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  • Winning by sowing the seeds of empowerment

    Winning by sowing the seeds of empowerment
    2026/07/01

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    WINNING BY SOWING THE SEEDS OF EMPOWERMENT

    Interviewee Leah Penniman and Fairfax criminal lawyer Jonathan Katz are good friends with Jon's essential peace teacher (and prior Beat the Prosecution podcast guest) Jun Yasuda, whose beautiful peace pagoda is less than two miles from Leah's Soul Fire Farm.

    Leah's story is one of never giving up nor giving in, which is also essential for criminal defense. She experienced substantial racism while growing up, and kept persevering, including with learning about farming. Long ago, Leah, her husband and children lived in an Albany food desert, and ultimately, she and her husband bought the farmland that is now Soul Fire Farm.

    Leah did not stop at merely opening a farm, but has a nonprofit to assist lower income people with food, and welcomes countless people to learn about self empowerment and farming.

    Leah tells some captivating stories, including about African women who would braid seeds into their hair, to have them available for planting in the event they were forced into slavery.

    Leah does not candy coat the hurdles in life, the history of racism (including in farming), and the continuing racism found too extensively in society. She recognizes those hurdles and continues persevering.

    Leah's thoughts on helping criminal defendants, are, aptly, for them to remember that they and all beings are sacred.

    I recommend donating to Soul Fire Farm, and reading Leah's books Farming While Black- Soul Fire Farm's Practical Guide to Liberation on the Land, and Black Earth Wisdom: Soulful Conversations with Black Environmentalists (2023). Coming next is Children of the Land: A Soul Fire Farm Parenting Guide, authored by Leah and her child Neshima.

    Here is the video version of this episode. Here is the Apple podcast version.

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    57 分
  • Winning with resilience while ready for danger- Fleet Maull

    Winning with resilience while ready for danger- Fleet Maull
    2026/06/11

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    Fleet Maull inspires Fairfax, Virginia, criminal defense lawyer Jonathan Katz for his extensive experience applying mindfulness with highly challenging situations, making the most of his fourteen years in prison for a drug conviction, and emerging from prison continuing to help inmates and by now helping so many people beyond those in the criminal justice system, with resilience while ready for the dangers that can lurk around the corner. (Check out this month's free online Somatic Healing Summit, where Fleet will be talking.)

    When Jon Katz first met Fleet over ten years ago at a weekend program that Fleet was leading, Fleet included a great exercise that underlined that we can treat circumstances as neutral, which does not mean the absence of plenty of terrible world events, but that "we, not circumstances, are in charge of our lives and destiny." Radical Responsibliity, by Fleet Maull. Fleet also is great leading guided meditation, which he does early in this podcast episode with a few-minute sit. Fleet was trained in-depth in mindfulness at Naropa Institute (which became Naropa University) before getting convicted for alleged drug trafficking that apparently had taken place a good amount of time before being prosecuted.

    Fleet spent fourteen years in federal prison. No matter how much of a chunk of his adult life that represented, at least he avoided the even more draconian federal statutory criminal sentencing increases that took hold not long after he got convicted.

    Fleet does not candycoat his prison experience. He points out the racial disparities in the criminal "justice" system, his coming to terms that the people he was imprisoned with would be his "brothers and sisters" while there, six run-ins that could have taken an awful turn (and many more minor run-ins), the importance of not being passive nor too aggressive in prison, and knowing that people could walk in through an inmate's unlocked cell door and even kill them.

    Fleet made the best of his prison situation. Helped other inmates along the way, and emerged from prison -- whether immediately or later -- a ball of positive energy and inspiration. This Beat the Prosecution interview with Fleet Maull is riveting.

