And so is Pizza Law

I was just thinking about the gun forum where I caused a stink by saying I was able to do my job.

Someone I knew started a forum, and I joined because I thought he was a decent guy. At some point, gun laws were being discussed, and random people who didn’t know very much started trying to tell me I needed to consult an attorney in order to understand a federal firearms law. I told them I was an attorney, myself, and that I would not have any problems figuring things out.

You wouldn’t believe the storm of bile I brought down on myself, simply for saying I was able to do my job! It’s as if I worked at Firestone and caught hell on a forum for saying I could change a tire. I was egotistical. I was naive. Unbelievable nonsense, from people who had no idea what they were talking about. You don’t have to be a “gun attorney” to understand a gun law, but you do have to be an attorney in order to tell an attorney his business.

There is a well-known Florida attorney who specializes in firearms law. He wrote a book, and he has a website. If I recall correctly, they were pushing me to rely on him instead of my three years of postgraduate education. He seems to be doing Florida a great service, and he’s probably a fine lawyer, but I was no slouch, either, and–sorry to say it–firearms law is far from cerebral. The areas in which I practiced required more brains, not that I’m claiming they were cerebral, either. I don’t need this man’s help to read a statute.

Law is not that hard. If you have an IQ of 140, which is common, you can probably be a fine Supreme Court justice.

Lawyers hate reading things like that. They want people to think they’re brilliant. Your dentist is probably smarter than your lawyer.

Here’s another interesting fact: there is no Florida specialty called “firearms law.” The whole idea is a bit of a joke. You can’t go to the Florida Bar and get certified as a firearms lawyer, but you can be certified in recognized areas like elder law and aviation law. Here is a list of the certifications the Bar provides. You can bill yourself as a gun lawyer and do fine work related to gun laws, but it’s not a real specialty.

A “firearms lawyer” is really just a criminal attorney who deals with cases involving alleged violations of certain gun laws. No one goes into “firearms law” in order to do civil trials. Gun-related cases are about criminal charges. People represented by “firearms lawyers” are criminal defendants. If you’re a “gun attorney,” you should also be a qualified criminal attorney. You should be able to defend rapists and purse snatchers with complete competence before you branch out into “gun law.”

You can proclaim yourself a firearms lawyer and study the law on your own until you become a legitimate expert, but it’s still not a recognized specialty here. Also, even if you are a gun-law expert, you may not know much about guns.

I know a guy who was considered to be a firearms lawyer. The word “expert” was tossed around. He’s no longer an attorney, but he was promoted as a gun lawyer when he was active. This was a person who never spoke of hunting in my presence. I never heard of him competing in any shooting matches. A person who knew him quite well said she shot as well as he did when he took her on her first trip to the range. I don’t think he had a serious gun collection. The only gun I ever heard about was a carry pistol.

Was he really a gun-law expert? No idea. There is no exam. If you Google him, you will see him mentioned in connection with “firearms law.” People seem to have accepted him as an expert, without investigating.

Lay people can’t evaluate professionals. They take their claims at face value. When we say so-and-so is a good doctor, we mean he’s polite and not too expensive. When laymen say another guy is a good lawyer, they may mean he won an easy case for them or even that he must be good because they saw him on TV.

Do you know how Fox and CNN get their legal “experts”? It’s hilarious. You call the networks and say you’re willing to appear for nothing. Bang. You’re an expert. My sister was all over CNN and Fox for a time. She had a PR agent who hooked her up.

Call Fox and CNN today. Tell them you went to the Duke University School of Law, you work in Manhattan, you’re an expert in constitutional law, and you like being on TV. They will take you seriously at first, believe me. I’ll bet they won’t even check your background. I seriously doubt they called my sister’s former boss. They might have gotten an earful.

There is no way to prove the guy I knew was or was not an expert, without an extensive history of court opinions from cases in which he participated. There is no real training or oversight for “firearms lawyers,” unless there are a few ridiculous CLE courses out there. You can’t go to law school and “major” in gun law. There is no such thing as a postgraduate course for gun lawyers. Every person in Florida who claims to be a firearms lawyer is self-educated and self-anointed, and because there is no certification process, there is no easy way to know if they know anything.

I might become a “firearms lawyer.” I can sit here and read case law for a month. I’ll buy a couple of CLE’s. After that, I’ll know as much as anyone.

Lawyers love making up new legal fields. There is a glut of lawyers, and most lawyers are not very good, so it pays to have a niche and pretend you can do things other lawyers can’t.

Maybe I’ll make up a legal field. I want to be the first expert in pizza law. Did you burn the roof of your mouth at Chuck E. Cheese? I’m here to get you MO’ MONEY MO’ MONEY MO’ MONEY!

What I’m trying to say is that laymen shouldn’t get the idea that there is a big guild of highly trained gun lawyers out there, who have special skills other lawyers don’t have. A smart attorney–and I stress the word “smart”–can pick up any field of law with a certain amount of homework. Because gun law is part of criminal law, which is very simple as law goes, it should be particularly easy for people in other fields to get up to speed.

A dermatologist can’t walk into a hospital and do a lung transplant, because medicine is much harder than law, but any clever lawyer can look at a common statute about a simple subject, and the surrounding case law, and make an intelligent decision.

Here is my advice concerning gun lawyers: stay away from them. If a criminal lawyer can’t get business without advertising a dubious specialty, there may be something wrong with him. Hire the best criminal attorney you can afford.

Googling around, I see that gun lawyers are using “gun trusts” to scare people and drum up business. Something to do with “NFA devices.” This means guns and devices that have to be licensed by the BATF. I would stay away from such things. We raise hell when we have to do background checks, fearing that the FBI is making lists of our guns, and then some of us go ahead and file “NFA device” paperwork, INSURING that the feds keep records on us. I dunno ’bout that.

Of course, many of us tweet, Facebook, Instagram, and blog pictures of our guns every chance we get, so maybe there is no point in discussing privacy.

At least one website says gun trusts are a crock. Don’t ask me. I’m just a lowly litigator. Here is a link.

I’m billing all of you for this, and if you’ve read this far, you already owe me. Email me for Paypal information.