[Music]
what do you think about the legal system
that we have in America today the system
is skewed in favor of the prosecution
even people that are innocent can
unfortunately get kind of the next
morning was Sunday morning and you know
the phone starts to ring the words were
Brent is not breathing and he’s turning
blue the day that I’ll never forget one
of the things I loved doing this
interview and interesting characters who
have an incredible background and an
experience with business and that’s
exactly who we’re sitting with here
today Robert Shapiro who was the dream
team leading the defense attorney for OJ
Simpson also the co-founder of Legal
Zoom as well as write counsel he
transitioned from what he was doing
there to also work in with civil
litigation right now so with that being
said thank you so much for making the
time and opening your office to us well
you’re welcome to release thanks for
being here I love your YouTube channel
great to be here with you so obviously
LA I lived here for 25 years I’m now in
Dallas and every time I come back here
there’s an affinity to this city I got
growing up seeing I was telling you
earlier I said you know there’s a lot of
attorneys out there that you’ll see on
TV and a lot of them that have different
approaches they take and I don’t know
what it is
every time I see you I watch any of your
content I’ve seen you on TV you read
about you you’re so consistent and a
class act I just wanna make sure I give
you that props because I know sometimes
you don’t hear that what attorneys well
that’s the reason you’re here but yeah I
knew you’re gonna say nice thing one
thing about you so but let’s get right
into it prior to you becoming who you
are today you’ve represented a lot of
different characters you know Paul and I
are big on baseball he’s a KC guy he was
talking about Vince Coleman Canseco
whether we know or strawberry that’s
right strawberry your list of people you
rub her car – and recently there’s a
list of a lot of people that you’ve
worked with but take me back to what I
want to know about is if I’m in high
school with Robert Shapiro who was
Robert Shapiro on high school I was this
very very small undersized kid had a
good memory but didn’t really study hard
was not really athletic when I entered
high school I was in five feet tall I
had struggles in high school on a social
level
because of my size and my lack of
maturity from a middle-class working
family my father drove a lunch truck my
mother was a sales lady in a clothing
store had a nice family existence only
child did fairly well I was able to get
accepted to UCLA directly out of high
school and spent the next five years of
my life there because I liked it so much
UCLA well you stayed a little little
longer than usual I took the long term
program well you haven’t found where you
were you a guy that I have fun with if I
was in college with you were you so
focused on classroom and reading your
books and all that stuff I see I see a
fun humor side of you as well well there
was an organization at UCLA called the
kelps and there was really a fraternity
within a fraternity so every fraternity
would put up a certain number of people
and it was primarily made up of athletes
kareem abdul-jabbar was a kelp when I
was there a lot of the football players
and there was a spirit organization but
the spirit had no limits so we pretty
much we pretty much exceeded
expectations of having fun I like that I
mean answering you’d like an attorney
the spirit had no limits you know you
gotta read into it that’s great for me
my spirit had no limits in the army I
wanted to make sure I contributed to
society when I was in the army there
were a lot of fathers that loved us when
we lived in Kentucky so so I was in the
ROTC oh really
yeah it was mandatory at UCLA okay I
went in I entered UCLA in 1960 the draft
board was right across the street on
Westwood Boulevard and it was mandatory
for two years of ROTC if you decided to
stay four years
you immediately went in as a second
lieutenant if you did two years then you
were eligible for the draft and I was
one a fit and ready to go when I was at
UCLA I never wanted to be a lawyer and
never thought about being a lawyer I
never knew what lawyers did and it was
only upon graduation when the war in
Vietnam was raging and
there were a couple of ways not to go
into the service one was to burn your
draft card and become a conscientious
objector which I wouldn’t do to was to
move to Canada or three was to go to
graduate school and I was a finance
major at UCLA and they didn’t have any
graduate business school at that time so
myself and a few of my fraternity
brothers who were in the same position
said you know what why don’t we apply to
law school we sent out applications
virtually flew any fluke to anything
that was below a first-rate law school
because we hadn’t done any education we
hadn’t prepared for testing etc and the
three of us got accepted to the
University of San Diego law school and
we went down to San Diego enrolled and
