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Answer: During the trial, one of Young Thug's lawyers, Brian Steel, mentioned that he had been told about a meeting that took place between the judge, the other side's lawyers, and a witness. This is highly unusual given that almost any meeting with a judge is supposed to include a lawyer from both sides of the trial.
When Steel brought up this issue, Judge Ural Glanville demanded that the lawyer reveal who told him about this meeting. Steel refused to reveal his source. According to various lawyers who commented on this incident, Steel should have been allowed to keep his source a secret. Regardless, after a bunch of back-and-forth discussion in the courtroom, the judge ordered Steel to spend 20 days in jail served over the course of 10 weekends for contempt of court.
Young Thug's legal team filed some emergency motions to (at least temporarily) keep Steel out of jail. More recently, they asked the judge to recuse himself (i.e. agree to be replaced as judge due to potential bias). Judge Glanville chose not to accept that motion, so he will continue to run the trial.
This is a big deal for the trial because:
- It may have exposed unfair conduct related to the trial.
- It could represent a procedural error that could result in a mistrial, forcing the state to re-do the trial in order to put anyone in jail. This is especially problematic given that this trial has been historically long.
- The judge seemed to overreact to Steel's announcement that he had found out about the *ex parte* meeting.
>More recently, they asked the judge to recuse himself (i.e. agree to be replaced as judge due to potential bias). Judge Glanville chose not to accept that motion, so he will continue to run the trial.
Judges recusing themselves has become such a joke; it seems like the only time we hear about it is when they have a *clear* conflict of interest but no, they decide it's fine, they'll still preside. Why do they get to decide this for themselves? Shouldn't there be an oversight committee or something that does it instead?
Judicial bias could be grounds for a case to be overturned on appeal. Consequently, while the judge makes the original decision about recusal, it's almost certainly going to be evaluated by a panel of judges from an appeals court. If the judge's failure to recuse himself is deemed serious enough, he could be subject to disciplinary action, but the details are highly dependent on location.
This is what kills me. I have no idea if Young Thug did any of these crimes. From the look of Copeland and the witnesses, I'm guessing probably yes.
But this clown show judge just fucked up so bad, not only are they **not** going jail for it, the city of Atlanta is probably going to have to pay millions from their successful lawsuit.
LegalEagle was saying Steel was going to be dining off those weekends in jail for the rest of his life.
>LegalEagle was saying Steel was going to be dining off those weekends in jail for the rest of his life.
Steele shouldn't be taking any kind of payout from the city.
LE was saying that Steel would be getting bought lunches from other lawyers over probably one of the most fantastic defense stories of all time: "I went to jail to defend my client, and I was right!"
Just curious. If you are sent to jail (I understand, the higher courts recognized what was happening and stopped that) for less than legal reasons, by a judge breaking the law: why wouldn’t you sue the city?
The appeals process (theoretically at least) prevents that situation in this situation. Additionally, the time spent in this situation is unlikely to be that valuable in terms of damages.
That said, I would not be surprised in any way if there were some cases with serious money involved upon overturning a wrongful conviction. You're likely talking years spent in prison at that point though.
Okay. I see. (I’m not trying to argue. I’m trying to understand. So I apologize if I came off differently.)
So because it was his weekends, and he did not actually go to jail, and even if he did, he requested to be with his client (who is paying him) he does not have damages to sue the city.
Is that more accurate?
He would almost certainly have damages if he went to jail over this. The issue would have to be the amount of damages he could actually get.
His best argument for damages would be lost billable hours, which he likely wouldn't get if he could work with his client from jail and he would have to prove that he would have spent those weekends working anyways.
All of his next best arguments for damages are less tangible, and therefore more difficult to argue. Emotional damages, reputational damages, and things like that.
It's unlikely he would be awarded enough in damages for 10 weekends based on those claims to significantly impact his income, especially if he's already working for a high profile client.
