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Trial and Error: The Education of a Courtroom Lawyer
Trial and Error The Education of a Courtroom Lawyer Author:John C. Tucker Landmark civil rights suits, the "Chicago Eight" trial, Mafia cases, all recalled in a candid memoir by one of Americas leading lawyers. In 1958, John C. Tucker began a legal career that would lead the Chicago Tribune to call him "one of Chicagos finest and most idiosyncratic trial lawyers." Now, in a book reminiscent of Scott Turow... more »s classic One L, told with painstaking honesty from the twilight of his legal career, Tucker details the difficult steps in learning the trial attorneys trade and illuminates the reality of life as one of the countrys leading civil and criminal trial lawyers. Skillfully he chronicles his immersion in the sometimes brutal machinery of our judicial systema system that while steeped in raw ambition, temptation, and unimaginable stress, can nonetheless change our lives for the better while delivering justice for the afflicted. Throughout his professional memoir Tucker takes readers into the inner sanctum on an extraordinary variety of engrossing cases that span three decades of legal landmarks: from his involvement in the raucous 1969 trial of the "Chicago Eight" Vietnam War protesterswith William Kuntsler and Len Weinglass, before the odious Judge Julius Hoffmanto one of the most important civil rights cases of the era, the Supreme Court decision that ended the corrupt political patronage system in Mayor Daleys Chicago. In TRIAL AND ERROR, Tucker becomes his own star witness. His crisp prose and penetrating voice carry readers rung by rung up the legal ladder to provide the clearest presentation yet of trial lawyers and their craft. Depicting the highs and lows of a storied career that includes the colorful trial of a giant Mafia gambling ring and a legal showdown with heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, Tucker gives aspiring young attorneys, law students, recent graduates, and all fans of courtroom drama (and the comedy the system often exhibits) the chance to view the vicissitudes of the justice system through the eyes of the lawyer at the center of the storm.« less