In this episode, Vicky and Khalil Madani (class of ‘14) open their case files on mock trial competitions, prison phone recordings, and on-campus gardening. Plus: what happens when a Stetson graduate walks into a courtroom.
Transcript:
Speaker 1 (00:01.614)
When you start law school, you gotta hit the ground running. And that's something that I wish I would have known as a first year is I should have listened to all of the information coming in. And I just tried to like do my best. And sometimes you gotta work smart. You know, that saying is work smart, don't work hard. That's something that I wish I would have implemented earlier on in law school.
I wish I had known my wife's number on day one.
This is Real Cases, a legal podcast presented by the Stetson University College of Law. We'll sit down with Stetson Law faculty and students to examine today's critical cases and debates in environmental, international, elder, and business law, plus the role of social justice in these fields. Join us as we open the case file.
I'm Dustin Britt, Master of Arts in Education from East Carolina University. My guests are Vicki and Khalil Madani, who both received their JD from Stetson Law in 2014. Today, Vicki Madani is a litigator and partner at the Miami-based Schutz and Bowen law firm. She's been named a Florida Super Lawyers Rising Star for the past three years and was published in the Law Review. Khalil Madani specializes in criminal law. He began his career as Assistant State Attorney at the 12th Judicial Circuit and is now a felony division chief at the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office. Vicki and Kalia live in Florida with their two young children.
Speaker 3 (01:35.342)
So thanks Vicki and Khalil for being here and chatting with me today. So you were both Stetson class of 2014. I'm assuming you walked across the stage together, at least proverbially if not literally minutes apart but we definitely both crossed the same stage.
Nice. So I want to start by asking you, Vicki, I believe you started studying accounting. How did you end up getting into law?
So I was an undergraduate student during the Great Recession. I actually started studying finance and I had an internship lined up with Lehman Brothers before they declared bankruptcy. That really scared me and I wanted to have job security in the event that I did not get into law school. So I went with a very safe business career path in accounting, which always has jobs in demand. And I assumed that that way I would have a back.
plan in the event that I did not get into law school. Actually, on my first day of my internship with the Big Four accounting firm, I had to leave early to go take the LSAT. So I had to be very open with them about what my plans were. And by the end of the summer, I knew I was going to law school with my LSAT score. So it's kind of a done deal. And I never dipped my toe back in the accounting world after that.
Speaker 3 (03:01.25)
So Khalil, you were studying poli sci, right? Was law in the future at all?
yeah. Yeah, I think so. my sister, my older sister is a lawyer. She went to Stetson as well. I think she was class of seven. And, I remember I started in a different school. played college football at the air force academy. And I remember I was pre-med at the time because I come from a family of doctors and I was, I was in a law class and it was the only class I got a good grade in while I was there. just kind of something that clicked.
So when I left the Air Force Academy and I went to Clemson, I decided that I was either going to do one or two things. I was either going to, you know, do politics, you know, be a legislative assistant in the DC or something like that, or I was going to go to law school. I felt that Polly Psy was sort of a well-rounded undergraduate major to kind of let me do that. Had I known that it kind of doesn't matter in law school what your major is, I probably would have done something different, but I thought that was sort of the best.
major for myself, at least for what I was aiming to do.
So when it came time to pony up and pay for law school, did you become a scholarship expert pretty quickly?
Speaker 2 (04:20.398)
No, you know what, I am extremely fortunate in that because my first two years of college were paid for because I was on a football scholarship, I had undergraduate college money saved up that my parents had been saving for me. So my legal education, my law school education was largely paid for by my parents. So I was very lucky in that. I know that a lot of people aren't, but I was very lucky to be able to have that paid for.
about you, Vicki?
the opposite experience. So I was a full merit scholarship recipient. I had applied to Stetson and immediately I had been notified that I would be eligible potentially for a scholarship. had to come in and interview for the scholarship. I ended up getting one of the diversity scholarships because I am Cuban American. My parents are first generation Americans. I'm like Kahlil's dad. So I applied for the full merit scholarship and then
While I was in law school, I did apply for a couple of little scholarships that would allow you to do extracurricular activities. I would supplement your legal education. They would buy you books. Getting book awards, for example, that would give you $1,000 that I ended up applying towards my living expenses while I took the bar exam. And even with all of that, I still took out a little bit of student loans because living is expensive. And your scholarship does.
cover your education, it does not cover your living expenses. So to help my parents supplement my living expenses for those three years, I did take out student loans.
Speaker 3 (05:49.806)
So where were you living when you started school and did you stay in that setting throughout?
I moved, so I initially started at Stetson, at a Stetson house that was about a block from the library, but I did not get along very well with my roommate. The house was wonderful. I actually thought it was very spacious and it was really cheap. I I paid like $400 a month in rent. And beginning in my second year, I moved in with a colleague that I met in law school and we stayed roommates through the bar exam. And we ended up paying a
private landlord, we lived about five minutes from campus in downtown Gulfport. And our rent was a bit more than it is when Stetson is your landlord. I think I ended up paying $650 a month instead of $400.
So Khalil, whereabouts are you staying at that time?
So I always lived in campus housing my my 1st year. I lived in a campus house. That was a 2 bedroom house. On the, I guess it's the North side of campus, which is really just about 2 houses over from Stetson's campus. I think I paid less than 400 dollars a month in rent when splitting it with my roommate. And then my, my roommate.
Speaker 3 (07:04.632)
Can I get the address of the place, please?
Yeah, I wish I still had it. I'm sure it's somewhere in my in my documents or one of my old resumes or something like that. But no, I especially compared to, you know, when I graduated law school, I moved to Bradenton and I was paying like $1,200 a month in rent. And then, of course, you come down to Miami, you know, you can't find a safe apartment that's got running water for less than $2,200 a month. So it was a blessing. But my second house, we moved across basically the other side of campus to a three bedroom house.
that was a little bit of party pad for us, but I still think I paid under $500 a month. And what a blessing that is to be able to live in a clean house that's affordable, that works. You have problems, you call Stetson, they fix it. was a great, living experience. Plus you're right there.