the first day of class I get a call from
Loyola where I had been wait-listed that
one seat opened in the night school I
said guys you know Loyola was a lot
closer I don’t have to live away from
home they were a little bit it’s pushed
off yeah to say the least I went up to
Loyola to start at four years in night
school I get to Loyola and lo and behold
the last guy in the day school drops out
and one seat opens up in the day school
and they asked me if I want to take that
turned out to be the beginning of my law
school career something I never never
thought about something of its own high
school you weren’t somebody said I’m
gonna grow up and be a lawyer that
wasn’t you my mother wanted me to be a
dentist that’s why I spent five years in
UCLA my first year was as a pre dental
major and I was doing okay until I met
physics and chemistry with these
geniuses that were at UCLA so but I was
able to struggle my way through those
classes what I didn’t know is they give
you a piece of chalk and an exacto knife
and they say cut a tooth no preparation
I’m not really good with my hands other
than when I box every time I did it I
broke the chalk so my first year I had
to drop out a free dental program and
get into the finance interesting so now
your other friends who once you see UC
San Diego you said and they went to law
how do they end up doing in their
couriers did you end up staying and long
you know one ended up being an assistant
to the Commissioner of baseball Richard
Levin who was a lifelong friend and the
other became a lawyer and still
practices still practices so all three
of you went to the top all three of you
did well for yourself yeah in that
amazing yeah when you were a kid were
you one that would debate all the time
where you won that would always argue
because you’re the only child will you
argue with your mom or your dad was
there some of that in you or not really
yes okay yeah I had a gift for gab you
did I could talk my way out of most
things and into a few things so you knew
you could go this route and do something
with this gift that was given to you
yeah so now you are now a lawyer you’re
coming up how was it and what was the
first breakthrough you had upon
graduating law school I said you know
what I’m gonna give it a shot being a
lawyer one thing that happened in law
school was we had Moot Court Competition
I was fortunate to win the oral argument
in moot court they got the highest grade
in the school and became the chief
justice of the wood court and got to
meet judges that would be judging the
next competition and so they said you
know you you really should go into trial
law and at that time I thought I need to
get some experience so I had a choice of
becoming a deputy district attorney a
public defender or City Council City
Council lawyers rarely if ever got to
court the public defender’s had long
hair and were on the very liberal side
and I was on the liberal side but my
hair was short and then I said you know
if I’m a public defender I’m gonna be
going up against DA’s who know as little
as I know but as a DA I’m gonna get
exposed to other lawyers who are in
private practice and that’s what I did
for about 18 months then went into
private practice and I got the first
publicized case in America when I was
out of the DA’s office for about six
months I got a call from somebody I
didn’t know
who identified themselves as Liza
Minnelli and said I was told to call you
because David winters a choreographer
who I knew because our sons went to the
same preschool and Linda Lovelace just
got arrested in Las Vegas for possession
for sale of cocaine went to the airport
rented a plane flew to Las Vegas and
ended up representing Linda Lovelace on
the first nationally publicized case in
America how was that adjustment for you
from being not in the limelight to all
of a sudden everybody’s it just gets a
momentum of its own you don’t plan on it
and all of a sudden that’s Linda
Lovelace the first legitimate porn star
prior to stormy Daniels that people knew
her name actually showed her movie deep
throat in theaters where people would go
on dates she inspired a lot of men yeah
oh she was she was an inspiration to a
lot
she had god-given talents I get national
publicity and now it’s it’s the 70s and
it’s drugs sex and rock and roll and I
seem to be getting calls from lots of
people in the music business who are
getting arrested for drugs and developed
a niche for representing people in
high-profile cases so let me ask you is
a good friend of mine Rick he was a
criminal defense attorney in the 80s for
20 years and he was doing very very good
for himself here locally in LA and then
he started kind of getting a little bit
too deep into it where he ended up
picking up the bad habits of the people
he was representing and then obviously
lost his license went to prison for 20
years and you know god bless his soul he
passed away six months ago just a
sweetheart of a guy he could tell
stories all day honestly if he sat here
and told stories the guy was a non-stop
