The Connect- with Johnny Mitchell - The Top Criminal Lawyer In LA Reveals How He Keeps Gangsters & Drug Traffickers Out Of Prison

Episode Date: February 25, 2024

Criminal Defense Lawyer, Nicholas Rosenberg, has defended some of the most dangerous people in the criminal world of Los Angeles. He walks us through the unconventional road he took to criminal law. He goes into detail about how the criminal justice system works, the corruption, and the tips he has for anyone that gets caught up in the law. Plus a discussion about a current case he’s working that is on the path to become an historical case in the state of California! Go Support Rosenberg! Documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XANVDdM0IcE IG: https://www.instagram.com/attorneyrosenberg/ Website: https://losangelesdefenders.com/ This Episode Is Brought To You By The Following Sponsor: RocketMoney! Visit https://www.rocketmoney.com/connect and stop wasting your money TODAY! Join The Patreon For Bonus Content! https://www.patreon.com/theconnectshow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So I was in the sheriff machine. I was in the district attorney machine. And I was in the public defender machine. So the DA wouldn't hire me and the public defender wouldn't hire me because I was in the machine. But what I do now is basically I shut down the government. Today's guest is Nick Rosenberg, better known in L.A. as attorney Rosenberg. Ask anyone in Los Angeles who the number one criminal defense lawyer is, it is undoubtedly this man.

Rosenberg has been defending high-level criminals in LA for years, murderers, gang members, high-level cartel dealers. This guy gets not guilty verdicts like no other lawyer we've ever spoken with. He gave us insight into the inner workings of the criminal justice system. He talks about how he manipulates trials and gets not guilty verdicts. What to do if you get arrested? Andy spoke about a current case that he's working on involving street vigilantes who are protecting vendors and cart owners in L.A. against violence. That's turning out to be a historical case in Los Angeles.

If you get in trouble, contact this man, attorney Rosenberg. And of course, check us out for bonus content with Nick Rosenberg on Patreon. Patreon.com slash The Connect Show. Without further ado, it is my great pleasure to give you Attorney Rosenberg right here in the Connect with Johnny Mitchell. Beyond identifying yourself, you're under no compulsion to talk to the cops. And let's be honest, right? It's scary to get arrested, put in the interrogation room, and they say, this is a hot one, bro.

You're looking at 50 to life. We've got your car. We've got your cell phone. And your crimey gave you up. My slogan on that, and everyone should learn it, practice it, is I have no statement. I want my lawyer. So then they put you back in the jail cell, and we call that the tank. And they can put an undercover cop or an informant.

And they can record. Don't talk in the tank. That's when I see the lights behind me, start the flash. And I didn't even think. I just hit it. I was driving like my life depended on. Then I parked the car, popped out, closed the door, and I started running. And he pulls out a burner, shank.

It's like six inches. And he passes it to me. And he goes, here, that's yours. Don't ever leave the cell block without this. He was the reason I made it out of that place alive. Mr. Rosenberg. I won't call you the better call Saul of Logger. Angeles. I think you're a better lawyer than him. But well, Tom Hagan from the Godfather.

I'll take that. I'll take that. Appreciate you. Absolutely, man. So you are a criminal defense attorney. One of the top criminal defense attorneys in one of the biggest cities in America, the world, one of the most important cities. This is an absolutely fascinating place to be. So glad to have you on here. So we're just going to get into it. give us a little bit of your background and how you came to law and criminal defense law. Sure. So I'm an L.A. native. I went to John Burroughs Junior High and then Fairfax High. So I'm a West Sider, right? I didn't grow up in a neighborhood per se, but I encountered the African American gangsters. So that's kind of how I grew up. So our schools were. You know, here's the Jews, the Jewish Americans.

And then there's no offense to anybody. But in Spanish, we say the Negroes, right? So that's kind of how I grew up. Fairfax High, 4.3 GPA, 25 college units. And I played football. So I was kind of one of those guys that was in every click. I was good. And they knew me.

You're a complete anomaly. You're one of these Jewish guys that grew up around, urban black culture. And so you have both of those elements in you. Yeah. So football, one of three white dudes who started, I started fullback and defensive and offensive line.

So they called me Conan because I was like a raider, right? I was late hits. I got in fights. We had seven out of 10 games, cleared the benches. And the coach said, Rosenberg, if you start one more fight, I'm taking you from the team. So there was one play we did. I forget, we played, you know, Norban, Washington, John Locke, Star Jordan, Compton.

That was the league we were in, right? And there was one time when this guy was starting a fight with me, I put my hands up like that to show coach I wasn't the one, right? So that's kind of how, you know, I developed that heart. Husspa, as your people would say. Right. So you go on to college, you went to Berkeley, but not for law. What did you go there for? Correct.

So I was always good in science. And also I was a great writer. So when I went to Cal, I was a philosophy major. But on the first day of school, a friend of mine from high school who was in them, you know, she's in my calculus class. She was enrolling in architecture. And I said, architecture. They have a major for that.

So I went to the School of Environmental Design, did very well. And I also was pre-med setting the curve in O-CAM a couple times. And I worked for professors medical laboratories. But when I graduated, you know, I didn't want to get a job, right? I was great in school. So I went to film school, city college of San Francisco. And after one semester, I was shooting 16 millimeter. Wow.

Yeah. So you're just kind of this brilliant guy, but you didn't know what you wanted to do. You were just jumping from profession to profession to profession. And it was years later when you came to law. So how did that come about? And then how and why criminal law? Sure. When I graduated, I was living in the co-ops. So that's kind of a frat for, you know, the artists and the musicians. And there was a girl I met who was in a 10-year-long relationship with somebody who was graduated from law school. And she just finished up her master's in Latin American Studies at UCLA. And the summer I met her, she was starting law school at Hastings College of Law, which is basically in the tenderloin of San Francisco. It's a great law school.

So I ended up stealing her from him and I moved in with her to the law dorm. I was in film school, so I was shooting a documentary on their moot court. So I had all the lesbianas were shooting for me, City College San Francisco. And then after a while, I helped her with some of her papers. And I said, you know what, I can do this. So I cut my hair and started to get involved in community organizing in the tenderloin. So you had long hair before you became clean cut. Yeah. When I was, you know, I had a sole patch, the long hair. I wrote a Beamer R90 rolling my own cigarettes. Yeah. So you had a, you had an era. You lived a life. People don't know. You're 56 years old. Right. You look young, but you've been around a long time.

You ended up marrying this woman, correct? Yes, I did. Gangster. She helped, she was the reason that you started to get active in the community. Did you become a public defender? First of all, where did you go to law school when you eventually made that jump? So I went to USF, University of San Francisco, Jesuit school, private in the hate Ashbury. And, you know, I got scholarships.

Wow. was good at getting, because I did so much community work. Before law school, I was a nonprofit director for a group called Adopt-a-block. And it was like public safety, right? So I worked with the cops and the city attorney. We weren't criminalizing, but we were holding property owners accountable under a theory of nuisance for the crack houses. So I was shutting down, you know, the open air, smoking crack on the street, the crack houses.

the crack houses. That's what I did. So I knew all the cops. Right. And did you like law enforcement? Or how did you view them at the time? So they were our partners. So what we would do is I used to teach people how to call the cops for drug transactions.

So I had neighborhood watch groups. I worked with the merchants, the religious institutions. So San Francisco, the politics are very progressive. but I was part of this task force called the Lower Eddy Task Force, and that was funded when they built the Moscone Center. So they gave the neighborhood a million dollars. And this was like 1996. So through that, any politician who runs in San Francisco,

they have to come to the tenderline. So we had an undue influence on San Francisco politics. So I started as a little safety organizer, making 23 grand a year. And I thought that that was amazing at the time. But you're a rich kid. Your mom's side of the family had money. Did that pass on to you?

No. So my dad was an engineer. He grew up in the Bronx. And he came to L.A. in the 50s during the space race with Russia. He worked on the American equivalent of Sputnik. So I still have his rocket, you know, engine. high pin from the mid-50s. And so we did well, but we weren't like super wealthy. Okay. So you still had to work. Because a lot of people, you know, a lot of people get into social work,

especially Jewish people. A lot of times they do it because they can afford to because, you know, community organizing pays no money. Right. So, but it doesn't matter because they have a trust fund. But it sounds like you kind of fall somewhere in the middle. You didn't just have endless money. I started working at farmers market at the age of 13. Okay, so you've been working. You know what it is to work. I had to work. Right.

Then I was a cook. So does this, does money motivate you to do what you do now? Or is it serving the community? Like, how do you see what you do? Sure. So Berkeley is a very interesting place. And I was exposed to a lot of stuff. But what I do now is basically I shut down the government, right?

Now, I'm not a revolutionary. I'm a proud American. Support the military. And I support the good cops. Okay. But it's the government, I'm a roadblock for the government taking people and putting them in a box for the rest of their life. So that's kind of my motivation. I got to pay the bills.

I got to eat. and, you know, I'm a good lawyer. And that's why my name is good out in the street. And, you know, cops come up to me all the time. In fact, I was doing the Alex Enumerado case in Victorville. And I'll tell you a little bit about my Friday. We touched on it. But I'll say hi to the cops, right?

There's a lot of people who are hating on the cops. But, you know, it doesn't benefit me and my client to have cops. hate Rosenberg. So I say, hey, gentlemen, how's it going? And there was a friendly detective, and he puts his hand out, so I'm going to do the shake. And I asked them, who you guys got in the Super Bowl? We started chatting. And I told that friendly cop, I'd be on this show. And he's like, Johnny Mitchell? He's like, the connect. And I'm like, yeah. And so he pulls it up. And he told me, bro, that's a two-hour show. Yeah. So if you're lucky, we might go three, if you guys, really juicy stories. The San Bernardino County sheriffs, the Victorville station, they wanted me to

give a shout out. So there it is. Well, hey, we're flattered. And if I ever take a pinch in one of those districts, I'll know I'm in good company. Hey, everyone, let me take a minute to thank our sponsor for today's show, Rocket Money. I gave Rocket Money a try when they came on board to sponsor the show. And I got to tell you, it already located an old subscription of mine that I've been paying for for over a decade. And I was able, just burning money, I was able to get rid of that. Thanks to Rocket Money. I had a gym membership from Oregon. I haven't lived there since 2012. I've been paying like $10 a month for this crappy gym that I had in Oregon. And I located it thanks to Rocket Money. That's what Rocket Money does. With all of the thousands of streaming subscriptions and services that are

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Mm-hmm. Did you choose criminal law while you were still in law school? Right. Did you? So criminal law kind of chose me. So I'll try to set it up for you. My mentor in the community was aligned with the San Francisco sheriff. So we could communicate directly with Mike Hennessy. Mike Hennessy was a non-sworn peace officer graduate of USF.