    This episode is also available on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi33kl8qIFQ and Apple Podcasts. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/winning-with-resilience-while-ready-for-danger-fleet-maull/id1721413675?i=1000772153117

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    1 時間 1 分
  • Winning without wishful thinking and by converting hurdles- Eric Davis

    Winning without wishful thinking and by converting hurdles- Eric Davis
    2026/06/05
    Send us Fan MailObtaining justice in court is a never-ending process of learning; self-development; blood, sweat and tears; self discovery; inter-discovery; often deep pain that can transform into strength and growth, but often with more pain along the way; banding together with birds of a feather; and giving back what we have learned. Texas criminal defense lawyer -- moved recently from Houston to Maryland -- Eric J. Davis (until he has a website, reachable at eric.davis@gmx.us and 713-227-2727) believes strongly in giving back what he has learned, and in integrating what he learns into what he already knows, rather than shedding valuable experience and ability with the latest teachings. Fairfax, Virginia criminal defense lawyer Jon Katz met Eric at the spring 2026 National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers program, and learned that Eric, like Jon, is a Trial Lawyers College alum, where Eric is on the TLC board and staff. Eric is also a member of the NACDL board of directors. He states straight out that the criminal justice system evolved out of racism, and finds positive ways to deal with that, including bringing race to the attention of jurors so that they will help criminal defendants when they spot racial bias and unfairness. Eric is full of optimistic energy and fight, including in talking about his acquittal for a firearm defendant by focusing on how police rushed to judgment and narrowed themselves to finding evidence to prove him guilty, rather than considering other possible suspects after finding a firearm in an empty vehicle. Eric talks about how his experience with the Trial Lawyers College and its focus on psychodrama and storytelling helped him feel freer in pursuing justice for his clients, including focusing on the emotions of the case, the emotions of the jurors and of the actors in the case and their motivations for how they acted. Eric tells a great personal story during jury selection / voir dire to inspire them to be open about racial issues -- rather than expecting to transform their prejudices in the short timespan of a trial -- by recounting how he had his defenses up when walking to fill his empty gas tank when a truck with an older white driver slowed down, and how the driver -- after they learned how much they had in common -- told Eric how he at first thought Eric was up to no good, and Eric confessed to having first had the same view of the truck driver. And then Eric asks the jurors about any assumptions they are making about race, to start the discussion. Pure brilliance. Rules that help for a fair trial for a criminal defendant are great, but often are few and far between, and are not always sufficiently enforced. That is why I prominently display a Gladiator film clip board in my office, as a reminder of how Russell Crowe's Maximus Decimus Meridius and his teammates win despite the absence of any rules protecting them, and despite the lowest and basest violence from their opponents. Eric Davis reminds us that we can win justice for criminal defendants even when the rules do not appear to be in our favor nor to be sufficiently enforced when those rules are favorable to criminal defendants. He starts by diving deep into the jury selection process, with conversations in which he steers guilty verdict-leaning jurors closer to his side, sometimes by adding one variation to the conversation at a time. (See minute 29 in his presentation here.) We can open and widen avenues to acquittal. This Beat the Prosecution episode is also available on YouTube and Apple podcasts. This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text). If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    1 時間
  • Winning as the jurors' trustworthy & entertaining tourguide- Donald Ramsell

    Winning as the jurors' trustworthy & entertaining tourguide- Donald Ramsell
    2026/05/29

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    Jurors and others do not get persuaded by brute force, badgering nor begging. Often a criminal defense or other trial lawyer obtains traction by putting themselves in the shoes of the thirteenth juror. When my teacher Gerry Spence was on his road to obtaining an acquittal for Geoffrey Fieger, he reportedly one day walked along the jury rail sweeping his palm alongside its top, as if erasing the barrier between him and the jurors.

    Fairfax criminal lawyer Jon Katz's guest on this Beat the Prosecution podcast episode is Wheaton, Illinois, DUI defense lawyer Donald Ramsell. Don does not have the winning charisma of Gerry Spence, but charisma is not mandatory to persuade jurors, as demonstrated time and again by my teacher Steve Rench, who incorporated methodology into winning. Steve was the yin to Gerry's yang, with both at the Trial Lawyers College for at least its first three years. Don synthesizes that methodology with a singleminded drive for knowing and incorporating the essential science, evidence, law, and the persuasive tasks at hand.

    Don fashions himself as the entertaining tourguide, showing the jurors the path to help them fulfill their oaths, and hopefully delivering an acquittal. Don paints the counterpoint of the uninteresting prosecutor attempting to dissuade the jury from the reasonable doubt that bombards the courtroom walls.

    Listen as Don talks about a police employee who retired to his home's basement -- rather than a sterile lab -- disastrously to manufacture the simulator solution control mechanism for breathalyzer machines, and how he successfully stymied the blood THC testing regime in Illinois.