four to three full days how did you
yourself while you were representing and
while you’re in this world how did none
of that like get to you where you’re
like this is just purely business none
of this associations gonna rub off on me
well I’ve always viewed being a lawyer
as something that was a profession and I
always separated personal life from my
life I never socialized with clients and
was always anti-drug even though I was
representing people in the 70s primarily
for possession of drugs
I mean marijuana in the 70s was a felony
and today it’s legal in some form in 29
states are in this country I never got
to the point where I got seduced by
anyone in the drug business or people
that were using drugs and and was then
and still I am very anti-drug that’s one
of the reasons why you start your
foundation which is something yes talk
about the later on going back to your
career are you as you were coming up
from seeing it from your standpoint
Robert what is different between the
legal world you were in then versus what
it is today what dynamics has
dramatically changed in the last 4050
years with social media one word the
internet I wrote an article about 20
years ago it was called how to deal with
the press I gave a speech only the
lawyers and they said you know that
there was a great article can we have a
copy of the speech and I don’t write
anything out so I said no it was you
know I’ve done extemporaneously and they
said what why don’t you try to put it on
paper so so I did and became one of the
ten best articles of the decade from the
legal journal then the news was on a
daily basis not on a second-by-second
basis so there were ways you can get
messages across the way you would like
got it you could have more time to be
intentional versus today it’s more
spontaneous –is its instantaneous Wow
instantaneous and so that’s why you can
catch people at an off moment saying
things that they hadn’t thought about
making statements that they regret they
made that they have to claw back on but
then you know I mean if a reporter would
call it said you know give me a few
minutes I’ll get back to you get your
get your thoughts together and well it
was that article stole a bill is there
still public key can it still be found I
think it Kenya has opportunities for the
law as an industry obviously you you
were also co-founder right counsel and
the legal zone is the business and
amount of opportunities for lawyers to
go
to business higher today than it was 40
50 years ago yes no I think it’s much
it’s much higher I mean today today
anybody can put a website up doesn’t
matter what their office looks like it
doesn’t matter about anything they can
put up the most gorgeous website and
have walked out of law school yesterday
I think about today when you’re saying
that you know makes you think people are
getting caught with mistakes more today
than they did before which means there’s
more of a need to have somebody
represent them today than 30 40 50 years
ago yeah and you know what we said is is
one of the reasons we started both of
the companies LegalZoom in 2000 which is
now 18 years to make legal documentation
available to virtually everyone at an
affordable price and more recently right
counsel because today any person can put
up a fancy website and people don’t know
where to find lawyers especially if
they’ve been injured if they’ve been
injured either in an auto accident if
the insurance companies haven’t treated
them fairly if they’ve been
unfortunately affected by bad drugs if
they’ve been injured in the workplace if
they’ve been discriminated against any
kind of case that a lawyer would take on
a contingency that is they’ll get their
fee at the end of the case as part of
the recovery but people don’t know who
these lawyers are so they’ll just type
in a keyword accident lawyer and up will
pop a bunch of very fancy websites of
lawyers who you may know nothing about
and so people would ask me even in my
own law firm a friend of ours was in an
accident who was a good lawyer for this
or we had a wrongful death we had a
horrible injury through the years of
practice I’ve gotten to know lawyers
across the country and so rather than
having a service where people are
actually buying territories you have
this 1-800 dentist for
example well people will come in and say
I’ll pay so much to get referrals in Los
Angeles so much in Orange County
lawyers do the same thing we said you
know you’re not getting the best lawyers
you’re just getting somebody who is
paying to get a referral what if we did
this with no charge to people if they
called and used our expertise and our
backgrounds and people that were working
with and put them in touch with the best
lawyer had no cost to them and then we
would try to put together the right
lawyer with the right person for the
right case almost like a matchmaker
exactly that’s right exactly and that’s
right counsel com so right counsel comm
is a matchmaker between the client and
the lawyer how do I as a lawyer to get
filter to make it on right counsel you