And he was a progressive sheriff. So I worked in my community with a lot of ex-offenders. right, people who had cleaned up their lives from drugs. We had an organizer who was basically a Black Panther. And the way my mentor got her job was through a guy named Johnny Spain. Johnny Spain is one of the San Quentin Six. And he was shackled with 30 pounds of chains during his trial. And the first African-American judge in the Northern District of California,

he granted Johnny's writ of habeas corpus for that. So he's one of the San Quentin Six who discovered my mentor, and then my mentor discovered me. So you saw these injustices in the system, and that sounds like that's kind of what motivated you to go fight these injustices from the inside as a defense lawyer. Well, I worked for San Francisco Prisoner Legal Services. when I was in law school. So we were enforcing Title 15, the jail regulations, and we had the power to actually sue the county from inside the sheriff. So through that, I got to learn all about the jail.

The attorneys just go to the attorney room, but we could go everywhere. We inspected the safety cells, the SVPs. So I did that, and then I clerked at the city attorney's office, and this was when I was in law school, I was on nonprofit, board of directors for housing corporations. And then,

so my wife was a staff attorney at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and she did immigration, administrative law, what they call civil. So when I became an ex-turn there, they had to put me in criminal. So I did, worked up the cases

at the Ninth Circuit, the staff attorneys orally present cases to the judges. So one of my cases I worked on ended up getting published. It's called United States versus fine. And it's a fraud decision. And you won that decision? Well, I worked it up and presented it.

And the panel realized that there was a real legal issue. So they sent it to judges chambers. Okay. So you won that. You helped on that case and you got a favorable decision. Right. I identified a novel legal issue that ended up getting published by the Ninth Circuit. So did you end up becoming a public defender or did you just go straight to a private practice?

Right. So I was a public defender, but what I wanted to set up was in during law school and before, I was active in the community courts. And that was run by district attorney Halanan and then then district attorney Kamala Harris. So I was in the sheriff machine, I was in the district attorney machine, and I was in the public defender machine because I worked on Jeff Adachi's campaign. And I was trying to bring everybody together for restorative justice. So what happened is because of that, I got canceled out. So the DA wouldn't hire me and the public defender wouldn't hire me because I was in the machine, right? and so I ended up in to Larry County as a public defender in 2005. Wow.

Oh, and then I forgot to mention my wife passed away right when I became a lawyer. So I was in a period, you know, grieving. And then I moved out of my loft in San Francisco and was a baby public defender. Wow. So you knew Kamala Harris? Yeah. I worked with her. I met with her.

And I'm familiar with it. You know, see, when I started, it was the mayor Willie Brown machine. And where Mayor Brown is like, if you know him, it's patronage, politics. So the mayor's office of neighborhood services, I went there all the time. So now you're moved out of Glitzy San Francisco and you're making your bones in, you know, a shithole county like Tulare. Correct. If you live there. Well, so I'm sorry.

The cities of like, I think it's Frisalia. Yeah, Vysalia. and I think it's close to Fresno or Modesto. 45 minutes away from, sometimes they call it Fredno. Right. So you're going to get a lot of experience as a criminal defense lawyer working in those areas. So you're a PD, public defender. What are your thoughts on public defenders?

You know, a lot of them, we call them dump trucks in jail because they got so many cases. They just try to get you to take the first plea deal, right? But I know there's some really good public defenders, too. What was your experience like as a PD? And why did you ultimately, and when did you make the jump to being a private lawyer? Sure. So my first day of being a public defender, I got my little office and they had a stack of files this high. I think it was 55 cases.

And they basically said, Rosenberg, you're running calendar tomorrow. So I had to figure it out. You know, what is this? But misdemeanors, I started a misdemeanor, so it's driving without a license, DUIs, DVs, trespasses, right? But I figured out how to do it, and I just started running calendar. Now, where I was, I had a great judge. Her name was Elizabeth Crant, RIP, but we just sat in front of her every day and tried to beat up on the DAs. So what I learned to do, because of my experience with the night circuit,

I'm very deferential to judges because I'm not, I never argue. I'm very formal and that's my legal style. So we would, we would just battle it with the DAs. It was all very personal, Vysalia, more churches than liquor stores, 2% African-American, 55% Latino and about 35% white. But everyone, it's a religion. And then everyone works for the prisons on the jury pool. Yeah. So because I'd been in San Francisco, you know, I dressed like a city slicker. And as a public defender, they always thought I was a private lawyer. And remember, this is such a small community that you go to the market and you'll see jurors on your last trial.

Yeah, they haven't seen a lot of Jews go through there. No. So when I did juvenile was interesting. So they have the Nazi lowriders and the woods out there. Pecklewoods. Yeah, Pecklewoods. So I was doing a case for a guy who was 13. I think it was a robbery. So I put out my hand. I said, Nicholas Rosenberg, I'm representing your son.

When he put out his arm, I saw like a four-inch swastika. But as the lawyer, I'm focused on the client. And the dad wanted his son to get taught a lesson. What do you mean? Like he wanted him to go do time? Yeah, he wanted him to go and suck it up inside. Probably, you know, we had camp, was up to a one-year commitment. But I have to represent the client.

Do you feel any kind of way when you're representing a client that, as a Jew, you're representing a client that has swastikas on him? Does that affect you at all? Or do you just write that off as ignorance and keep it moving? So I'm a Sixth Amendment right to counsel lawyer. And, you know, they've asked me if I would represent. present Trump, who politically, you know, he's not my guy. But I separate that stuff out because what I'm really doing is I'm representing a young man. And if he's getting a juvenile strike, right, I owe him a

duty of loyalty. I owe him a duty of confidentiality. So as a Jewish-American person, I understand the concept of persecution, right? Sure. And because of that, I think that's why some people say hire a Jewish lawyer because Jews in America, we are outsiders, even though everyone thinks that we're insiders running everything. So I can set that aside. Dad is dad, but here's my client, right? And if I mess up, I'm reviewed by the Court of Appeal. Now, as a PD, as you start to get some time in the system, do you start to get more and more

serious cases. Is that kind of how it works? They start you off when you're a brand new public defender with misdemeanors. Is that how it works? And you start moving up to felonies and more serious felonies. What were some of those felony cases? What was the most active common felony case that you took in a county like Tulare? Sure. So the way it works is they give you your assignment. So I think I did misdemeanors for about a year. And then I wanted to go into felonies, but they put me in juvie. And I was kind of disappointed because I was the guy. I would do any trial.

Yeah. So if they said Rosenberg do this trial, I did it. So I did. Can we talk about that for a second? Yeah. There's different kinds of attorneys. Trial lawyers are the sharks. They're people who tend to love the spotlight, the performance.

Does that describe you? Did you love being up there, getting a rush? The way I do when I do stand-up comedy. right? You're in front of a crowd, high pressure. Tell us about that. Did that get you going when you just, when you went to trial and beat the DA? Did that do something for you? Yeah. So I'm a trial lawyer. I'm not an appellate lawyer. A lot of people think that trial lawyers are just a lot of like sizzle. But we're, the way we win, the way I win is with the stake. So when I write my motions before the trial, that's, when I win, because that's when I contain what the government will do. Without the judge ruling, they'll put on everything. They'll put on prior arrest. They'll put on all this gang evidence, and they'll really go after my guy. So that's where I actually went. Now, I have kind of a colorful personality. I like to entertain people. I'm animated. And I love doing trials.

now I do high stakes life in prison, 50 to life trials. But just to go back to something about when I was a public defender in Juvie, that's where I got interested in the gangsters. Because if there's a fist fight at school, they'll add a gang enhancement. Wow. And they're giving these guys juvenile probation with gang terms, do not associate, right? And they're setting these kids, you know, at 16, if you get a robbery, especially with a gang enhancement or a gun enhancement,

that's an adult strike. So I did a really deep dive on the gang enhancements. They had a 10-point gang member validation criteria. And I challenged that. And I wanted to find where are they getting this? So I actually did a subpoena to the Department of Justice in California. And I spoke to one of these really high-level sergeants, and he told me the origin of that validation criteria is the entry into the Cal Gang database.

So that's back when they had that. And now, as a trial lawyer, I really do the gangsters. Okay, I do the gang enhancements. I do the gang conspiracy. And that's one of my specialties. Are those gang criteria still the same as it was in the 1990s? So LAPD uses similar criteria. So what are the criteria?

Self admits to a peace officer. Self admits in a custodial facility. In other words, are you going to run south side? Are you going to run PISA? Or maybe, you know, my guys don't, but you might go PC. Protective custody. Yeah, protective custody. Tattoos, gang attire, possessing notebooks with, you know,

people like to draw out gang graffiti. So we call that indicia of gang membership. Now, if you're not a full-fledged validated gang member, then you can be an associate. So an associate, you know, you got no ink. Maybe you have hair, right? But you hang out with the homies and they'll get FI cards on you. So FI cards, field identification cards. So let's say we're at the park after.

10 p.m. and we're drinking and you know you're 18 I'm 19 they're going to go up to us they don't arrest us but they say hey Rosenberg we know you bro you're from so and so and you go by the moniker of Seda and then they write that down and they're documenting that I'm with you and if you're a known gangster if I go to trial they're going to bring that up as an FI card and so you were saying part of how you win cases or at least get reduced sentences is before you go to trial, you have a motion to bury or not allow that evidence from the prosecutor into trial, correct? That's correct. One of the main sources of this for trial is evidence code section 352. And 352 says that if evidence is not very probative but is prejudiced.

The trial court has the discretion to exclude that. So you convinced the judge that this is prejudicial. Correct. Now, we'll talk about the gang enhancements because the statutes have changed. It used to be, let's say you have a murder with the gang enhancement. It used to be that during the case in chief, the prosecutor proves the murder and the gang enhancement. So the jury hears, you know, Florentia, 800 members, common signs and symbols, you know, with your hand, for example. And they hear that they commit murder, attempt murder, kidnap, extortion.

They show them graffiti and they have to prove two prior convictions that we call predicate offenses. But the jury's hearing all that while they're deciding did Rosenberg's client commit the murder. So they changed the rule about two years ago, and now we can get a bifurcated trial on the gang enhancement. So what that means is the jury has to convict on the underlying offense before hearing from the gang detective who renders an opinion, is it for the benefit of an association with or at the direction of a criminal street gang with the specific intent to aid further or promote. criminal activity by gang members. Wow. So that's... That's the enhancement. Right. And that's after the decision is made, you know, a guilty or not guilty plea is made by the... Spring weekends are all about family, sunshine, and evenings on the patio. Before everyone arrives, I stop by my local total wine and more to grab a great bottle to share. With such a wide

selection and the lowest prices, it's easy to find something amazing for every... everyone to enjoy. If you're not sure what to pick, their friendly guides can help. Find what you love and love what you find only at Total Wine and More. Shop total wine and more. In store or online. Spirits not sold in Virginia and North Carolina. Drink responsibly. Be 21. The jury, and then they, the jury, that same jury also decides about the enhancement. In a second mini trial. Interesting. But here's how criminal justice reformed. works in California, in my opinion, is it sounds good, but what ends up happening is the judges let gang evidence in, in the case in chief, for motive, lack of mistake. So gang evidence does

come in. And that's, so I did a trial, uh, the prosecutor's theory was that my client knew that another gang member gave a statement to the police. And that was the alleged, uh, motive for the killing. In that case, I was able to exclude that theory from coming in to the case in chief. So that was an example of what I call motions in limine. In LA, they say 402 motions, but you know, you have to litigate this stuff because if you don't push back on it, the judge will let it in, and it's very prejudicial. You know, the people that we get on our juries, they're the people that go to the mall, right? So if you know too much about prison, criminal justice, or if your dad was chief of police in, you know, Wichita, Kansas, I'm going to kick that juror. The DA is going to kick

jurors who have been arrested, whose brother is wrongfully serving 20 years for a murder he didn't commit. So the extremes get kicked off. We call that a peremptory challenge. But we're left with people who are more or less in the middle. In the middle, right. So would you say that you, you know, barring any kind of factors, would you say that you try to take most of your clients to trial to win? Or are you trying to just get better plea deals for them? Like, how much of the time are you fighting and how much of the time are you trying to

plea down? Sure. So a lot of my cases in L.A. County, I work with the hardcore gang DAs. Now they're called community violence reduction. They call that cover. But basically, all the gang DAs know Rosenberg. So I've done, I've done a lot of different neighborhoods around L.A. County. And the ones that go to CCB, Clara Shortridge-Foltz, Courthouse, pretty much all the DAs and the bosses know Rosenberg. So for some cases, when I'm preparing for preliminary hearing, I'm discovering my trial strategy. And I've had cases even after preliminary hearing, my client,

I did a post. I think my client was looking at over 75 years to life. And I ended up getting him a voluntary manslaughter with a gun enhancement for 21 years. So I have settled big, ugly cases by showing the prosecutors' weaknesses in their case. Right. Because prosecutors don't want to lose. Nobody wants to lose. But DAs hate to lose. A lot of times they're politically driven, right?

