
Court stenographers often misunderstand Black English - benryon
http://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/01/stenographers-need-understand-black-english/581671/
======
JshWright
>“Why don’t you just give me a lawyer, dog?” Warren Demesme asked the police
when accused of sexual assault in 2017. The statements one makes to law
enforcement after requesting a lawyer are inadmissible—but Demesme’s rights
were ignored because, it was argued, he’d requested a “lawyer dog,” not an
actual attorney.

No one _actually_ thinks that was a misunderstanding, right?

~~~
treis
No, it's wildly misleading:

>And the basis for this comes from the second interview, where I believe the
defendant ambiguously referenced a lawyer— prefacing that statement with “if
y’all, this is how I feel, if y’all think I did it, I know that I didn’t do it
so why don’t you just give me a lawyer dog cause this is not what’s up.” As
this Court has written, “[i]f a suspect makes a reference to an attorney that
is ambiguous or equivocal in that a reasonable police officer in light of the
circumstances would have understood only that the suspect might be invoking
his right to counsel, the cessation of questioning is not required.” State v.
Payne, 2001- 3196, p. 10 (La. 12/4/02), 833 So.2d 927, 935 (citations omitted
and emphasis in original); see also Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452, 462,
114 S.Ct. 2350, 2357, 129 L.Ed.2d 362 (1994) (agreeing with the lower courts’
conclusion that the statement “[m]aybe I should talk to a lawyer” is not an
unambiguous request for a lawyer). In my view, the defendant’s ambiguous and
equivocal reference to a “lawyer dog” does not constitute an invocation of
counsel that warrants termination of the interview and does not violate
Edwards v. Arizona,

[https://www.lasc.org/opinions/2017/17KK0954.sjc.addconc.pdf](https://www.lasc.org/opinions/2017/17KK0954.sjc.addconc.pdf)

It's pretty obvious that the judge does not think that there are lawyer dogs
and that the word "dog" in that sentence has no bearing on the judges opinion.

~~~
unclenoriega
I was ready to agree with you, but the fact that opinion quotes "lawyer dog"
makes me question what the judge actually thinks (or is claiming to think).
Clearly it should be "lawyer, dog," instead of "lawyer dog". The judge does
seem to be quoting the transcript, however, which leads us to the point of the
article.

~~~
treis
I don't know why you're questioning anything. The judge gave his reasoning. He
said:

>defendant ambiguously referenced a lawyer— prefacing that statement...

It's crystal clear that he is referring to this portion of the defendants
statement:

>if y’all, this is how I feel, if y’all think I did it

I'm a little bit stunned that people actually think this is how the legal
system works. You think that a prosecutor would seriously argue that a
defendant didn't request a lawyer because they added "dog" to the end of that
request? Or that a judge would take that argument seriously?

~~~
JshWright
'In my view, the defendant’s ambiguous and equivocal reference to a “lawyer
dog” does not constitute an invocation of counsel that warrants termination of
the interview and does not violate'

Stunned or not, it seems pretty clear the judge is referring specifically to
the phrase "lawyer dog" in the summary of their judgement. I don't see how
'reference to a "lawyer dog"' could be interpreted any other way...

~~~
treis
In this case ambiguous or equivocal means:

>ambiguous or equivocal in that a reasonable police officer in light of the
circumstances would have understood only that the suspect might be invoking
his right to counsel

So the judge isn't saying that he is confused and thinks the statement is
ambiguous because he doesn't know what a lawyer dog is. He's saying it's
ambiguous because the statement didn't clearly request a lawyer, canine or
otherwise.

This isn't anything confusing to a lawyer or someone familiar with the law.
It's a well known legal standard. What the article claims is equivalent to
saying that Java takes a lot of memory because the code is so verbose. It's
just so obviously wrong to anyone with legal knowledge.

~~~
JshWright
That's all well and good, but the judge is quite clear that it is 'the
defendant’s ... reference to a “lawyer dog”' that is 'ambiguous and
equivocal'.