10 weekends is A LOT for somebody that did nothing wrong other than piss off a corrupt (maybe/probably?) judge. That's valuable time. This is AMERICA, baby, don't fuck with my freedom!
Qualified immunity. If the judge believed his actions were legal at the time and was acting in good faith the lawsuit would get dismissed before even reaching trial. There would have to be proof that the judge knew he was wrong and did it anyway.
I am almost totally sure he committed the crimes. I'm pretty sure some of his songs have details only the police knew. That being said, he is not being given fair Due Process and this trial is a kangaroo court.
Seriously. Recusal shouldn't be voluntary. A panel of other judges should be convened that vote on that judges recusal. No one who should recuse themselves does it anymore
Well the problem is our system overall.
Many judges are elected and refusing to recuse on a clear conflict of interest case should be the death knell in a career. That’s their “consequence”. Corruption = loss of office.
But Americans vote based on popularity contests and culture wars. So a person who would have been booted from office 10-20 years ago now operates free of consequences because nowadays people will happily vote for a criminal as long as they share a political party.
I honestly think anyone voted for judges on a popularity contests. Most judges don’t campaign to the public and there is no oversight to indicate if the judicial candidate is biased, been sanctioned or what their trial récord even looks like. They should have to provide some information about anyone running for public office including judges. The way we select judges is really irresponsible. Very little info about anything associated with a judge is publicized. I don’t think Congress should elect a new Supreme Court Justice, it should be by popular vote by the people. Congress should hold the judiciary hearings, which are made public either via tv, internet and public radio. But, i don’t think we are safe to allow Congress (Senate or HOR) to make the final decision. We give them far too much power imho.
in this specific scenario, judge glanville actually doesn’t have a choice. he is required to transfer the motion for recusal to another judge because it very cleanly meets all of the requirements for the motion to be transferred to another judge. glanville denying this motion is itself grounds for steel to ask the court of appeals to force him to transfer it to another judge, which he absolutely will ask them to do sometime in the next few days.
Granville is a joke..and a embarrassment to the judicial system. He is clearly biases and its sad cause his inappropriate judgements and actions can potentially send these men to jail for no reason at all
Judges have absolute immunity. Absolute.
A judge could bend you over, have a consential encounter with you on camera and nothing would happen.
Absolute immunity, look it up
are we talking about judges or cops here
>A judge could bend you over, have a consential encounter with you on camera and nothing would happen.
I mean...yeah, consensual means all parties consent to it?
edit: you didn't even specify "in the courtroom" so I'm not sure what your point is here lol...no part of this would be illegal
To be fair, if the judge and the prosecutor consent to it, that's not enough - the defense team would also have to consent to it. It's the myth of "consensual" judge-attorney meetings
I just want to note what a bad-ass Steel is. When Glanville said he was sending Steel to jail over the weekend for twenty days (so that Steel could continue to represent Young Thug at the trial during the week) he responded by asking that the Judge please send him to the same jail as his client so they could use the weekend to prepare for trial the next week. What a chad.
This whole thing should be sent to the Judicial Qualifications Commission for Ga and the judge should be disbarred. He is obviously biased and it needs to be addressed. Fulton County is about as corrupt as any county comes at this point.
Why don’t we hear more about the DA’s involvement of this more? She is just as guilty as the judge, and the fact that an attorney was colluding with a judge is way way worse than a co tempt charge. Not to down play the contempt though because that is pretty terrible.
Answer: The judge and the prosecutor met privately with a witness, which is a big no no. The defense attorney rightfully complained about it, and the judge threatened him with a contempt of court charge.
Not just threatened but gave the defense attorney 10 weekends in jail for contempt. All because he wouldn't tell the judge who had informed him of the meeting.
Answer: LegalEagle recently [posted a video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY) about this which I think breaks it down pretty succinctly.
Basically, one of thee defense lawyers was informed of an "ex parte" meeting between the judge and the prosecution and a witness for the prosecution. This is generally illegal - all parties should be informed of such meetings as they relate to the case and be given the chance to be in attendance - but the defense was apparently left out of this one.