So I know, Khalil, you were a bit of a gardener during this time and that led to quite a big, big, big thing. Tell us about gardening.
Yeah, so when I, you know, I think everyone goes to law school thinking they're going to do one type of law, you know, and it's almost always some sort of public service or environmental law. It's something really altruistic. That's what happened with me. I went to Stetson. I wanted to do environmental law. And so naturally they have a fantastic environmental law program there. It was run at the time by, who was the associate dean of the time Roy Gardner. And they, it's a great program.
Speaker 2 (08:33.71)
Well, they had this great environmental law section society that ultimately decided to do a community garden. So we bought these, they were called green boxes. They're basically the size of like a standard cooler. And they're very simple. They've got a plastic covering on them. You just poke holes, you put seeds in and you feed the water in through a tube. So it's, kind of low maintenance. So it all started as this grand idea that, you know, these 10 or 12 people were going to take a part of. But as soon as the summer hit.
And it was hot outside and the garden really needed a lot of maintaining. You I was the only redneck who kept showing up to the garden. So, and it was smack dab in the middle of campus. We had a platform set up in the middle of campus and there were about eight of these boxes set up and we had herbs, had tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, different varieties of lettuce. And, you know, it was a lot of fun because it was a community garden.
people would come by and they would take as they needed. And my wife would come by and always take the mint from the garden to make mojitos. And I used to take the cucumbers and the peppers and you know, used to pickle the cucumbers and pickle the peppers and do all sorts of fun things like that. So that was a really cool experience and something that, you know, such a small law school like Stetson has such a community atmosphere that Stetson was completely fine with us having it set up right there in the middle of campus.
This sounds like while Khalil is digging in the dirt, Vicki, you're writing, right? You're competing.
Yeah, Khalil always had different interests, but we both ended up having a love of advocacy. So I initially started out just on the Newport board and on the trial team. I started that beginning of our second year of law school. About the second semester of our second year, my grades had done so well that I was invited and graded on to the law review. Basically, for those that are interested, there's two methods.
Speaker 1 (10:37.946)
Technically, there's a few methods that you can get onto the law review. You can grade on, which is just based on your academic performance. The top percentage of the class is invited to join the law review. You can write on, so there's different opportunities where they do ask you to submit a writing to join the law review, and they review it. And if they think that your writing is up to par, you'll be invited to join the law review. I graded on, and I thought it was too good of an opportunity to pass up, even if
leave me a little bit low on time for myself. And I'm glad I did it. ended up not only joining the law review and doing the regular law review process and editing others' papers, but my final paper was actually published by the Senate's law review because I wrote about drones in the Fourth Amendment, which was very cool back in 2014.
So it sounds like we have two very kind of stylistically different kinds of thinkers in the house. How did you collide with each other during that time?
In a courtroom. Very cool things about the Stetson campus is that it actually has real courtrooms that there you take your advocacy courses in them or the advocacy teams use them. Then evening before the Stetson trial team tryouts, I wanted to go into a courtroom where we would be doing our auditions the next day to practice. And that's where I bumped into this handsome fella.
who then spent the next 15 minutes criticizing my closing argument and telling me that it could be much better than it actually was. No, he was wrong. I was a shoo-in for the trial team.
Speaker 3 (12:17.962)
Is he right?
Speaker 2 (12:24.182)
Yeah, you know, as a one L, as a first year law student, there are a lot of different competitions that you can join. There's an opening statement competition. There's a closing state argument competition. And, know, sort of the people who are really interested in doing mock trial, those are the kids that are constantly set and they're, you know, they're doing those competitions. So, know, Vicki and a couple of other of our friends who all ended up on trial team all did those competitions and it was so fierce.
And for whatever reason, I didn't do any of them. I had no background in mock trial. I could just spin a yarn. I was just a storyteller. So having absolutely no basis to be able to critique her, I somehow found it appropriate to give her some criticism that she still gives me a hard time about to this day.
So as we're talking about getting towards the end of law school, tell me about the big scary bar exam. How does one prepare for this and what does it mean?
So every student has a very different style. The one wonderful part about Stetson is that it does have the bar prep services department. So they kind of give you a checklist of things that you should be doing to get ready for the bar exam. They give you a structure, they give you a calendar, they make recommendations on the bar prep classes, and Alex will talk about the bar prep classes. And if you follow their programming, you follow their steps, you should be able to pass the bar exam.
You know, it is a well documented, well organized program that they have. I will tell you that I took the bar exam only doing what Stetson told me to do. And I got one of the highest grades on the bar exam when we took it. I was one of the highest examinees in the third DCA. So I was invited to speak to the third DCA, to the other attorneys who had been recently admitted to the bar exam, to the bar.
Speaker 1 (14:25.998)
So the Setsum program works. I not only myself, but I know several other colleagues from our year who were top performers on the bar exam.
Leo, what does this test look like? How scared should I be if I were if I were a lost?
bar exam?
I mean, it's a very difficult test. It's not only that it's a difficult test, it's that there is a lot of pressure to pass the test, right? You've just spent three years, hundreds of thousands of dollars on an education. And it means, it may mean practically nothing if you can't pass the bar. Now, obviously you can take a JD and you can do a bunch of different things, especially a JD from Stetson. But, you know, there's a lot of pressure on.
And everyone tells you that you have to treat it like a job, you know, studying and preparation for that test is like a job. You graduate with about three months to study for it. I think that was about as much time as you got. And I don't know, I know I took a day or two off here or there, especially to take my wife on dates, but there wasn't a lot of time off. was Sunday to Sunday studying.
