mid law school crisis

I’m baaaaaaack!

So I didn’t mean to take two weeks off from posting. My apologies. But this one is longer so is that a fair trade-off? Yes. It is. Thank you.

Let’s recap the last two weeks. I had my first mock trial competition in New York. And that was an……..experience. We didn’t do so hot, and we have several ideas of why, but it is what it is. Just means we need to work harder next semester to try and defend our national champions title. And I am prepared to do so. But I did learn a lot throughout the whole thing, so that’s good. And the comp itself wasn’t the only exciting thing to happen that weekend, but that is not my story to tell, so you’ll just have to trust me that it was quite the weekend.

Unfortunately, the comp was also the same weekend as our law school Halloween party, which sucks because I think it was a lot of fun last year? But to be honest, I don’t actually remember my 1L law school Halloween so do with that what you will.

Anyway, after returning to KC from the comp in NYC (we did not see Mamdani 😓) (the real disappointment if you ask….literally any of us) I returned to working at the prosecutor’s office and started the grueling effort of catching up on everything I had fallen behind on. The goal now is to finish all the semester’s material so I can start actually studying for finals after a wedding Nov 14, but we shall see if I can get there (I will). But I noticed my mindset had started to change.

I have not been quiet about my reasoning for being in law school. My reasoning for taking the LSAT, applying to schools, deciding which one to go to, and going to said school even after a significant number of people in my life told me not to. And that still holds true – my entire purpose is to seek justice for animals and the environment. And for a while, I thought maybe that meant prosecution, specifically prosecuting people accused of animal abuse.

But over the last week something has changed within me. I sat in on a few hearings in which I found myself vehemently disagreeing with the prosecution’s stance. I found myself internally rooting for the defendants. And, to clarify, none of these hearings had to do with animal abuse. I don’t think my position will ever change there. But I realized I was seeing in real time some genuine discrepancies in the legal system, and I did not like it. I couldn’t back it. And that was the weirdest feeling to me. I had never doubted before that I was on “the right side,” so to speak.

I mean, there is always some amount of corruption in anything government related, because certain people in power tend to abuse it, but I always thought that didn’t apply to where I am. That everyone there is perfect and makes no mistakes and always has the exact same mindset as me about what fairness is.

And let me be extremely clear before continuing. Defense attorneys are SO. CRUCIALLY. IMPORTANT. ESPECIALLY public defenders. The government should absolutely never have unchecked power over a person, regardless of what they are accused of doing. I just never thought I would be able to be the person sitting on the defense side of the well.

But after these hearings, I started to wonder if maybe that was where I was going to be. I know, that if I do go into prosecution, I do not want to ever proceed with a charge unless I am 100% convinced that the defendant is the one who did XYZ. I want to be the type of prosecutor who does dismiss a case if they find doubt, because if I, with everything I have, am doubting, then there simply is not enough evidence for a jury, and the person should not be convicted. Innocent until proven guilty, always.

However I know not everyone operates that way. In my opinion, they absolutely should. But maybe that is something easier said than done. I have a hard time believing that, as the entire basis for me thinking this is practicable rather than merely idealistic was a prosecutor who talked to us my 1L year and said that is how he operates. That if he has even an inkling of a doubt, he dismisses. Every time. And that is how I want to be.

But the hearings I sat in on recently just really messed with me. I couldn’t understand how they had even gotten there, quite frankly. I went in expecting to be biased toward the prosecution, but left disgusted by the position taken, and grateful that the defendant ended up with a better outcome. It made me think, that as much as I want to prosecute animal abusers, that those are such a small fraction of cases that maybe I am not meant to be on the criminal side at all. Maybe I am meant to practice in the way that certain animal rights lawyers like Wayne Hsuing, whose advocacy and action is what is making a difference. That is, admittedly, a scary thing to think about. He is currently facing criminal charges for being a lead in the rescuing efforts of the Rigdlan Beagles. But if I was a prosecutor, and he was the defendant in front of me, I couldn’t do it. I know that. Because in my opinion, what is legal is not always what is morally right. And I refuse to let my morals be swayed.

So after coming back from a mock trial comp, I got hit with a mid law school crisis. I thought I had everything figured out, but then I realized, I didn’t. And as someone who is now just over one year from graduating, that was a terrifying reality. Made me want to curl up and pretend these realizations didn’t hit me like a semi truck. But that would be the cowardly thing to do.

And all of this is not to say I am by any means ruling out criminal work, on either the defense or prosecution side. I am still learning so much, and have extended my internship to the next semester at the prosecutor’s office. But I think it gives me a more robust way to look at things when making decisions, a more real and practical way to think of things rather than just “here is what the law is on paper, do it.”

The law is not black and white. Never has been, despite literally every piece of pop culture media saying it is. And I think I needed that reminder, and I needed it to hit me when it did, and as hard as it did. Even if it made me spiral a bit in the midst of an insane two weeks.

So I don’t know what this means for me while looking for an internship for summer 2027, or a job after graduating. Maybe it helps me to expand what I look for. Maybe it makes me pause and really think about what I do or do not want on a resume. The only thing I do still know for sure is that I still want to be in the Pacific Northwest, specifically Seattle, and that, for the time being, the internship and job hunt should pause while I focus on finishing out the semester.

So the mid law school crisis is being compartmentalized and pushed back into a nice little box in the corner of my brain until I can unpack it later (winter break). For now I have to get through the next couple weeks (with a family medical emergency, my own personal health, and monetary concerns no less, but, you know, when life gives you lemons) finish the semester strong, and go from there.

One day at a time.

And hey, on a positive note, the new Hunger Games movie comes out soon! Just in time to be emotionally devastated before finals, because Suzanne Collins is a mastermind and Haymitch’s story is heartbreaking. But you can bet your ass I will be seated in that theater at least once.

Song of the day:  Draw You Out – Noah Kahan