They want to move up to become a judge or get elected to government. They, if you present them evidence to show them that there's a chance that they could not get a guilty plea, they're more motivated to deal. So they'd rather take some years than have to go to trial, cost the government money, and lose, and that person go free, correct? Yeah, I mean, from a prosecutor's point of view, if Rosenberg can expose weaknesses in the case at trial, whether that be a rule of evidence, I did a case like that where the co-defendant gave a lot of statements against my client, but that co-defendant, if he didn't test, at trial, a lot of that evidence would not come in. That's a case called a Randabruton for a non-testifying co-defendant who implicates the defendant. So in that case, I got 21 years.

I was able to show the prosecutor, look, if you go to trial and this guy doesn't testify, you don't have enough evidence on my guy. Right. So, I mean, look, off the record, the video, it was my guy. Yeah. It was my guy. Well, we're very much on the record. But we had issues that I exposed and we ended up getting a deal.

So would you rather do that? Like in best case scenario, would you rather, if there's any, if it's looking like there's a decent chance that your client could be found guilty, would you rather handle a better plea without going to trial? Or how do you feel about that? So whenever you have life in prison on the table, could be seven to life on an attempt murder at, a gang enhancement, you make that 17. First degree murder, 25 to life, add a firearm enhancement that could add 25 years, so 50 to life. But when you get into that level, before I go to trial, I will talk to my client, see what he or she is comfortable with, and I'll ask for an offer.

And the reason that I do that is if I were sitting in jail, in prison, on a four yard, level four yard convicted of first degree murder and I would say you know what Rosenberg my cellie he got 21 years and his case was worse than mine so what the fuck you fucked me over so I will prepare for trial that's how I can get a deal now there's a lot of cases where they say f that Rosenberg we're going to trial so I did a case like that it was in florencia and my client was charged first degree gang murdered by firearm. His DNA was recovered at the crime scene. And he didn't testify.

And I did a podcast on this. It's going to get released soon. But I ended up getting him a not guilty on the gang murder, not guilty shooting at a car, not guilty assault with a firearm. And all with gang enhancements, that was a great trial for us. Wow. So he walked? Well, they convicted him of felon in possession of a firearm, but he got credit for time served.

How long was he in jail for? He'd been in, I think, for about four years. In county jail, waiting for, oh, my God. Fighting a murder. Wow. So the backstory on that case was that he was accused of murdering an OG Crip. I can say his name. They called him Bugsy.

And he was a witness to an LAPD shooting. If you remember the officer, Wambler, shooting the guy named Ezel Ford, who was an 18-year-old unarmed African-American with schizophrenia, and he was shot, gunned down in front of his home. So it was a whole big thing in, like 2018. And so Bugsie was going to give a deposition against LAPD

a week after he was murdered. So a lot of people in the neighborhood said that LAPD had him killed to prevent that negative deposition and the surviving family filed a lawsuit, obviously. But interestingly, the widow of Bugsy filed a lawsuit, claiming that the police chief promised, if you come forward, we'll have your back, will protect you. And so that was a right. strongful death case. In that case, because we had a black versus brown dynamic, community members, crips would come to court and it got a little tense. So one day there was a community leader there.

I said, can you step outside, come over here? And I said, look, bro, we basically have aligned interests because we believe that the LEPD was behind this too. And he never heard anything like that at the next court day. they stopped coming. Okay. So that's like the community organizer side. Right.

Yeah. You have this amazing multi-layered background working in the system that's just benefited your lawyering today. But how did you get him, how did you get that not guilty verdict though? There was a murder. Right. There was a murder. How did you, and his DNA was there and he's a felon.

How did you extrapolate doubt for the jury to get that not guilty verdict? So it's a very interesting case. The judge didn't let me put on that theory of the LAPD third party culpability theory, just so you know. But I called two gang experts. I called a firearm expert. I hired a DNA expert. And what I was, okay, so when we're picking the jury, the victim is African American. He's black.

But I left three African American jurors on the panel. And most people will say, Rosenberg, are you crazy? But here's what it was. This one lady was 65 and she grew up in Chicago. And I knew she would not trust the cops. I never talked to her because I didn't want the DA to figure out what I was doing and kick her. And in that case, the four person was a young African American computer dude. And so he was the foreman.

So he drove the vote. But what I was able to convey to the jury was this was a sloppy investigation. they found the gun perfectly located sitting against the wall and that firearm was inoperable and I had my firearm expert explain, you know, stove piping and the crime lab admitted she had to cycle the weapon 14 times before it could fire. So my argument was, ladies and gentlemen, how is this the murder weapon? Ladies and gentlemen, the DNA expert testified, but she cannot tell you. you if the source of the DNA is a male or a female. And then I put on two gang experts.

I'll give Alex Alonso a shout out street gang television. Alex Alonso is the best gang expert that we have access to basically is a genius. And he testified for me. So when we put on the community side of the criminal street gang phenomenon, I was able to counter what the police said because everything with them is doom and gloom fear and respect but we were able to show another side of it and the jury was not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt uh and that was a great case that case so now that is the privilege of being in a hyper liberal place like los angeles you try that case in texas there's a good chance you're going to get a guilty verdict but you were basically, again, you weren't proving that he didn't do it. You were just saying, look,

you're basically insinuating that the cops planted the murder weapon there. Am I wrong about that? That's a conclusion that I invited the jury to reach without being allowed to present that evidence to the jury. Of course not. But again, what you're doing is you're saying it without saying it. That's why trial law is so theatrical. That's why it's so fascinating. Yeah. And so you got this guy off. That's an incredible case.

Now, how much, by the way, how much did you make off that case? Or what did you actually charge the defendant? Because you've got to hire all these experts, your time. What does that cost a defendant to fight a murder case? Sure. When they're fucking with Rosenberg. So this was in 2018. Yeah.

And my fees have gone up since them as I have. Biden's economy. Well, I've gotten better as a lawyer and I've put up a bunch of wins on the scoreboard. But what you want to know is how hard is it to hire a lawyer like Rosenberg and what's the price point? So my price point is less than Garagos, right? He charged, I think he charged a million dollars for a preliminary hearing, right? And they paid. Who's they?

I don't want to say the ethnicity, but they were able to afford the money. What was the charge? Is this drug trafficking? I don't know. I don't remember that. But what I'm saying is I'm not a Garigos, right? But I'm also not just out of law school. This is my first rodeo.

And you're paying me money to learn. So I'm kind of in the mid-range. What's interesting about the case is that, you know, the mom worked in the medical field. she's middle class. So she doesn't have 200K to pay Rosenberg. But having said that, I was on that case for a long time. And you mentioned experts.

So I don't pay for experts. When my client is in custody, he's presumed to be indigent, meaning he cannot afford $4,000 for a video expert. So I have a case that says the county must pay. Oh, wow. So you can actually, you can do that so you can get the county to pay for the experts but you are still private getting your fee

correct in that case is called tran t r a and that was leslie abramson's case uh was a death penalty murder in orange county she charged the family 300 000 and then she had the gall to ask for a 19 thousand dollars for a psychiatrist so it went up through orange county and the reviewing court said no, it doesn't matter if third parties are paying for the defendant's private lawyer. The issue is the defendant's indigent status. Oh, wow. So this is great for you and the defense and the defendant because they know the money they pay you is not going to be siphoned off to your buddies. There's not going to be a lot of corruption there because everybody else, all the experts are getting paid by the government and all the money that you're getting goes to you

and you're going to be more motivated. You're going to do better. When you do better, they do better. So how much did you make off of this case, Rosenberg? I'd rather keep that business and professions code 6149, which says that a retainer is confidential. But let me just say one more thing because people are interested in hiring criminal attorneys.

You never want the attorney responsible for the investigator or an expert. And here's why. then it's in the attorney's interest to minimize the investigation because they're eating into the lawyer's fee. So you always want to have the lawyer incentivized to do more work, not do less work. And that's why, and the case law on this, you know, comes from the Sixth Amendment right to counsel and due process. So it's very important. Remember, the government wants to lock Rosenberg's client up for 50 years to life. So it's not that much of a stretch if the county will pay Alex Alonso, you know,

a couple thousand bucks to come in and testify and keep it real. Right. So the government thinks their witnesses are going to be in their favor. So they're going to pay for that. Well, so, okay, anytime a defense expert testifies, especially if they're privately retained by the family. The prosecutor will say, now you're getting paid, how much are you getting paid,

trying to insinuate that they're, this gun for hire. But remember, everyone in a trial is getting paid. Except, well, the jury, I think they get 15 bucks a day.

But the prosecutor's getting paid. They get paid well. And plus, they have a pension. Rosenberg, I don't have no pension, right? So the judge is getting paid. The bailiffs are getting paid.

The court reporter. getting paid, the clerk's getting paid. Everybody in the system makes money. And we can talk about this later too. And much the way that drug dealers and criminals want the system to continue, I think the criminal justice system wants the drugs and the crime to keep flowing because that's how everybody's getting paid. But how much can you at least tell us the scales?

Can you tell us like from DUI up to first degree murder? Can you give us an idea of what your price point is? Can you tell us that much? I can tell you this. Every case is different. And when I say that, you know, when we did the Fox, Jose Rodriguez-Lander trial, that was a seven-week trial. So a seven-week trial, I have to cover all my court appearances for seven weeks. So that's going to be a more expensive case.

Some of our murders might be a 10-day trial. So one of the things I look at is how, long as this trial? How big is the discovery? Nowadays, we get so much video. We're in the terabytes of data just for one case. But I want to answer this because I want people to know how much it really costs. So in Los Angeles, if you tell most lawyers, I've got a first degree murder with firearm, they're going to say 100 grand up front. Now, my fees are not at that level. And there's a reason, because I try to make my law firm available for people who want something better than the public defender, but they don't have, you know, 300 grand for Leslie Abramson. So, so that's what I try to do to keep my firm more accessible.

