LAW In Self-Defense

Dallas businessman Allen Coker rocks back in his chair with a self-salisfied smile and remembers the rapture. He’s recalling the euphoria he felt when the foreman of a Dallas jury stood up and intoned, “Judgment to the defendant.”

Coker, you’ve guessed, was the defendant. But he had another reason for that giddy rush of joy: he was also the lawyer. On the courtroom docket, Coker was listed as pro se, which might be Latin for “see you later, alligator,” but actually means “for yourself.” Coker chose to defend himself and won, thus providing an exception to the ancient maxim, “He who acts as his own lawyer has a fool for a client.”

From the standpoint of practicality, it would make more sense to enlist with the Flying Wailendas than to stand in front of a jury and represent yourself, with a licensed and experienced attorney representing the other side, poised and ready to chop the pitifully misguided pro se into cat food.

But Coker, armed with a fifty-cent booklet on courtroom procedure that he purchased at the Dallas County Clerk’s Office, bucked the odds and won his case.

Actually, in the last couple of years, Coker has gone against a licensed attorney in a jury trial three times. Twice, he’s won.

Coker. by trade, operates a company that tows off illegally parked cars. The wrecker people, in general, do not fare well in terms of public esteem. Perhaps this is why he feels so comfortable playing lawyer.

“In the wrecker business, you can expect to be sued three to six times a year for damage to cars and other factors,” he says. “In one situation, I realized that the losses from a suit would be less than the attorney’s fees. That’s when I decided to represent myself.”

Coker says he won his first case when his wrecker driver testified that he was a former Eagle Scout.

“As far as the jury was concerned, that constituted an approvable, honest background , and when he said he hadn’t damaged that car, they believed him,” Coker says.

He lost his second case because the plaintiff was “a little old lady. She looked like my mother. How can a jury be convinced that a person like that could lie?”

Having experienced the thrill of victory in a courtroom, Coker intends to try another one in his own behalf in June 1986. But despite his 66 percent success ratio, the judge will advise him not to attempt it. Judges advise everyone not to attempt it. They’ve seen too many individuals, perhaps inspired by the courtroom performance of Raymond Burr or Spencer Tracy or Paul Newman, decide to go it alone. Such brave souls are at a definite disadvantage in the courtroom, so judges feel obligated to acquaint pro se litigants with the harsh realities of their situation. Playing doctor can be fun. Playing lawyer, on the other hand, is expensive and usually disastrous.

In Dallas County, judges routinely pass out a “Notice To All Parties Attending Court Without Legal Representation.” The gist of the message is as follows: “Any individual has a right to appear in Texas courts pro se, i.e., without an attorney. Along with this right is an obligation to perform all tasks correctly and in accordance with Texas law. All litigants, whether represented by legal counsel or not, are expected to comply with that same law and those same procedures. If you do not have an attorney representing you, you are sincerely urged to secure one.”

No matter how solid the case that the pro se wishes to present to the court, the failure to grasp the rules of procedure almost always leads to the awkward demise of the non-lawyer. “They don’t understand the rules of jury selection, they don’t know how to make an opening statement, and then it goes down-hill from there,” says Candace Tyson, the judge in County Court At Law 2.

How do they get evidence ruled admissible? How do pro se defendants cross-examine themselves? The obstacle course of formality and technicality inevitably trips up the amateur. The pro se can tip-toe through this procedural mine field for only so long. Tyson says that most pro se operatives, at some point during their trial, will leave the courtroom to phone an attorney and ask what to do next.

One out of four litigants who appears on Judge Tyson’s docket is listed as pro se. By the time their cases come to trial, most of them will have hired a lawyer, but not all. “They’ll come into the trial full of enthusiasm, convinced that their case and their cause is right,” says Tyson of the prototypical pro se. Most will have visited a law library just long enough to compound the confusion. They arrive with pre-trial pleadings and petitions scratched in longhand. “And they almost always lose, and leave the courtroom mad at the judge,” Tyson says, “In fact, Allen Coker is the only pro se who went against an attorney in my court and won.”

Still, at the County Court At Law level, where many of the cases are appeals from Justice of the Peace courts, Tyson and other judges believe that the pro se trend is growing. She says that the popular daytime TV show, “The People’s Court,” might be one reason why some are tempted to take to the halls of justice in their own behalf. “They come in my court and expect me to be like Judge Wapner from the TV show and help them out if things go wrong,” Tyson says. “And I’m not going to do that.”

Allen Coker knows that firsthand. “I thought that overall, Judge Tyson and the attorney for the other side were pretty antagonistic to me and my pro se efforts during the trial.” Coker says. “And in a way, I think that was a factor in helping me win my case. The jury was kind of sympathetic to me. Juries are just as confused by rules of procedure and legal mumbo jumbo as the pro se is. The jury is just interested in hearing the facts of the case.”

Coker went pro se because he was frustrated with the results he was getting from his lawyer when he was sued the first time. The lawyer was happy to write letters and happy to send bills, but seemed reluctant to go to court. So Coker did his own research and decided to try it himself.

