This week on the Outlaw Lawyer, Josh and I will talk about the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling on the Bill Cosby case, abortion limiting legislation making its way through several state legislatures, and the entrapment defense that's being used by defendants that are charged with the attempted kidnap of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
Coming up next. I'm joined by Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. Forty-six combined years experience between these two. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina and they have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, and Gastonia. And as always, if you come up with your own legal question and you need some answers, we've got a number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.
Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer. We'll be in touch. Gentlemen, it's a pleasure. It's great to see you. I mean, we normally do this audio-wise, but now we're into video.
I love this. What's going to be, I guess, peak interest on the show today? Before we get there, I think we do need a disclaimer that we are not accustomed to doing this and being on TV. I think everybody needs to know that we're not going to be super camera ready today. We're probably going to make some mistakes because this is a new, we're usually in a little closet with our headphones on and our mics in front of us. So bear with us as this is our first try at a videotaped Outlaw Lawyer show. That was a good disclaimer.
I think it's important. I do the show from a closet usually. It's me in a closet, dark, with my headphones and that's it, man.
I don't know about your kids banging on the door. All right. So if you're used to listening to us as a podcast, we're still going to be there. If you're used to listening to us on the radio, we're still going to be there.
But now we're going to have a YouTube channel and on the website, we'll have the video. So just adding another dynamic to the Outlaw Lawyer. But there's a lot to talk about today. I think the most important thing that happened in the past week was that Scott Hall passed away. Yeah, that's not even in your notes because that's so fresh.
I hand wrote it. Yeah, man, that's terrible. That's a big part of my childhood, man. Early 60s, right? 63?
63. But he had been struggling for a while. Now, if you've been listening, I think it comes up from time to time that we're closet wrestling fans. I guess we're out of the closet with our wrestling fandom.
I don't think that's how you're supposed to describe your wrestling fans. But Scott Hall was very important if you're a wrestling fan who grew up in the 90s, 80s and 90s. He was a big deal. And what was the name of the movie? Resurrection of Jake the Snake Roberts? Was that the movie? The one with the Jake Snake movie?
Yeah. Talked about his recovery from addiction. Yeah, so even though it's about Jake the Snake, Scott Hall's recovery, he had an alcohol, maybe some other things I don't really remember. I think it was alcohol and then pain pills, probably. That's usually the cocktail the wrestlers get on. And so he was pretty far gone and came back.
Even if you're not a wrestling fan, that movie's a really good movie to watch, I think. But no, Scott Hall did pass away. He said he was getting a hip replacement surgery. Hip replacement had three heart attacks after it.
Blood clot got loose. But we met him. We met him. I don't know if you recall that at one of our indie wrestling shows we went to.
Right, we did. Yeah, man, a larger than life character. He really made an impact, man. You know, his story was a good story. So whether you're a wrestling fan or you're not a wrestling fan, he could have been a football player.
He could have been anything. But you know, he was in the throes of addiction. Got help from his friends. He was well liked. He got help from his friends. And he came back. And did you see the quote from his Hall of Fame speech that kept showing up on social media?
I remember what it was. I remember bad times don't last. But bad guys do. That's the gist of the end of the quote. Yeah, he says he says, I didn't write it down either. But yeah, he says, he says hard work pays off.
Dreams come true. Bad times don't last. And then he was known as the bad guy.
That was his persona. So he said, but bad guys do. But I think no matter what you're doing that bad times don't last. Like I, I keep remembering that. Like, I don't think right now I'm going through a bad time. In my personal life peak, this is the peak for you. This exact moment is as good as it gets.
So it doesn't apply to me personally right now. But we all we all have our bad times. And that's just going to stick with me.
You know, I think that's something that probably bad times don't last. I feel like I'm gonna get that tattooed on my forearm. You should point to it. And now that people can hold you accountable.
So they can see your forearm. You know, you know what else? This is another This is an experience.
This is another This is an experiment that I'm doing. I think it's come out on the show before that as a as an older person. I enjoy CBS Sunday morning. It's a great I think you said that I tuned you out usually long, long form stories. Yeah, it's very nice. Very relaxing. You have a lot of coffee while you watch it. It's very nice more upbeat stories.
That's right. This week was really good, by the way, but there's neither here nor there. They always do a special on people who have passed away during the week. They always have this little segment. They never do. I've never seen a professional maybe there has been I've never seen a professional.
wrestler featured on that little vignette that they do. But I'm, I'm going to write an angry letter if they don't feature. Right, right. Well, that's, I think that makes sense. They're really big as as a fan of angry letter. How about a concern?
Yeah. Because you start concerned Sunday morning. It's a it's a concern letter and then the follow up letters and angry letter if they don't consent.
If they don't immediately make demands. Yeah, well, they spend so much time to talk about the arts, which is great, right? They always have a segment on the arts and they, how do they I'm not a fan of musical theater. I know you're a huge fan of musical theater on it. I love it.
What gave it away? I don't know Morgan stance on musical theater. Love it. Okay, good. I dislike it. I'm not a fan. And so you're not cultured.
Right? Maybe not. But in my mind, professional wrestling, musical theater, the same to two sides of the same coin, right? It's just two tellings of a story. You know, musical theater has a better image than pro wrestling.
The point being CBS Sunday morning doesn't spend any time talking about pro wrestling. But he spent a lot of time talking about musical theater. And I think they should be on the same level in society. Would you go see a musical about the life of Scott Hall? As long as there's no dance fighting. I can't dance fighting regular fighting is okay, but dance fighting.