Speaker 2 (15:38.84)
know, sometimes eight, nine, 10 hours a day, because it's so expansive. There's just so much knowledge, you have to learn all of the law, all of the law for the for the for the main bar, right for the US bar, then you've got to also learn all the law for the Florida bar, which is different, right? It's different in parts. So it's very challenging. It's very challenging to be able to get yourself ready for
But like Vicki said, Stetson has a great program. Listen, Vicki didn't need it. Vicki didn't need it. She was going to pass that bar by just showing up. But because she's so smart. But I needed it. I really needed someone to be able to be there and hold my hand through the studying process because, you know, I like I like to do other things. I'm a very laid back person. I would much rather not study than study. You know, so it was nice to have Stetson to be able to push me along.
and guide me and critique me and review me and sort of adjust my study schedule as I needed it. And they were with me all the way up until the last day. And that was a big help. But it is a daunting test. is. But there are so many lawyers in the state of Florida that it's clearly passable. It's clearly doable. You just have to have the abilities to do it. But you have three years to psych yourself up.
I imagine Ron and Hermione, the two of you sitting trying to prepare for this test.
That's not far off. That's really not far off.
Speaker 3 (17:07.618)
Vicky.
We only ever took about two courses together during law school. And I remember one of them, he turned around and said, can I have your notes? And I was like, you didn't take notes this entire course? Only to find out Khalil was just sitting there listening to the professor, hoping that the whole time I was just going to forward him my notes at the end of
So I had to soak it in naturally.
So Vicki, what does passing the bar allow a lawyer to do that you otherwise couldn't do?
So you can't practice law unless you have passed the bar exam. In the meantime, before you pass the bar exam, while you are a law student, you are what's called a law clerk. A law clerk cannot practice law. They must work under the supervision of a practicing attorney. You cannot go to court. You cannot sign legal documents. You cannot argue with another attorney. It's just basically, you get through a lot of the writing things that an attorney gets to do as a law clerk.
Speaker 1 (18:03.618)
The state of Florida does offer what's called a certified legal internship program. Those individuals are basically law clerks, so they are law students who have not yet passed the bar, but who have been authorized by the state Supreme Court to do limited roles in court. So for example, a prosecutor's office or a public defender's office, they do have internships available for CLIs, certified legal interns.
And those are students who will get to go and work on a case with the state attorney's office or with the public defender's office. So it is a way that some of these public service organizations that work for the state are able to give students courtroom experience while they are still students. But other than that, you've got to wait to pass the bar exam to put your foot in the courtroom as an attorney.
When we hear about disbarment, that's big. You're thrown back on the other side of the fence basically. You're now a spectator again.
Absolutely.
With great power comes great responsibility.
Speaker 3 (19:10.816)
It sounds similar to the medical hierarchy in turn to a resident to fellow to an attending. It almost seems like you work up to that process. And in terms of where you are now, Vicki, I know that you are a partner. So what does it mean to be a partner in a law firm?
So a partner in the law firm is a lot of responsibility. So not only am I responsible to my clients that I bring in on my own, but I'm also responsible for the attorneys who work underneath me and all of the staff that works underneath me. So as a partner, I'm more of a supervisor, but that doesn't mean that I'm not litigating at the same time. So now I work two tasks, supervisor and practicing attorney at the same time. And it's a lot of responsibility.
It's a lot of fun, but it is a big change of responsibility from when you are just a practicing attorney.
And Khalil, you are really getting your hands dirty. Tell us about what you do.
So I'm a prosecutor. I work at the 11 Judicial Circuit, which encompasses Miami-Dade County. We are the, we're the third or fourth largest prosecutorial office in the country. We have over 250 lawyers spread across a couple of different offices in the county. Miami-Dade County by sheer size, I believe is the largest or second largest county in the state of Florida. So it encompasses more than just the city of Miami. You've obviously got Kendall and Morales.
Speaker 2 (20:44.334)
homestead in Florida city all the other cities that are in between. So I, I, I'm a prosecutor. We prosecute crimes for the state of Florida. If you commit a crime in Miami-Dade County, it comes through our office. Now they obviously don't all come by my desk. I've had to work my way to where I am now, but I'm currently a felony division chief. Each judge, there are 20 felony division judges in Miami-Dade County that handle criminal.
Each judge is assigned a chief, division chief. And division chief in each judge's division handles all of the homicides. So I am what other offices refer to as a major crimes or homicide prosecutor, but here we're just division chiefs. The prosecution of a homicide is a very fluid thing. The investigation does not stop on a homicide after someone is arrested. You'd like it to be, but there is always a constant investigation that's going on. I also respond to all
post conviction motions that are filed in my division. So we have a lot of post conviction motions, a lot of people who are saying that their attorney was ineffective and they're serving a life sentence now because their attorney didn't do A, B or C or that their sentence is illegal by law. know, some of those responses are very formulaic, but some of those responses require lengthy hearings and a lengthy discovery process, which I'm responsible for as well.
What does a good day look like?
What do you mean by good?
Speaker 3 (22:13.422)
At the end of the day, day off is ideal. My favorite subject is lunch. At the end of a work day, what might have happened that sends you home feeling the most accomplished and satisfied with what you do?
You know, I think at the end of the day, if I can go home and say that I did my job and that I was fair is the best thing possible. know, the criminal justice system casts a wide net. And in that wide net, it captures all sorts of people, horrible, horrendous people who commit heinous acts, murders, rapes, robberies, arses, heinous acts. But you also have people who get caught in the net who are not.
pardoned criminals who are just people who are caught in the wrong place at the wrong time or are mistaken about what's going on. People who are so much as driving with a suspended license that they don't know about, they could be subject to arrest. A good day to me is making sure that I can properly differentiate my bad people from my people who could really use a break. And if I can go home at the end of the day and tell myself that I did the right thing today, as long as I feel like I've done the right thing,
That's a good day. You I cut someone loose. You know, we dismiss a case because someone gets a good license in there here on a felony suspended driver's license. That's a good day. Someone someone gets caught at the airport. You know, this happens a lot, actually. Someone packs their bags in a rush and heads to the airport and they have a concealed weapons permit and they totally forget that their gun is on. You know, that it's a good day when I can figure out some sort of way to make that charge.