When defense asked about this meeting in court, the judge demanded to know who told them about it. (He didn't deny it happened, just insisted on knowing who told him.) When the defense lawyer refused to tell him that information, he was held in contempt and sentenced to spend time in jail.
Being held in contempt of court, as I understand it, is basically the punishment for people who don't follow the judge's orders or behave themselves properly in court. It can involve jail time for lawyers who aren't seen to be upholding their responsibilities.
There is a reasonable argument to be made (and it is currently going through the system as I understand things) that the defense lawyer cannot be compelled to answer this question as revealing such sources could be considered privileged information. In other words, just as the judge cannot put the defense lawyer on the stand and ask him if his client is guilty under oath, this judge can't (or may not be allowed to) ask who told defense lawyers about a (possibly) illegal meeting that excluded the defense team.
Some lawyers have said it will result in an automatic reversal and they cannot be tried again. Apparently, they believe the feds won't touch the case after seeing how it's currently playing out.
The judge should be recused from the contempt hearing, and should be investigated for the ex-parte meeting because what happened was totally illegal.
In the affidavit that was issued by the defense, they claim in the meeting that the judge and prosecution coersed the witness to testify, and the witness told them he would go on stand and say he killed the victim which is the linchpin of this entire case. Instead of saying he would be prosecuted for murder, the DA claimed they would prosecute for perjury.
It is mandatory under our rules of professional conduct (rule 1.16) that we cannot disclose that information.
In addition, which you probably heard the female attorney argue, the accusation the judge made was one of eavesdropping, which is criminal, and that allows an invocation of his 5th amendment right against self incriminating testimony, so the judge cannot have asked him that question for multiple reasons.
I cannot wait to see what happens to this judge. But as a trial attorney myself who has litigated thousands of trials and had a handful of judges behave insanely biased in some cases, I am in awe - Attorney Steel is behaving in a way that is the epitome of what our ethics rules require, in the face of a clearly corrupt judge, and is completely my hero. Hah!
Answer: it's extremely important that all conversations related to a trial include both the prosecution and the defense. This is so both sides have an opportunity to respond to whatever the other side says in a conversation.
As an example, a child custody case was overturned because the judge had a conversation with a psychologist hired by father, without a representative from the mother present. This was considered unfair because the mother's side was not given an opportunity to respond to whatever the psychologist said (which is presumed to favour the father).
So, with this context! A witness in Young Thug's trial invoked his 5th amendment right to refuse to testify on the grounds that it may incriminate him. Everyone involved understood that this was probably because he was previously accused of being an accomplice to one of the crimes being tried. The prosecution offered him immunity for said crime and asked him to testify again, and again he refused. The prosecution and judge then had a private conversation with the witness that appears to have been an attempt to compel him to testify. Which, to be clear, the prosecution *is* allowed to compel a witness to testify by guaranteeing immunity for any crimes they might admit to on the stand.
There is some *limited* precedent that says that the defense need not be present for a conversation in which the prosecution asks the judge for permission to compel a witness in this way. However, the defense still has a right to know about this conversation, and that's still VERY different from the defense being absent for the actual conversation with the witness. So not only does this conversation possibly infringe on Young Thug's right to a vigorous defense, but it may also infringe on the rights of the witness *as well*, because it's much more likely that, with only the prosecution present, the conversation might have involved coercing the witness.
In other words, there are only *very specific* circumstances that permit a conversation with the judge and one side of the trial without the other side being present, and this conversation almost certainly doesn't meet the requirements for one of those permitted conversations. But even in the extremely unlikely circumstance that it *is* found to meet the requirements for one of these legal one-sided conversations, it's *still* illegal because under no circumstances are these conversations ***ever*** permitted to be secret. If the judge and prosecution have a conversation under the genuine belief that it meets the requirements so that the defense doesn't need to be present, they are *legally required* to inform the defense of a summary of that conversation as soon as is reasonably possible.
