automatically, it’s put into their client file.  The record is kept and not only that, here’s what I really like.

Automation is such a big part of efficiency and how effective you can serve your clients.  If the client is coming to the portal, his or herself to find information, you may not even know about it.  That’s the beauty of it.  You can update their case.  You can upload an order that was entered by the judge, refer them to it, and they can go anytime at their leisure, day or night and access that in their secure environment. That’s the beauty of a portal.

It’s more than just texting it’s more than just emailing it’s more than just giving a reminder, here’s your next court date.  It’s an entirely enclosed two-way traffic information environment.  That’s how you need to think about it.  It’s an extension of your office, and it’s all about consumer relations, customer service.  That’s what you’re doing here to win your clients and make them refer you to the next neighbor and friend.

Jared Correia:  I love it when an ethics guy — sorry to generalize you like that refers to consumer service in any way.  The fact that customer service exists and is a thing is important to remember.

Mark Palmer:  Let me answer that, though, Jared, because what I see happening and you’re right on point there.  What happens is people say, “All right, here’s the starting point.  Here’s how I want to serve my clients.”  Now, let’s apply ethical rules to limit that or unwind it or put-up barriers or limitations.  No, it should be the opposite.  You should start with the ethical rules and figure out how to do it right from the get go, right?  That’s a good generality

Jared Correia:  I love it.  That’s so refreshing to you hear.  That’s why I had you on the show.  Let’s stick with the client thing for a little bit and the consumer service theme, because I actually get this question a ton, and I don’t know the answer. Cryptocurrency.  Should law firms be looking at crypto as a payment option and in the first place, can they even take it?

Mark Palmer:  Yes, this is a really weird one and yet it’s a popular one, and right close to this is another one that I hear often is crowdfunding.  I think both of these – 

Jared Correia:  That’s a good one, too.  Yes, you can get that one as well.

Mark Palmer:  How are you going to pay for it and then who can pay for it?  Those are kind of the two basic questions there.  But with cryptocurrency, again, it’s taking the traditional rules, the rules that exist and finding, “Okay, what’s going to apply here?”  First of all, we shouldn’t even bother.  This is just going to be kind of a marketing gimmick to have a purpose to release a press release.

Jared Correia:  How many people are actually paying for stuff with crypto right now?

Mark Palmer:  This really going on and you actually see some major law firms, some big law pushing like, “Oh, we accept that.”  And maybe they use that more of a marketing tool, and maybe it’s a realistic option for some of their clients.  But the point being is you still got to look at the rules about when have you earned a fee versus when are you holding a fee that’s not yet earned?  How are you following the rules of that?  Also, obviously, the biggest concern with cryptocurrency is the volatility of the price and the value of it.  You have to always be careful and this is a strange thing to say, but lawyers, make sure you’re not overpaid for your services, because that’s part of the rules.  You have to be clear in what’s that moment in time that the value is being reflected.

I think a lot of these balls are still floating in the air and haven’t landed yet on, is cryptocurrency money is a property?  How are we holding it?  Where should we hold it?  Some would say it’s a danger zone not to get into.  But like I said, it’s not going away anytime soon.

Jared Correia:  I’m pulling from my grab bag of ethics questions.  This is an important one, too.

Mark Palmer:  I’ll do my best.

Jared Correia:  I know you’ve covered all these issues.  You’re an expert.  With the whole rise in people working from home, working hybrid.  There’s been a lot of “people starting virtual practices.”

(00:20:03)

It’s a different way to work and it’s a different place to be working.  Some states, I think, still have bona fide office rules, right?  So, can you talk about what that is and how that affects a virtual practice of law?

Mark Palmer:  I think the number one thing to remember among all the specific rules and play here, but the main thing to do is what is it from the perspective of the client and that’s set of all ethical rules all the time.  The main purpose of ethical rules is to protect the client.  What does that mean and there’s lots of components to virtual offices or working virtual, and they mean different things.  It’s a very difficult thing to nail down.  It’s like nailing jello to a tree, as my old boss used to always say.

Jared Correia:  Well, right.  A virtual office could be somebody who has a cloud-based email account or somebody who never sees client – 

Mark Palmer:  We’ve been working virtually for years, but that is different than me working from Puerto Rico and only being licensed in Illinois.  Is that legit?  Can I do that?  Does it matter where I’m physically seated where my butt is in a chair, does that matter on where and how I’m delivering legal services?  You mentioned, yes, there is an office requirement.  What is the actual office?

Jared Correia:  Some states have recently dropped the office requirement, right?

Mark Palmer:  I believe so, or some at least require some kind of like the bona fide registration office requirements, whether it be a PO box or an actual location.  There’s also a whole other category of requirements for the advertising rules, and I don’t think we’re talking about that.  That’s a whole different category.

