Leonard Little Quotes

I've never been in prison. I've been in jail a lot. But I've never actually been sentenced to anything.

I know what it means to prosecute people.

I don't know what goes on in prison. I've never been in trouble with the police in my life.

So I went in front of the judge, and I had my St. Jude prayer book in my pocket and my St. Jude medal. And I'm standing there and that judge said I was found guilty, so he sentenced me to what the law prescribed: one to 14 years.

I represented many of these kids as they become young adults in the criminal justice system when I was a public defender. One way of reaching out is by the mind of experimentation.

I was never jailed. The fact is that I was arrested, but I went into a diversion programme, and by that time I'd already begun working in what was called anger management. It was a painful and awful moment.

Legal aid gets a bad press. Some rail against handing taxpayers' money to criminals; others attack fat cat lawyers, while some argue that we spend far more on legal aid than other countries. But let's get some facts straight: saying that legal aid is just about criminals is wrong - most goes to people before any decision is taken on their guilt.

Personally, I never had any negative encounters with the law growing up.

I was in trouble with the law from when I was real young.

Prosecution I have managed to avoid; but I have been arrested, charged in a police court, have refused to be bound over, and thereupon have been unconditionally released - to my great regret; for I have always wanted to know what going to prison was like.

One thing I know from personal experience, judges hate it when parties talk publicly about their cases. There are a lot of things about our criminal legal system that need to be changed, and this is just one of them. Prosecutors know how to play the press. Most defendants don't.

I would strongly recommend any young man to stay away from criminal law. It's not a good place to be, unfortunately.

I was kind of excited about going to jail the first time and I learnt some great dialogue.

The reality is, when you're representing someone that's guilty, you're in the position of taking that position.

Within the realm of the law, we have to be as severe as we can. We will not simply give capital punishment to all criminals, but those who deserve it will get it.

First we pin the convict's badge on him: then we examine his case.

In the long run, a flexible sentencing procedure which works to rehabilitate offenders offers the best hope in the majority of cases in the Federal courts.

The criminal defense attorney is misunderstood if not despised by most of society. It doesn't matter if we believe in our adversarial system and the ideal that everyone charged with a crime is entitled to a vigorous defense. Ideals give away to reality - defense lawyers working loopholes and angles to get their clients off.

We don't live in a world where, if you commit a crime, your life's over. We as a society believe in rehabilitation. We believe in second and third chances.

Judges have a hard job. It's not just putting someone in jail or slapping someone on the wrist and giving them a punishment, but it's protecting society as a whole.

Don't hire a prison consultant.

I been in jail twice. The first time was reform school: they got me for carrying burglar's tools, something like that. The morals charge was a frame-up.

As a law-enforcement official, as a politician, you are always going to have in the back of your mind the fear that someone you release will end up committing another crime, potentially a serious crime, during a period when they otherwise would have been incarcerated.

Johnnie Cochran was such a heroic figure for getting the acquittal of O.J. Simpson, and the acquittal was such a historical event because it was the first time that I'd seen somebody who looked like me have the criminal justice system work in their favor rather than against.

I think most of us are far removed from what goes on in our jails and the system. When I started working on 'Lucknow Central,' it was the first time I gave it some thought.