JUSTICE FOR ALL
Pasadena Weekly, CA
Dec. 2007
‘Attorney to the Stars’ Mark Geragos is also a hero in the Armenian
community
You can’t turn on a TV these days without seeing criminal defense
attorney Mark Geragos commenting on a high-profile criminal case on
"Larry King Live" or the "Nancy Grace" show or the "Today" show or
"Good Morning America."
These days, Geragos is known as attorney to the stars — infamous
cultural luminaries, really, people like former Clinton insider
Susan McDougal; former California Congressman Gary Condit, who came
under suspicion in the death of former Capitol intern Chandra Levy;
actress Winona Ryder in her shoplifting problem in Beverly Hills;
Michael Jackson, with whom he worked for a while when Jackson was
accused of molesting a boy; murderer Scott Peterson, who now sits
on death row; and now Gary Anderson, trainer for recently indicted
baseball great Barry Bonds.
Anderson was released Nov. 15 after spending most of the year in jail
for refusing to testify against Bonds, who was indicted for allegedly
lying under oath about using steroids. Geragos told Forbes.com that
Anderson will likely refuse to testify at Bonds’ trial.
But for all the celebrities he’s represented over the years, Geragos
is pretty much an everyday criminal defense attorney whose firm has
taken on almost a quarter of its clients free of charge.
Part of the reason for Geragos’ generosity with both his time and
skills is the intense pride that the 50-year-old father takes in
his Armenian heritage, and much of that pro bono work is focused on
helping his community.
Along with being a trustee with the Armenian Assembly of America,
Geragos, according to brief profiles on Wikipedia, Armenipedia and
other Web cites operated by various organizations, serves on the
advisory committee of Birthright Armenia. He’s also chairman of
Armenian Bone Marrow Donor Registry and has been a member of the
Armenia Fund International board of trustees.
Geragos was also one of three lawyers in two federal class action
lawsuits against New York Life Insurance for policies that never
paid death benefits to relatives of victims of the Armenian Genocide
of 1915 in which 1.5 million Armenians were slaughtered by Ottoman
Turks. The two cases were settled for more than $37.5 million.
His celebrity was apparently not lost on jurors he was selecting
recently for the trial in Pasadena of a young Armenian man accused
of murder. "They were perplexed as to how it was I was in Pasadena
and representing a person who is charged with murder. ‘How would he
have the money?’ His mom’s a recent immigrant," Geragos said of the
questions he read on the faces of those prospective jurors.
But the fact is Geragos, who lives with his family in nearby La Cañada
Flintridge, continues making his mark — without much fanfare — as a
criminal defense lawyer in the Pasadena Courthouse. In fact, shortly
after representing Susan McDougal, who was also charged but later
acquitted of stealing from conductor Zubin Mehta, Geragos served as the
attorney for Michelle Holden, former wife of Pasadena City Councilman
Chris Holden, who was ultimately convicted of molesting the family’s
teenage male babysitter.
We caught up with Geragos last week while he was having lunch at the
Green Street Tavern in Old Pasadena.
— Kevin Uhrich
Pasadena Weekly: How did you get so involved with Larry King and
Nancy Grace and all those shows?
Mark Geragos: It started, actually, with Susan McDougal, and that
really when cable started to come in, because that was all Whitewater
at that time, and I’ve had the good fortune to have a series of cases
that attract attention, I guess … You can look at that from two
different perspectives. Most recently I’ve been involved with the
Barry Bonds’ indictment and I represent Gary Anderson, who is his
trainer. We just got [Anderson] freed after 51 weeks, which is kind
of a throwback to McDougal and the civil contempt [citiation].
(In 1996, McDougal spent 17 months behind bars for refusing to
answer questions related to Independent Prosecutor Kenneth Starr’s
investigation of the Whitewater real estate scandal involving former
President Clinton, who later pardoned McDougal before leaving office
in 2001.)
In my opinion, there aren’t enough voices from the defense side
articulating on TV why this pro-prosecution and pro-law-and-order
mentality may not be the be-all and end-all.
It seems somewhat ironic that you have all these high-profile cases,
when you and your firm do a lot of pro bono work.
Over the years, fully 25 percent of our practice has been pro bono.
Actually, you are very involved in the Armenian community. How
important is that work to you?
To me that’s the best thing that I do. This year, we raised over $15
million for Armenia Fund in the Thanksgiving telethon. I’m one of the
three lawyers who worked on the genocide class action cases and we’ve
recovered over $37.5 million. Just in this past month we distributed
another $4 million to charities that came out of that work, so it’s
pretty satisfying.
I guess the biggest thing now, legally speaking, is still Peterson,
because he’s on death row. Are you still his lawyer?
We still consult with and represent him in the civil matters and I’ll
continue to do so until someone tells me not to.
I can guess the answer, but what is your opinion of the death penalty
at this point?
I never thought that the death penalty made any sense. Still don’t.
Three strikes?
Same thing. One of the good things about [LA County DA] Steve Cooley
has been a more judicious use of [the] three strikes [law]. You go
out of LA County and some of the horror stories you hear are just
unbelievable. But we are fortunate in LA County that Steve has a more
enlightened view of how to use it.
That goes to the next contention, which is the criminal justice system
is broken. How do you go about fixing that, in your opinion?
Part of the problem is the fact that so many people have this view
of defendants getting off and all of that. That’s not the problem
with the criminal justice system. The problem is innocent people are
being convicted. That is clearly the biggest problem.
But how can that be reversed?
Well, I think there are a lot of things. There needs to be more
resources for public defenders … you know the problem is 95 percent
of the cases that go through the justice system involve people who
are indigent, and that’s a real problem. Because they can’t afford
representation. Public defenders are strapped. They don’t have enough
resources, and it’s a real problem.
Has the PATRIOT Act increased your workload at all?
It has and it hasn’t. It’s increased the workload because I’m
generally more suspicious of how evidence is obtained. But generally
the mitigation of those things is really on the periphery.
It’s the implementation of it that I think is a bit scary.
–Boundary_(ID_CBWedSsyibCUH/WWdapo+w)–