It's always sad to say goodbye to great trial lawyers. And Cook was one of the best From ACJ:
Bobby Lee Cook, one of the premier trial lawyers in America and perhaps Georgia’s most famous attorney, died Friday at his mountain home in Cloudland. He was 94....the stories of Cook’s ingenuity, antics and legal prowess abound. Many have been repeated so many times over the years, lawyers take them as gospel although some are hard to completely verify. Like the time Cook was defending a man accused of murder and the state’s star witness testified he was certain Cook’s client had fired exactly two shots. Expecting this testimony, Cook stationed a friend outside the courthouse and had him fire off six rounds. When asked how many shots had just been fired, the state’s witness couldn’t say for sure. Cook’s client walked. Or the time in a moonshine case where Cook was cross-examining the local sheriff. When Cook accused the sheriff of not arresting another moonshiner because he’d been accepting bribes from him, the sheriff threw a Coke bottle at Cook, narrowly missing him. Cook dragged the sheriff down from the witness stand and began pummeling him. After a few moments, the trial judge told Cook to let the sheriff get up off the floor, saying, 'I think he’s had enough.' The jury acquitted Cook’s client in that case, too.
A remarkable life. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteThe last story, if a joke about adverse witnesses, is funny. If true, not so much.
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