Having said that, you know, someone's life is at stake. And I'm really going to tell you that being an attorney representing these. cases, you know, I don't use the word stress, but there's a lot of, you know, challenges. There's a lot of excitement. And when I win, you know, I get to keep the win, right? If I shut them down, I can keep that win. But one thing that I recently realized, and I think you might find this valuable to hear, is that I've realized that, you know, you see the lawyer, but behind every lawyer is a whole community. It's a community of family members. It's a community of friends. It's a whole community that passes on my name, right? I can't function without a very large community behind me. And that's why I'm blessed. That's why I'm back in L.A. That's why my law firm is always going to be in L.A.

Yeah, that was going to be my next question. So for a criminal defense attorney, the best marketing is word of mouth. It's not even close. You know, somebody in jail beats their case, beats a murder case. That's getting around to everybody in the dorm. Rosenberg, Rosenberg, Jew, right? Get yourself a Jewish lawyer. It's all you here in prison. Do you remember the case that really made you that put your name down as like the guy to get with if you're in trouble? Sure. I'll give you a little backstory to set it up. and then I'll clinch it for you. So when I first started my law firm, I was in the valley,

and I got a Van Nuys office, two blocks from the courthouse. I always wanted to be right near my courthouse. And I got a client. He had two strikes he was charged with. I charged 14 grand. This was in 2011. Family was from Ohio. And ever since then, I just started getting cases word of mouth.

But what really happened for me was I was, walking around outside the courthouse, and they used to have, like, solicitors who would go get your business license for you. And one of those guys was a homie. And for some reason, I started talking to him, and he started getting me cases. So my first neighborhood was Pekoyma. So shout out to the homies. I've given a shout out. But one of the main guys, like a legend, total complete legend in the valley, his name was Jorge Lopez. They called him Little Boy. And Little Boy is the one that got me the Valley. He said, Rosenberg, I'm going to make you famous, but you'll never be as famous as me.

So that's how I just started kind of like maybe hood hopping and picking up neighborhoods. But the case that really made me was the Jose Rodriguez-Landa, the Fox case, because that was a drug conspiracy as well as drug distribution. and there was so much overwhelmingly much prison gang evidence that the jury heard about. Right. But the defense, and I did the closing argument after seven weeks, and I was able to persuade the jury that my client knew the rat was the rat, and he never wanted anything to do with him. Tell us about the case, first of all.

Could you tell us about the charges, the background, the evidence they had against him? So this case was at a public trial. Therefore, it is public so I can speak with a little more depth. But basically the idea was the California prison gang was aligning with a Mexican cartel. And they had this kind of quid pro quo relationship that they were trying to work out. And the- You're talking about the Mexican mafia when you say California prison gang? I can't speak on that. The only thing that I say, I just say the prison gang,

and it's kind of like if you know, you know. But this was like a partnership deal. And so, again, overwhelming amount of prison gang evidence. And my client, Selly, actually testified against him for 13 hours. I'm sorry, but what is the actual, now this is a federal RICO case, I assume, right? Puerto Rico, it's, it's an 841, 846. So 841 possession with the intent to distribute narcotics. Okay.

And then 846 is the conspiracy to commit that offense. And what kind of narcotics? What was the quantity and where? Was it in prison or on the street? It was on the street. It's a bunch of meth, a bunch of Coke, a bunch of marijuana, five co-defendants. Wow.

And, you know, that was a case where so each in federal court we had two lawyers my co-counsel carlos spiga who's one of my mentors got me involved because he's he's an old-time lawyer and they they know his name but there were five co-defendants each one had two lawyers so you've got 10 defense lawyers you've got three u.s. attorneys but let me tell you one thing that's interesting because we talked about it uh that i have a degree and architecture. So in federal court, the U.S. attorneys sit facing the center and we sit facing the center. So the architecture of the room is that the AUSAs have their back to the jury. AUSA?

Assistant United States Attorney. Right. Got it. And that's why I wear the flagpin. My joke is I out USA, the AUSAs. I had no idea that. So you're actually looking at each other in federal court and the jury's behind you. So I'm looking at the jury. Oh, I see. I'm playing the jury. Oh, okay. So the prosecutions are back to them.

The defense is facing the jury. So that's why you have your pin on. And do you wear the glasses in court or do you take those off? I wear prescription. These are prescription. I wear progressives now. But anyways, the point of it now when I'm in trial, I'm animated.

I use my body a lot because jurors are bored. Right. The government will bore the shit out of them. And then I try to train the jury when Rosenberg gets up there and starts asking questions, something happens. So they're kind of looking forward. Okay, what's Rosenberg going to do now? You're waking them up.

And that's how I'm inviting them in to my defense theory. Wow. And we did that. And I'll tell you, ever since they did the first, I say prison gang, RICO in 1996, no prison gang leader has ever had a not guilty verdict. And we did that. And that was in 2019.

Okay. So just to summarize the scope of this accomplishment, you won, you beat the feds at trial. Correct. The feds have a 98, some say 99% conviction rate. 98 to 99% of the time when the feds go to trial, they win. It is like almost set up for the defense to lose. When you really get to know the federal system and what they're allowed to present, it's unfair.

You beat them. And that, I mean, it's shocking. It's wild. And you got, and this was your defendant, the alleged ringleader, was a shot caller. Where in prison? What prison was he in at the time when they arrested him? So what happened for him, and there's going to be a boundary where I have to kind of zip it because he's got an open case. He's got another one.

Yeah, he got indicted in 2018 for a case that they called the dirty thirds. And that's an open case. so me speaking on some things can hurt that case. But what I can tell you loosely is that the day he was supposed to get out, they filed another state court case on him and extradited him to the Los Angeles County Jail. So I can answer that, but anything else. Can you answer where he was during, in the past? Like, where was he during, where was he during, where was he in prison?

What prison was he at? when he caught this particular case that's already finished. So, well, okay. And what were they alleging he was doing? Was he commanding drug sales on the street from prison? So here's the answer. When they extradited him on the state court case, that was a separate conspiracy case from this federal drug conspiracy.

And they held him in Los Angeles County jail for so many years. and then they case built the case that I won. Wow. And then that wasn't enough. So they re-indicted him with the new RICO that's pending. And you're not on this case? I'm not on the new Fed case. Why not?

So basically it's like a conflict of interest. But in that case, the dirty thirds is 2018. And this is all publicly available. You can Google this. But they indicted a lawyer. And I wanted to work on that case for the lawyer, but basically my other client's lawyer said no, so I had to go with it. But that was a fascinating case where they basically said that he stepped across the attorney-client boundary and they indicted him for RICO. And what were they accusing him of doing this lawyer?

So some of this has been in the paper, but they accused him of passing messages, brokering a peace treaty. That case was done by Megan Blanco, and I saw 40% of that trial, and she hung that trial, so he is subject to retrial. But it's been reported, some of this has been reported. So the issue for him is that they're pushing the retrial. but he's like a personal friend and a colleague. So I, you know, I followed the trial carefully.

And, you know, when you do these cases, we come under scrutiny. And, you know, I've had cops. Cops go to my Instagram. And it's, they don't make any bones about it. And they'll come up to me. I've had cops say, hey, you're Rosenberg, right? You do a good job for your clients. So the world that I operate in is a world where I imagine all my phone calls, all my texts, all my meetings could one day end up in front of a judge.

So that all my emails. So that's how I operate because there is scrutiny on the lawyers when you do these cases. How often do you have to tell your clients, look, you can't be telling me this? Right. So stuff like that does come up. And for example, we'll say like a character letter, right? Sometimes my clients will say, well, I know a guy. He'll write me a letter saying I'm in this program. And I say, look, if you tell me that this is a false letter, then I cannot use it. Right. So that's how I deal with that. How often have you had clients try to basically overtly get you to commit criminal. acts. So the way I would answer that is that sometimes we get into a boundary zone. So as an attorney, I'm sworn. So like a cop, I'm actually sworn to uphold the Constitution right hand of the United States. And I'm an officer of the court. And I take that very seriously. So I try and engender

credibility. If Rosenberg says something, he's a sharp lawyer, I can rely on it. And So if somebody comes in and they basically say, hey, Rosenberg, you know, what's up with this and what's up with that? I say, look, you're under investigation. I cannot tell you how to commit a crime. But if the detectives contact you, contact me. I can be an intermediary between you and the detective. And I'll tell them having conferred with my client, my client has no statement and does not wish to make a statement with out as attorney present. So I'll give a little self-plug. My slogan on that. And everyone should

learn it, practice it, is I have no statement. I want my lawyer. I have no statement. I want my lawyer. That's, I have that on a T-shirt. Yeah. And how often- Which I should get you one. Yeah. I mean, I basically, when I got arrested, I basically did that. You know, I talked my way into my first felony. I was going to make that mistake the second time. just repeat that again. Cops are, they're trained to get you to tell on yourself. So how does somebody watching this who gets hemmed up for anything? What is the process?

Like what's your advice to somebody who's getting arrested? They know they're going into the system. What's the first thing they should do? Sure. Let me unpack something you said about police officer training. So my new thing is I like to give out little gems or nuggets and I encourage people to Google it. So the training and interrogation that California police use, it's based upon what we call the Reed method, R-E-I-D, and it's taught to police agencies all over. But Google the Reed interrogation method and you'll learn more about good cop, bad cop, how they threaten you, etc.

So the first thing that you have to know is that beyond identifying yourself, you're under no compulsion to talk to the cops. Now, they play on that. They use a show of authority. And let's be honest, right? It's fucking scary to get arrested. It's the scariest thing. Put in the interrogation room and they slam their file down.

And they say, this is a hot one, bro. You're looking at 50 to life. We've got your car. We've got your cell phone. And your crimey gave you up. And they can lie. They can lie. Talk about this.

I had no idea before I got arrested. Cops can lie to you. In fact, that's their job, is to get any way to get a confession. They'll lie to you. Tell us this. Sure. So that is true.

And here's how I say it. I say the case law in California currently is that they can use deception and no judge will care. Now, there's been a movement. The pendulum has started to swing the other way. But let me also explain. So I have no statement, I want my lawyer. That covers you when you've been arrested.

They bring it to the interrogation room. That's what you need to say. Do not answer any questions because you might inadvertently put yourself at a crime scene where they couldn't even establish that. So that's the first thing. I've done several posts on that. go to my Instagram at Attorney Rosenberg and you can find out more. But here's what I really also want to say.

Let's talk about what a Perkins operation is. So the Perkins is after the detective say, hey, we got your license plate. We got your car. We know your cell phone was pinging at the scene of the murder. And then the guy says, I have no statement. I want my lawyer. It's not over. So then they put you back in the jail cell at the police station.

and we call that the tank. And they can put an undercover cop or an informant and they can record. So then that other person, we call them the Perkins agent. They say, hey, bro, what's up, man? What are you in for? The guy says, I'm hearing a hot one. They say, oh, bro, that's bullshit. What do they got?