I am against dance fighting. But anyway, I think that was the most important thing. I know the Ukraine stuff still going. I'm still paying a lot of attention to that. I can't pay attention like Scott Hall and that Ukraine. That's the thing. That's still a thing. But you know what else I was talking to a lot of people the ACC tourney basis tournament was this past weekend. I know we like to talk about sports.
Sure. I didn't watch any of the ACC for the first time in my life. I didn't watch the state game. I couldn't do it. I couldn't as a state fan. I couldn't I couldn't put myself through that. But I didn't watch a single I didn't watch the championship game.
I didn't turn to it on a commercial by accident. This was the first year. I completely ignored it even happened.
That's a great story. Seven seed Virginia Tech a lot of players that no one else wanted a couple of Wofford transfers came with the coach shot lights out for four straight games. I mean, really, really impressive beating UNC. Yeah, well, the crazy thing is, is they they had they needed overtime right for the first game. It was like cluster.
You don't know I'm talking to you. Close game and they came out smoked everybody. So some would call that a great story. Someone call that a tragedy. Really, none of it. You didn't care. It was why just because states terrible.
And because Brooklyn as opposed to Greensboro. Yeah, I think it was everything and then multiple days. It's definitely not what it used to be. Yeah, yeah, you know, I work now, you know, my work where my desk is my place that I work. I have a TV like right in front of me. So I got my monitors, and I got a TV. I usually keep it on something during the day. Simpsons is sometimes the Simpsons, but I could have just turned it on.
Yeah, I didn't even go through the ad clicking to turn almost too much trouble. So do you think kids you think they even put it on in classroom? That was the big thing, right? You would always watch the tournament in class.
And that was like a huge thing. I doubt it. I don't think so. It's it's just too many teams, man. Let's kick some people out of ACC. Well, you know, if they keep combining conferences and stuff, and then eventually what we're gonna be, we're just gonna be like, uh, yeah, I think it's a I think it's more of a college basketball in general just isn't what it used to be. I mean, the game has changed.
You've got the one and done. I mean, it's just different, man. It's different. It will never be the same. Really, I would have never imagined if you go back to like, when I was in middle school, I had never imagined there'd be a time where I would not even know. I did figure out Virginia Tech one I saw a screen or something. It's not a mystery.
But like, if I'm not if I'm not paying attention. Yeah, you know, they're losing. That's big. Yeah, it's big. It is. You're right.
That's fair. I paid attention. I was watching the competition. And so I was watching on my how did you place?
Oh, man, it was the third place finish. I'm not a good flyer. The girls can't keep me up the 11 to 12 year old. But yeah, I watch I mean, I don't watch every game. I watch do play. I watched I caught the tail into some games. So I wasn't as like super invested as as I have been before.
But um, you would have cared if state was good. Yeah, probably. Yeah. That's a big part of it. Yeah.
And maybe, you know, maybe next year. That's what we say, right? That's that's the famous saying, the, I wanted to give an update a couple of weeks ago, we talked about the fart truck. You guys might remember that remember that the Dean, you know, the first of the fart truck for the folks who didn't listen the fart truck. There was a molecular biologist out of Asheville who got a vanity license plate.
And so we she got the word fart FA RT fart. The DMV somebody complained about the DMV came back. They revoked the vanity plate. Wow.
And he got a lot of covers ended up being like I saw some national outlets pick up that story. So they revoked. They revoked it. I was sad. I was I don't know that we made a prediction. I don't think we made a prediction an official show prediction on that. No, no, no, no, if we did, we're gonna say we didn't prove it.
Exactly. Show us the actual footage of us saying that. But I was reading a national article and I got the quotes here. But it just mentioned randomly.
Some license plates that were vanity plates that were out there. And one of them was Mcboob just made me laugh. So I wrote that down because I want to remember. And I was driving yesterday and I got behind a truck. I was dropping my kids off at school. I got behind a truck and the license plate was beans. But instead of an S it was a Z beans beans with a Z. And I couldn't figure out why that guy would have gotten that. It was just like a, you know, like an older Toyota truck. And maybe that was his nickname or something.
But in my mind, he just went to the DMV and like just decided on a whim to get a vanity plate. And they asked him what it should be. And he just said beans. And he said, Oh, well, somebody's already got it with the S. And he was like, Z.
And I hope it's that meaningless. That's a cool nickname. Being drop on that.
That's my one of my kids nicknames. I have to figure out which one. Well, yeah, starting today, starting today.
Just go home. Hey, beans. Alright, well, as always, we managed to waste some time today, but we got some real legal topics to dig into. And some of them we've talked about before. So we all know we all followed the Bill Cosby criminal case. When that was taking place. I think we did a whole show on it. I think we took a deep dive on on bill.
It was like all bill. Yeah, all Cosby all the time. Well, that, you know, Bill Cosby went to the Court of Appeals. And they reversed it. Bill Cosby is his home.
He's he's free. But his case went to the US Supreme Court. So there are oral arguments. And so the US Supreme Court had to weigh in on it.
And so we're gonna talk about that. Saw a big write up in a national news outlet about we've been talking about Roe v. Wade. We've been talking about abortion. It's come up a lot.
The Texas law. And so a lot of states are kind of, I think, anticipating that that Roe v. Wade may be overturned, may may be altered drastically. And so you're seeing a wave of state legislatures making laws restricting abortion in ways that are absolutely contrary to Roe v. Wade now. And so we're gonna talk about that. And it's something we haven't talked about before.
So we're gonna spend some time talking about that. But those are our three big legal issues we're going to tackle today. All right, well, we got a lot to get into the outlaw lawyers Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer Whitaker and Hamer law firm 46 combined years experience again practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina managing partners of the firm offices in Raleigh Garner Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got your own legal situation, and you need some answers 800-659-1186 just leave your contact information.