Coker walked into the courtroom looking cocky. But he was privately hopeful that the other side might not show up. They did. “I was extremely nervous throughout the whole thing. A lot of the terminology left me completely in the dark. I expected to lose.”

So how did the licensed attorney react when the pro se won?

“He reacted by seeking a new trial,” Coker says.

The tactics of Coker and his pro se colleagues might not be entirely wise and certainly aren’t endorsed by the courthouse professionals. But their efforts are held in lofty esteem by a Washington-based group known as HALT (Help Abolish Legal Tyranny). The non-profit group has more than 110,000 members nationwide and 12,000 in Texas, A recent “Dear Friend” letter from HALT, purportedly written by a licensed lawyer, offers would-be self-defendants a free series of “Citizens Legal Manuals” to help them thread their way through the legal jungle. HALT’s rhetoric is inflammatory: “As long as you are uninformed, lawyers have you at their mercy. They can tie you in knots, destroy your business or home, and make a shambles of your life.” Despite these blunt words, Richard Hebert, a HALT staff member, insists that the organization is “not anti-lawyer. It’s pro consumer.”

Hebert says that HALT lobbies for reforms to reduce the cost of the civil legal system, but the organization is also devoted to abetting the cause of the pro se. “Of course, the pro se situation is a mighty big waterfront;” Hebert says. “All evidence says that pro se is clearly becoming a trend. Unfortunately, most of the pro se litigants who get notoriety do so simply because they’re regarded as oddball cases. But for a pro se to win in major litigation, they have to overcome so many barriers. Therefore, they tend to be adamant, persistent, and finally, obsessed.”

Mary C. Harlan, a Dallas attorney, agrees that the pro se phenomenon is gathering some popularity. “Maybe the TV shows have been a factor in this. Suddenly the courtroom is not such a threatening place,” Harlan says. “I’ve heard of several instances where a pro se was quite capable and came out in pretty good shape. But the problem they face essentially is getting personally involved. I know because I’ve represented myself in a couple of small claims situations. It’s much more demanding than defending a client.”

Harlan says there is an “ego factor” at work in the pro se presentation. Feeling that personal integrity is on the line, the pro se may become angry, flustered, and ultimately less effective in the courtroom.

Pro ses are growing more common at the small claims level and in the family courts, where many litigate their own divorces and child support contempt problems. But the ranks of the pro se in the higher echelons of litigation are thin. “Beyond the County Court At Law level. I’d say the number of persons who formulate their own lawsuit and bring it in for filing will number about ten a year,” says Carolyn Graves of the Civil Section of the Dallas County Clerk’s Office.

Those few find that these courts are less lenient than at the Justice of the Peace and county level. In these ballparks the pro se can make one false procedural step and be thrown out of court. However, Dallas CPA Bob Hurt stands out as an exception.

In 1982, a court appointed Hurt to audit the financial records of the Humble Oil Exploration Company in a state receivership proceeding. Hurt later found himself being sued by the Humble co-founder, Pat Hollo-way, an oil man from Giddings, Texas, who also happens to be a graduate of Yale Law School. Holloway, who has become to Hurt what Dr. Moriarity was to Sherlock Holmes, alleged that the accountant entered into a conspiracy with the widow of Humble’s co-founder and her attorneys to bury him financially and otherwise.

When Holloway sued Bob Hurt, the accountant promptly walked down the hall to a law office-but he didn’t go to hire a lawyer. He wanted to visit the law library to begin studying rules of civil procedure because he knew from the outset that he intended to defend himself. “I resigned from an accounting firm in 1960 and have been in business for myself ever since. I work alone, and I want it that way,” Hurt says.

So far. Hurt is two for two in the courtroom, having prevailed in the original suit and won a subsequent appeal. Hurt’s capacity to recite dates, articles, issues, and sub-sections suggests, if nothing else, a photographic memory. As he explains the details of his case, a listener could assume that Hurt has been practicing law for forty years, but he has no such delusions.

“I couldn’t even come remotely close to passing the bar exam,” Hurt says. In hearings and in actual trials. Hurt always felt that he was creeping along a tightrope. “Some judges have been tough on me. They’ve chewed me up,” he says. “It’s difficult to go in and prevail. Judges have a tendency to side with men of stature,” he says, meaning attorneys who represent “name” law firms.

Hurt concedes that he “messed up on one of my original petitions because I approached the issues as an accountant and not as a lawyer. “Then, in court, as a pro se, I wanted to go straight to the facts,” Hurt says. “Meanwhile, the opposition attorney would imply that ’we don’t want to go to the facts right now. We’re lawyering.’

“And I’ve had to be extremely careful about maintaining my composure. That business about the man who represents himself having a fool for a client? Yes. I think that’s valid. But if I had it to do all over again, I would. I just wouldn’t want to do it many more times, though. I never had a firm grasp of all the rules of procedure.”

