How Many Lawyers Does It Take?

For several days now, I have been reading about Karla Homolka’s attempt to leash the press by seeking a provisional injunction, effectively preventing reports about her life after prison. Justice Paul-Marcel Bellavance of the Quebec Superior Court rejected the request as inimical to freedom of the press just last week. Now, Homolka will seek an interlocutory injunction “to restrict media coverage…once she leaves prison.” This is a narrower restriction than the one sought before, but a restriction of the press it is.

Homolka’s lawyers have been spinning a story that poor Karla is terrified about her life on the outside, and the hounding press will only contribute to her state of terror, her lawyers have been saying. Yet, the interlocutory injunction they seek typically would require her to appear in court as a witness, which essentially will bring more press upon her. Perhaps her lawyers have calculated that the strategy would bring short term pain for long term gain.

Which brings the point about her lawyers (in the plural). On Thursday, 30 June, the NP made a reference to Homolka’s legal team. On Saturday: “Lawyers will ask for temporary media ban.” Friday’s (1 July) G&M prints a CP story:

the convicted killer has a team of lawyers filing last-minute legal motions as if she were a death row inmate facing execution.

A legal team? How fashionably uppity. O.J. Simpson had a legal team; Jean Chretien has a legal team; Michael Jackson had a legal team. Presumably, they had legal “teams” because they could afford them. But Homolka’s team is filing injunction after injunction in court with “her legal aid team,” much in the same way as the powerful millionaires because expense is no object. The state picks up the tab for her.

I wonder if the state pays for Tim Danson, the lawyer who represents the families of the two girls who Karla helped to capture, confine, rape, torture, and slain.

Now, before my libertarian readers jump up, I am not saying that she should not have representation. But how many lawyers precisely will the state provide for Karla’s Team at the taxpayer’s expense? So far, two have been named in the media: Christian Lachance and Sylvie Bordelais (there are likely more).

These two are no Johnny Cochranes, to be sure, but two is one too many. Considering the state’s willingness to provide Homolka with a team of lawyers at no expense, I would expect that more filings in court, and more legal pursuits in her name will take place.

Cross posted from Civitatensis