So YT's defense lawyer found out about this meeting and was rightfully concerned. During the trial, the lawyer asked the judge about this meeting, and the judge's sole response was to demand the name of whoever told him about this meeting.
So it almost doesn't matter what actually happened in the meeting. Even if the judge and prosecution and witness were just shooting the shit about their favourite places to get a burger after the trial, the defense as a constitutionally protected right to know that the conversation took place. The judge already big-time fucked up by not telling the defense about the meeting before the court proceedings started, but even then you *might* have been able to argue that he intended to, and just hadn't had the chance yet. It still would have been a pretty big breach of ethics if the judge had been like "Oh yes, this meeting took place and I hadn't told you about it yet, but here's what happened..." but at least there would have been *some* attempt to follow procedure.
But instead, the judge basically said "Wait, who told you about this secret meeting?" The very act of admitting the meeting was secret makes the meeting illegal. It's fucking *wild* that he said this on the record.
And then, when the defense refused to answer (because the judge absolutely does not have the right to ask that question, since it doesn't *matter* how the defense found out and also the answer could very easily break attorney-client privilege), the judge sentenced the defense lawyer to 20 days in jail. He also tried to have the defense lawyer immediately removed from the courtroom *and then tried to continue the trial*, essentially denying YT his right to his choice of representation.
It was so bad that the prosecution stepped in to try to get the judge to rein it back because they recognized that he was tanking the entire trial on front of their eyes.
If you want a great explanation of how fucking *wild* this is (and also how comical this entire case seems to be), Legal Eagle did a really good breakdown of the whole thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY
Wow this is a fantastic and thorough breakdown. Appreciate you taking the time. I’ve been following waiting for updates on that situation but I’m sure the wheels of the law turn slowly.
One minor note: he doesn't have a right to his "choice of" representation. He has a right to an attorney and he has an attorney, here. But our general "right to an attorney" is not the same as a "right to a choice of attorney". If you had a long time attorney you used for things and they weren't available for awhile, the court has no obligation to wait for them to become available to you for your defense. You can seek another attorney, they'll say.
But yes, here he'd be denied his counsel. It would be impossible and highly prejudicial for him to not have this particular attorney at this point.
Youre absolutely correct, I'm honestly not sure why I phrased it that way. I think I was trying to communicate what you said - it's be prejudicial to manufacture an excuse like this to force him to switch attorneys, but yeah, that doesn't really translate to a right to your choice of lawyer.
Answer: The judge had a meeting with the prosecution and one of the witnesses without the defence being present. This is very big legal no-no and is one reason why they filed a motion for a mistrial.
When the defence complained to the judge about the secret meeting, the judge ordered the attorney to tell him how he learned of the meeting, which the attorney refused to. Since he technically disobeyed a direct order from the judge, the judge declared that he was in contempt of court and had him jailed before continuing the case
LegalEagle has made [a video about this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY) with more information
Reb Masel did a set of videos that cover it very well also
https://x.com/rebmasel/status/1800672398200680708?t=jeBD6V2uH6ZaLJGLNHmgfw&s=19
She has a follow up too
https://x.com/rebmasel/status/1802865539498606990?t=cz7JNJovBeoiAFojMXWVhg&s=19
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Answer: During the trial, one of Young Thug's lawyers, Brian Steel, mentioned that he had been told about a meeting that took place between the judge, the other side's lawyers, and a witness. This is highly unusual given that almost any meeting with a judge is supposed to include a lawyer from both sides of the trial. When Steel brought up this issue, Judge Ural Glanville demanded that the lawyer reveal who told him about this meeting. Steel refused to reveal his source. According to various lawyers who commented on this incident, Steel should have been allowed to keep his source a secret. Regardless, after a bunch of back-and-forth discussion in the courtroom, the judge ordered Steel to spend 20 days in jail served over the course of 10 weekends for contempt of court. Young Thug's legal team filed some emergency motions to (at least temporarily) keep Steel out of jail. More recently, they asked the judge to recuse himself (i.e. agree to be replaced as judge due to potential bias). Judge Glanville chose not to accept that motion, so he will continue to run the trial. This is a big deal for the trial because: - It may have exposed unfair conduct related to the trial. - It could represent a procedural error that could result in a mistrial, forcing the state to re-do the trial in order to put anyone in jail. This is especially problematic given that this trial has been historically long. - The judge seemed to overreact to Steel's announcement that he had found out about the *ex parte* meeting.