Hurt calculates that pro se operations have saved him thousands in legal fees, although the figure is hard to determine because of the lengthy distractions from his work. Hurt has several recommendations for the person who decides to carry his own banner into the courtroom:

“First read the rules of civil procedure, state and federal. That’s essential for self-preservation. Also, keep your pleadings very simple. If you enter the case because you have a quarrel with ’the system,’ then you’ll lose. The pro se person frequently comes into the court with some kind of ax to grind, gets lost in the proceeding, and ultimately defeats his own purpose. One other thing. Never, under any circumstances, make wild allegations.”

To anybody who sat in on any of the State vs. Betty Minyard Stein, it was evident from the outset that the attorney for the defendant had not read Bob Hurt’s Handy Tips For The Pro Se. Stein is the rarest of all the pro se species. She appeared in her own behalf in a felony trial.

Courthouse historians can’t remember the last person who attempted such a defense, but they won’t soon forget Stein and her self-defense on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon that resulted from the shooting of a Highland Park High School student last summer.

The bizarre events began to unfold the day of jury selection, when Stein first mentioned that the boy she allegedly shot, Ward Huey III, was on “God’s hit list.” In short order, prosecutor James Nelson, Judge Bill Moye, and a multitude of others would be included on Stein’s ominous roster of candidates for heavenly retribution. At one point, during one of the frequent recesses called for by Judge Moye, Nelson was heard muttering, “There’s gonna be a helluva lightning storm up here before this is over with.”

The lightning never struck, but there was plenty of thunder. During a bitter interchange while Nelson was cross-examining Stein, the assistant DA asked her why she was defending herself. “Why should I pay thousands and thousands of dollars to a lawyer to defend me on charges I’m not guilty of?” she shouted at Nelson. “I had a lawyer once in a civil matter. He was a Communist and stole my money. He’s deceased now. God got him.”

Betty Stein, by the way, was no courthouse rookie. She has filed innumerable civil suits against the Highland Park Independent School District and the City of University Park throughout the years. On more than one occasion, Stein has won, including a $137 judgment awarded by a jury in a suit she filed against the City of University Park for overcharging her on her water bill. This time, though, things were much more serious: Stein was staring into the jaws of a ten-year prison sentence.

At one point, Criminal District Judge Tom Price, a family friend, pleaded with her to resign as her own counsel. “Betty, this isn’t one of your home-cooked civil suits. This is serious. You could go to jail,” Price told her.

“I’m the one who’s been fighting this fight for thirty-three years,” Stein snapped back. “And I’m the only one who knows what happened the day I shot at that car. I know the facts better than any lawyer.”

Stein was not exactly helpless as a pro se defendant. At one point, James Nelson moved that testimony on the defendant’s behalf be limited to events of the July 24 shooting itself. Anything that happened in the thirty-two years prior to that was irrelevant, the prosecutor insisted.

Betty Stein was promptly on her feet to object. She launched into a frenzied litany of how she “lived, or rather existed, across from a bunch of little sadists who have thrown light bulbs at me, pointed R.O.T.C. rifles, called me vile and filthy names.” Judge Moye denied Nelson’s motion in what, from a legal standpoint, was Stein’s most significant triumph during the trial. A few hours later, however, after numerous warnings from the judge, Stein shouted that Nelson was “stupid” and, moments later, called him a “simple-minded thing.” Moye then sent the jury out of the courtroom and sentenced Betty Stein to seventy-two hours behind bars for contempt, to be served when the trial was over.

Stein also subpoenaed University Park police reports concerning an incident some three years ago when the windshields of about thirty cars were shot out. including hers. Stein called the UP police chief to the stand and demanded that he read the last names of all the complainants in the car-shooting incidents. “Objection.” said Nelson, who probably added two inches to his thighs from jumping up to complain. “That’s irrelevant.”

The judge sustained the objection, but Stein pressed on, “Aren’t all the names on that police report Jewish?” she said, ignoring the prosecutor and judge as usual, The police chief shrugged and said he wasn’t qualified to determine which names were Jewish and which weren’t. “I’m not Jewish, by the way,” Stein continued. “I’m Scotch-Irish-Dutch and right now, my Irish is up.”

Later. Stein attempted to develop her own “grassy-knoll theory,” insisting that she only aimed at the car and that Ward Huey’s wounds were caused by something or someone else. She implied that the wound was actually caused when he’d fallen on a ski pole. However, it took the jury only one hour to return their verdict: pro se defendant Betty Stein was guilty of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. The sentence included a $5,000 fine and a ten-year probated jail term.

After the trial, Nelson admitted that he had been anticipating some pyrotechnics as he prepared for Stein’s pro se defense. Still, he said that he prepared “about the same as I would for any normal case. Betty Stein is not alone when it comes to putting on some flamboyant shows in front of a jury. That’s been known to happen from licensed defense lawyers.” There was one major exception. Nelson said. Preparing strategy largely involves anticipating the moves of the defense team. “In the case of Mrs. Stein, it was impossible,” said Nelson. “You never knew what she was going to do next.”

So the curtain came down on one of those rare occasions when the courtroom becomes theater. It generally works that way when a pro se is at center stage.