A sneak peak of Legal Docket podcast

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, August 9th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN: And I’m Myrna Brown.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: a sneak peak into season three of Legal Docket Podcast! Mary, how’s it going?

REICHARD: It’s going full steam ahead. Let’s pull in Jenny Rough who is my capable co-writer and co-host. Hi, Jenny!

JENNY ROUGH, GUEST: Hi, ladies!

BROWN: Well, you two hit a home run right out of the gate during the very first season in the summer of 2020. You went to #1 on iTunes in your category of podcasts.

ROUGH: We did, with our faithful listeners making that happen in a big way. And that’s fueled seasons two and three!

BROWN: Let’s take a moment and set up a clip from this season’s first episode that we posted this morning on the Legal Docket Podcast feed. A man on death row is fighting for religious rights in the execution chamber!

REICHARD: This one shattered me, let me tell you. John Henry Ramirez is on death row for the murder of Pablo Castro in Corpus Christi in 2004. He’s not fighting his conviction. He acknowledges his guilt. But Ramirez wants his pastor to be physically present with him at the moment of death, praying out loud and laying hands upon him.

Here’s some of what he told me when I visited death row earlier this year:

RAMIREZ CLIP: You know, it always comes back to that, oh, you had a terrible childhood. And I always like to curtail that. Eh, then, because it comes across, like the pity party thing, you know what I mean, it comes across so insincere, and so, like, an excuse, you know, and it's like, there's loads of people that grow up like I did, or  worse, and they don't end up being murderers, they don’t end up on death row. Yeah, I had a bad childhood but I still made my choices....

REICHARD: You’ll hear a lot more from Ramirez in our first episode.

BROWN: Mary, what was it like coming face to face with someone you know murdered another person?

REICHARD: I saw a man who’d done a terrible thing, and I also saw a man who lives a life of meaning behind bars. He brings Christian ministry to other death row inmates and has for years. My heart ached for his victim and his victim’s family and I brought that out in the episode. I’ll just say it was hard.

ROUGH: I do want to point out, though, not all the episodes this season are quite that dramatic. Like a case about arbitration agreements. In arbitration, you agree to handle legal conflicts through private dispute resolution. In other words, you’re signing away your ability to sue in court. We’ll hear from arbitrator Tom Stipanowich we have all signed those agreements, whether we know it or not.

TOM STIPANOWICH: The real controversy with arbitration relates to contracts of adhesion, which means a company issues a contract and this is a contract you have to use if you want to do business with them. It's take it or leave it. And often people are not aware of the fine print, and certainly not when it comes to arbitration.

ROUGH: Arbitration dates back to ancient times.

STIPANOWICH: Let me just say, arbitration goes way back. There are examples of arbitration in the Bible. The fact is, we often refer to compromise decisions by arbitrators as, forgive me, splitting the baby.

ROUGH: Mary and Myrna, have you ever served on a jury?

BROWN: Been summoned but never served.

REICHARD: I did, when I was 21 years old. Now I’ll get called to serve on a jury, but get thrown off as soon as one or other of the lawyers learn I have a law degree. But that’s another topic we’ll cover this season: the importance of impartial jurors.

ROUGH: Well, if you’ve ever on a federal jury, the court probably showed you a video that went something like this.

CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS: Hello, I’m John Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States. I welcome you to jury service in the federal courts and thank you for taking the time to serve your country and your community in this way. The right to a jury trial is guaranteed by the sixth and seventh amendments to the U.S. Constitution. But that right would mean very little if people like you didn’t take time from their busy lives to serve on juries. I know jury service can be difficult.

BROWN: Compelling topics. Well, you two are working on a total of 10 episodes. One is an interview with a famous courtroom artist. Tell us about that.

ROUGH: Well, Mary and I got to travel to Virginia where that artist, Bill Hennessy, lives.

REICHARD: You know when you’re in the presence of someone with unusual talent, and this man has decades of experience sketching courtroom scenes. Sometimes he only has a few seconds to get it down on paper, and he has high ethical standards for what he does draw. Here’s how he puts it:

BILL HENNESSY: Accuracy is one thing I’ve, it’s certainly been drilled into me over the years. There’s an ethical responsibility as an artist that’s just like a journalist. You gotta get it right and don’t embellish. Don’t get it wrong. And if you didn't’ see it, don’t draw it.

BROWN: Well, I can’t wait to hear this! Season three of Legal Docket Podcast is underway! Subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. The first episode lands today!