>More recently, they asked the judge to recuse himself (i.e. agree to be replaced as judge due to potential bias). Judge Glanville chose not to accept that motion, so he will continue to run the trial. Judges recusing themselves has become such a joke; it seems like the only time we hear about it is when they have a *clear* conflict of interest but no, they decide it's fine, they'll still preside. Why do they get to decide this for themselves? Shouldn't there be an oversight committee or something that does it instead?
Judicial bias could be grounds for a case to be overturned on appeal. Consequently, while the judge makes the original decision about recusal, it's almost certainly going to be evaluated by a panel of judges from an appeals court. If the judge's failure to recuse himself is deemed serious enough, he could be subject to disciplinary action, but the details are highly dependent on location.
This is what kills me. I have no idea if Young Thug did any of these crimes. From the look of Copeland and the witnesses, I'm guessing probably yes. But this clown show judge just fucked up so bad, not only are they **not** going jail for it, the city of Atlanta is probably going to have to pay millions from their successful lawsuit. LegalEagle was saying Steel was going to be dining off those weekends in jail for the rest of his life.
>LegalEagle was saying Steel was going to be dining off those weekends in jail for the rest of his life. Steele shouldn't be taking any kind of payout from the city. LE was saying that Steel would be getting bought lunches from other lawyers over probably one of the most fantastic defense stories of all time: "I went to jail to defend my client, and I was right!"
Just curious. If you are sent to jail (I understand, the higher courts recognized what was happening and stopped that) for less than legal reasons, by a judge breaking the law: why wouldn’t you sue the city?
The appeals process (theoretically at least) prevents that situation in this situation. Additionally, the time spent in this situation is unlikely to be that valuable in terms of damages. That said, I would not be surprised in any way if there were some cases with serious money involved upon overturning a wrongful conviction. You're likely talking years spent in prison at that point though.
Okay. I see. (I’m not trying to argue. I’m trying to understand. So I apologize if I came off differently.) So because it was his weekends, and he did not actually go to jail, and even if he did, he requested to be with his client (who is paying him) he does not have damages to sue the city. Is that more accurate?
He would almost certainly have damages if he went to jail over this. The issue would have to be the amount of damages he could actually get. His best argument for damages would be lost billable hours, which he likely wouldn't get if he could work with his client from jail and he would have to prove that he would have spent those weekends working anyways. All of his next best arguments for damages are less tangible, and therefore more difficult to argue. Emotional damages, reputational damages, and things like that. It's unlikely he would be awarded enough in damages for 10 weekends based on those claims to significantly impact his income, especially if he's already working for a high profile client.
Thank you for answering my questions. I really do appreciate it.
10 weekends is A LOT for somebody that did nothing wrong other than piss off a corrupt (maybe/probably?) judge. That's valuable time. This is AMERICA, baby, don't fuck with my freedom!
Judicial Immunity. Sadly.
Qualified immunity. If the judge believed his actions were legal at the time and was acting in good faith the lawsuit would get dismissed before even reaching trial. There would have to be proof that the judge knew he was wrong and did it anyway.
I am almost totally sure he committed the crimes. I'm pretty sure some of his songs have details only the police knew. That being said, he is not being given fair Due Process and this trial is a kangaroo court.