I'd be curious about your views on why the judge chose to include that
sentence if the 'reference to a “lawyer dog”'' wasn't relevant to his
decision?

~~~
treis
>That's all well and good, but the judge is quite clear that it is 'the
defendant’s ... reference to a “lawyer dog”' that is 'ambiguous and
equivocal'.

In that it was not a clear and unambiguous invocation of the right to counsel.

>I'd be curious about your views on why the judge chose to include that
sentence if the 'reference to a “lawyer dog”'' wasn't relevant to his
decision?

I don't know why he chose to quote "lawyer dog" and not more or less of the
defendant's quote. I'm not a mind reader. But when he writes:

>I believe the defendant ambiguously referenced a lawyer

It's clear that the ambiguity he is arguing does not derive from his lack of
knowledge of what a lawyer dog is.

------
treis
> In 2007, a Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals dissent claimed that when a black
> woman said, in terror, “He finna shoot me,” she may have been referring to
> something in the past, when in fact “finna” refers to the immediate future.

This one is ridiculous as well.

Here's the quote:

>“I need police. . . . Me and my mama’s boyfriend got into it, he went in the
house and got a pistol, and pulled it out on me. I guess he’s fixing to shoot
me, so I got in my car and [inaudible] left. I’m right around the corner from
the house.”

Here's the judge's argument:

> I hear the words: “I guess he finna shoot me.”

>the statement contains no auxiliary verb (e.g., “is” or “was”) connected to
“finna,” which I understand to be a slang contraction for “fixing to,” much as
“gonna” serves as a contraction for “going to.” See, e.g.,
[http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=finna](http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=finna)
(last visited Apr. 19, 2007) (defining “finna” as, “Abbreviation of ‘fixing
to.’ Normally means ‘going to.’”).8 The lack of an auxiliary verb renders
determination of whether Gordon intended to imply the past or present tense an
exercise in sheer guesswork.

[http://www.opn.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/07a0181p-06.pdf](http://www.opn.ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/07a0181p-06.pdf)

The majority said that "he's fixing to shoot me"/"he finna shoot me" means
that there is an ongoing attempt by the defendant. The dissenting judge said
that's not something you can definitively conclude absent an "is" or "was"
given that the rest of the statement was in past tense. So when the author of
the article writes:

>when in fact “finna” refers to the immediate future

It's obvious he hasn't actually bothered to go and read the opinion. Or I
suppose it's possible that a professional writer doesn't understand that you
can use future tense when recounting stories in the past.

------
code_duck
“Black people, including kids, use Black English alongside standard English
rather than exclusively.”

Okay, so it’s solved. Since according to the author all black people can
communicate in the standard English dialect, I would suggest to use that when
speaking with court employees. This is what I do. I do not address police
officers as “dog”, for example, and expect 100% positive results. I would say
“sir”, which is also in contrast to how I speak to my peers in daily life,
despite the fact that I am white.

~~~
sokoloff
> “Why don’t you just give me a lawyer, dog?”

That this was not interpreted as a request for a lawyer and (worse) that that
interpretation was upheld on appeal is a grave miscarriage of justice, IMO.

~~~
code_duck
Sure, it’s a clear intentional misinterpretation. Probably not the worst
miscarriage of justice that occurred in that person’s case. Probably they were
arrested for something that shouldn’t have even been a crime in the first
place. But the person who said it is also an idiot.

~~~
unclenoriega
> Probably they were arrested for something that shouldn’t have even been a
> crime in the first place.

I wouldn't say that.

> [T]wo juvenile victims told investigators that Warren Demesme, 22, sexually
> assaulted them. Baddoo said one victim reported that Demesme “would portray
> the rape as a game, and the child articulated the sexual contact caused her
> pain.”

[https://www.theadvocate.com/new_orleans/news/article_1ecdd37...](https://www.theadvocate.com/new_orleans/news/article_1ecdd375-9c45-5aeb-8316-295c864c8a2d.html)

~~~
code_duck
“Probably” indicates a likelihood, not a statement about one particular
instance. You’re discussing one particular instance. Statistically, very many
people arrested for things that I do not believe should be a crime, such as
marijuana possession, and that is to what I am referring.

~~~
sokoloff
Your prior sentence _literally_ ended in "in that person's case". IMO, it
takes a significantly tortured reading of your words to interpret them as you
suggest above.

~~~
code_duck
I said “probably” because I didn’t know anything about it. You’re making a
bizarre and pointless assertion and I’m not going to try to bother figuring
out what you’re talking about. You seem to think we have them serve
philosophical differences or opposing facts, but in reality, you do seem to
have had a hard time understanding the phrasing of what I wrote. Sorry.

I said “probably… In that person’s case”. That means, if you randomly select
one case, according to me, the likelihood is that some more serious bullshit
occurred during the supposed application of justice. I said this in the
absence of knowledge about the specifics of this case, and in fact, since I’m
speaking in generalities, the specifics of this case don’t matter, at all.

If the legal system was to analyze the situation that you said was such a
great miscarriage of justice, they would not be concerned about the underlying
crime. They would be concerned about the legal principle of whether it was
legal to interpret someone’s words in that way. I think we both agree it was
unfair. What was your point again?

------
burfog
One of the biggest ways to lift marginalized groups out of poverty would be to
provide speech therapy. This needs to be as universal as teaching history,
math, and science. We're choosing to leave people with a huge disadvantage
when we pretend that dialects aren't a problem that can and should be fixed.

~~~
JshWright
I think the author of this article says it well...

"In fact, Black English is not deficient but alternate. There is no scientific
basis for judging Black English grammatical structures as faulty or unclear"

~~~
burfog
Riiight...

You could say that of French too. The trouble is, French is very deficient
when judged as English. French grammatical structures are faulty and unclear
in an English-speaking environment.

Likewise for Japanese being judged as Korean. It is deficient, faulty, and
unclear. The fact that it is an alternate is unimportant. Japanese is very bad
Korean.

The point of a language is to communicate. If you can't communicate, you need
to fix that.

~~~
unclenoriega
The problem (IMO) isn't your suggestion that marginalized people be taught to
use and understand General American, it's that you characterize speaking Black
English as a pathology.

It can be important to speak the prestige language if one wants to advance in
society, but it's not a medical problem to speak a local dialect. Would you
advise an aspiring London barrister from Yorkshire to see a therapist or watch
some YouTube videos on RP?

~~~
krapp
It is odd that English is accepted as having many local dialects... except
among black people, who are just too ignorant to speak it properly.

~~~
LyndsySimon
As a white man with a strong Southern accent - when I don't suppress it, which
I do in professional settings - I assure you that looking down on someone
because of their dialect is not solely determined by skin color :)

~~~
krapp
Fair enough, but skin color is definitely a factor, particularly where law
enforcement is concerned.