And to make that charge go away or to mitigate what they're going through because they've never been a part of the criminal justice system. And a good day is also when I get to come home and say, I put a murderer away today. Someone took a plea today or someone went to trial today and they were found guilty. And they're not gonna be out on the streets for a long time. And that was because of my effort. That's a good one.
Speaker 3 (24:21.676)
What's so fascinating to me is the media representation of a prosecutor is just a tiger that's just out for blood. And the best thing you can do is lock people away. The fact that you're saying good days can be when you were able to make sure that fair justice was even if your side didn't quote unquote win. Because we think about it in terms of sides, right? So what is it that we all are getting wrong?
I'm very surprised by you sounding so empathetic.
Well, I think that I have the benefit of perspective and I have the benefit of perspective that a lot of people just don't have. You know, I tell my wife that I have trouble with living in Miami sometimes because I just see the worst of it every day. But I also I've been around along long enough to know that it's not that everything all crime is not that big of a deal, right? You know, it's it's it's just not. We have a job to do and we will do that job.
But there are ways to find mitigators. And I will say that my office in particular is one of the best at alternative sentencing resolutions, at finding different ways to make things right. We have a Fair Justice sort of initiative here. We review old cases to make sure that the right sentences are given out. And I think what the media captures is
I think they capture the most extreme versions of both sides, right? You have public defenders who are these, you know, bleeding hard people who can't stand the idea that anyone would be trapped in a cage and locked away. And then you have prosecutors who believe that from someone who's willing to take a Snickers bar to someone who's willing to kill someone, they should all be in jail and locked away forever. You know, I have an office of 250 people. They do not all share the shame.
Speaker 2 (26:17.078)
same personality or the same beliefs and ideals that I do. But that is what is so fantastic about my office. And that is what's so fantastic about working here is that I'm given the authority to determine what is fair and what is just in my courtroom, you know, along with the judge and along with the public defenders. So, you know, I get what you're saying. Prosecutors, they can get a bad rap. We are viewed, we're kind of coupled and grouped along just...
with cops, you know, they look at us and they see cops. have a badge, right? I have a badge. have the authority to carry a gun if I want. I have the authority to sign, you know, to approve arrest warrants, to have people arrested, you know. So I can understand how people do get a bad rap. But from my perspective, the only way that I can help improve that is by being as fair and just as possible. It's the only way I can.
Vicki, tell us more about when you're practicing as opposed to your supervisory responsibilities as kind of an administrator. When you're practicing law, what does that look like on your side? What does that look like for you?
In civil practice, it's a lot of writing, it's a lot of motion practice. So I write a motion or I have to respond to a motion. We do have hearings, not as frequently as the criminal defense bar does, but I was hearing yesterday, I have a hearing tomorrow, usually about two times a week or so, and I'm in a busy litigation practice, I will be in the courtroom. Right now for civil practitioners, our courtroom is still the Zoom room.
But hopefully soon we'll be back in person. I argue motions. I argue against my opponent's motions. Sometimes my job involves settling a case, finding the most cost effective resolution for my client. Those are all different things that I have to handle on the day to day. We can do evidentiary hearings. It requires us to offer the core evidence, testimony. I did one of those yesterday.
Speaker 1 (28:25.358)
or it can just be asking the judge to rule on something that they've already ruled on and just asking them to apply it to the facts of your case. So I handle a very wide variety. And sometimes, for me, a good day is when I can make both people happy. I can make the other side happy and my client can be happy. I actually had a recent example of that where I secured a very favorable outcome for all the parties involved. And opposing counsel was over the moon.
My client was over the moon and it made me feel so wonderful just to know that I was able to do my job, I served my client's interests, but at the same time I helped opposing counsel serve his client's interests. And ultimately we came to a very fair resolution for both sides and everyone left with a good view of the civil justice system, which isn't always the case, right? Some people have a view of it of, people are greedy or it's not fair or it benefits big business.
doesn't benefit the little guy. If you ask most civil practitioners, think we're just like Khalil, we're trying to do what's fair. What's fair for our client, what's fair for the other side, and that's what the judges are there to do as well. So sometimes we need the judge to like nudge us one way or the other, but ultimately we're just seeking the truth like everybody else.
So give me an example. You just gave me an example. Can you walk me through a specific case that is particularly memorable or impactful that you've worked on observed? What's the case that really?
So since I know a lot of the listeners are students that are recently applying to law school or about to start law school or thinking about it, I will tell you that as a student at Stetson, I had a summer clerk program with the law firm of Rumburger Kirk and Codwell here in Miami. And as soon as I finished taking the bar exam, I had my job starting about two weeks later. Maybe it was three weeks, but basically after my first week at the firm, after my initial training,
Speaker 1 (30:27.766)
I was going to get my bar results and I knew whether I would be a practicing lawyer or not. And that Friday afternoon, one of the partners walked into my office and said, I have a trial starting on Monday and I want you to work on it with me. And I went and I can tell you that it was a slip and fall case for a retailer here that's based in Florida.
I was basically given just a couple of days notice that I would be basically assisting him with a trial that was starting on Monday morning. And it was just a matter of me getting up to speed on the file. I had to watch a lot of like store surveillance video, reading a lot of depositions that have already been taken, reading medical records, trying to understand what all of that meant, coming up with questions that I thought we should be asking, helping him to find the things that he needed to prepare for the case.