And they start getting you talking about it. And then the Perkins agent will say, you know, they say no face, no case. and they get the person to feel comfortable. And then they start, they end up asking questions like, where did you get the gun? What did you do with the gun? And they leave you in the tank for hours. Yeah. And when you're in jail and you don't know how long you're going to be in there and there's just one other guy,

human nature is to just bond. And you talk about shit that you had no, you haven't talked about to anyone. It's crazy. It's a psychological phenomenon. And so they try to get you, they try to record you talking to a jailhouse snitch. Yeah, they're trying to elicit a confession. And that's admissible. Correct.

Wow. Now, there was a California Supreme Court justice. I believe it was Chin or Chen, my apologies, but I haven't looked at this case in a while. But he wrote a dissent, dissenting opinion. So the majority said the Perkins operation was okay. But he wrote a dissent saying, that this is deceptive and he basically said we should shut down the Perkins. But going back to what you said about bonding, usually this is used on the youngsters. So 18, 19, they'll put like an older

quote, homie in there. And there's a power dynamic because, you know, it's, it can be, they play on your fear. Right. I have to bond with this dude or he's going to say, or he's going to say, I'm no good. You know what I'm saying? So there's this power dynamic. Now, will that Perkins guy? Will that actually be an undercover cop? Or will that be a criminal who's trying to get a time cut or trying to get off? Like, and he's been, he's cooperating.

I've seen both. I don't necessarily, I can't tell you, you know, they only use a cop when they can't find a snitch. I don't know that to be true. But again, and my. My t-shirt on that is don't talk in the tank. Right. Don't talk in the tank. You hear that?

Now, they can do that when you're at the police station before you go to court. When you go to court, the filing of the complaint when you see the judge, that's considered to be the start of the criminal proceedings. And then you have the right to an attorney. Right. So they're not supposed to do that. Now, how long is that process from when you first get arrested? for an alleged crime to, like, how long do they have to actually keep you in jail trying to get a

confession or trying to find enough evidence for the DA to charge you before they either have to charge you or they have to kick you loose? Sure. So most people think of it as a 48 hours. I think of it as two court days. But here's the catch. Let's see you get arrested on a Friday. It's always on a Friday.

your arraignment is most likely going to be Tuesday. So now they have five days to work on you. But again, once you are booked into L.A. County, then they can't do the Perkins. But then they can try to get jailhouse informants, but that's a whole other topic. So the case that, and I did a post on this, unfortunately, was raining that day. So people talk shit thinking that like my hair gel was on my. my suit coat. But it's one from the Valley office.

It's probably like post number 100. But I talk about Perkins. I talk about Miranda. Miranda's the advisement before you give a statement. It was considered to be prophylactic, meaning it allows the defendant to know his rights because they used to beat confessions out of people. And that was legal. That was legal.

until the Miranda decision said, no, we recognize due process and Fifth Amendment and Sixth Amendment. What year did that change? What year did that change? So Miranda was written by Justice Earl Warren, who is my hero because he's a politician. The Warren Commission? Same guy? No, no, no. Earl. Well, it may be, but Earl Warren was the Warren court that did the Miranda decision. I want to say 1967, but if you're having doubts, I invite you to Google it. Sure. So think about that in America with this beautiful constitution and Bill of Rights. Prior to 1967, and you got picked up for a crime in L.A., they could just beat a confession out of you.

So there were cases in the 1930s. that looked at that. And if you're interested in the history of that, Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, Sixth Amendment right to counsel, which is part of the Miranda advisement, then go back and read that decision and you'll see the history and you'll see why the United States Supreme Court said that you need to advise the defendant.

Now, in today's world, you probably wouldn't get a Miranda decision. The way the U.S. Supreme Court is now, I don't think you'd have Miranda. But, you know, it's very important. And when a Supreme Court, California Supreme Court, or the United States Supreme Court renders a decision, that's the law.

So we call that decisional law as opposed to statutes. Statutes is like penal code section 1054.1. Rosenberg, when will you not accept a case? So it's kind of tricky, but I'm blessed. I don't have to accept every case that comes in. So some people call that being a door lawyer, any case that walks through the door. But I'm known for taking challenging cases. I focus on the law, and that's why I think I'm an effective lawyer.

there's always a lot of drama and chis-may, and there's always a lot going on. The way I run my law firm is I focus on the law. So I do represent a lot of folks from the Chicano rap community, and through that, I've met, you know, the Rasa actors, the producers, the directors. I'm very involved in the community. But if I see my client, so, Somebody came in. It was a case out of Long Beach.

It basically it was like a shootout. Okay? And they came in and I said, well, I think we're going to need an investigator. And they said, we don't need an investigator. And basically I ended the meeting. Why? Because that client basically said, Rosenberg, I'm not going to follow your legal advice. So I got up and I showed them the door.

So that's a case I don't want. What I'm looking for in my clients. So when I win is when my client and I are collaborating. That's how we win. It's a partnership. And the best example of that was a case that I did for Danny Pena, Daniel Pena. And this was a wiretap case in Ventura, prison gang evidence. And the allegations were that they had a wire on basically a prison cell phone.

Okay. So tough case, right? Wiretaps are the most damning evidence and incredibly difficult to win. But we won that case. Hold on. They were alleging that he was selling drugs over a prison phone? Yeah, basically. Yeah, it was conspiracy to commit possession for sale, possession for sale, active participation in street gang, everything with gang enhancements. Right. So you have a guy, a shock caller in prison who's direct. erecting drug sales on the streets. That's the prosecution's theory.

Right. Okay. But what, you know, over two years, we got pretty close. And again, he pushed me to become a better lawyer because I had to do a deep dive on the wiretap statutes. So it was the collaboration. It was the client pushing me, but he's a very charismatic guy, very persuasive. And so, you know, clients like that teach.

me. And that's how I learned. That's how I become a better lawyer. And it ended up that we got the prosecutor to dismiss three drug counts on a wiretap case in Ventura County, which is one of the most draconian counties. So that one was another milestone win for Rosenberg. So sometimes you want to tell the client to take a plea and they say, no, no, no, no, no, let's fight. And it sounds like this was one of those cases. It's not necessarily take a plea. It's what is our trial strategy. And in that case, the trial strategy was motions. So I basically accused the detective of making omissions in his affidavit to get the wiretap. I challenged the wiretap statute itself. And no one's ever done this. This is what's really interesting. Yeah, go into this. You were able to find a

technicality in the wiretap? Well, so what it was was the wiretap statute, which starts at Penal Code section 629 and goes up to 670 something, what it allows for is any felony with a gang enhancement can be an offense you can get a wiretap for. And so I did a deep dive on that. And I found, so there's the federal omnibus statute that sets out the federal wiretap law. And then we have the California law. And the way it works is the California law is supposed to be protective of the defendant

the same as the federal law. So what I argued is that for the federal statute said dangerous to life and limb, and I argued that under California law, any felony with a gang enhancement could be the subject of a wiretap, but it was overbroad. Now, we ended up taking, a deal on a second case for non-strike, and we kept the appellate rights,

which Ventura never does. If you plead a Ventura, you're going to waive your rights. But I got them to keep the rights. So that issue went up on appeal, and I was really looking forward to litigating that. Imagine Rosenberg shutting down the gang section of the California wiretap law.

Unfortunately, the appellate lawyer did not come through, but you see what a great case that is. You don't get to that level of litigation without your client pushing you. And so I learned a lot on that case. So you were basically, you beat the main, you beat it before you went to trial. You won it in the motion.

Correct. There was a second case where it was on a jail phone. So that's a whole different follow wax. And he's accused of what? It's more drugs. Okay. Yeah. Will you ever not take a case that looks too damning?

Like if you ever see somebody come into your office and the evidence against them is overwhelming, will you ever say, look, you have no chance, save your money? No, I don't because, you know, I've said this before. There's always something a criminal defense attorney can do to help a client. So, you know, my, my bougie cocktail party answer is factual. is factual innocence is not a prerequisite to hiring an attorney. So there are cases. You know, it's all on video. They have recordings. They got a Perkins agent, but there's still- Now uploaded it to YouTube. Right. Yeah. Well, no, YouTube. Yeah. So for those watching,

I don't tell my clients what to do, right? If they want to be active, they can be active. but for my purposes, posting yourself with guns, a big sack of weed, or stacks of money, you know, that evidence comes up. And remember, even though it's legal in California, marijuana is still illegal for the feds. So that's a little word of caution. But yeah, YouTube, I've seen YouTube being used against people defendants. So just to say one more thing about that. So let's say the case is really bad factually.

Maybe I can find a legal doctrine that can help the client, such as doing a Franks motion, accusing the detective who wrote the search warrant, either of lying, malfeasance, or failing to present mitigating evidence that would have caused the magistrate, the judge, ruling on the warrant to not issue the warrant. And I did that for a guy. The DA was writing his opposition. The supervisor came by and he said, what are you doing? He explained and he said, just give Rosenberg 30 days community labor.

So I settled a fairly serious case with fentanyl for 30 days after litigating this whole thing. By proving that it was a bad warrant? Well, that was my legal position. But what I'm saying is, is that you make them work, and sometimes you get action. You get action. You get action. That's right. This guy's got action.

He's either fucked or he's got action. And action means you got to play. So they catch you with a bunch of fentanyl. But Rosenberg has basically convinced the judge that or the prosecutor that this was a bad warrant. There was not enough evidence for a warrant. So they're playing ball. Maybe you won't get to walk, but you get 30.

days community service when you should be doing five years in prison. Well, that guy, they had an offer for him of 365 days county jail, which he would have done at half time. Yeah. But I got him no jail and 30 days community labor. He was happy. Oh, yeah, of course. Oh, okay.

So this wasn't a big quantity, I assume. You know, so I forget how many fentanyl, you know, the M30s. But it wasn't like. the kilo cases that I've done. But, you know, sometimes the issue is just what's the penalty going to be, right? So I use mitigation, character letters. And also, it's not like Rosenberg pulls up on day one. I get this amazing offer.

And then that's it. It takes time to build up a rapport with the prosecution. And, you know, that's kind of, you know, the kung fu of being. of being a defense lawyer. Okay, so answer me straight. We're just two guys talking at a bar. You don't have to give me a political answer. What person, nine out of ten people come to you with cases.

How many of those ten people are innocent? Didn't do it. So, you know, again, factual innocence. So what is factual innocence? Ten guys come to you with murder cases. How many of them actually did it? I mean, a lot of times it might be all ten. Who knows?

This is what I'm trying to say. Like, what do you think? What I think doesn't matter. What the judge thinks doesn't matter. What my client thinks doesn't matter. What matters is what's the evidence against my client. So there are cases where self-defense cases, I'm telling the jury in opening,

ladies and gentlemen, my client discharged the firearm that resulted in the death of the decedededed. Okay? So factually, they can prove, causation, but they still have to prove malice of forethought, which is the right mental state. And self-defense is a complete defense to malice of forethought. So does that mean somebody did it? They didn't do it. That's a conclusion the jury must reach based upon the evidence and having the benefit of my closing argument as well as the closing argument for the district attorney.