And remember, briefly what it's about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can also email your questions to the program questions at the outlaw lawyer.com. That's questions at the outlaw lawyer.com. And as always, visit the website the outlaw lawyer.com.
We're back right after this. I'm Morgan Patrick, managing partners and practicing attorneys here in North Carolina managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate between Josh and Joe 46 combined years experience offices in Raleigh Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got your own legal situation that you're dealing with, and you've got questions, we've got a number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. You can also email your questions to questions at the outlaw lawyer.com and on the call, just leave your information, contact information.
An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. So gentlemen, take it away. I want to know who has a license plate, Mcboob. We're going to bring them on the show. I feel like you're going to bid on it. Yeah, I feel like we should nickname somebody at the firm.
That's just a good fraternity style. I'm not going to name a kid. That's not going to be a kid's nickname, but definitely someone at the firm.
Yeah, Beams is good for the kid. Mcboob, we just give it to our least favorite employee. All right, so this segment, Pennsylvania v. Cosby. We've talked about this before and how much I love Bill Cosby. I won't let cancel culture take Bill Cosby away from me. We separate Bill Cosby, his art, from what he's accused of. Tell us a little bit about what happened. Yeah, so again, Josh, like you said, we did a deep dive on this.
We did like a whole entire episode. And basically, in Pennsylvania v. Cosby, what we had is you had justices that rebuffed a request from the Pennsylvania prosecutors that were trying to revive sexual assault charges against Cosby. Tons of allegations against Cosby, but at issue specifically in this case, you had Cosby being convicted of three counts of aggravated indecent assault for the 2004 drugging and molesting of Andrea Constand was her name. But basically, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court threw out Cosby's conviction. They reasoned that he had relied on a 2005 press release in which a prosecutor who had cited a lack of sufficient evidence had declined to file charges. And so based on that statement, Cosby had gone on to provide evidence in a civil lawsuit that was brought against him by Constand under the assumption and the agreement that there wouldn't be criminal charges filed against him. And then that testimony and some of those things that he said under that understanding actually were used against him later on, and that was kind of the crux of the issue here. Yeah, and for me as an attorney, we talk about why we do this show, why we do the Outlaw Lawyer, and it's to take items like this and kind of look at them like an attorney would be.
Like if this came into my office, how I would dice up the facts and what I would advise. And so here this seems obvious to me, and it doesn't even get to what Cosby may or may not have done. You know, if Cosby did this stuff, that's terrible. But Cosby had, and whether you agree with this or not, Bill Cosby had an agreement with the DA, with the prosecutors that he would not be charged with this crime and relied on it for the civil case.
Right? And there was a civil settlement, there was a deposition, all this stuff was under seal, and so Cosby would not have done this had it not been for this agreement. Right, Joe? And the new DA, the new prosecutor came in, what, 10 years later, I don't remember how long, how much time had passed, but just said, yeah, I know that agreement's in place. I don't care. We're charging you with this crime. And that's where it should have stopped. Like I think someone should have stepped in then, like say, hey, we're wasting a lot of taxpayer money. This is going to fail at some point, but there was no, you know, there's this big swoon to punish him for, again, vile acts if they're true.
Sure. And of course there was a trial, Bill Cosby was two years in jail, I think, two years in jail. Two or three, I think it was three, but again. And then, and then it went to, uh, it went to the next level in the court system and they were instantly over, instantly overturned it. Like you can't do this, you know, you, this violates constitutional protections. No one made you agree not to prosecute him.
You could have done it then and yeah, threw it out. And then the state kept fighting it. I don't understand why Pennsylvania kept, that's what I would like.
I would like someone to go, I don't know if it was the AG or the DA's office. I don't know who in Pennsylvania kind of kept pushing it forward to the US Supreme Court because that's who did it. And the US Supreme Court swatted it down really quick. I was like, you can't, you can't do this.
I almost feel like somebody should be criminally liable or civilly liable in Pennsylvania for continuing to push it forward. Because it just seems like a slam dunk to me. I don't, I don't, I don't get it. And my, my assumption, you asked the question of like, who did it and like, why? And it's tough, man, because like you said, if you take the allegations as true, like it's terrible. Like the things he did are terrible.
He should be punished for those things. So I don't, I don't want anyone to get confused and think we're advocating like, Go Bill Cosby, like this was fantastic what you did. That's not the point.
From a legal standpoint, all the I's were dotted in the teeth. Sure. Right.
That's, that's the point. You've got these constitutional protections for a reason. And whether you agree with, I mean, no one agrees with what he allegedly did, but I think everybody agrees with the Constitution the way that it's true that those protections, and they're necessary, man, you know, they're necessary. And so, and they're a good, these, they're a good thing.
Like they have purpose. Would you agree like that? Yeah. The agreement to not prosecute, to bring some of these things out, it's necessary to the way that the system functions.
And so it's important that we protect that. Yeah. When you start studying criminal law, when you start studying criminal law, like a law school level or a master's level, and you start reading all these criminal law cases, the defendant has always done something or been accused of something horrible. And a lot of times they may have even confessed to it, admitted to it. And these are, these are horrible. I mean, rape, you know, hurting children, you know, just the worst of the worst kind of things that have happened. But somewhere along the line, the system has violated their constitutional rights to, to get to the end game, I guess, to get to a conviction or what have you. And so these, a lot of times these folks will get off and you will hear them talk in the media, they get off on a technicality or this child murderer got off on a technicality, but there's technicalities or technicalities because they're important.