But it was a wonderful experience and it really basically made me go from zero to a hundred very quickly. We were in the office on Sunday preparing for trial when at one o'clock in the afternoon, the plaintiff filed what's called a notice of voluntary dismissal, which is when they dismissed the case. The plaintiff dismissed the case the night before the trial was supposed to begin. And while it was disappointing, the nice thing is it led to a wonderful opportunity for me because my client didn't agree to the dismissal.
So my client was able to recover all of the attorney's fees that we had expended preparing for that trial through a motion that I filed that I argued once I had already passed the bar a couple of weeks later. And it was great. It was really cool. I kind of got to see the whole perspective of how you get a case ready for trial, what happens when the case doesn't go forward on trial, and then what are some of the things that you can do to kind of make it more fair for your client.
One of the outcomes of that motion was that the individual could not refile the suit against my client until she paid that debt, the attorney's fees that were owed to my client. So that was a win in my client's book because it left them a little bit less out of pocket for those attorney's fees.
Speaker 3 (32:34.252)
Leo, tell me about a case that may be kind of outside of the norm or something that we don't see on law and order. What's more of a realistic kind of case that you've worked on?
So it seems that my most common cases are always related with drugs. You have people who are involved in drug deals, setting up drug deals, things like that. But I have some atypical cases. I can't talk about specifics necessarily of open cases, I have an interesting case that's.
kind of been all over the news lately, where it involves someone receiving federal funding to fund a homicide for a murder for hire. We just made a big arrest on that case a couple of months ago. That's pretty interesting because it involves so many different types of aspects. And what is also interesting is that technology is advancing so much now that.
We almost don't need eyewitnesses for a lot of cases. And don't get me wrong, you want an eyewitness. You want someone who's going to be able to say that this person was there and this person did that. But there's so much technology now that allows us to be able to find these people. So in one of my most recent cases, we were able to make an arrest due almost solely off of two different things. The first thing is cell site location data from your cell phones. The other thing is from recorded jail calls.
So we were able to piece this entire case together from cell site locations. So we get a tower dump to try and find numbers that correspond to numbers of interest that we have. So we essentially pull data from one of the cell phone towers and we start cross-referencing all of the numbers that touched on that cell phone tower within a period of time to find a number that we're tracking.
Speaker 2 (34:36.422)
So once we find a number that we're tracking, okay, great, we've got someone who's pinging off of this tower within the radius of this tower. And then you do geolocation warrants on that phone to be able to try to pinpoint and triangulate their exact location. So now we were able to take what turns out to be a circle, a 360-degree area of where that cell phone could be. And through geolocation data, we're actually able to start slowly narrowing it down.
to where I can now tell you the parking space that that person was sitting in as they were utilizing their phone on the day of the homicide.
This sure beats following muddy footprints through the woods.
I mean, you know that that's absolutely right. We're kind of past the days of I mean it. Don't get me wrong. I've I've I've had our ceramics people come out there and they cast molds of footprints in the dirt. know every little piece works because not only does every little piece works, every little piece of evidence is important in our investigations in the prosecution of our cases because we have to be right. We have to be right. We know for a fact that people are convicted of crimes that they did not commit every single day.
So the more evidence that we can create, the more evidence that we can find, we can find, know, helps us make sure that we're right, you know? So even if it is a money footprint or a blood splatter analyst, which people don't, you know, which isn't necessarily good technology. I actually read, I read an article the other day, I'm happy to send it to you. I can't even remember what the name of the thing is. was a article about how crime scene investigators are now teaching the process of witching.
Speaker 2 (36:16.78)
to find bodies, right? So they basically take a stick that's split into two and they, it's, it's, walk around thinking about what they're looking for. And the stick is supposed to lead them to body is buried, which is just a completely insane idea, but they are teaching that at forensic academies now, whether we'll adopt it down here in Miami. have no idea. But the point is, is that we have to have all of these clever ways of moving things.
DIVINE
Speaker 2 (36:46.434)
Get it right. Have to get it.
So Vicki, what kind of evidence is making your life easier slash harder? What does evidence look like when it comes across your desk?
Communications, emails, back and forth. A lot of our evidence is documents, right? Policies of insurance, medical records, bills related to injuries, things like that. So our documents are not always held by the party. So our job sometimes involves reaching out to other people who aren't necessarily directly related to our case, but who may have information that's helpful to our.
case and obtaining it through them through the discovery process, through a deposition, through a subpoena, and trying to make that a non-confrontational process. So you can imagine, Dustin, if you've never been a part of the legal system, but all of a sudden you got a document from me that says, you are commanded to appear in my office tomorrow at 2 o'clock with any documents that you have related to the payment of your rent at your home, you may be like, what the heck is this all about? That happens all the time.
folks who aren't used to seeing these documents that are asking, am I in trouble? What did I do wrong? And just explaining to them that you may have possession of some documents that are pertinent to a dispute that we're trying to resolve between someone who at one point owned your property or one of your neighbor's properties. And we're trying to figure out what's fair rent. So things like that. That's a unique part of our job sometimes is educating non-lawyers or folks who have a very minimal involvement.
Speaker 1 (38:27.622)
in the legal process about what the legal process is all about and how they could know a document that you might be in possession of or something that you saw that might have been of help to me. You might have witnessed a car accident that you don't think anything of, but the police officer jotted down your name. And now I'm trying to find you because I know someone who was gravely injured in that accident. And we're trying to make sure that we can find out who was at fault. Did someone take the red light? Did someone not stop at the turn signal?
those kind of facts. So in the civil world, could be a number of things that are evidence. It can be tangible stuff, cell phone, a watch. One of my cases right now involves a watch. Or it can be documents. know, it could be, you know, receipts that you may have, medical bills that you may have, a contract between myself and you. we're suing each other because I say you did something wrong under the contract and now you owe me money. That would
I would say that's vast majority of what I deal with, a breach of contract cases.