    Don aptly talks about letting judges know that when they do not rule sensibly on the law, Don appeals often enough that they may get reversed. Plenty of Don's appeals are pro bono, to advance legal arguments that will assist his other clients.

    To boot, Don -- like so many of his National College for DUI Defense colleagues -- generously shares his know-how and wisdom with DUI defense colleagues. Through that generosity, I met Don when I attended an NCDD-sponsored training for lawyers on administering field sobriety testing to subjects who have consumed alcohol, with the teaching led by Anthony Pallacios, one of the nation's leading instructors of FSTs to police officers.

    Don obtains acquittals in his conservative jurisdiction in part by appealing to jurors' belief in our nation's criminal justice system, which of course includes the presumption of innocence and the burden of the prosecution to prove a criminal defendant's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Don talks persuasively as just folks, and as the real McCoy.

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    58 分
  • Winning through engagement as one's true self- Patrick McLain

    Winning through engagement as one's true self- Patrick McLain
    2026/05/21

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    Winning through engagement as one's true self- Dallas attorney Patrick McLain joins fellow Trial Lawyers College alum and Fairfax criminal lawyer Jon Katz in discussing revealing our true selves -- warts and all -- to jurors and judges, so that they will also be true to themselves and each other and to their oaths.

    Jon Katz met Patrick -- a Trial Lawyers College faculty member -- through the monthly trial preparation gatherings hosted by fellow Trial Lawyers College alum and faculty member Christopher Flohr . Patrick is a Marine veteran who was a military lawyer and judge, now for many years in private practice for military defense and criminal defense.

    Patrick discusses applying storytelling and psychodrama approaches to obtaining justice for criminal defendants, and the power of lawyers joining together in pursuing that path.

    In this talk, Patrick includes discussing the bonds among military members from the rough times they experience, and the bonds among Trial Lawyers College attendees, with our own challenges that we handle in pursuing justice for our clients. This journey can lay bare our raw feelings and emotions, which is often the only way for us to best help our clients.

    This Beat the Prosecution podcast episode is also available on YouTube, and Apple Podcasts.

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    59 分
  • Winning with MacGuffins and heroes' journeys- Andrew Mishlove for the DUI defense

    Winning with MacGuffins and heroes' journeys- Andrew Mishlove for the DUI defense
    2026/05/14

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    The Trial Lawyers College -- which your host Jonathan Katz attended in 1995, followed to this day during the year with periodic trial preparation gatherings of TLC alums and others (shout out to our repeat co-host, criminal defense lawyer supreme, and my decades-long friend Christopher Flohr for hosting such monthly gatherings for years at his Maryland law office) -- makes clear that the TLC does not "offer training for those lawyers who represent government, corporations or large business interests." A sizeable chunk of Trial Lawyers College attendees are criminal defense and plaintiffs personal injury attorneys. When Jon learned that National College of DUI Defense leader Andrew Mishlove embraces Trial Lawyers College approaches, Jon Katz invited him to speak on this Beat the Prosecution podcast, to include addressing integrating TLC approaches with winning DUI defense.

    Andrew exemplifies the truism that there are always more essential lessons to learn. When he was already in his fifties and very accomplished as a DUI defense lawyer, Andrew learned about the Trial Lawyers College and immediately embraced its approach of persuading through storytelling and applying psychodram and scene setting approaches.

    Andrew is right on point in talking about the story catalyst that Alfred Hitchcock named the MacGuffin, and the hero's journey of the story. He wonderfully weaves My Cousin Vinny and Star Wars in articulating that approach.

    Andrew also discusses using the Moth storytelling approach (see his article on the Moth here) -- which is covered at the TLC's Graduate II program -- giving credit to Nebraska lawyer Maren Chaloupka, who addresses storytelling as involving the story worth telling, running from extraordinary to every day events that can be transformative.

    Andrew also here discusses his week-long annual program with the NCDD entitled
    Serious Science: Advanced Course in Blood Drug Analysis & Trial Advocacy, where in addition to focusing on persuading for justice for the defense in court, the participants have an opportunity to experience blood analysis from the viewpoint and approach of blood examining and analyzing scientists, whether their testimony is for the defense or prosecution.

    This episode is also available on YouTube and Apple Podcasts.

