Given the recent post about the "mean cable guy," what are your strangest or unusual confessions? To get things started, I recall an earlier post in which a west Texas DA picked up a hitchhiker, who then by way of conversation admitted committing deeds that were later that day used to revoke his probation. There must be some great stories out there.

I was getting ready for a pretrial conference on some traffic tickets, when the trooper issuing the citations called and told me he'd given the defendant a break. If the defendant didn't plead no contest on these Class Cs, the trooper wanted to dismiss and refile a POM. The defendant showed up unrepresented. I told him he didn't need to talk to me, had a right to an attorney, etc. He wanted to talk, and to plead not guilty. When I reminded him of the facts, he said, "All the dope was in my mouth by the time he got there," and "I've got drugs in my system right now. Does that mean I'm in possession?" The baliff and I just gaped at each other.(Defendant hurriedly pled no contest at the end of this discussion.)

Defendant (represented by counsel) had panic attack in the middle of forgery trial and provided State with written confession that was subsequently introduced and resulted in a conviction.

John Healey & I tried a guy for UUMV when it was still a 3rd deg. felony. He was enhanced with a prior to 2nd deg. status.

The def. has gone to an auto dealership and gotten a test ride in a Camero Z28 with T-tops. He told the salesman he wanted to take it out on the freeway. The salesman left him in the car to get permission to gas up the car, and the crook drove off. Our indictment alleged the owner of the car as the salesman.

At trial, def. insisted on testifying (against his atty's advice). He was a writ writer, and considered himself much more clever than his ct. appointed lawyer.

He then explained to the jury that in fact he had permission from the salesman to drive off with the car. He said he'd paid the salesman an oz. of cocaine and $500 so he could use the vehicle. He turned to the jury and further explained: he had to run several kilos of cocaine to Baytown, and he needed a car that was fast, and had T-tops, in case the cops got to chasing him. The reason for the T-tops was that if it looked like the cops were going to get you stopped, you needed to be able to toss the cocaine thru the roof, and the slip stream would blast the cocaine everywhere, so it couldn't be recovered. If you tried throwing it out a side window, he said, you run the risk of the bag of cocaine ending up hung up on the pursuing cop car's windshield wipers. "I had that happen once," he said.

The jury convicted in 15 minutes, and it took them another 15 minutes of "deliberation" to give him 20 years.

He then turned to his attorney, and said, "I guess I should have listened to you, huh?"

Well, you live and learn.

All my interesting confessions came from my ten year stint as a defense lawyer.

My favorite guy was "Mr. Amen" as he came to be known.

He was charged with delivery cocaine to a couple CI's (both female) and he had his two preachers sitting in the front row.

He insisted on testifying.

My first question to him was obvious to me: "Did you sell cocaine to those two ladies that testified earlier?"

His answer: "No, no, no. I gave them the cocaine in exchange for sex."

It got worse from there. He got his nickname because, after a few questions from me, he began to substitute "Amen" for "Yes" and then decided that the more amens he could string together the more convincing he must appear. By the last question, the answer went like this: "Amen, brother, I say amen, amen, amen, amen and again AMEN!!!!!!!!"

I rested.

The prosecutor lifted his head up from the counsel table and managed to stop laughing long enough to gasp out "No questions" before collapsing again in a fit of laughter.

And who says defense lawyers have no fun.