So Vicki, at the end of the day, at home, at the dinner table, which may not even be a situation that exists between lawyers given your schedules, what do y'all talk about? You talk about work a lot.
We do. So we try to talk about at the dinner table because we do have little ones and sometimes little stories can be a little scary or some of the things he dealt with might be a little bit more intense than a two and a half year old should be listening to. But we always ask everyone how was your day? We do try to have that conversation just to make sure that if there's anything that you want to talk about and then once the kids go to bed we do like the nitty gritty, you know, back and forth about what we dealt with today. Usually we talk about what we dealt with in the courtroom. So we're both
Speaker 1 (40:12.686)
Who is in front of the same judge every single day? I have the opposite experience. Every single day I'm in front of a different judge. So sometimes it's sharing feedback on, how was the judge today? And what did you argue? And how did they rule? Did they think that they were fair? And I like to ask him as well, because sometimes we'll have a judge that comes from the criminal division or from the civil. And he has some unique insights because he was in that courtroom one day. Or he knows someone who was in that courtroom. So a lot of it's like kind of exchanging notes.
But we do that for about 20 minutes and then it's no more work talk. It's just, you know, family talk and just spending time with one another. But there's no way to spend the day with two lawyers without talking about what you did at work.
You know, and we do we do such different things that there's really no conflict. I know a lot of people are like, oh, I bet you guys argue all the time. We really don't. do such different things. In fact, I'd say that we collaborate on a lot of things. You know, she's got questions that involve my realm. She comes to me. Same to her. You know, I've always got questions for her. So we always we always end up talking about that a little bit. We know what everyone we know what each other is always doing. You know, like yesterday, people.
I say like, aren't your arguments really intense? You're both litigators. You're both always arguing with each other side. And it's really not, because if one of us cares enough about the subject to really want to argue about it, the other one usually will bow down and say like, what are you doing? But that happens all the time. We know we pick our battles. And it's very rare that we'll actually go head to head on something. Like the crocs and the pretty shoes with the dresses, that's always one of the battles.
in a way.
Speaker 2 (41:48.718)
Yeah, that's right. She doesn't like it I put boots on her daughters and you know, sometimes I'm going win that argument sometimes.
Lot to pick.
Speaker 3 (41:56.782)
So Khalil, how does your Stetson experience, how has it prepared you for what you do now? And in what ways was it maybe lacking in preparing you for what you do now?
You know, law school and I'm not, I'm not, I'm not speaking out of school here. Law school is not about teaching you how to be a lawyer. Law school is teaching you how to understand the law. It's teaching you how to interpret the law and read the law, you know, because reading through a case or trying to understand a statute, it requires a different sort of, it requires different wiring in your brain, right? So I think all law schools to an extent fail to
to prepare their students with practical application. I think all of them across the board fail because I think that you could, I mean, I really do think that there should be a more practical component to law school, but most law schools have practical components to them, right? You can become a certified legal intern and go intern one summer at the state attorney's office or at the public defender's office, and you can get real live courtroom experience.
But going through mock trial at our school was really instrumental. I mean, there is still things that I was taught that I do every day, right? Every day when I'm in court, you you're taught litmus, ways to say things, ways to present things, ways to introduce things. I still do those things to this day, even in my most serious of trials. I still click right back in to the words that were hammered into my head as a Stetson.
know, as a Stetson Law student. And I will tell you that a lot of the what they teach you about how to behave and act in a courtroom is done to such a level that you can tell when someone has had formal mock trial training experience. And then even then you can tell what law school they got the training in. And when a Stetson lawyer walks into the room, who's had that mock trial experience, I mean, you can you can tell you can just tell by
Speaker 2 (44:07.438)
the way they're dressed, the way they present themselves, the way they look at the judge. I remember one of my first days doing mock trial in a practice, Lee Coppock, Professor Lee Coppock said, don't look at the defense when they're arguing with the judge. You're always looking at the judge, always. You never ever look at the defense attorney. And that is something that I still hear Professor Coppock in the back.
of my head saying, stop looking at the defense, look at the judge. That's who you're trying to convince. sure, know, sure as anything to this day, I don't look over at the other podium. I'm always facing the judge when I'm making my arguments. Those are the, I mean, those are the things that you learn. And I think that they're extremely important for a practical aspect on how to practice law, how to practice actual law. And I, and I do think that law schools could use more of it. I really do think that all students should be required to do a CLI.
First of all, for the benefit of the public, When you're public interest work, working for a state attorney, a county attorney, a city attorney, you're actually assisting with the public. And I think everyone should have to touch here, right? Because the reason why everyone isn't clamoring to do my job is because I make a quarter of what my wife makes, right? I don't make enough money for what I do.
And the legislatures acknowledge that. My own boss would tell you that I don't make enough money for what I do, but I make what I make. And I think it would be such a benefit to all of the students to have to take part in some sort of public interests while they're in law school, whether it be through the state or the public defender. I think all of those things would be really important to get practical law experience in the public sector.
Vicki, what about you? Where did you feel prepared and where were you like not ready? You were a rock star in mock trial. We know this. We have the receipts.
Speaker 1 (46:04.59)
So when I walked into the courtroom, I had zero fear. But when I had taken my first deposition, I didn't know where to start from Adam. That's one of the practical components that we'll talk about that we're lacking. And there was one course that was called practice and procedure that you could have taken, but it was an evening class, one time a week. It was really inconvenient, very hard to get into. And I just didn't take that class. So I had to learn by watching others basically kind of teach myself once we were done with law school.