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    59 分
  • Winning with resilience & compassion for all sentient beings- Miyoko Schinner

    Winning with resilience & compassion for all sentient beings- Miyoko Schinner
    2026/04/16

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    Criminal defense lawyers can learn plenty from non-lawyers who courageously and optimistically blaze their own trails, stick to their guns in very challenging times, are resilient, and keep on blazing trails. For Fairfax, Virginia, criminal defense lawyer Jonathan Katz, Miyoko Schinner fits that bill.

    Miyoko Schinner became a vegan, missed the dairy that she loved with pasta and other dishes, and became a pioneer with Miyoko's Creamery, which quickly went nationwide on major grocery shelves with vegan mozzarellla and other cheese, and butter. Along the way, and with Miyoko's rebellious streak, her company won a 2021 First Amendment-protecting partial federal injunction barring the California government from restricting "Miyoko’s use of 'butter,' 'lactose free,' 'cruelty free,' and 'revolutionizing dairy with plants' on the company’s 'vegan butter'."

    Around ten years ago, Miyoko founded the animal sanctuary Rancho Compasión (here is the donation link), which thrives to this day with dozens of rescued animals, several staffmembers, and many students visiting throughout the year. She supports a support forum for women in business.

    As Miyoko says, she does not promote veganism by such abrasive approaches as throwing blood, but instead invites people to break bread over delicious vegan food, creates vegan cookbooks, brings people on worldwide vegan tours, and co-taught a Berkely college class on plant-centric food systems.

    When Jon Katz met Miyoko for the second time, at the 2022 Animal and Vegan Advocacy Summit, he did not know that she had been removed (or else was about to be removed) from the very Miyoko's Creamery that she had founded. Unlike Steve Jobs's revolving door with the Apple company he co-founded, Miyoko did not return to Miyoko's Creamery, and pivoted forwards.

    Criminal defense involves plenty of thrills of victory, agonies of defeat, the lack of any supporters in the courtroom other than those on the defense team, and constant retooling, regrouping and refining on the road to victory. In this Beat the Prosecution episode, Miyoko talks frankly of how she emerged from being ousted from the company she founded (while her marriage was ending, at that), partly through the support and love of people who cared about her, and also from her companion animals.

    This episode also is on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijpVhPKWswI

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    1 時間
  • Powerhouse lawyer Bob Hilliard- Winning trials by caring for our clients and throwing ourselves fully into their cause

    Powerhouse lawyer Bob Hilliard- Winning trials by caring for our clients and throwing ourselves fully into their cause
    2026/04/09

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    What do non-ego, blue jeans, and tireless work have to do with beating the prosecution? Join us as Fairfax, Northern Virginia, criminal and DUI lawyer Jonathan Katz talks in depth with Corpus Christi, Texas, trial lawyer Robert C. Hilliard, who was Jon's roommate at the Trial Lawyers College. https://hilliard-law.com

    Bob got a man released from prison after over two years in jail for a vehicular homicide conviction, where Bob proved that the collision was actually caused by a defective vehicle acceleration.

    Bob argued right up to the United States Supreme Court for the right to sue a United States Border Patrol agent for his cross-border fatal shooting of a teenager. Hernandez v. Mesa, 589 U.S. 93 (2000) (a 5-4 decision declining to permit such a cause of action for a cross-border shooting). Bob Hilliard pursues victory for his clients without ego, without airs, and with hard and smart work.

    In this episode, we talk about being authentic and powerfully vulnerable, and about the connections we make with our loved ones, with each other and with jurors. We include discussing our late friend Dax Cowart, and Bob talks about how meaningful it is to have Dax's walking stick in his office. Bob and I have not seen each other in person for years, and here pick up where we last left off, as if it was yesterday.

    This episode also is available on Apple podcasts.

    This podcast with Fairfax, Virginia criminal / DUI lawyer Jon Katz is playable on all devices at podcast.BeatTheProsecution.com. For more information, visit https://KatzJustice.com or contact us at info@KatzJustice.com, 703-383-1100 (calling), or 571-406-7268 (text).

    If you like what you hear on our Beat the Prosecution podcast, please take a moment to post a review at our Apple podcasts page (with stars only, or else also with a comment) at https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/beat-the-prosecution/id1721413675
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    53 分