would not qualify I didn’t tell the
media but but how does somebody like to
be all right counsel okay so first of
all it’s people I’ve known throughout
the years lawyers that I’ve worked with
lawyers that I’ve seen in court lawyers
that have distinguished themselves by
getting special recognition being the
tops in their field are people that are
coming to us are getting the best
representation shotta
how many total lawyers are right counsel
well we don’t have any lawyers on right
counsel every case is individually so
they analyze little venue match make
exist well I’m not gonna really know who
it is
you’re gonna direct me and you give a
few options you say here’s this here’s
this you know typically what we try to
do this we probably try to say you know
you’ve filed the claim for insurance
you’ve had tremendous flood damage in
your house and you think it’s gonna cost
you two hundred thousand dollars to fix
the insurance company says no we think
it’s twenty thousand dollars well you
can either give in to the insurance or
try to find a lawyer who will say
they’re acting in bad faith I’m sure all
the people here would have no idea where
to find a lawyer
that deals with bad faith I happen to
know the top lawyer in the country that
deals with bad faith yeses bomb right
counsel you connect me with them exactly
and in all legal sin which were a
customer about we use LegalZoom God
knows for how many years
phenomenal sight easy to use all of it’s
pretty simple to find the documentation
there so LegalZoom was inspired for
reasoning to find what to do the basic
stuff obviously we know right counsel
how about legal okay so so league
LegalZoom started out with a simple
simple premise that people needed
important documentation basically wills
everybody should have a will and should
at least have a living will durable
power of attorney if god forbid
something happens to you get ill and it
started with this concept that we had
four founders Brian Lou Brian Lee and
Eddie Hartman and myself each had
different roles and in putting this
business together
and we were hoping to do forty wills a
month and breakeven and today it’s the
biggest company in the world doing legal
documentation biggest company in the
world doing legal documentation so how
many wills do you do per month now to
break you it wills is not the biggest
thing that we do primarily its
incorporation okay we do more
corporations than everybody else
combined in California even though
you’re nationwide though in California
you have to in California okay but
LegalZoom is it’s the nation nationwide
nation yes so so let me ask you I’ve
hired a lot of attorneys I’ve fired a
lot attorneys that somebody that runs a
business himself we’ve had some
incredible attorneys Cooley law firm we
worked with a lot of guys here locally
we have them some in New York we have
some in San Fran but when you get a good
one you got to keep it because it’s
tough to find a good one good lawyer
good doctor all things that you always
have keep them keep them for a long time
right the question becomes I’ve also had
some bad experiences with attorneys when
I was early on coming up so I didn’t
know how to decipher between the two and
hold them accountable right and that can
be pretty costly for a lot of people how
does a client who is running a business
you’re running a budget so you don’t
have a lot of money you don’t have
$300,000 in trying to get this business
going and every $10,000 counts every
$5,000 counts every single penny you put
counts to make your business last how
does a client hold an attorney
accountable so when you get the
statement that says this really took me
42 hours at 380 dollars an hour you owe
me this much versus he had his other
guys doing the legwork assistant who are
$120 you know $75 an hour how do you
hold them accountable with the math it’s
a question that’s it’s something a lot
of entrepreneurs struggle with and with
good reason
sure because the law practice is really
a law business from a business model
talking to entrepreneurs perhaps the
worst business model anybody could come
up with only lawyers could think of a
business model like this number one most
lawyers work on an hourly basis only so
many hours in a day only so many hours
in a year that you can bill for number
two there is no passive income you have
to continually put in hours to build
people tremendous overhead tremendous
back support needed hours are incredibly
long because judges require
documentation almost instantaneously
overnight to be filed but then the worst
part of the practice of law is you could
build up the best law firm in the world
and at the end of the day you can’t sell
it it has no capital value whatsoever
the only time a law practice has some
value is when you get a divorce
and the goodwill is put to the other
side but other than that there’s no
passive income and there’s no residual
income so having said that and that
capitalization and I hear that a lot so
that’s why on the other side but there’s
also a lot of money to be made on the