Negotiations and mediation. I spend I don't know how much time trying to settle cases. I didn't take a single class that taught me how to do that in law school or how to value a case. And that's something that is a brand new attorney you were expected to do when you were practicing civil law. So I would have loved to have had that component of it. But I also think that I got invaluable experience doing internships. I did a summer clerkship. I worked both years at a personal injury firm on the plaintiff's side.
one for an insurance defense firm, and then I went to work for that firm. So doing something that will give you hands-on experience more so than just the mock trial and the moot court, that is really what teaches you what you need to do to be a lawyer. And I highly recommend to anyone who is thinking about going to law school that if you're not sure, go work at a law firm. We're all hiring at all ends. Go work at the state attorney's office. We need schedulers. We need clerks to handle the filing of
paperwork, you know, but it gives you experience. shows you what are they doing? What are they working on? I don't like that kind of wall. I would love to see what goes on in the back and forth of the negotiating of a contract. Great. Maybe you're more of a transactional lawyer. There's a lot of different things that you can do with your degree, your Juris Doctor. You know, you can do transactional work. You could be a prosecutor. could be a civil litigator. You could be a judge. You can just do research and writing all day. You can, you know, disguise the limit with your degree.
So take the three years to figure out what makes you happy, right? What wouldn't bring you joy that you get to do it every day? You know, don't want to be a miserable prosecutor because you actually hate being in the courtroom. Well, that's probably not the job for you then. You know, maybe there's something else that you should be doing with your interests of criminal law. So that's what I would recommend to anyone is, you know, take your time in law school to figure out what it is that you actually want to do with your degree because
Speaker 1 (48:26.872)
The degree can do anything that you want to do.
My background is in education and this sounds very much like the conversation we have of which education course was the most helpful. My first day of teaching was the most important education course I ever took. Everything else was great and theory and I could quote you up and down all the research and what everything means. But when you're in the room with the people whose futures are on the stake, nothing's quite prepared you for it. And it sounds like that's a similar situation.
I need Stetson and the advocacy programs to do as close as they can to kind of mimic what you might be seeing in real life. And sure, they'll teach you what to say, what to do, but until you're there and you're actually your feet are to the fire, you don't know how you're going to perform. So all you can do is be best prepared, right? You can study, you can do everything you want, but once you're an actual teacher, it's not until you're in the classroom that it all kind of comes to fruition. Same for us. For both of us, it was support room.
For other lawyers, it was the first time that they had to draft a document from scratch, know, a transaction that their client wanted them to on paper. That's like the first time that you are truly a lawyer.
Vicki, would you ever want to teach in a law classroom? Have you taught and is that something that you would like to do?
Speaker 1 (49:44.492)
I'm sure it's something that I would like to do. I don't know that it's something that I have time to do, but I have always tried to go back and teach. So, Khalil coached one of the mock trial teams when he lived up in Bradenton, because he was close enough to Stetson to do it. I actually took my time and I tried to help a high school mock trial team to teach those girls about the law, what hearsay means. I would love to teach a course, you know, about anything. I feel like I've gotten a lot of experience as an attorney.
Sometimes it's just hard finding time. And I think that's for everyone. It doesn't matter your profession, but we have a very high pressure job when you work in civil law, for example, we keep track of our hours. So to bill a certain number of hours. And that's really a lot of pressure when you are a mom and a wife and a boss and doing leadership programs and other responsibilities, trying to still make sure that my employer has enough money coming in for my work that they can still pay me.
but also getting to do the things that kind of make me feel fulfilled.
Would you ever want to go the professorial route, Khalil?
I don't know that I have the temperament to be a good professor. think Vicki and I, before we had kids, we would go back to Stetson once or twice a year to help out with the mock trial team. Vicki and I love helping. We've always loved helping. And we wish we were closer so that we could still be involved with the team up there. With kids, it's very difficult.
Speaker 2 (51:18.6)
I think it would be fun to teach a trial advocacy course down here. There's plenty of law school down here for me to do it for Vicki as well. But right now, I think the most important thing is focusing on my family. We have such little time that I think taking it up somewhere else. Plus, I've always kind of envisioned that if I were ever to teach, I'd be teaching from a place of experience. I always found my best professors in law school were the doers, not the scholars. Don't get me wrong, they're...
There are fantastic teachers in both both sections, people who just wanted to be in academia and people who have practical experience. But for me, someone with practical experience resonated more right? So I think that once I've got some more experience under my belt and I've got a lot of practical experience to be able to impart upon people, then maybe that's something that I'll take part in. But for now, I'm just kind of enjoying the ride and watching my kids grow up. And if I get 20 minutes at the end of the day to talk to my wife about her job, that's pretty good.
you're young. You can wait till you're well retired and then decide to wear the, the smoking jacket and, you know, be all professorial.
Yeah, there was a couple of Stetson at the time. I don't even know if they're still alive. Judge Demers and his wife. I've always kind of pictured that Vicki and I would be sort of like Judge Demers and his wife. Judge Demers was sort of an older crotchety judge who would come in and- What do you call him? He was a little crotchety. was a wonderful guy. was very nice. But his wife was so colorful and they were so different.
not dissimilar to Vicki and I. And I've always kind of pictured in the back of my mind that maybe Vicki and I would be a lot like them one day. You know, just sort of this odd couple that loves the law and that loves to teach and loves to be around people because that's what they
Speaker 3 (53:08.482)
guess my just a couple more questions. Thank you. You've been very generous with your time. I know you have lots of things going on. A couple more questions. One thing, Vicki, and this is very cliche question, I apologize for it. What do you wish you had known before that first day at Stetson that you didn't know?
wish I had known how important academics would be to getting a job. I think if you ask a lot of our friends, we all would have maybe studied a little bit harder early on. Because once your grade point average is at a certain point, it's very hard to pick it back up. So I was lucky I did pretty well my first year. Had I studied a little bit harder, I would have gotten my foot into different interviews that then maybe would have led to different job opportunities for me.
