About
How to Read this Blog:
I blog about things that are completely unrelated–my travel, tasty food, and the legal system. Unless you are completely in my thrall and want to read every word I write, you are probably not interested in all of these topics. That is why I have provided you with the opportunity to navigate by categories. Simply click the category of interest on the left-hand sidebar, and you will see only those posts that you want to see.
About Me
Andy Cowan is a public defender in Lowell, MA. I’m a big law nerd, which means that I read and blog about all sorts of legal news and information, even if it’s completely unrelated to my work. I also dedicate a great deal of time to being outdoors and cooking tasty food. I believe that the purpose of life is both to maximize my own happiness and the happiness of others. These two goals are equal, and should be valued not only in terms of present happiness but also present value of future happiness—and that means something that will make me happy now but will cause others to suffer in the future is a wrong course of action.
This blog is intended as a space for my reflections on the state of the world, the outdoors, and tasty food. Since I eat a “flexitarian” (almost-vegetarian) diet, the subject matter is mostly plants.
Since I mention that I am planning to be a public defender, I will also address “the guilty people question,” that is, how I feel about defending those who did what they are accused of doing. My answer is that I feel just fine about it. The thing that gives me joy is to serve the client, and I believe that a human being is more than a single act or event. Even if they did it, and even if what they did was wrong (and not everything that is wrong is criminal!), that does not mean they are a “bad person.” Even if you disagree with me on that point, a bad person is still a person, and still deserves to be treated with decency and respect.
That’s my moderate answer. My radical answer is that I think the validity of our criminal law and penal system are questionable at best, and that our resources are grossly misspent on caging transgressors, when they could be addressing the real problems: racism, greed, poverty, illiteracy, maleducation, mental illness, and desperation. Crime isn’t a sickness in our society, it’s a symptom. But we don’t deal with the problems, instead we demonize and dehumanize our victims. The fundamental paradigm of the penal system is that when somebody hurts you, you can and should hurt them back (not personally, but through the State). I don’t believe in that. I believe that our society would be better if public policy were based on love, not hate. I believe that even if there are people who are intrinsically incapable of conforming their behavior to peaceful norms, keeping them in cages in squalid conditions designed to make them suffer does nobody any good.
The philosophical connection with defense work is not to use the client as a vehicle for a quixotic charge against the penal system–that would be a grave breach of duty to the client. The tie-in is that because I reject the validity of the penal system, I can defend a person who faces the threat of incarceration even if I believe that the client did commit murder, rape, or some other scary act of violence. I sleep just fine, thank you. Even then, I do not believe that Attica (for example) is a place where anybody should be forced to live.
What You Will Not Find Here
Legal advice. If you think that anythign on this blog is legal advice that applies to your particular problems, you are wrong. Go get your own lawyer. I do not know you or your particular situation, and I can no more give you legal advice without knowing that than I could do brain surgery without knowing anything about you. Also, as of now I am not licensed to practice law in any state. I have a special exception that lets me represent public defender clients under supervision, but I have no authority to give you legal advice no matter what state you live in.
Anything about my cases. That shit’s confidential, yo. I may from time to time post “overheard in court” snippets, but they will not be from my or my colleagues’ cases unless it is so far removed from the specific facts of the case that it would be funny (or at least remarkable) even if you knew nothing about the case.