Yeah. For a reason. And it's not the, it's, that's the fault of the system. You know, the, the, the failure to do whatever was necessary that there, there are protections, like you said, they are there for a reason. And nobody wants to see justice not be done. No one wants to see people who've done terrible things walk free, but no one wants to see people who've done nothing be punished for it.
And that's, it's a balance for that reason. One day we'll have to spend some time talking about in that same vein, you know, one thing that was disturbing to me, again, we stay real apolitical here. We don't really talk about Republicans. We don't talk about Democrats, but just observing legal things that happen. If you followed the presidency of Donald Trump there at the end, he had hired all these attorneys to represent them on whatever, you know, falsified votes or, you know, whatever was going on. And so he retained attorneys and attorneys made filings on his behalf, I guess Giuliani and I can't remember that other lady's name.
But, you know, they're in the process of, you know, their local bars are trying to disbar them, keep them from practicing law. And I don't know all the facts. That's why we need to do a deep dive. But, but people will ask me, you know, if, if would your firm have represented Bill Cosby, if he had been accused of these horrible things. And I always tell people like, yes, everybody deserves a defense, no matter how despicable you think the actions are, no matter how despicable you think the person is, everyone deserves a defense attorney, a defense. And I think that's hard for people who don't practice law, for people who don't spend a lot of time talking about the law. I think that's a hard pill to swallow for a lot of folks, but otherwise we don't really have a justice system.
We just have like a railroad. Exactly, exactly. And just to jump in guys, I mean, you guys are immersed in it every single day. And you think about this Cosby situation and it's the shiny object. I mean, somebody wants to push that shiny object because everybody knew him, knew him on TV. And you're going to get a lot of attention if you push that particular issue that involves Bill Cosby, who everybody knows. So, you know, we don't, we can't get in the minds of the people that are putting it back out there, but I can kind of see why, hey, that's Bill Cosby.
But from a legal standpoint, you guys do it every single day. Yeah, yeah, and it's, I really hope, and I don't know if Cosby's got enough energy and enough money, because Cosby's in his 80s, is that right? I mean, he's early 80s. If you see him now, man, this took a lot out of him. Like you can tell, he's not the same.
Yeah, his eyes kind of, he's got something going on with his eyes, like a cane, and he's struggling to get around. But I hope, man, I would love to see someone hold whoever's liable, Attorney General, DA, whoever in Pennsylvania, because that's a waste of taxpayer. To me, it just seems open and shut. Like we talked one week about one of the things you have to have in as an attorney to push things forward to litigate is you have to have a controversy, right? And I don't know if there was ever any controversy here.
I don't know. It's a lot of political pressure, man. I think Morgan said it best.
It's the shiny object. There's a ton of political pressure. You've got cancel culture. And I'm with you, like these people, they have law degrees. They've practiced law.
They understand the law. And, you know, it should be obvious that there's nothing here. And I'm with you on that completely. And I haven't heard a lot on that.
That's just been my personal thought. So maybe there's something else out there, which is why there's not a national discussion. But if you don't have these protections, if you don't have this counterweight, then people get swept up in emotion. People get swept up in the, again, the horrible, horrible facts. If taken to be true, people get consumed by that. But this should have never gotten this far.
Sure. Or he should have been charged in like, you know, 1992 or whenever. Yeah, exactly. Charge him then. Like that's a great point, man. Because like we're not saying, don't charge him.
That's not the point at all. Like if you charge him, but don't handle it this way and tell him you're not going to charge him, solicit, you know, statements for a civil purpose and then come back and try to do it then. Because it's a slippery slope, man. We say it all the time. And that can be, you know, you set the precedent that that's okay. It can get used, you know, in a similar fact pattern where, you know, like you said, people get railroaded by it. I was going to say, is it fair to say that Cosby will come back, will do a deep dive on, because it's probably going to be around for a while.
Yeah, I think that could be fair to say. I wanted to point out, before I went to law school, I never said slippery slope. You say it all the time. I say it like three times a day. Ten times a day.
All the time. It's a slippery slope. It's a crutch. I could give you that snack, Charlie, but it's a slippery slope. It's a slippery slope.
I don't want to set a precedent. You'll be addicted to Pop-Tarts like me for several years. A show on Pop-Tarts, that might be good. Yeah. The outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Whitaker and Hamer law firm, the power behind this program. They're the managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina. They've got offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, and Gastonia, and they've got 46 combined years experience. We know that there are probably some of you out there that are having your own legal situation.
You've got questions. Well, we've got a phone number for you, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Just leave your contact information briefly, what the call's about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can also email your questions to the program, questions at the outlawlawyer.com, and we certainly want you to visit the website, theoutlawlawyer.com.
We're back with a little bit more after this. It's New York Times article on Roe versus Wade. Welcome back in to the outlaw lawyers. We have Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer on set with us, and as always, Whitaker and Hamer law firm is where you can find them, managing partners there, their practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.
Forty-six combined years experience between these two, and again, offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, and Gastonia. If you've got your own legal situation right now and you've got questions, I've got a phone number for you, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.
Just leave your contact information briefly, what the call's about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can always email your questions to the program, questions at theoutlawlawyer.com, and check out the website. It's a great one, theoutlawlawyer.com.
Gentlemen? Well, Morgan, up next, and we've talked about this before, we'll talk about it for I don't know how long, but a big legal conversation in our country has been and will be abortion. And so we've spent a lot of time talking about Roe v. Wade, kind of where the settled law is, right, you know, what Roe v. Wade says, you know, abortion is legal, states can limit it in certain ways, but there's strong protections in place right now with federal law on what states can do, how they can limit access, how they can limit, you know, just a bunch of limitations.