And was all decided as early as my first year. I thought, well, I have three years to get my grades up. And you really don't. So from day one, kind of really focusing on academics I think is important. And the other thing is networking. I don't know that I capitalized on that enough. Getting to know people who are in career services who could have given me pointers how important it would have been to do a judicial clerkship.
I didn't understand that until I was in my last semester of law school and had zero time to do a clerkship. But that was, now that I interview candidates who are coming to my law firm seeking jobs, I see how much more polished they are when they did their judicial clerkships, that they've had different exposure to the law because they've done a judicial clerkship. So, you know, I would say when you start law school, you got to hit the ground running. And that's something that I wish I would have known.
first year is I should have listened to all of the information coming in and I just tried to like do my best and sometimes you got to work smart like you know that that saying is work work smart don't work hard that's something that I wish I would have implemented earlier on.
Speaker 3 (55:15.958)
And finally, Khalil, what do you wish you'd known?
I know my wife's number on day one.
was waiting for
to throw it in there. I'll give you a little bit of a different answer because I think that it's pretty clear that the legal profession is burning out a lot of young players. And I wish I'd known in law school the benefit and I wish I'd just known to appreciated my free time a little more in law school. know, for as busy as you think you are in law school, you're not half as busy as you are when you're actually practicing law.
And I certainly wish I would have taken better advantage of using my free time to do different things within the law school and different things outside of the law school. But mental health being such an important issue right now with young lawyers. Our young lawyers are flaming out. are absolutely, they're burnt out by the time they get here, even before they start, and they can't even put in half of an effort.
Speaker 2 (56:24.684)
to be a good lawyer because they're already so burnt out from law school and from here. And I just tell people, you when we get interns, we have hundreds of interns that come in every summer and every intern that I cross paths with. I tell them to enjoy your free time while you're in law school. You know, if you can, if you can find a way to go out with your friends and get that drink tonight, then you should, you know, if you can find a way to, to go to that seminar on an interesting area of the law that you've never involved yourself with.
you should take the time to go do that. Because once you're working, once you sort of selected your field, you know, the further further, the further you get down that road, the harder it's going to be to turn around and get back any of that time. And I just think that time is such a such a benefit that a lot of young kids don't really understand. You know, my wife and I have talked about it. It's been a theme of this podcast. But, you know, we do that if we have the time. We'd like to if we had the time. But with two kids and
really, really busy law careers. You it's tough to find the time. We make it. We absolutely make the time, but we've got to carve it out. But you know, we had so much free time in law school to do all of those things. I just wish I'd utilized it.
We did a lot of fun things though, I want everyone to know that Stetson does. It's in a beautiful city. There's so much to do. It's really safe. used to go down to downtown golf court all the time. Now it's Salties and Old Maddy's has been there since the beginning. We always used to go grab a drink with our friends, go to the beach, used to go to the postcard inn. It's still day.
in terms of
Speaker 3 (57:56.622)
Do you still live within distance of the school?
Yeah.
So my second house, you had to actually drive there. So my second house, could actually walk to the bars. You could not necessarily walk to campus. You could, but it was a really lengthy walk and not a...
I mean, currently now, how far now do you live from Stetson?
now four hours. But, that's exactly what I've talked about with Vicki saying is that there's so many fun things to do in that area. I mean, it's law school on the beach. You know, how can you beat law school on the beach? You know, you've got so many things that are so close to you. had a boat and a paddle board in law school. And I used to, I mean, if I wasn't in class, I was on that boat or I was on that paddle board. And I still don't feel like I got enough time out there. I just wish I'd done a little more of that stuff. Maybe that's not what Stetson wants to hear.
Speaker 3 (58:18.998)
or else.
Speaker 2 (58:47.266)
But I think it's beneficial for young kids who are, they're gonna approach that first year like all people do, stressed out, worried about the fact that like, there's only one thing that's gonna determine your grade and that's a test at the end of the year. There's no quizzes, there's no take-home work. Like you go to class for an entire semester, you learn a subject and at the end of the semester, you're given one shot to show that you know the material. And that's very stressful. That's very stressful. And my point is, that in between there, you should drink a couple of beers for fun.
Drink a couple beers and still have good grades. I graduated in our class and had a lot of fun while I was in law school. Went to the beach, went to parties, hosted parties, played softball, you know, did all of the fun things that I could have wanted out of like a law school experience. So it's possible to do both things.
I mean, these kids are burning out in high school. We're lucky if they get to law school to burn out and very lucky if they get into practice. Thank you so much, both of you for your time. It was wonderful talking to you. Thanks for sharing your experience and your wit. Is there anything else that you wanna throw in that we didn't get to that you'd like to make sure we have stated for the record?
Right.
Speaker 1 (01:00:06.328)
I just want everyone to know that Stetson is a wonderful school and it was a little bit off the path for me. It was not a school that I had ever heard of before I started applying for law school and it was by far one of the best decisions that I ever made. And I highly encourage everyone to go on campus, take the tour, get the feel for the campus because it's a really unique place. And I got very lucky. I found my forever person at Stetson, but
Stetson is a forever home for me. It's my home away from home and I'm really grateful for all the opportunities that it gave to me.
Yeah, no, I I echo that sentiment. really do think that Stetson is a fantastic law school. It's it's a it's a place that you could live and grow and love, you know. And that's how we feel about it. That's how we always feel.
Thank you so much. Have a wonderful rest of your day and your week and best of luck to you. Hopefully we'll touch base again soon.
Take care.
Speaker 3 (01:01:05.442)
This has been Real Cases. Thank you for listening. Check back for more episodes about an array of legal topics presented by the Stetson University College of Law. Learn more at stetson.edu.
Topics: Real Cases Podcast
