Category: Newsletter

In News of the World by Paulette Jiles, Civil War Veteran Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd makes a living traveling around Texas reading newspapers to people who pay an admission fee of ten cents. Apparently, news was scarce in the years following the Civil War. I suspect the literacy rate increased Captain Kidd’s market too. The book is…

Some people do not understand modern methods of communicating and connecting. Emojis are the little images young and old alike include with their texts. Microsoft is updating its emojis this year just as people start to understand what the old ones mean. Acronyms like “idk,”  “ikr,” and “lmao” may be obvious to us, but other people need explanations. Some recipients have to text their children…

Brandon Stanton worked as a bond trader in Chicago in 2010. He bought a camera and started taking photos in downtown Chicago on weekends. When Mr. Stanton lost his job, he moved to New York City with a plan to photograph 10,000 New Yorkers and plot their portraits on a map of the city. These photographs led to discussions…

Sallie Krawcheck has been a fixture and powerful force on Wall Street for decades. Today, she is the chair of the Ellevate Network, a global professional women’s network, and CEO and co-founder of Ellevest, a “digital-first, mission-driven investment platform for women.” Among her objectives is the goal of elevating women by helping them build financial…

Do you remember Imelda Marcos? She does not get a lot of press in the United States these days, but is still alive. She was making headlines in the Philippines just last year. Marcos and her husband, Ferdinand, ruled the Philippines for twenty-one years.  According to some reports, the couple was responsible for imprisoning, torturing, and killing thousands of…

We are bumping into our friends at the courthouse again. Despite the quiet and distance of the last fifteen months, our friends have not changed much. A lawyer friend of nearly thirty years stopped to chat on the courthouse steps yesterday. He was headed to another county. I was due in court. But, we had not…

You may recognize this person. If she isn’t a close friend or family member, you know someone with a similar personality. She doesn’t tolerate fools. Although she is not completely humorless, she usually has better things to do than engage in light-hearted conversation. Her mind is sharp and her use of the English language exacting,…

My friend was a long-time public defender before he retired. Over four decades of public defense, he accumulated a lot of wisdom, which usually takes the form of self-deprecating, humorous, and instructive stories. One such story comes to mind. Years ago, my friend represented a client in a two-person conspiracy. The other person’s family had…

A lawyer down the street was ahead of the times in what came to be known as the “Me Too” movement. He developed a favorable reputation during the 80s and 90s representing children and (mostly) women in civil cases against the people who physically or sexually abused his clients. He remains passionate about the cause….

The newspaper options in New Bern in the 1970s were The “Raleigh” News and Observer and The Sun Journal. My parents took both papers. The papers included the baseball box scores and, between the two of them, all the local and national sports coverage we could imagine. Walking up the driveway to collect the paper every morning or afternoon was part…

Superior Court Judge J.B. Allen was a rather large man with a big personality. He had white hair, a booming voice, and a no-nonsense approach to the most mundane issue. Some say he was a bit of a bully. I tried my first serious case before Judge Allen. My client was accused of attempted murder…

My friend stayed single longer than the rest of our peer group. Not that he didn’t have options. Arguably, his delay can be attributed to the fact that my friend was more handsome. Women really liked him and settling down can be a challenge for a young man with his qualities. After college, my friend…

It has been a difficult week calling for difficult decisions. We started watching The Queen’s Gambit, which one review in The New Yorker called the “most satisfying show on television.” It is pretty compelling. But just as we immerse ourselves in Beth Harmon’s journey, season four of The Crown is released. It violates binge watching protocol to leave one show and…

Chapel Hill is a bit of an island in our state. Commonly accepted views here may not be so commonly accepted in other parts of the state. In fact, I am pretty confident that some of the commonly accepted views in my home of over thirty-five years have not made it to New Bern, my…

A mentor of sorts told me the story of his relationship with his brother. They were close in age and fierce rivals while growing up. They competed at everything. They were not violent, but argued every point. Neither gave ground to the other in making their cases. It continued throughout their childhoods until my mentor…

Richard Riggsbee was a lawyer in Durham, and a character. For many years, he practiced with Bill Cotter, who is still a character. Bill is from Boston, a Vietnam Veteran, and a graduate of Duke Law School. Richard was from Hillsborough, a graduate of Hillsborough High School, and a former assistant clerk of court. In…

My friend Steve Freedman is a wonderful lawyer. For more than forty years, he worked as a public defender. Steve retired recently from working as an assistant capital defender in North Carolina. As a young lawyer, Steve was assigned a felony marijuana case. His client was a well-dressed, nice looking young man. Like most people,…

About twenty years ago, a local Sheriff’s department intercepted a large load of marijuana. Originally, the Sheriff’s deputies got great publicity for their good work: photos before bales of marijuana and reports of the street value redirected. Eventually, everyone wondered what would happen to the marijuana. Well, about 4000 pounds went missing from an Army…