And that's been the settled law since the 70s. And so now this past year, we've got a new Supreme Court that you can argue has kind of a conservative tilt, and they have heard several cases already on not directly overturning Roe v. Wade, but they've heard several cases that will certainly at least weaken Roe v. Wade if the court comes down, like some people speculate they'll come down. And I saw a big article, I think it was the New York Times, but I saw and read a big article, it was really well done, just talking about a lot of states are kind of jumping the gun.
Like right now, the Supreme Court has heard oral arguments on a couple of cases, and we've talked about them, Joe. The Texas law, yeah, the Texas state law, which looks to... Do you remember that one? Do you remember the state law? Yeah, so the Texas state law, again, we deep dive on so many things.
We've done a couple of stories on that. And basically what that law tried to do was essentially circumvent the constitutional requirements, and it basically deputized citizens in a way, and it kind of went around the prohibition of state action and gave individuals a vehicle to civilly sue to enjoin basically abortion. So it was kind of a... we talked about how it was a very unique way to go about prohibiting something, and it kind of just tried to circumvent the constitutional requirement altogether and get around it in a super unique method. Yeah, and I think at the time, and I still kind of feel this way, I don't like the mechanism, right? Whether you're pro-abortion or you're for abortion, I think most Americans probably fall in that limited abortion... Somewhere in the middle.
Yeah, somewhere in the middle. Sure. And we're not here to say abortion's right or abortion's wrong. We're just here to tell you about what legally is transpiring. But that Texas state law, I'm real uncomfortable with it, not because it attempts to limit abortion, but like you said, the unique way it tries to punish people who are administering that constitutional right, right? I think that Texas state law, you could sue a doctor who performed an abortion, even though abortion is protected and it's constitutionally protected and that doctor can't face any federal penalties for doing it.
Under the state law, I could sue him. If I decided I didn't like the fact he was performing an abortion it would give me an avenue to sue him for damages or you could sue somebody who takes someone to have an abortion done or the secretary at the abortion clinic. So it opened up this avenue to punish people for doing something that was otherwise constitutionally protected. And I don't like that because that could easily be applied to anything. Guns, gun sales, right? If you live in a state that's kind of anti-gun, you have a Second Amendment right to possess a gun, let's say that state, let's say California decides, okay, well if Texas can do this to the constitutional right of abortion, we're going to do it to people who sell guns. Yeah, you make a good point, man, and that's the thing with, you know, there may be, if you look, you know, we don't like to look at things in terms of conservative versus liberal, we don't like to dissect things that way, but if you look at those traditional perspectives, and traditionally a conservative is going to be very much against abortion. You may have a conservative person who looks at this kind of wacky way to prohibit abortions, that's a good thing, because they think abortion is bad and this is stopping abortions, but along those same lines, generally speaking, that's the same type of person who's going to be staunch gun advocates and gun right advocates. And like you said, the same exact mechanism of action can be used to go after gun rights as well.
So it's one of those things where it may be, you know, you may think it's a good thing, but then it can be turned around and it can be used against you. And that's why I'm with you, I hate the way that they went about it, because it can, where does it stop? Well, and to piggyback on our Cosby conversation, again, you may, the things Cosby is accused of are horrible, but if there's not a system, you know, if there's a way to circumvent, you know, the constitutional protections in place to keep you from, you know, the Fifth Amendment from incriminating yourself, if you just skip over that, because you think Cosby should be in jail, that's this Texas law to me. You're skipping over constitutional protections, because you're in game as people shouldn't be allowed to get abortions. And that's fine if you believe that, but getting there that way is not fine if you're, you know, if you believe in the Constitution and you believe in the judiciary and you believe in the separation of powers, then this Texas state law, I think it should have been struck down already. The fact that it's been in place this long, I just don't think it's a good way to achieve their goal.
I think it's a bad precedent, and the longer it survives, the worse off we are. But in response to this, there's been a big national conversation on abortion law, which I think everybody pretty much thought was pretty much settled, you know, it's not something that gets... But anyway, so we've got a lot of states who are limiting abortion access weeks, you know, I think a lot of these states are doing 15, 10 weeks limits that are well under what Roe v. Wade, the law of the land, allows. And so a lot of states are just jumping the gun and making these laws that will get struck down. So when we, I mean, I don't know if we're weeks or months away, but at some point we're going to get a very big Supreme Court decision on all these abortion cases that they've been hearing this session.
And so those will probably all be put into one opinion. And if they limit Roe v. Wade, then these state laws will stay in effect. But if they don't limit Roe v. Wade, then all these are going to get overturned immediately. Yeah, and it's like, you know, we talked about the Texas law extensively, we talked about a few others, but it's interesting, man, and we could speculate on why, you know, why so many states are passing this, you know, what appears to be at least by the existing standard overly restrictive legislation. And I don't know, man, I don't know that I have a thought, maybe they look at the makeup of the court. And again, you don't like to look at the court in terms of political leanings, but I don't know if these states are trying to force that issue to be heard. It's hard to say, but we're going to see, there's going to be, this is forcing the hand of some sort of ruling and some sort of further elaboration on that Roe v. Wade ruling. And if people hear, you know, the court's position, you know, whether it's upheld, whether there's some kind of modification of the standard, I think we're going to see something.
Yeah. And, you know, just so people know, we talked about separation of powers, kind of the balance. If the Supreme Court decides something on Roe v. Wade that as a nation, you know, we don't like, there can always be a federal law. Sure.
Right? So it's not like the U.S. Supreme Court is the be all, end all. Those are the things that come before them, but they don't make laws. And so there could always be a federal law regarding abortion. There could always be changes that kind of preempt that. But, again, we'll talk about this a lot more. The U.S. Supreme Court is going to issue some big, big time decisions on abortion, again, in the next few months, definitely before the end of the year. So that will be something to talk about. Yeah, for sure.
