Attorney Gives Advise On How To Get Away With Murder

I have often talked about the fact that Lawyers Professional Responsibility Boards more often work to shield lawyers from violations of the law and their professional rules than actually enforce the rules and discipline lawyers for misconduct. Well, surprise surprise, in Nashville a lawyer named Winston Bradshaw Sitton was actually disciplined. He was suspended for giving legal advise on how to get away with murder. His suspension? A measly four years. Four years for offering legal advise on how to actually get away with murder in our legal system. I guess something is better than nothing but really four years?  The kicker is that Sitton thought he did absolutely nothing wrong. 

ABC reported on the case. Here is the summary:

Attorney Winston Bradshaw Sitton reportedly wrote that if the woman wanted to kill her ex-boyfriend, she should "lure" him into her home and "claim" he broke in with intent to do her harm and she feared for her life, according to the Tennessee Supreme Court judgment.

Sitton, whose Facebook page described him as a lawyer, also emphasized in the comment that his advice was given "as a lawyer" and that if she was "remotely serious" she should delete the thread, because it could be used as proof of premeditation against her in trial, the court documents state.

"If you want to kill him, then lure him into your house and claim he broke in with intent to do you bodily harm and that you feared for your life," he wrote. "Even with the new stand your ground law, the castle doctrine is a far safer basis for use of deadly force."