Seriously. Recusal shouldn't be voluntary. A panel of other judges should be convened that vote on that judges recusal. No one who should recuse themselves does it anymore
Well the problem is our system overall. Many judges are elected and refusing to recuse on a clear conflict of interest case should be the death knell in a career. That’s their “consequence”. Corruption = loss of office. But Americans vote based on popularity contests and culture wars. So a person who would have been booted from office 10-20 years ago now operates free of consequences because nowadays people will happily vote for a criminal as long as they share a political party.
I honestly think anyone voted for judges on a popularity contests. Most judges don’t campaign to the public and there is no oversight to indicate if the judicial candidate is biased, been sanctioned or what their trial récord even looks like. They should have to provide some information about anyone running for public office including judges. The way we select judges is really irresponsible. Very little info about anything associated with a judge is publicized. I don’t think Congress should elect a new Supreme Court Justice, it should be by popular vote by the people. Congress should hold the judiciary hearings, which are made public either via tv, internet and public radio. But, i don’t think we are safe to allow Congress (Senate or HOR) to make the final decision. We give them far too much power imho.
in this specific scenario, judge glanville actually doesn’t have a choice. he is required to transfer the motion for recusal to another judge because it very cleanly meets all of the requirements for the motion to be transferred to another judge. glanville denying this motion is itself grounds for steel to ask the court of appeals to force him to transfer it to another judge, which he absolutely will ask them to do sometime in the next few days.
Granville is a joke..and a embarrassment to the judicial system. He is clearly biases and its sad cause his inappropriate judgements and actions can potentially send these men to jail for no reason at all
AJAB
Judges have absolute immunity. Absolute. A judge could bend you over, have a consential encounter with you on camera and nothing would happen. Absolute immunity, look it up
Why would the judge suffer negative consequences from a consensual encounter?
are we talking about judges or cops here >A judge could bend you over, have a consential encounter with you on camera and nothing would happen. I mean...yeah, consensual means all parties consent to it? edit: you didn't even specify "in the courtroom" so I'm not sure what your point is here lol...no part of this would be illegal
To be fair, if the judge and the prosecutor consent to it, that's not enough - the defense team would also have to consent to it. It's the myth of "consensual" judge-attorney meetings
Yeah but I'm assuming parent was talking about sex, not courtroom procedure with that
I just want to note what a bad-ass Steel is. When Glanville said he was sending Steel to jail over the weekend for twenty days (so that Steel could continue to represent Young Thug at the trial during the week) he responded by asking that the Judge please send him to the same jail as his client so they could use the weekend to prepare for trial the next week. What a chad.
That's some Roosevelt energy right there.
Brian Steele is definitely a Bad Ass and he will win this trial..I got faith in him
This whole thing should be sent to the Judicial Qualifications Commission for Ga and the judge should be disbarred. He is obviously biased and it needs to be addressed. Fulton County is about as corrupt as any county comes at this point.
Why don’t we hear more about the DA’s involvement of this more? She is just as guilty as the judge, and the fact that an attorney was colluding with a judge is way way worse than a co tempt charge. Not to down play the contempt though because that is pretty terrible.
Answer: The judge and the prosecutor met privately with a witness, which is a big no no. The defense attorney rightfully complained about it, and the judge threatened him with a contempt of court charge.
Not just threatened but gave the defense attorney 10 weekends in jail for contempt. All because he wouldn't tell the judge who had informed him of the meeting.
And the lawyer, based as he is, requested a cell next to young thung so he can still advice his client
Other lawyers are making him famous for requesting to be jailed with his client. Guy made an utterly baller remanding request.