I guess the better question should be, you know, putting self-defense in like a gang situation aside. There's brutal murder. There's murder of old people, murder of kids, you know, sexual abuse and then the murder of kids. There's a lot of murder that's not where there isn't really no mitigating circumstances. Do you get those kind of cases? And do you have any moral misgivings if you think the person actually did it. Did it? Right. So the answer again is I'm a Sixth Amendment lawyer. I believe strongly in the right to counsel.

So do I, have I done like the multiple child murders? I haven't had cases like that. I don't think anyone's ever approached me. I have had people with severe mental illness who have committed murders. so I have some cases like that. And in those cases, I've appointed doctors to evaluate it. Sometimes mental health can be part of a defense. There are lawyers that are known for sex crimes, and that's not my milieu. That's not, you know, that's not my lane. So, you know, some people say Rosenberg, how do you represent all those gillsenberg?

guilty people. And the answer is that guilt is a determination that can only be made by a jury or if the defendant pleads guilty or no contest. So that's the legal answer and that's the world that I operate in. So you live in a gray world. You live in a world that's run by law first and personal morality or values second. Well, I mean, here's an answer to that. And that is, let's talk about fentanyl. So I did one of the first fentanyl cases at the CCB courthouse. This was out of Central Station.

And they know because they misidentified the fentanyl as heroin because it tested positive for opiate. But they didn't know. And the client, you know, he had a big ass brick. okay they offered him 180 days jail we unfortunately did not have a motion to suppress but i ended up getting him no jail um and some community service which he did so the point is you know fentanyl uh fentanyl factually has been implicated in a lot of casual recreational drug use uh deaths so do i support that I don't, right, as a person.

But as a lawyer, I have to set that aside. And, oh, by the way, recently they made the penalty for possessing more than one kilo of fentanyl. They made the penalty more severe. I think people know the pendulum is swinging towards criminalizing fentanyl for people who give fentanyl to somebody who ultimately becomes a decedent. So if somebody hires me, then I'm representing them, right, if I accept the case. Do you, let's talk about that. How have you seen the drug cases change from the 2000s in terms of quantity, Mexican organizations, up until now? Right.

Well, when you say Mexican organizations, I think you're alluding to cartels. Am I correct? Yes. Okay. So when I was a baby public defender, you know, we did cases where it's called 11550. So somebody's high and that's actually a crime. And if you don't get a drug program, you can do 90 days in jail. So this was like small quantities, right?

$20 sacks. Occasionally I saw, you know, an ounce. In my practice now, I've seen pounds. I've seen kilos. I did a five kilo case out of Ventura where I got my guy credit for time served. I think his max was eight years, depending on what he was doing. So I've done the bigger cases. I had one case that was great.

I got 14 pounds of meth suppressed during a motion to suppress. And I argued a case. How did you do that? Right. Well, I found a good case called United States v. is Rodriguez. And what Rodriguez says is that the officer cannot prolong the detention for a traffic stop. And if it's unduly prolonged and then they bring in the drug dog, then it can be suppressed.

So it was a highway patrol case and the dashboard camera. I played to the judge. And it showed the overall encounter was about 25. minutes in Rodriguez, the encounter was eight minutes long. So I was three times as long. And I'll never forget the moment that I played what the cop said, because my client said, you know, I don't have to get out of the car, which by the way, you do have to get out of the car.

If they ask you to step out of the car. But then he said something about you're violating my constitutional rights. And the cop said, I don't care about the constitution. I'm searching your car. And that was on his body cam footage? is either the other the dashboard. Man,

you must thank your lucky star cops are so fucking stupid, huh? Well, so what's really funny about that case is that afterwards

the cops shook my hand because he earned, I earned his respect that I shut that thing down. And so it's kind of ironic, right? Right. But,

you know, we can talk about credibility of police officers. So hang on one second. I'm sorry, because this is, this seems like the best way to beat a drug case when your client's been caught red-handed is to prove that the arrest

was essentially illegal or the search was illegal? Correct. Okay. That's interesting. So I didn't know there was a time limit on a stop. Well, when I say the Rodriguez case was eight minutes and my case was 25 minutes, that's an argument that I make to the judge. I say, Your Honor, look, under Rodriguez, the detention was this long.

and here we have this. Right. So you're using just precedent. Right. You're using, hey, look, eight minutes long and it was too long of a stop and they buried the evidence in this case. My clients was 25. You should similarly bury this evidence.

Sure. So much of your job, it's fascinating. So much of it is just research and using precedence to suppress evidence in the motion stage of the proceedings. Have you ever had a case that became the precedent, that other lawyers are using? Yeah, that's a great question. That's a softball

for me. So this was a case out of Pomona, and I'm allowed to say the name. It's People v. Neil Del Rio. I'll tell you the backstory. We did, this is a sheriff homicide case? So my client was accused

of shooting his cousin, which he did. It was a self-defense case. So the first trial was in August of 2018, and after six days of the prosecution's case in chief, they called their homicide detective, and he basically said, my client answered a few questions, and then asked for a lawyer. So immediately, that's something that we call Doyle error, and I made a motion for mistrial, which was granted. it. So on retrial, we did the retrial, and in a 402 motion in limine, I had gotten all these crimes of violence for the decedent, right, where he'd been convicted, he had a gun,

he beat up his girl, and that evidence is admissible in a self-defense case to show the character of violence for the victim, even if my client didn't know about it, by the way. So the judge excluded all that. So we went. to trial and partially because of the rulings my client was convicted of a second degree murder that went up on appeal and the court of appeal said no absolutely not that was an unfair trial so not only did they remand the case uh so that he got a new trial but they published so now i have a case that i did where i preserved all the issues and it's a self-defense case now publishing in the of self-defense is incredibly rare because there's so much case law on it. So basically,

the court of appeal smacked the judge so hard that they felt the need to publish. So I count that case as a win. Now, the appellate lawyer who wrote the brief, he works with me now. So I've got I've got a badass research lawyer that I work with. Amazing. So now future attorneys can go to the look up in the California law, they can find that case, uh, to try to help their clients. Right. Every lawyer in California should read people versus Neil Del Rio and they can cite that in their trial brief. Rosenberg, have you ever lost a case that you didn't think you were going to lose? And did you ever have somebody be found guilty that you thought was really actually innocent or not guilty? So I, when I was a public defender, I had lost some cases. So there's a city called

Dinuba. And Dinuba is just below Reedley, which is Fresno County. So it's at the very top. But the jury pool was very brown. So I remember winning three out of my four Dinuba trials. The judge was like a maniac. So what we used to do is go in the back and talk about the calendar, you know, get Rosenberg an offer. This is going to be a first time, D-Y. This is that, this is that. So, yes, I have lost cases. But again,

here's what I think, all right, and this is my lawyer answer, is if the prosecution can ethically prove each element of an offense beyond a reasonable doubt, then they're entitled to that conviction. So if I can create reasonable doubt, then I'm entitled to the acquittal. So if a case is presented fairly under the rules of evidence and ethically, then the prosecutor, if they can prove it, they keep the win.

That's the American justice system in a nutshell. It does not matter what happened. It's what you can prove. Yeah. Do you think we have the best legal system, despite its flaws? Do you think we have one of the best legal systems in the world? Well, I have a good story. So I was talking to a prosecutor. Now, I try to be cool with my DAs, right?

Because when you're like this, it doesn't help anybody. Right. So he was telling me he was in England and he saw a trial, it was a murder trial, multi-defendants. And he said that they're not at council table. They're in the back in a cage. And that's what the jury sees. Right.

So compared to that, remember I said, the 30 pounds of chains, that was Judge Thelton Henderson, by the way, that name slipped by mind. So our criminal justice system is based on England, but we're better. We've made improvements. Is it perfect? No, not by any means. Is it better than Japan or China or Russia? or Russia or God forbid North Korea,

hell yeah. And I've traveled to some of these countries and you do not want to get in a fist fight in Japan. Or get caught with drugs. Yeah, no, no, no. And, you know, China, I did some research on this for a project I'm working on. So in China, you don't really have Miranda and you, if a lawyer is too great an advocate, then they'll charge that lawyer with perjury. For helping the criminal. So imagine that.

They also are allowed, or they do, whether they're allowed to, I'm not an expert, but I do have a friend who went to University of Beijing. She's a Chinese lawyer and she's a lawyer here. Maybe I should ask her. But they use torture. They use torture techniques. So, you know, well, I mean, I can't tell you that. because I haven't researched enough about Chinese law, but I know they do it.

It happens. So if you visit China, you know, you need to run a squeaky clean program. That's my advice to you. Nowadays, do you represent, what's your opinion on Mexican drug cartels? When you get a so-called cartel case in Los Angeles,

are they actually cartel members? Are they just big drug traffickers who are supplied by the cartel? And then when they're on this side, they're just freelance. Right. So my answer comes down to the word, two words, Cinque dos. And that means 52. So when I get calls from country code 52, that's Mexico.

So my answer is for those calls, I screen those calls because I want to see who. Sometimes it's one of the homies who's down there, you know, on the run. But, you know, I'll text back. So I'm more used to dealing with the California cases versus Cinque dos. Having said that, you know, it's a fascinating area. I have done cases with the Mulas. So I've done cases where the guys pulled over and he has $130,000 in cash and then they take it and then I write a letter and then they don't file the case.

So I've done those guys. What do you mean by that? So mullahs are the mules. Right. In other words, I've done lower level people who, and I have some cases like that right now in Orange County. But I haven't done, you know, the big boss. Okay, so you usually don't deal with Spanish-speaking only kind of top-level people from the other side of the border who get brought over, who get arrested in Mexico and then extradited. You haven't dealt with that yet.

So the answer to that is a lot of those are federal cases. And, you know, as a private lawyer to do a federal case, it's a very big undertaking and it's very expensive. and it's very expensive. It takes a lot of work. So most of those tend to go to appointed lawyers. Who are excellent, by the way. I've heard federal defense lawyers are excellent. Yeah.

It's a hard panel to get on. But what I was trying to say is that I've done most of my cases are with the homies. Okay. Now, I've done a wide array of cases. I've done practicing medicine without a license, dentistry. I had a gal, Chinese gal, from Wuhan, who was an amazing cook. So she held herself out to be an acupuncturist in Los Angeles. And she was making a million dollars a year.

And she advertised. She's just a great, great business person. But she didn't have the license. So I did a, it was it 72 counts? of fraud and practicing without a license with the consumer protection DA. And I ended up getting her. She was looking at like 25 years. It was just a big-

Was that in the state or the feds? No, no, this was here in the state. Okay. So I ended up getting her out of jail. I got her credit for time served. And it's funny, her return of property motion, this woman had like 30 ermes and Chanel bags. Wow.