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Tuesday, August 9th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN: And I’m Myrna Brown.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: a sneak peak into season three of Legal Docket Podcast! Mary, how’s it going?

REICHARD: It’s going full steam ahead. Let’s pull in Jenny Rough who is my capable co-writer and co-host. Hi, Jenny!

JENNY ROUGH, GUEST: Hi, ladies!

BROWN: Well, you two hit a home run right out of the gate during the very first season in the summer of 2020. You went to #1 on iTunes in your category of podcasts.

ROUGH: We did, with our faithful listeners making that happen in a big way. And that’s fueled seasons two and three!

BROWN: Let’s take a moment and set up a clip from this season’s first episode that we posted this morning on the Legal Docket Podcast feed. A man on death row is fighting for religious rights in the execution chamber!

REICHARD: This one shattered me, let me tell you. John Henry Ramirez is on death row for the murder of Pablo Castro in Corpus Christi in 2004. He’s not fighting his conviction. He acknowledges his guilt. But Ramirez wants his pastor to be physically present with him at the moment of death, praying out loud and laying hands upon him.

Here’s some of what he told me when I visited death row earlier this year:

RAMIREZ CLIP: You know, it always comes back to that, oh, you had a terrible childhood. And I always like to curtail that. Eh, then, because it comes across, like the pity party thing, you know what I mean, it comes across so insincere, and so, like, an excuse, you know, and it's like, there's loads of people that grow up like I did, or worse, and they don't end up being murderers. Yeah, I had a bad childhood but I still made my choices.

REICHARD: You’ll hear a lot more from Ramirez in our first episode.

BROWN: Mary, what was it like coming face to face with someone you know murdered another person?

REICHARD: I saw a man who’d done a terrible thing, and I also saw a man who lives a life of meaning behind bars. He brings Christian ministry to other death row inmates and has for years. My heart ached for his victim and his victim’s family and I brought that out in the episode. I’ll just say it was hard.

ROUGH: I do want to point out, though, not all the episodes this season are quite that dramatic. Like a case about arbitration agreements. In arbitration, you agree to handle legal conflicts through private dispute resolution. In other words, you’re signing away your ability to sue in court. We’ll hear from arbitrator Tom Stipanowich we have all signed those agreements, whether we know it or not.

TOM STIPANOWICH: The real controversy with arbitration relates to contracts of adhesion, which means a company issues a contract and this is a contract you have to use if you want to do business with them. It's take it or leave it. And often people are not aware of the fine print, and certainly not when it comes to arbitration.

ROUGH: Arbitration dates back to ancient times.

STIPANOWICH: Let me just say, arbitration goes way back. There are examples of arbitration in the Bible. The fact is, we often refer to compromise decisions by arbitrators as, forgive me, splitting the baby.

ROUGH: Mary and Myrna, have you ever served on a jury?

BROWN: Been summoned but never served.

REICHARD: I did, when I was 21 years old. Now I’ll get called to serve on a jury, but get thrown off as soon as one or other of the lawyers learn I have a law degree. But that’s another topic we’ll cover this season: the importance of impartial jurors.

ROUGH: Well, if you’ve ever on a federal jury, the court probably showed you a video that went something like this.

CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS: Hello, I’m John Roberts, Chief Justice of the United States. I welcome you to jury service in the federal courts and thank you for taking the time to serve your country and your community in this way. The right to a jury trial is guaranteed by the sixth and seventh amendments to the U.S. Constitution. But that right would mean very little if people like you didn’t take time from their busy lives to serve on juries. I know jury service can be difficult.

BROWN: Compelling topics. Well, you two are working on a total of 10 episodes. One is an interview with a famous courtroom artist. Tell us about that.

ROUGH: Well, Mary and I got to travel to Virginia where that artist, Bill Hennessy, lives.

REICHARD: You know when you’re in the presence of someone with unusual talent, and this man has decades of experience sketching courtroom scenes. Sometimes he only has a few seconds to get it down on paper, and he has high ethical standards for what he does draw. Here’s how he puts it:

BILL HENNESSY: Accuracy is one thing I’ve, it’s certainly been drilled into me over the years. There’s an ethical responsibility as an artist that’s just like a journalist. You gotta get it right and don’t embellish. Don’t get it wrong. And if you didn't’ see it, don’t draw it.

BROWN: Well, I can’t wait to hear this! Season three of Legal Docket Podcast is underway! Subscribe wherever you listen to your podcasts. The first episode lands today!

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