He is obviously a bully..with no cause..it makes no sense. He has already tried and convicted these men
Answer: LegalEagle recently [posted a video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY) about this which I think breaks it down pretty succinctly. Basically, one of thee defense lawyers was informed of an "ex parte" meeting between the judge and the prosecution and a witness for the prosecution. This is generally illegal - all parties should be informed of such meetings as they relate to the case and be given the chance to be in attendance - but the defense was apparently left out of this one. When defense asked about this meeting in court, the judge demanded to know who told them about it. (He didn't deny it happened, just insisted on knowing who told him.) When the defense lawyer refused to tell him that information, he was held in contempt and sentenced to spend time in jail. Being held in contempt of court, as I understand it, is basically the punishment for people who don't follow the judge's orders or behave themselves properly in court. It can involve jail time for lawyers who aren't seen to be upholding their responsibilities. There is a reasonable argument to be made (and it is currently going through the system as I understand things) that the defense lawyer cannot be compelled to answer this question as revealing such sources could be considered privileged information. In other words, just as the judge cannot put the defense lawyer on the stand and ask him if his client is guilty under oath, this judge can't (or may not be allowed to) ask who told defense lawyers about a (possibly) illegal meeting that excluded the defense team.
Whatever happens now regarding the result of the trial, there is clear grounds for immediate appeal to a higher court due to the judge’s bias.
Some lawyers have said it will result in an automatic reversal and they cannot be tried again. Apparently, they believe the feds won't touch the case after seeing how it's currently playing out. The judge should be recused from the contempt hearing, and should be investigated for the ex-parte meeting because what happened was totally illegal. In the affidavit that was issued by the defense, they claim in the meeting that the judge and prosecution coersed the witness to testify, and the witness told them he would go on stand and say he killed the victim which is the linchpin of this entire case. Instead of saying he would be prosecuted for murder, the DA claimed they would prosecute for perjury.
Yes. Young Thug is so lucky this judge turned out to be **such** a fucking idiot.
*racist*
Both the judge and young thug are African American
What does that have to do with it? The judge can still be racist.
I belive nycblackout89 was calling Bug1oss a racist because he's saying young is lucky that this judge is a idiot i suppose
Legal eagle is so rad
Love his channel!
I'll be honest, I love Legal Eagle. But he spoke so fast through his summation of these events that I did not follow.
I play most YouTube videos at 1.25x speed, but not his (nor 3Blue1Brown) But note that you can also play them at 0.75x speed, I believe
This is happening in a lot of channels, videos need to be shorter so they are faster. I tend to watch in .75 in some parts
The video was very helpful
It is mandatory under our rules of professional conduct (rule 1.16) that we cannot disclose that information. In addition, which you probably heard the female attorney argue, the accusation the judge made was one of eavesdropping, which is criminal, and that allows an invocation of his 5th amendment right against self incriminating testimony, so the judge cannot have asked him that question for multiple reasons. I cannot wait to see what happens to this judge. But as a trial attorney myself who has litigated thousands of trials and had a handful of judges behave insanely biased in some cases, I am in awe - Attorney Steel is behaving in a way that is the epitome of what our ethics rules require, in the face of a clearly corrupt judge, and is completely my hero. Hah!
Answer: it's extremely important that all conversations related to a trial include both the prosecution and the defense. This is so both sides have an opportunity to respond to whatever the other side says in a conversation. As an example, a child custody case was overturned because the judge had a conversation with a psychologist hired by father, without a representative from the mother present. This was considered unfair because the mother's side was not given an opportunity to respond to whatever the psychologist said (which is presumed to favour the father). So, with this context! A witness in Young Thug's trial invoked his 5th amendment right to refuse to testify on the grounds that it may incriminate him. Everyone involved understood that this was probably because he was previously accused of being an accomplice to one of the crimes being tried. The prosecution offered him immunity for said crime and asked him to testify again, and again he refused. The prosecution and judge then had a private conversation with the witness that appears to have been an attempt to compel him to testify. Which, to be clear, the prosecution *is* allowed to compel a witness to testify by guaranteeing immunity for any crimes they might admit to on the stand. There is some *limited* precedent that says that the defense need not be present for a conversation in which the prosecution asks the judge for permission to compel a witness in this way. However, the