Jared Correia:  We’ll put that on the next topic.

Mark Palmer:  But as far as where are you delivering the services, and I mentioned in one of the blogs, a great case that really dissects this when it talks about a lawyer that got in trouble from Colorado, I believe it was.  This is all a documented case where he was serving his in laws in Minnesota.  It was such a very realistic example that I used that in my blog to point out.  It’s something that any lawyer could very easily get themselves caught up in. Before they know it, they could possibly be committing UPL unauthorized practice of law in another jurisdiction.

Jared Correia:  That sounds like something almost anybody would do.

Mark Palmer:  Yes, because it’s so simple.  Here we are.  We’re recording this near the holiday season.  You travel somewhere, you spend some time with relatives, and one thing leads to another, they follow up, and they’re just, “I just need a little legal advice about this thing.”  It turns out this thing is actually pending litigation or post judgment litigation, as it was in this Minnesota case, helping the in laws settle a debt.  You can walk that line for a little bit, but then you might trip into it a little further.  That’s where you just got to be careful of where – it’s again from the consumer viewpoint is the key there.

Jared Correia:  In terms of that attorney, let’s say who lives in Puerto Rico has a license in Louisiana, that could be possible?

Mark Palmer:  Yes, absolutely.  And very much of it depends on the type of practice.  One of the most popular practices I keep seeing of people who literally travel the world while they practice law seems to be like trademark law or things like that.  You can handle that.  But, of course, like I was a former litigation attorney, and it would be near impossible for me to travel the world and still go to court once a week.  I can’t do that.  But there are transactional types of practices that are very conducive of remote work, and I don’t see anything wrong about serving clients that way.  In fact, it could even be a very well argument that that’s an access to justice solution having more availability of lawyers or legal service providers across literally the world to reduce these needs.

Jared Correia:  I think you got a great approach at this.  You looked at the ethics rule, but you’ve also got a practical viewpoint here in terms of logistics of actually running a practice.  You’re going to stick around for part two?

Mark Palmer:  I’m always here.

Jared Correia:  All right.  You said you meet with the relatives, and crazy stuff happens.  I’ll keep that in mind for the next segment.  We’ll take one final sponsor break so that you can hear more about what our sponsors can do for your law practice, then stay tuned for the Rump Roast.  It’s even more supple than the Roast Beast.

[Music]

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(00:25:00)

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Welcome to the rear end of the Legal Toolkit.  That’s right it’s the Rump Roast.  It’s a grab bag of short-form topics, all of my choosing.  Why do I get to choose?  Because I’m the host.  As Mark referenced, we’re recording this the day before Thanksgiving.  You’ll listen to it sometime after Thanksgiving, and at that point, we’ll be knee deep in the holiday season, whichever set of holidays you celebrate.  So, I wanted to bring back a Rump Roast segment that’s an old favorite.  However, I’m going to put a twist on it.  We’re going to play What would Florida Man Do Holiday Edition.  Mark, how’s that sounding to you?

Mark Palmer:  Wow.  My mouth was starting to water talking about Thanksgiving, but now I’m kind of nervous, but I’ll do the best I can.

Jared Correia:  Don’t be nervous.  Here’s how we’re going to do it.  I’m going to read off some weird crimes that took place over the holiday season.  Mark, it will be your job to tell me whether it’s a Florida Man that committed these crimes or not.  You get a 50/50 shot on each question.  I say that’s pretty good odds.

Mark Palmer:  Yes, I’ve seen some interesting headlines that never disappoint, so this will be a challenge, but I am up for it.  Here we go.

Jared Correia:  All right.  First one, in 2011, a man named Terry Trent took bath salts walked into his neighbor’s house and decorated for Christmas.  He lit candles, arranged them on the table, brought out coffee, even hung a Christmas wreath on their garage.  Then, he sat down and watched Christmas movies while playing with toys under the tree.  Unfortunately, there was an eleven-year-old boy in the house who was surprised to find this man on bath salts who is not Santa and went to tell his mom before the man was arrested.  Your question, Mark, is this a Florida Man or not?

Mark Palmer:  I’m shocked to say, but maybe not shocked that this vaguely sounds familiar Jared, my gosh.

Jared Correia:  This wasn’t you, was it?

Mark Palmer:  No, it was not me.  I actually did study a lot of the early bath salt laws in Illinois and across the nation when I was a prosecutor because they were evolving so quickly because every time they make one bath salt substance illegal, they’d find a new one because they just add another atom or something to it.  I don’t know I’m no chemistry.

Jared Correia:  I had no idea you would bring this level of expertise to this segment.  It’s amazing.