front end right there’s a lot of money
to make if you do it right again the
right market but how do you hold the
attorney accountable how does the
entrepreneur the CEO hold so for
instance have you ever had anybody
represents you have you had lawyers
represent yes so how do you hold them
accountable to make sure they don’t
charge you 50 percent more than they
typically would your in the world so
teach us as an expert
how do you hold you attorneys
accountable alright so the first lesson
that I learned and I actually learned
this from the general counsel at Wynn
where I was just involved in in a very
significant case for the last five years
and she said I hire lawyers
I don’t hire law firms so any lawyer
that was going to work on the case had
to be interviewed by the general counsel
to see whether or not this was a lawyer
they wanted number two they don’t pay to
train lawyers so if you have a first
second or third year lawyer that you’re
giving an assignment to that lawyer is
learning on the job and the client is
paying for it I’d recommend to
entrepreneurs number one make sure
you’re hiring a lawyer not a law firm
number two that the person that’s going
to work with them has experience is not
there to learn on the job and number
three don’t spend a lot of time talking
on the phone because lawyers build by
the milind good at it
don’t talk on the phone hole hold it
until you really know I see a lot of
people last long except us as attorneys
know how to have a run-on sentences for
18 minutes and 18 minutes get you past
the first fish that’s right now you’re
paying for 30 that’s right Oh believe me
I put the phone they’re not watching us
so you know I know what he’s doing I
said this okay I gotta go so for me it’s
okay I gotta go or else we’re gonna get
that bill and I make the note so hire
lawyers not law firm to if you are gonna
hire the lawyer don’t hire a lawyer
that’s gonna be a $200 an hour I think
this is what I’m taking from what you’re
saying be willing to pay to 450 right
because he’s not gonna just come in
trying to learn on you he’s already had
it before him with ten plus years of
experience paid to X the price you know
I closer while our law firm here that
I’ve been a partner for thirty years we
don’t hire lawyers to train we don’t
have first second or third year lawyers
here all our lawyers are lateral
transfers who have proven themselves at
other firms and what I want to come to a
place where there’s a great atmosphere
great camaraderie and
legal services available I like that so
what makes a great lawyer by the way I
mean being in the world that you’re in
you watch everybody see somebody and you
say this guy has it or dead girl has it
or the lawyers that people know are the
trial lawyers are the attorneys that are
in court and the ones that you see to be
a great lawyer as a trial or number one
you have to be able to be very quick on
your feet you have to be able to analyze
things quickly and you have to be able
to present things to a jury of 12 people
who may know nothing about the law in an
understandable way I’ll give you an
example years ago there was a major
lawsuit here by the NFL against the
Raiders who were at the Coliseum this
lawsuit was whether or not the Raiders
could move from Oakland to to Los
Angeles even though there was some
controversy with the NFL and I knew Pete
Rozelle and I knew one of the owners
Jean Klein who was the owner the charges
was uh was a good family friend and so
they asked if I would come watch part of
the trial and so I went to the opening
statements and there were two different
styles one was a lawyer from a major law
firm who got up and gave the greatest
treatise on monopolies and lack of
competition that you could ever hear and
he had behind him about 15 other lawyers
and in those days there were file boxes
not computers in the courtroom he was
stunningly brilliant then a guy named
Joe Alioto lawyer from San Francisco got
up he didn’t have anybody sitting next
to him other than Mac’s bleach or
another lawyer who was representing the
Coliseum he was representing al Davis
and they got up with no notes and there
was six people sitting in the jury box
and they just started talking to him
the way the NFL was manipulating and
taking advantage of these small people
we had lunch and lawyers were sitting
around and the team owners that were
with the NFL they were talking about how
brilliant their lawyer was and the other
lawyers didn’t even know anything about
antitrust and about monopolies and I
said you know what they knew one thing
that you guys don’t you know how to talk
to those jurors those jurors were
listening your lawyer was great if he
was teaching a class in antitrust at
Harvard Law School six people sitting
there after five minutes had no idea
what he was talking about and Al Davis
won Wow that’s what makes a great lawyer
you see it also style wise you see some
is very in-your-face you’re not an
in-your-face type of a an attorney you
think the fact that your pacing is