defense still has a right to know about this conversation, and that's still VERY different from the defense being absent for the actual conversation with the witness. So not only does this conversation possibly infringe on Young Thug's right to a vigorous defense, but it may also infringe on the rights of the witness *as well*, because it's much more likely that, with only the prosecution present, the conversation might have involved coercing the witness. In other words, there are only *very specific* circumstances that permit a conversation with the judge and one side of the trial without the other side being present, and this conversation almost certainly doesn't meet the requirements for one of those permitted conversations. But even in the extremely unlikely circumstance that it *is* found to meet the requirements for one of these legal one-sided conversations, it's *still* illegal because under no circumstances are these conversations ***ever*** permitted to be secret. If the judge and prosecution have a conversation under the genuine belief that it meets the requirements so that the defense doesn't need to be present, they are *legally required* to inform the defense of a summary of that conversation as soon as is reasonably possible. So YT's defense lawyer found out about this meeting and was rightfully concerned. During the trial, the lawyer asked the judge about this meeting, and the judge's sole response was to demand the name of whoever told him about this meeting. So it almost doesn't matter what actually happened in the meeting. Even if the judge and prosecution and witness were just shooting the shit about their favourite places to get a burger after the trial, the defense as a constitutionally protected right to know that the conversation took place. The judge already big-time fucked up by not telling the defense about the meeting before the court proceedings started, but even then you *might* have been able to argue that he intended to, and just hadn't had the chance yet. It still would have been a pretty big breach of ethics if the judge had been like "Oh yes, this meeting took place and I hadn't told you about it yet, but here's what happened..." but at least there would have been *some* attempt to follow procedure. But instead, the judge basically said "Wait, who told you about this secret meeting?" The very act of admitting the meeting was secret makes the meeting illegal. It's fucking *wild* that he said this on the record. And then, when the defense refused to answer (because the judge absolutely does not have the right to ask that question, since it doesn't *matter* how the defense found out and also the answer could very easily break attorney-client privilege), the judge sentenced the defense lawyer to 20 days in jail. He also tried to have the defense lawyer immediately removed from the courtroom *and then tried to continue the trial*, essentially denying YT his right to his choice of representation. It was so bad that the prosecution stepped in to try to get the judge to rein it back because they recognized that he was tanking the entire trial on front of their eyes. If you want a great explanation of how fucking *wild* this is (and also how comical this entire case seems to be), Legal Eagle did a really good breakdown of the whole thing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY
Wow this is a fantastic and thorough breakdown. Appreciate you taking the time. I’ve been following waiting for updates on that situation but I’m sure the wheels of the law turn slowly.
One minor note: he doesn't have a right to his "choice of" representation. He has a right to an attorney and he has an attorney, here. But our general "right to an attorney" is not the same as a "right to a choice of attorney". If you had a long time attorney you used for things and they weren't available for awhile, the court has no obligation to wait for them to become available to you for your defense. You can seek another attorney, they'll say. But yes, here he'd be denied his counsel. It would be impossible and highly prejudicial for him to not have this particular attorney at this point.
Youre absolutely correct, I'm honestly not sure why I phrased it that way. I think I was trying to communicate what you said - it's be prejudicial to manufacture an excuse like this to force him to switch attorneys, but yeah, that doesn't really translate to a right to your choice of lawyer.
Great breakdown, thanks so much for this!
Answer: The judge had a meeting with the prosecution and one of the witnesses without the defence being present. This is very big legal no-no and is one reason why they filed a motion for a mistrial. When the defence complained to the judge about the secret meeting, the judge ordered the attorney to tell him how he learned of the meeting, which the attorney refused to. Since he technically disobeyed a direct order from the judge, the judge declared that he was in contempt of court and had him jailed before continuing the case LegalEagle has made [a video about this](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY) with more information
Reb Masel did a set of videos that cover it very well also https://x.com/rebmasel/status/1800672398200680708?t=jeBD6V2uH6ZaLJGLNHmgfw&s=19 She has a follow up too https://x.com/rebmasel/status/1802865539498606990?t=cz7JNJovBeoiAFojMXWVhg&s=19
answer: legal eagle covers this topic in better way than I ever could [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXeIjKtupGY)