(Season 5, Episodes 1-3)
I enjoy long cases as much as the next legal drama fan, but it’s generally only enjoyable when the case is so massive that it requires multiple episodes. The Practice seems to have found another reason for dragging these out: the lawyers just care too darn much. And it’s not even the trial that simply lasts a long time. No, the trial is usually one (or at most two) and done. Instead, it’s the appeal after appeal that kills me, because the lawyers at Donnell and Associates can’t accept that maybe their clients are guilty. It does happen.
5.1 “Summary Judgments”
Season five opened with a bang: Bobby’s friend (who does he associate himself with?) Scott Wallace (Bruce Davison) is charged with murdering his wife, and we’re off to the races for a many-episode arc. But first things first — the trial that finds him guilty and lands him in prison. With a cool guest spot from Daniel Davis (Niles from The Nanny) as the judge, this case was high on intrigue and drama.
Especially when you consider that Richard Bay could very well have coached perjury from the prosecution’s lead witness, telling the victim’s brother exactly what his testimony needed to say in order to convict Scott. Is that something that Helen’s going to stand for? I suppose it depends on how tenuous her position in the DA’s office is right now.
In other news, Ellenor and Lindsay took on an ill-conceived case against the EPA for failure to properly monitor the paint on some playground equipment that ultimately led to the mental injury of a bunch of kids. Besides mentioning that Lindsay went off on their clients when the couple dared question whether they could rely on their chosen attorneys, the ridiculousness of this one isn’t really worth mentioning at this point, save to say that Lindsay and Ellenor somehow managed to win their clients a trial.
5.2 “Germ Warfare”
The Scott Wallace case reached its inevitable appeal, with Bobby inevitably losing control of himself, and the situation. It’s nice that these lawyers actually care, but there’s a very thick and visible line between caring and losing your mind, one that Bobby nevertheless tramples over on a regular basis. You haven’t failed humanity when you lose, Bobby — let it go.
It did seem, however, that Helen was ready to go to bat for Scott Wallace, to the extent that Richard did suborn perjury. I’m not sure that it will help, even if the brother was a pretty damning witness, but Helen going up against her office says a lot for her moral compass.
Ellenor and Lindsay, meanwhile, somehow managed to pull another tear-jerker over the eyes of a naive jury, winning an award in the amount of $172 million for their clients. Good move by Judge Aldrich (Dakin Matthews) to pull it back to $135 thousand per kid (thus times three), even if that was below the last settlement offer from the defense. But now Ellenor’s gunning for him … maybe she’ll go too far and get imprisoned and disbarred!
5.3 “Officers of the Court”
With no regard for the repercussions, Ellenor went right after Judge Aldrich, dragging in all manner of other jurists to hear her arguments and appeals. The tunnel vision that’s a hallmark of this show has to come back and bite them one of these days. Of course she managed to gain the concession of an appeals judge that Aldrich’s pullback of the award was capricious, but did she fail to note that no other judge seemed to indicate that they would have done things differently? What does she expect from a case that should have been a loser on its merits?
Richard, in a veiled effort to save his job, tried to convince Helen that it would be in her best interest to drop the whole perjury thing. Do we really want DAs more concerned with their own jobs than sticking to the letter of the law? Good for her for ignoring all the voices shouting at her inside the DA’s office.
Jimmy’s old hooker client from back in season two, Jennifer Cole (Tracy Middendorf), returned for another go-round, this time eight months pregnant and arrested for crack use. This case actually left me with a big question for all the attorneys out there. Jimmy acted on what he felt was his client’s best interest, instead of what was clearly in her best legal interest, by attempting to get her remanded to a treatment facility. As a result, he was guilty of colluding with the DA. Is that really something that lawyers do regularly? Judge a client and act accordingly, as opposed to dealing with the law at hand? I realize it’s a staple on TV because we need the drama and the emotion, but it also leaves the impression that that’s something common in the legal profession: abandoning your fiduciary duty to a client because you’d do things differently.
Anyone out there willing to clarify the issue?
Clacked by Aryeh S.
on Dec 17, 2009 @ 12:00 EST5EDT