slower than the most gives you an edge
because the way you know the same
sentence a person can say in two seconds
I think you say in four seconds and I
think that gives you an additional two
seconds to think about an answer and
maybe allows you to think a little bit
more of a better answer you think
there’s an edge for you I see it from an
outside as an edge for you
you know I picked up lessons in life one
of the people that I got to know during
the practice was Jack Nicholson and he
said something to me that has stuck with
me throughout my career speak low and
speak slow I took that advice to heart
oh you big movie guy that you do you
watch a lot of movies about law and all
this stuff where you know you don’t
really go no I hate these about law
really I and real reason is because
they’re legal fiction I mean there’s
some 12 Angry Men stands out as a
realistic movie but the rest of them are
legal fantasies legal fiction it’s
nothing that takes place in the
courtroom you don’t have lawyers running
up to the bench and yelling at a judge
or going back in chambers alone I mean
and so those kind of things frustrate me
and that’s really one of the reasons I
have always advocated cameras in the
courtroom so the public can really see
what lawyers do how it’s done yeah so
have you watched primal fear
there’s a part of it where I think you
said in a megyn kelly interview you said
there’s a and by the way the fact that
it’s since the OJ Simpson case you’ve
done you did to interview says right off
the bat and you said you did one just
recently with megyn kelly 20 years later
so we’re not going that side because
you’ve consistently said I’m not
commenting on the case and you have been
like that for all this time three
interviews to write after one recent
with megyn kelly but I thought it was
interesting when you said when it comes
down to it there is moral justice there
is legal justice right so you see a lot
in the movie primal fear you see Edward
Norton the character comes out and
Richard Gere’s just doing his jab and
all of a sudden is like oh my gosh I was
representing you did you ever have an
instance yourself where you were
thinking how do I set aside my emotions
when Robert you’ve represented God knows
how many people over the years
were you ever in a position yourself
where you’re sitting there saying I
really don’t like the gun representing
but you know what I’ll get the job done
were you ever in that position lots of
times
lots of times especially as a young
lawyer when I relied on court
appointments there were conflicts with
the public defender’s office and judges
would would ask you to represent
somebody I recall representing one of
the people that was in the Aryan
Brotherhood sitting next to me with a
swastika on his neck you know I had to
put aside the hatred I had for seeing
that symbol and focus on the facts of
the case and he was acquitted Wow that
tells me you’re very emotionally tough
and you’re very mentally tough what is
your formula to keep yourself mentally
and emotionally tough in situations like
that to still go out there and do the
job I’ll give you an example and I used
this example well shortly after a
controversial verdict I was in the
hallways leaving my doctor’s office and
a doctor came up to me with a name that
was obviously a Jewish surname and he
said how could you ever represent
somebody like that that you knew was
guilty and I said doctor let me ask you
something have you ever worked in an
emergency room yeah I mean that’s part
of our training we do
so well I want to give you an example
let’s say you’re on duty in an emergency
room and the cops come in with a guy on
a gurney and the cops are saying you
know we caught this guy in the act of
molesting a child and he tried to get
away we had to do a pursuit he wouldn’t
stop so we had a shooter and
unfortunately we didn’t kill him but
this is really a bad guy doctor and the
guys coming in now on a gurney and it’s
a code blue and you’re called to attend
to them and so you have to do a
emergency tracheotomy open up his shirt
and I use this example because it
happened to me and you see a swastika on
his neck what are you gonna do you say
well I’m gonna call another doctor well
let’s say it’s two o’clock in the
morning and you’re the only doctor there
what are you gonna do is it well I’m
obviously going to have to do my best to
save his life there’s the answer to your
question I’m not a judge I’m not a juror
most cases are not cases of who did it
most cases are cases of something did
take place who is responsible and if
they are responsible what is it so for
example you could take a set of facts
where two people are in an argument one
person takes a baseball bat hits the
other person and kills them so you would
say that’s got to be murder if you
weren’t there perhaps there was an
argument before and the other guy had
the baseball bat and was disarmed and
this guy held or fell down and fell on
the baseball bat or it could be an
accident
so you could have anything from not
guilty to involuntary manslaughter
