A Tallahassee law student has written a book about a courtroom drama. The story is based on a real case.
David Glasser said his fascination with the law was sparked by a very real - and very personal - incident.
"What really catalyzed my interest for criminal law was that one of my classmates in my P.E. class actually committed a murder during my freshman year of high school."
Today, Glasser is a student at Florida State University's College of Law. Once again, a personal experience has motivated him. This time, to write a book.
"And this book was based on a trial that I witnessed as a first-year-going-into-second-year of law school summer law clerk. It was a criminal trial up here in North Florida. I'm a criminal defense firm clerk at Pumphrey Law here in Tallahassee. It resulted in the conviction of our client based on what I believe and what I think was pretty objectively scant to no evidence."
But could a savvy local reader figure out which real-life case Glasser is writing about?
"So I would think the facts of the case, at least in the first quarter of the book, which is where the case is primarily discussed, they're similar to where, if someone were in the courtroom and involved with the case, they could probably figure it out. If they were somebody who had no involvement with the case, I'm not sure they'd be able."
Regardless of the details in this particular case, Glasser said there is an overarching legal principle that he hopes his book communicates.
"The truth is that while certainly in some situations people are absolutely guilty, if you go into every situation assuming that, as Blackstone said,
'I'd rather let ten guilty men go free than one innocent go to prison.' But the reality is if you assume everybody is guilty going in and defense attorneys and defense arguments are just an impediment to getting the bad guy thrown into prison, that can have some disastrous consequences."
David Glasser's first literary excursion, "The Death of Justice," is now in print.