We'll talk about it. And it's like you said, you know, I think if you look at it as it stands today, which is what we really have to do, because you have to look, you know, we have precedent for a reason. And if you look at what the court has ruled previously, I think it's fairly clear that pretty much all of these laws we've talked about, you know, they're unconstitutional. Right now, as they stand. As they stand currently. So it's just an interesting route to push that issue for sure.
Roe v. Wade, not going away, folks, it will be a topic of discussion on future shows. The Outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. You can find Josh and Joe at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're the managing partners there, practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.
Forty-six combined years experience between these two. And again, offices pretty much everywhere. We call them the Starbucks of lawyers. That's right.
Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, and Gastonia. If you've got a legal question that you're facing and you need some answers, here's a number for you, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. And you can get in touch, just leave your contact information, briefly what the call's about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can also e-mail us questions at theoutlawlawyer.com.
We'll answer those questions on future programs. And always, visit the website, theoutlawlawyer.com. Coming up, four men facing federal charges on conspiring to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer back in 2020. That's coming up next on the Outlaw Lawyer. Welcome back in to the Outlaw Lawyer. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer on set, and we are talking legalese. Whitaker and Hamer law firm is where you can find them during the week.
They're managing partners there, and again, practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina. We get into legal topics. You're going to have your own legal questions, maybe something you're going through. If you need answers, I've got a number for you, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Just leave contact information, briefly what the call's about, and an attorney will be in touch with Whitaker and Hamer.
Always, you can e-mail your questions to the program, questions at theoutlawlawyer.com. Gentlemen, where are we going next? Well, we've got two stories I wanted to talk about in this segment. One, I didn't pay a lot of attention to this when it happened, but it was kind of a crazy summer in 2020. There was a lot of different things going on. A lot of stuff happening in Michigan with a BLM protest, and then they had a lot of pandemic. That was a state that had a lot of pandemic lockdowns. What a crazy year.
It was nuts, man. It was. I think our kids will learn about that. We learned about 1968, I think.
That's going to be there. 2020 is there in 1968. Anyway, it was a crazy time, but one of the stories that came up was there was the FBI foiled a reported kidnapping attempt of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, who was, depending on how you felt about the pandemic and how you felt about lockdowns, was either really, really popular or really, really derided. Yeah, it was very few, like, she's doing an okay job.
Fantastic or terrible? I had forgotten about it, but there was a story, you know, she had locked down everything, right? So Michigan's Upper Peninsula is a big vacation area. Do you remember this? Yeah. And so she had locked down everything. I can't remember what it was, but basically if you had a second home, she's like, you can't go to your second home. And so they had a second home, I guess her and her husband in the Upper Peninsula.
And so her husband called the marina that serviced this lake or wherever they were. And he was like, I'm the governor's husband, and you're going to put my boat in the water, and I don't care about any of these restrictions, you know. But do you remember that story? I'm just trying to wrap my mind around a group of people sitting around thinking it might be a good idea to plot to kidnap a sitting governor. Well, and that's the thing, I didn't hear much about the story. I heard it happen.
You're like, oh, that's terrible. No one wants that to happen. No matter how much you like or dislike your governor, you're not rooting for them to get kidnapped by an armed militia.
Of all the things you're rooting for, yeah. So bad news, but I didn't hear much else from the story. So now we're finally getting to the point where some of these defendants, some of the people charged in this attempt, and I'm doing air quotes if you're listening to the radio, like attempt in quotation marks, because a lot of these defendants, some have pled guilty, and they've got sentenced. I think one or possibly two have pled guilty.
And the other defendants are like, no, no, no, I wasn't trapped. Because basically they're alleging there was three or four FBI informants involved. The FBI informant started this chat group and put out an ad for help in doing this. And it sounds like maybe there were some missteps. Help ad?
That's not funny, man, but it's Craigslist? I don't know. So these informants kind of attracted these guys to kind of talk about this attempt. But I guess that's part of the argument is like, hey, our guys were, you're the one who, you, the FBI, you're the one who created this situation, and yeah, they shouldn't have been going along with you, but they weren't instrumental in the formation of this plan. And so there was three FBI informants, I guess, involved, and they've all left the FBI. I think one got charged for doing something, drugs or something. But none of them are with the FBI, and they all left under not great situations. Some form of transgression.
Right. So all these FBI informants that helped put this case together are gone. And so the attorneys that represent these defendants on some very serious charges are kind of looking at it now and saying, well, wait a minute, what exactly did my guy do? How did they get involved? Were they entrapped by the government? And entrapment's a defense that you don't really see often. It doesn't work often.
Because the government can do a lot to try to get information on an active criminal enterprise. Which is a good, I mean. We want that. Yeah, exactly. We want that. But there is a tipping point where the government becomes maybe the primary bad actor. Yeah.
Trying to get people into something like this. And so here, I think it's just interesting because they're going to go to trial, right? There's been no plea deal. In federal court a lot of times there are plea deals. But it sounds like this is going to go to trial. And this entrapment defense, which is, again, not successful often, is their ace of spades.
Is that the big card? So in layman's terms, you're saying, or they're saying, their defense is saying that they were nudged in the direction of the kidnapper. Yeah, I think it's more than a nudge. I think a nudge is arguably permissible. But there's a line where it becomes entrapment. And it's a difficult thing to prove. And there was some planning. I think they sent one of the guys to look at.