And they had to give it all back. So most of your cases are with the state. Yeah. I have done federal cases. Obviously, your big one, the wiretapping was a federal case. When will you decide to take a Fed case? When it's a juicy enough case, when the money's right? Like, when do you decide to, like, put your other smaller state cases to the side

and take, like, that once in a decade case? I'll take a case like that if I know I'm going to learn a lot and you know I do so federal court is very different from state court they look at us like a zoo right if you walk into CCB everyone's talking and there's like five lawyers and they're texting on their phone and there's 30 people seated in there you go to federal court no no no no no no so we walk in it's very formal it's very rigid. You stand when you speak to the judge. And it's, you know, Nicholas Rosenberg on behalf of

the defendant. He's present in custody. And again, I'm a very formal lawyer on the record. But even the feds are more formal. So when you walk in, you know, it's like this. It's very different. But, you know, the AUSAs, what they know who the federal practitioners are, right? So they know I'm a state court guy. If I'm able to master the vocabulary with the statutes and the sentencing guidelines and the bail presumptions under the bail reform act, and they see that I'm conversant with the federal system, then they'll give me that respect. Is that your goal to move up into the higher echelon of like big federal cases? Yeah. It's something, you know, a lot of state lawyers don't function in the feds that well.

And part of the reason that I'm interested is I'm probably going to become a civil rights attorney, and I'm probably going to start doing the wrongful deaths. Is that right? So that's an axis of career development that I'm looking at. Wow. So you're going to move on to like. Rosenberg could be the Brown bankrupt. I don't even get that. Well, you know who Ben Crump is, right?

That's George Floyd's lawyer. Oh, of course, right. I was just going to say that. George Floyd is Derek Chauvin's was convicted of civil rights violations. He was the one that would have that. Yeah, Crump. So here's the thing about Crump. He's a great guy.

I've met him, you know, several times. And then some people say, well, he won't go to court. And the answer is, Trump doesn't need to go to court. Right. Because it's civil law. No, he's a searchlight. And when Crump shines his beam on a case, that's his function. But that's civil law, right?

Right. That's civil rights is not criminal. He's suing Derek Chauvin or the state of Minnesota or whoever for civil rights violations. Correct. And in the wrongful death context, you know, these are multi-million dollar cases. So that's why I'm wanting to build out my arsenal in federal. court because I'm a trial lawyer and I know with my experience that I can prevail. And how is Crump, is he just taking a percentage of that? I assume he's not taking any money

up front on those big cases. Right. So those types of cases are generally contingency fees. So it's, you know, 30%, 33, 40% if it goes to trial. Yeah, it's a lot. Those big money. So imagine a family whose loved one has. been killed by the police. That's devastating enough. But then to have to go through a trial for years, litigating that. In other words, you can't forget it. It's just in your face every time you go to court.

So I feel for the families. And so I'm on the board of directors for a nonprofit that works with grieving families like that. It's called Always for the People Foundation. and our executive director is Mr. Checkpoint. He's got 300,000 followers. And he's the always film the police advocate. I think you're probably familiar. Yeah.

So he's my mentee and good friend. And he worked, for example, with the family of Valentina. Remember when the officer shot into the dressing room at the store and killed the 14-year-old girl? So that was Valentina. So Senate through his advocacy and work has connected with the family. And so we, one of the things that we do, one of our initiatives, is working with families where somebody's been killed by the police. Is there enough work? Do you think, are there enough active cases like that to where you can actually make a good living and be busy as a lawyer like that?

Yeah. Unfortunately, there are a lot of police shootings that happened. And, you know, it tends to go to kind of the established lawyers who do this. Like there's a guy named Dale, Gallipo. He's well known in that field. But remember, these people are going to age out and retire. So there's room for young guns like Rosenberg. You're the Jewish Cochran.

That's what I call you. Well, you know, it's funny you should say that. People have made that comparison. You know, but here's the thing. I'm just me, right? My background, my training, my experience is unique and I'm blessed, right? I want to emphasize, you know, I lead a charmed life. You sure do. You sure do. As you do as well, sir. Absolutely. And trust me, once my taxes get too backed up and I'm in court for tax evasion, who do you think I'm going to call? Right. That's right. Attorney Rosenberg. Yeah, I'll help you. I wanted to talk about a few special cases.

The first being Conejo. Right. Rapper, actor, look him up, Conejo. He was from the Heartbeats gang, street gang, based in South Los Angeles. He was, I think he said, 17 of his homies got killed in the early 90s, 17. And that's in America. he catches a murder beef, goes on the run to Mexico. He's Mexican American.

His family's from Halisco, but he grew up in the States in L.A. He's a Chicano. He's a homeboy. He goes on the run, like a lot of Mexican Americans who get pinched on murder beefs, they flee to the other side. He was then for 10, 15 years involved. He was a soldier for the Tijuana Carth tell during the hottest period when Sinaloa under Chapo was trying to take the city from

the Ariano Felix brothers who were the kingpins, the bosses in T.J. He saw some horrendous things. You know, he was, he lived the life of a cartel soldier, but as a Mexican-American, then you take it from there. How did he meet you? And how did he meet you? And how How did he come back and get his case, his murder case, adjudicated? Sure. So it's the Harpies. Harpies, I'm sorry. Not the heart beats?

Right. Harpies? Heartbees. Okay. They just say it like it sounds like heartbeats. Yeah. No, I got you. As they say, I got you, my boy.

Okay. So this is in the West Adams corridor. Close to where we are. South L.A. For those who aren't from here, it's near U.S. USC. So the Conejo story is a fascinating story with many moving parts. Real quick, can I do my shout for Conejo? Of course. Okay, so Conejo recently dropped the reset album Deluxe. So it's different from the original reset. He's on season five of the Inside a Sinister Mind podcast. And that's available,

Apple Music, Spotify, Odyssey, as they say, wherever you get your podcast. But check it out. He's a sick rapper. Yeah. So he's got over a thousand songs. So he's done triple digit albums. And if you imagine more than 100 albums. So imagine 10 albums per song.

We joked one time and I told him that Shakespeare had 160 sonnets. and he said, I'm the ganks, I'm the hood Shakespeare. Yeah, and he was recording a lot of those songs while he was in T.J. You know, putting in work for the cartel. He was making music. That was his, like, outlet. Right. Yeah.

And Jay and Prime would help after the drop. They would make those records happen. So that's my shout for Conejo. I met Conejo in 2018 when he had been released. February of 2018, he ended up with a voluntary manslaughter with probation, but he had six years suspended time over his head. And he was in a film with David Eyre, and I'll give Dave Air a shout, Chris Long, Cedar Park, the Beekeeper movie was the number one movie. So I'll give a shout to those gentlemen. And he did a project with

Bobby Soto Jr. called the tax collector. We know who David Ayers. Respectfully, we want to hear about Cahejo's case. He had a first-degree murder charge. How did you help him get that down to a suspended sentence? Right. So I didn't do that.

That was another lawyer, Stuart Goldfar. But what I was trying to bring together was I was on Alex Alonso's page and he posted the tax collector. And I felt like, wow, are these guys following me around, right? And I made a couple comments. Conejo reached out to me. And what I did for him was I got him off his probation early.

And then I expunged it. So the legal issue that I found was that his career as an actor was being stifled by being on felony probation because of cast insurance. So that was my argument. And we first started, I had to go to court five times to do that. But when we first started, the judge was dead sent against everything. He knew a murder had been reduced to voluntary manslaughter for probation. It was a special circumstance murder during a robbery.

So therefore, the judge was like, are you guys crazy? He's going to do his five years. So I ended up terminating that probation after about three years. So halfway mark. And then even after that, so the DA and I, we went to war. And at the end, I got the judge to believe that the DA was all wet. And he granted my petition. What does that mean all wet?

She said stupid things. Like she said that my client was free to lie about his criminal record. And she just, she lost the judge. She alienated the judge. And it was interesting because Conejo basically, you know, he's into, he calls it the religion, but he practices. And he did a pin on the DA's throat. And that was that she would have bad speaking. And I don't know if it was that or Rosenberg or a combination, but we got that motion granted.

But then we had the issue of expunging it, which I did. now he's off probation, no joint suspension. And he's done out. Another shout for Conejo, his film Dominique, where he plays a police officer is dropping this summer. So catch Dominique. And, you know, Conejo is a gifted actor, in my opinion. He's become a friend.

And, you know, that's my boy. Yeah, he has one of the most remarkable stories. I'm sorry. I thought you actually had helped him beat the murder case. Can you just tell us really quickly? Because I know you weren't involved in that, but I'm sure you know a lot about it. How was Goldstein? Goldfarb.

Goldfarb. Stuart Goldfarb. How was he able to get a murder robbery down to six months and suspended sentence? How was he able to do that? Was there just not enough evidence? Or what was the background on that case? So I reviewed the preliminary hearing transcript. There were three co-defendants, and at preliminary hearing, the other two co-defendants, their cases were actually dismissed.

So it was a weak case for evidentiary insufficiencies. So the backstory, and we get into an area where I can't really speak, but basically he was known and someone identified him based upon his. presence versus actually being there. All right. So Goldfarb, who's still around, by the way, and I'm trying to hook up with him. I met him a couple of times. But basically it was a weak case. And the DA, who had the case, had a bunch of special circumstance death cases.

This was that. And Goldfarb was basically able to say, look, let's do credit for time served, probation, give the man midterm six years suspended and you close this case. And she was kind of a train wreck, no offense. But she extended that offer, which he took. And he was on the run for 10 or 15 years. Yeah, I believe it's 14 years. Yeah.

And now does that look bad? Does that make you look guilty? Or is that something a good lawyer can get suppressed? I mean, in his case, we'll just look. at his case. He was able to get probation despite being on the run as a fugitive. I think he has an album called El Fugito, The Fugitive. I have the T-shirt.

So does it look guilty? I mean, if the jury, if it's not excluded, which I would move to exclude that to the jury, right? They don't need to know why we're doing this trial now. But if it came in, what does it really prove? Right. It could prove that he got a phone call tipping him off and he chose not to sit here and get two million dollars bail or no bail and fight his case. And, you know, he he blossomed as an artist during that period. Right. Do you think, do you think that like old school, what do you call it, like identifying like in a murder case where they take a witness or an eyewitness testimony? Do you think that? Do you think that old school, what do you call it, like identifying, like, identifying like in a murder case where they take a witness testimony? Do you think as a defense lawyer, if prosecution is resting their case on an eyewitness testimony, do you like that? Do you feel that that's become pretty easy to argue against?

Because of now what we know about how ineffective that really is? So the answer is I'll start with a statistic from a few years ago. And that is that Project Innocence at the time. I want to say it was about 200 exonerations, but they found that 75% of those wrongful convictions involved faulty eyewitness identifications. Now, that's a statistic that I would love to get in front of a jury. Right. Could you use that? Well, I have the best identification expert in California. I don't want to say her name because then the lawyers will call her. But she's a brilliant. professor. And she introduces me to all the professors. So I hang out with them and, you know,

we have dinner, have a glass of wine, chit-chat. But she is great at challenging eyewitness identifications. And like Alex Alonso, whenever I use her, I win. Right. So the way to do that is we talk about the factors. And over, now she's a research professor. So this is, you know, they write papers about this stuff. It's fascinating stuff. She's a cognitive psychologist. So she does, you know, the papers, the clinical trials. Okay.

So whenever we have an identification case, right, I will consult with and often call at trial, my identification expert. And there are faulty IDs. I've got a case now where the primary witness, I don't want to say too much because we're going to trial. so maybe a juror will see this. But the primary identifying witness is getting a deal in exchange for his testimony. And he's got like, I don't know, five federal bank robberies that he's getting good treatment on.