voluntary manslaughter or second-degree
murder we know a crime took place we
don’t know what it was
do you want to know do you want it I
always been you know I want to know I
don’t want to drive down the road really
I don’t want to drive down the road and
somebody says you know just go straight
you’re not going to have any
shoes and if I hit a bump in the road
and I don’t know about it I’m gonna be
taken off guard so I want to know the
facts I don’t know the true facts and
not make any judgment on so first step
is tell me everything is that what the
first step is with you before you take
them up as a client is that that is that
the problem no no you have to really sit
down you have to get confidence with
somebody and then once you start getting
into the facts whether it’s a civil case
or a criminal case so is a process
except first then information or it’s
give me the info let’s sign that I’m not
going to disclose anything and an
acceptance what’s the process in the
world you’re in the way I do it if
somebody comes in I want to hear them I
want to listen to the about their case I
want to tell them whether or not
uncomfortable with this type of case
whether it’s something that I have the
time to do and and want to do especially
now with civil matters and then once we
get into the preparation I make it very
clear that you know everything you tell
me is privileged I will not share it
with anyone without your permission
and I want to know exactly what took
place it’s not going to affect the way I
represent you however I will not let you
take the stand and lie or misrepresent
maybe we won’t have you testify but I
need to know all the facts that’s do you
approach you take okay so when you are
getting that information
how are you processing the information
to say okay create a baseball bat he hit
him no maybe the other guy hit and the
other guy grabbed and hit him maybe if I
let me hit the head on the baseball bat
right so is there a part where you say
these are the facts if I go this fraud
we’re gonna lose if we go this right but
I’m gonna go this rod because I know
this is gonna be the argument that’s
gonna be beneficial to this case is that
what the creative you know look at the
stuff I’m doing now and the stuff I’ve
been doing for years are serious major
things especially on the civil side and
it’s really an intelligent
fact-gathering
method of getting a tremendous amount of
information being able to put it
together in a way that you can present
to a Trier of fact that’s understandable
and advocate your clients position the
best you can what do you think about the
legal system that we have in America
today would how its set up with the fact
that we have did percentage that we have
in prison and some that probably don’t
belong in there and some guys do belong
that are not in there what are your
thoughts on okay so we’ve got two parts
we’ve got a civil system and a criminal
system so you’re talking now about the
criminal system first of all it depends
where you are in the country in some
parts of the country it’s relatively
sophisticated in the federal courts it’s
more sophisticated in the state courts
and in some areas it’s more
sophisticated than others the system is
skewed in favor of the prosecution
there’s just no question about it
the judges are generally former
prosecutors police are generally believe
more than private citizens and the
overwhelming majority of people that get
involved in the criminal system end up
working out a settlement a plea bargain
hmm why because the risk of going to
trial in serious cases is overwhelming
even people that are innocent can
unfortunately get convicted can Kemp and
half sure reality we’ve had historically
innocent people executed which is the
worst thing that could ever happen and
so we’ve developed the system that cases
get evaluated by prosecutors and defense
lawyers and judges and get settled
because people cannot take the risk when
they’re facing 20 years if they can
settle a case for probation and house
arrest and so you have a tremendous
amount of people that if they went to
trial may quite often be successful but
they can’t take the
because the exposure is unknown so does
it need to be changed systematically or
socially like do we need to start
talking about it more to minimize it or
systematically some changes need to take
place for that percentage to go lower
you know the problem is this is that
financial resources limit the ability in
criminal cases judges are simply
overwhelmed with calendars federal
judges have one calendar themselves they
may have three four hundred cases a year
on a calendar state court judges are
hearing on criminal matters ten or
fifteen cases a day until they get to a
point where they’re sitting there with
high-profile trials the system is just
too big to fit the individual needs
which is very unfortunate
and so people fall into categories so
you think it’s gonna continue to wait as
right now yeah I think it is first of
all we have too many laws on the books I