They figured out where she lived and I guess they got some supplies. But when you actually lay out the federal government's argument on this. And again, I just read a couple of articles. I haven't seen what you would see at a trial or what you'd see if you were defending. But to me, it looks kind of weak when you lay it all out there. Yeah, I think it's fair. But I'm no federal judge.
I don't know. But that's another one we're going to be watching because I think that's interesting. If the entrapment defense works, you just don't see that play out very often.
No, no, you don't. And it'll be interesting to see it play out and to see the approach and to see whether it's successful. Much more successful than the plot to kidnap the governor was. I think 2020 made people do weird things, man. These people, surely.
That should just be a defense. It was 2020. Yeah, exactly. It was a crazy time. Wouldn't it be interesting if we could just flash forward 20 years and look back at how society is viewing what we went through in 2020, 2021? It'd be hard to explain. It'd be hard to explain to people 20 years ago, man, for sure.
And there's another story I want to talk about, but you've been following it closer than me. Yeah, so we've got Cain Velasquez, a UFC fighter, reached the peak level of the sport. I mean, there was a period of time where he was considered like one of the pound for pound best to ever do it.
Very, very successful. By all accounts, a sweetheart of a guy, like very well liked by his peers, which it's weird to think of someone who beats people as a sweetheart of a guy. But by all accounts, a good person arrested recently for multiple attempted murder charges. So when this news came out, you know, the initial story was just that he had basically fired on a vehicle with people in it. And he had hit it. I think he had hit one of the individuals. Very confusing story, if you know anything about Cain Velasquez. So that was the initial report.
A lot of people come out in support of him. Turns out, you know, that apparently there was an individual who I don't know the exact facts. I think worked at a daycare with one of his kids and had like for an extended period of time molested one of his young children for like an extended period of time. And that person, I think, was was arrested, charged and then ultimately released. And then he decided to kind of take the law into his own hands and go kind of vigilante style. And unfortunately, fired on the vehicle and didn't even hit the individual that he was he was going after.
I think he hit that person's stepfather. But I think the interesting thing so far is, and you mentioned this earlier, is he's being held. And of course, three counts of attempted murder is what it sounds like the charges are. There'll probably be some more charges, but no bail. Yeah, no bail. And that's that.
That's the thing. You've seen a ton of high profile people, you know, be it celebrities, UFC fighters, people who know him, have written in support of him receiving bail, basically. So there's been a large, you know, groundswell of support for him to to be released, because, I mean, it's hard to say he's he's a flight risk. You know, it's it's it's very I think I think I don't spend my day to day in criminal law, but we do handle a lot of criminal law at the firm. To be denied bail is a big step.
And if flight risk is one of the things that go into it, you know, danger to yourself or the community. And I don't know that we have I mean, just another attempted murder. I'm doing a lot of air quotes because we're on TV.
Doesn't translate to the radio. It's a tough one, man. That's a tough one, because, you know, we talk about these terrible things that people do.
We advocate for the system, how important that system is. And but it's it's about as tough of a thing to say that on when you're talking about, you know, someone molesting children, abusing children. Like that's when it really becomes difficult, man.
And as a as a legal analyst, you can step back and you can say, you know, he shouldn't do this, let the system play out. But then as like a father to children, it's very easy to understand how you like. Because it's you can see it right. I can understand it. I'm not a monster.
Not a monster. Exactly. But yeah, man, it's any way that what does it make sense to me is why shoot at him? Like he just you can just grab this man, honestly, like at the end of the day. And, you know, but but but that'll be an interesting one to keep an eye on as well.
Yeah. The no bail part is there's the most, you know, again, looking at it from a legal analyst and not a father, not a victim and not a defendant. But the denying bail to someone who doesn't appear to be a flight risk doesn't appear like he's going to harm anybody else randomly.
That's clearly there was a clearly a motive. I don't I don't get it. But this reminds me of we're going back to our long abandoned legal movie tournament that's going to come back in one of these days. Time to kill.
You can't comment on it. I've never seen the movies. It's basically a time to kill with Samuel L. Jackson playing the part of Cain Velasquez.
You should check that movie out. Does he get denied bail in there? No, he he gets arrested.
And there's like racial tension that's involved in this as well. Basically, his his kid gets like brutally raped. He kills the people responsible, some of them. And Matthew McConaughey is his attorney. One of the great movie attorneys of all time. He gets them off, actually gets them off. Interesting. Yeah, I'll watch it one day. All right.
Well, we are going to wrap up the program immediately following this break. The Outlaw lawyers, Josh Whittaker and Joe Hamer. You can find them at Whittaker and Hamer law firm.
If you've got your own legal situation, you've got questions. Here's a number for you. You can call at eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.
That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Just leave contact information briefly with the calls about an attorney with Whittaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can also email your questions to the program. Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com.
Right after this to wrap it up. Welcome back into the outlaw lawyer. We have Josh Whittaker and Joe Hamer with us. Whittaker and Hamer law firm is where you can find them. Managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. Forty six combined years experience between these two and offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia.
And you may be having a legal situation of your own and you've got questions. I've got a phone number for you. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.
Leave your contact information briefly what the calls about an attorney with Whittaker and Hamer will be. Well, we're back to wrap it up, guys. It's been a fun show, but we've got a couple of little things to talk about.
Well, I wanted to I haven't done it yet. We've seen Batman. I've seen it's the Batman.
Yes, I've seen the Batman. So it's just a read. It's just a reboot.
It's the. Yeah, it's a read. It's basically a reboot.
They don't do a whole lot of bad. You know, normally with Batman movies, you get the light flashback to his parents dying. That's like the seminal moment. They don't even do that. They don't they reference it, but it's more it's just a complete reboot. Yeah. So there's no real continuity. There's no reference to like a larger extended universe.