Mark Palmer:  I always surprise people, but I would say, yes, this is a Florida Man.

Jared Correia:  Ohio Man.  This guy was in Ohio.  Good guess, though.  All right, let’s move on.  In 2017, a man stole a baby Jesus from a major scene.  Only this baby Jesus was tricked out with a GPS device, and they found the man and the baby Jesus in his apartment two hours later.  Was this a Florida Man?  Don’t be out there stealing baby Jesus.  They could have GPS.

Mark Palmer:  The GPS, I think, puts it over the top in this case.  So, I’m assuming there was previous thefts of baby Jesus, and so they were prepared this time.  That seems a logical progression.

Jared Correia:  It’s probably a string of crime.

Mark Palmer:  I wonder how many GPS units they bought like a multi pack so they could tag the donkeys and the wise men at the same time.

Jared Correia:  They started making them just for major sets.

Mark Palmer:  I’m thinking too deep in this question already.  So, I’m going to say yes, this is Florida.

Jared Correia:  Yes, Florida Man.  Nice work.  All right.  In 2020, a woman reportedly informed her neighbors that she picked out the very best Christmas tree and invited their children over to open presents underneath it.  Turned out it was a giant cannabis plant.  Is this a Florida Woman?  Maybe the tree will burn up if we adjust this light.

Mark Palmer:  I feel like Florida would have a lot of remote areas for possible growth plant where she could harvest such a plant and be confused.  Northern States, they would much quick to recognize a proper spruce.  I’m going to have to say, yes on this one.

Jared Correia:  This lady was actually from Chile.  It’s a Chilean woman.  Pretty good, though.

Mark Palmer:  I had the logic right that she maybe wouldn’t recognize it.  Okay, go ahead.

Jared Correia:  All right.  You’re in position to hit the 500-mark here.  We got one last question.  All you have to say is whether this is a Florida Man or not.  Here’s the last one.

(00:30:00)

In 2012, a family got together for Thanksgiving dinner and settled down for a nice game of Trivial Pursuit.  After a dispute over a question, a woman threatened her relative with a hatchet.  Turned out that that hatchet was used for drug paraphernalia, and she was arrested by the police.  Now, I got to tell you, I don’t know how to use a hatchet for drug paraphernalia.  Are you building a bong out of the hatchet?  Are you cutting lines of cocaine with the hatchet?  What is actually going on? 

Mark Palmer:  You just chopped down a cannabis Christmas tree.

Jared Correia:  There you go, perfect.

Mark Palmer:  Yes, makes sense.

Jared Correia:  Now, the ultimate question, the hatchet wielding Trivial Pursuit player, was this a Florida Woman or not?

Mark Palmer:  Again, there’s an interesting mixture of issues and when you have a plus two factors, the probability goes up for Florida I think so.  I’m going to say yes.

Jared Correia:  No, this is a Pennsylvania case.  A Pennsylvania woman.  Hey, you did pretty good, though.  I love the analysis here.  I’m really impressed.  Wait, I got one more just for you.

Mark Palmer:  Okay.

Jared Correia:  We’ll up your percentage a little bit.  I think this one might hit home for you.  Two burglars named Marv and Harry tried to rob a home that was defended only by a kg young boy who just started shaving for the first time.  Where were these criminals from, Florida Man?

Mark Palmer:  Well, this I know is the suburbs of Chicago, so this is a no to Florida.

Jared Correia:  Illinois Man, yes.  That’s the blood of home alone everyone.

Mark Palmer:  All right.

Jared Correia:  Mark, great analysis of these.  I really appreciate it.  Thanks for coming on.  This is a ton of fun.  If you want to find out more about Mark Palmer and the Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism visit www.2civility.org.  That’s the number 2 C-I-V-I-L-I-T-Y.org www.2civility.org.

Now, for those of you listening in Goofy Ridge, Illinois, we’ve got a playlist.  It’s all about food.  That prickly old bastard Ray Kroc is probably smiling up at us from hell, so have it listened.  Unfortunately, we don’t have any footage of me bailing my family out of jail this Thanksgiving, and that’s mostly because it’s not Thanksgiving yet as we record this.  But let’s be real I’d probably be getting arrested along with them.  That’ll do it for another episode of Legal Toolkit Podcast were listening to our show is just the right and ethical thing to do.

[Music]

(00:32:55)

The views expressed by the participants of this program are their own and do not represent the views of, nor are they endorsed by Legal Talk Network, its officers, directors, employees, agents, representatives, shareholders, and subsidiaries. None of the content should be considered legal advice. As always, consult a lawyer.

 

Podcast transcription by Tech-Synergy.com

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