And that's the type of thing. There's a case called Giglio or Giglio that talks about the defendant's right to probe and find out about any leniency agreement for witnesses. Basically, he's a snitch, is the bottom line. Right. And he's getting offered a sweetheart deal to get out of major time. Correct. And that's a factor that the jury should be allowed to consider. And are they? Yes. So that comes in. That comes in as potentially exculpatory evidence.

The jury's entitled to know if people are getting a sweet deal for, singing. Have you ever made a supposedly credible witness on the stand? Have you ever just torn somebody to shreds, like made it brought out like their obvious lying? Yeah. I mean, prior inconsistent statement is something that we are allowed to present. And the reason I'm saying aloud is that these are all the rules of evidence, you know, hearsay, hearsay exceptions, 352, more prejudicial than probative. So that's kind of the world we operate in. Can you give us an example? Just a fun, really quick anecdote on a witness that you completely discredited on the stand?

Yeah. So this is a good segue into the Alex and now Marado case. So the issue is not the witness. The issue is what the cops said the witness said. So if you've seen my community updates, on Alex's case, the street vendor activist. So there's a guy named John Doe number one. And John Doe, number one, basically is harassing a street vendor

who's two inches into the property line at a supermarket in Pomona. He gets into a scuffle with him, and he grabs his phone and throws it down. But he told the cop that he was being choked. And I established at the preliminary hearing by playing video that the community sent me that he never was choked at all. And it's all on camera. You see his jugular vein pulsing

because he's so furious. But you never see the street vendor do that. So that's John Doe 1, lie number one. And he claims that the street vendor and my client used racial epithets on him, whereas I have video footage where he's calling the street vendor the N-word and he says Mexicans are liars.

Again, that's John Doe number one, lie number two. And did you bring that out in trial? It was at preliminary hearing because he didn't testify. Okay. So I was able to use extrinsic evidence, video evidence, to completely, in my opinion, eviscerate John Doe 1 at trial. So the background to that case is that my client and seven others, They're called the Justice Eight are being charged with conspiracy to commit criminal threats,

criminal threats, kidnapping, false imprisonment, assault with a deadly weapon, felon in possession of a firearm, and tear gas. They're currently all being held with no bail. No bail means there's no way you can get out of jail. No bail. So we've been litigating bail in that case since December 28th. we've had three hearings on the issue, and we just had the last hearing Friday, February 9th. And I was hopeful that the judge would respond to my argument and grant my client house arrest,

stay off social media, avoid the victims, and avoid the co-defendants. In what I thought was a slightly surprising ruling, but my client said he wasn't surprised because of the corruption in San Bernardino County. But the judge said there were no change of circumstances that would have triggered a new bail review. Now, he quoted from cases that I cited in my bail argument, which was 40 minutes long, and I used the bench guide.

The bench guide is a book that judges read in order to figure out what the law is. So I quoted from the bank. bench guide because he's a new judge. And I explained that filing new criminal charges after preliminary hearing is a change in the proceedings sufficient to trigger the bail review. Can I cut you off really quick? What are your defendants in San Bernardito County Jail? What are they accused of? Right. We got all those charges, but what were they doing? Right. Okay. So what are the facts? The facts, as alleged by the prosecution, is that they

have been in fights with people that they don't agree with. They have surrounded cars. They have, they made John Doe number two apparently go down on his knees and apologize for throwing a bottle of urine at the group. Okay, what is this group, though? They're, is this kind of famous, but I'm not exactly sure how. They're filming attacks on street vendors or? Yeah.

So let's say a street vendor is harassed. Then Alex's style of activism is confrontational. Right. My position is confrontational is not criminal. Right. So the sheriff of San Bernardino County gave a press conference, and he said that their activities are not protected by the First Amendment. They're thugs.

They surround people. They beat people. They pepper spray people, et cetera. So that's kind of their theory. Our theory is, and I said this in my argument, basically you've got two fist fights and you've got some pepper spraying incidents. He's looking at more than 10 years

and they've charged him. I want to say with at least four, if not five strike offenses, kidnapping is two years, three years, five years. That's a violent felony at 85%. But the real issue is, is why have they been denied bail? And we've litigated that.

In fact, we're going to go to the court of appeal on that very issue. We're going to take out a writ. And I'll just give you an example. At the last hearing, I asked the judge, not the last one, but the one before, for a transcript of the proceedings at court expense. And he said, Rosenberg, I've never had a private lawyer make that request. And so when he gave the ruling on Friday denying bail saying no change of circumstances, I renewed my request and I started arguing the Tran case that we talked about.

And he said, Mr. Rosembourg, let me interrupt you. It's granted. So he knows we're going to take out a writ. But here's what he really said. He said that under the case, it's called Inray Alberto. It talks about a second judge raising bail because they think the first judge's bail was too low. But the judge specifically said the remedy for that error is not with the first judge, but it's to seek extraordinary relief. So extraordinary relief in this context means a writ.

Basically, the judge invited Rosenberg, if I don't like his ruling, take up a writ. Wow. So it's a very strict racist county. And you get judges that behave like that, that have draconian bail. and draconian sentences. How do you feel about, you know, regardless if they get bail or not, how do you feel about the case? You feel confident that you can get these guys off?

The answer to that is it depends where the trial is held. Three-fourths of all the charges were in L.A. County, Pomona. And we're trying to get over to L.A. County to get away from San Bernardino for a variety of reasons. Currently, we're at the Victorville courthouse, which is kind of an outpost. You mentioned you don't want to be there. You mentioned the prison up there, the federal

facility. Excuse me. So that is a venue and a jurisdictional issue. My position is it's the dog wagging or the tail wagging the dog because you've got three charges in Victorville versus

the remaining of 16 counts are in L.A. County. there's speculation, which probably is well-founded, that they know that the Los Angeles County DA probably would not prosecute this. And that's why they're doing it in San Bernardino. There are, I don't want to say conspiracy theories, but a lot of people believe that Alex,

as we call him, Eden, Alex enumerado, Justice 8, had protested in front of the mayor of Fontana. Her name is Aquinetta. I forget her last name. But there's speculation that she's behind this as a political prosecution. And I've given community updates. Go to my Instagram at Attorney Rosenberg to learn more about the case. But Alex has been reading books from the 1960s.

So he's been reading about the New York 21. These were Black Panthers that were. charged with conspiracy, several charges in New York in 1969. And basically, it's a political prosecution. Tupac Shakur's mother was one of the New York 21, which I did not know. And he also is reading about the East L.A. 13, which were prosecuted in the late 1960s out of East L.A. So he's finding parallels between political suppression using criminalization to his case.

Yeah, because they're railroading these people, essentially, modern day railroading. I believe these cases are overcharged. I believe, like I said, I call it two fist fights. They call it a conspiracy for criminal threats, criminal threats, assault with a deadly weapon. And this is a case where it's unlikely we're going to get an offer. This is a case where we're very likely to go to trial. Yeah. It sounds like they don't want to deal.

They want to send a message out there in those Boundaq counties. Yeah, the prosecutor has clearly said, my boss said no offers. Wow. You know, and I don't know how we feel about it here because, you know, in San Bernardino, they're fans of the Connect. So we're torn about this internally. but I'm kidding, of course. Right. Well, you're talking about the sheriff.

Talking about the sheriff. But yeah, this is a, well, you know what? This case falls under kind of what you want to transition into, which is civil rights. So this is a really interesting case that it's probably one of these decade cases. So I wish you the best of luck with that. When do you think you'll go to trial? We're set for pretrial on March 1st. Oh, it's coming up.

And I think the last trial date is April 8th. I don't want to speak on our strategy, but I think the prosecutor anticipates that we're going to challenge jurisdiction and venue. I've got some tricks up my sleeve. I'm kind of the team captain of the lawyers because I represent Alex, and that's how I practice with co-counsel. and what I see is that we're going to divvy up the research so that each lawyer isn't independently doing the same research.

So I want to assign, you know, Christian Contreras to this issue, Mauro Quintero to this issue, see what I'm trying to say. And the lawyers are really working together as a cohesive group. And then Christian Contreras is, he represents Wendy Lujan, who's my client's, you know, romantic partner. But he's a civil rights lawyer. So right now we're anticipating, litigating my clients' access to health care inside the jail.

And that's on a federal level when you appeal like on a civil rights basis. Christian is likely to file lawsuits in the federal court. And again, I know the issues, but I'm not a practitioner in federal civil rights. So I'm having Christian, we're collaborating on that so we can litigate it. Rosenberg, where can they find you? Right. So the easiest way to find Rosenberg is my Instagram at attorney Rosenberg, at attorney Rosenberg.

By the time you type attorney, you'll actually see my face. Yeah, it's popping. Your social media is popping. So if you live in, how far a radius do you represent? clients if they're in Southern California. Sure. So I cover L.A. County, Ventura County, San Bernardino County, Riverside County, Orange County. I have done Imperial County, Sacramento. I'll go out of county, but I'm really looking for, you know, the high profile, the one that's on the news in, you know, Solano. I did a great case in Imperial County.

where I got my client a new trial because the jury deliberated and said, why didn't my client testify? So that went up to the California Supreme Court twice. It came down and I went to El Centro, Imperial County for 11 months, but I ended up getting the new trial for my client, which was unheard of. Imperial counties, my client and his co-defendant were African-American. Oh, it's a terrible place to be black and go to trial.

And the decedent was a telegenic Caucasian girl whose body was found in a like a calvert, like a wash. So it was high profile, but that was a big win. How did the new trial go? So he's still fighting his case. I think they should hire me for that trial. And, you know, that was a great win for me because we have the right. write to like a little trial on the issue of did the jury deliberate on that? And I wrote a motion. And it's always nice when I write a good motion because the judge starts talking to me first.

They say, Mr. Rosenberg, I read your motion. Do you have anything to add? And that judge granted my motion all the way out in Imperial. So that was cool. All right. Well, you got, I hope you're not in trouble. But if you're out there listening to watching and you are, you know what to do. DM attorney Rosenberg. It's that simple. I can't wait to see how the trial of the eight and San Bernardino plays out. I hope you win. But, you know, whatever you do out there, keep listening, San Bernardino. And yeah, we're going to switch over to the Patreon now, talk a little bit more. And also you have a podcast coming out, too. Let's plug that. Yeah. So I have a podcast coming out. I'm working with Prime, who's Conejo's director. He does all his media. Friend of the show. And I've got a

concert I'm sponsoring coming up April 27th at Adelanto Stadium. I'm a sponsor. I try to put money back into the music and the arts for the Rasa. So we've got Jenny 69, Little Rob, MC Magic. And we got Rose Royce from the back in the day to perform. Reverie's performing. Shout out to Revery. She's doing so many great things from Highland Park. And shout out to Encrypt, whose Reverie's director.

And, you know, I've been blessed to kind of meet all these people and work with them. You're as L.A. as it comes, my man. Well, I'll copy Revery. She does this. Where she doesn't do that, she does this. So shout out to Rev.

Hell yeah. All right, brother. Thank you so much. and thank you guys. We'll see you over at Patreon. Rosenberg. You're the best. Thanks, man.

All right. Appreciate you.