It's all self-contained. Is there a again? I don't want to spoil it for anybody. So I don't know if it's been out there and let's summarize the plot.
We're going to talk about it. Is there a bad guy? Is there a bad guy?
There's there's there's several. So you've got the Riddler's like the main bad guy and it's a real different take. It's a dark movie, man. I took the kids and I kind of regretted it. Yeah, almost instantly.
Someone told me not to take our little guy. Yeah, it's close to a it's close to an R. It's very close to an R. So there's actually F bombs that get dropped. That's usually like a dead giveaway.
I think they give them one for a PG-13 movie and they use it like early. I've heard from several that it's good. It's good.
Yeah, it's good. It's it's dark. And Batman is played by Robert Pattinson, Twilight Vampire. Every time I see him, I think Twilight.
I never saw that. He's had a couple of other movies that were more like that. He's more serious in and that will take that Twilight taste out of your mouth if that's a thing. So did the Christian Bale voice? He does. He does a different.
Yeah, he's got his own voice similar, but different. It's not quite as like, but he's an all right Batman to me. A good Batman even. But it's not a lot of Bruce Wayne in the movie. You know, the Bruce Wayne is real sad and like he's supposed to be like a billionaire playboy type of thing in my head.
That's not really like a sad boy. The only true Batman is Michael Keaton. Yeah.
You know, Michael Keaton is reprising the role of Batman. Right. And like I'm like, oh, yeah. Yeah.
So I'm gonna see that because I'm not a big flash guy, but I'm gonna see that. But I heard a story. You know, Michael Keaton does like anytime he's like on SNL or he's like on the on the set of like a different movie.
Have you ever heard this? I'm not what he needs to like lighten people up. Like he'll whisper to him like he'll, you know, like making jokes on the sun whisper.
Yeah. He just goes, I'm Batman. He just says it. They'll say he'll say it like 20 times a day. He'll say that this Batman movie is not funny at all.
There's no humor. It's very dark. I'd say it's good. Yeah, it's good. It's long, man. It's like I want to say it's right at three hours.
So anytime you get close to three hours, it's lengthy, but not good, man. Definitely good. Different. Serious.
Very serious. Now, my question is, if Michael Keaton is your Batman, is it more Michael Keaton or is it the fact that Jack Nicholson's the bad guy? He is the only joker.
I will accept no other joker. Not even Heath Ledger. He was good, though. Yeah. Heath Ledger was good.
He was. No Jared Leto. I'll give you that. Like, no. Yeah, they need to get out of that. Yeah, they're out of that. I think they're done with that. I think that's dead. That's gone.
Yeah, I think it's dead. I grew up, and Morgan, you probably did this, too. We're close in age, but I grew up on the TBS reruns, right?
Yes. So I'd watch Mork and Mindy and I'd watch Three's Company, but they used to rerun the old Batman. Adam West, Batman. Adam West, Batman. No muscle tone. No, nothing needed.
He just needed it. This is as far removed from Adam West, Batman, as it could possibly be. But that Adam West, Batman, it has a place in our society.
Like, if you watch it, it's still entertaining. And if superheroes wore PJs, it'd be perfect. He didn't need the muscle tone.
He didn't need the... There's not a lot of... It's not really an action movie. I mean, it is. There's action. But it's more of like a... I almost liken it to the movie Seven. Like, that's a weird thing to do.
Really? It's dark. Yeah, it's very dark. It's dark. Yeah, it's dark. I haven't seen that movie, so that doesn't mean anything to me. Jeez, man.
Come on. Seven is dark. Yeah, it's dark.
It's like a lighter Seven. Riddler's very much, like, dark, man. He's not, like, playing pranks on people.
He's just murdering people, basically. So very unlike the Riddler and Adam West. Very unlike Jim Carrey's Riddler. Do you know the name of the person who played Riddler on the Adam West Batman? No, man. I know that Cesar Romero is the Joker, right? Oh, yeah. I don't know his name either.
I can see his face, too. It wasn't a quiz. I don't know it either.
If anyone should know it, it's you. Yeah, well, I'm going to beef up on it, because... Yeah, go see the Batman. I'll say see the Batman. So I'll take my 12-year-old, me and my wife are my 12-year-old, but I think I'm going to leave my 10-year-old.
I took a six-year-old, and I think he was just very confused by it, you know? But a 30-second plug for the firm. Go. Me and Joe, we are real attorneys. We're the managing partners of Whitaker and Hamer.
We don't mention it enough. Morgan's got the information, but we can help you. We've got our attorneys who practice real estate, family law, criminal law, civil litigation, offices all over the place.
That's our goal, as Morgan said. But we're happy to help you with your legal needs. One of our attorneys will be happy to meet with you. We'll be happy to talk with you if you follow Morgan's instructions.
All right, there you go. The Outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. Whitaker and Hamer law firms, where you can find them during the week.
And folks, they are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina, managing partners of the firm. And if you've got your legal situation, call this number, 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information, briefly what the call's about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. That's 800-659-1186.
We're back next week. Outlaw lawyers hosted by an attorney licensed to practice law in North Carolina. Some of the guests appearing on the show may be licensed North Carolina attorneys. Discussion of the show is meant to be general in nature and in no way should the discussion be interpreted as legal advice. Legal advice can only be rendered once an attorney licensed in the state in which you live. Have the opportunity to discuss the facts of your case with you. The attorneys appearing on the show are speaking in generalities about the law in North Carolina and how these laws affect the average North Carolinian. If you have any questions about the content of the show, contact us directly.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-05-20 20:33:42 / 2023-05-20 20:58:49 / 25