think we have to start focusing more on
on things that are really important to
society and to individuals and try to
minimize the smaller cases and find ways
to take them outside of the court system
which we’re doing there’s a lot of
diversion programs for first-time
offenders on drug cases especially and
there’s been tremendous in advancements
in not incarcerated people who have a
drug disease and we’ll talk about that a
little bit later so why don’t we
transition to that you know I read up on
I was also speaking to your assistant
and she was talking about your passion
for the brain Shapiro foundation this
story I don’t want to say the story I
wanted you to say the story on why it’s
friendship hero so in 2005 my wife and I
lost our son to the disease of alcohol
and drugs brent was 25 years old we had
discovered that he had a drug addiction
probably from the
17 or 18 but we didn’t discover it early
enough I had some suspicions about it my
wife thought it was part of growing up
and experimentation and so there were
there was some some conflict within the
family but then it got to the point
where it was very very obvious that that
he was in trouble and needed help
fortunately was a bright kid so he was
able to cover it up and and you learn
through experience that people who have
this this addiction in which I am
convinced as a disease are incapable of
telling the truth so the mother may
accept statements that would seem
incredulous to most people drug addicts
have have a way of being very cunning
and being able to convince you that they
are not addicted to drugs and that
there’s no real problems and then you
get to the point where where you know
that there’s a problem and your friends
and their friends start telling you and
so then you start the process of
rehabilitation a real problem in this
country number one there are no
standards for rehabilitation – nobody
has ever come up with any proven way to
treat this disease it’s all based on oh
we have great results here out in Malibu
and we have great results in Florida
it’s not true it’s just not true so
there are very few people who have the
expertise of how to deal with mental
diseases in general and drug disease in
particular and that was the experience
we had with Brent he went to a 30-day
program and like most people on a 30-day
program on the 31st day they relapse I
could put him a drug addict in my home
lock him up for 30 days feed them and
talk to them and they’re not going to
use drugs for 30 days
and next day they leave that they will
definitely relapse there’s just no
question about it
then you go back and then you try to go
to sober living unless somebody’s in a
program for a year or more there’s
really virtually no chance and Brent
fortunately at the end got into a
year-long program in Virginia got sober
went to SC was on the Dean’s List was
ready to graduate core Law School and he
relapsed
he took a half of ecstasy and two shots
of Jagermeister according to everybody
who was at a back-to-school party not a
wild crazy party something at the Elks
Club in Hollywood and he got sick he got
really sick and started to projectile
vomit and nobody wanted to call the
paramedics for a very simple reason they
didn’t want us to know that he had
relapsed he was engaged the wedding
would be off he’d have to go back into
rehab
so they said just let him sleep it off
and he went home with his fiancee and
the next morning was Sunday morning and
a day that I’ll never forget that you
know the phone starts to ring and it’s a
little too early and it seems to be
ringing a little bit too long and the
words were Brent is not breathing and
he’s turning blue did you call the
paramedics yes just before I called you
where are you
we’re in West Hollywood I wake up my
wife Linnell we get in the car and go to
cedars-sinai and we got there before the
paramedics arrived I knew that wasn’t a
good sign
and the news wasn’t good he wasn’t
breathing and he was in a coma doctors
worked with him and the next day
conclusively told us that he was not
going to recovery and so we had to make
that decision that parents never want to
make and and let him go we had a
memorial 2,000 people came a a lot of
our friends and a lot of his friends
very popular very social kid and one of
my friends who has since unfortunately
passed away Michael King came to me and
said you know I’m so moved by what took
place because at the memorial we only
talked about drugs and addiction we
dealt with it head-on and the only
people who spoke were his friends who
were also drug addicts and his counselor
and myself and he said I want to make a
donation in your son’s name to your
favorite charity and I said you know I
don’t know that I have a favorite
charity but I want to start one for drug
and alcohol awareness and he wrote me a
substantial check within eight weeks we
had a public charity called the Brent
Shapiro foundation for drug and alcohol
awareness from 2005 to about 2011 we
went around the country we published two
children’s books one called so mo says
no for five-year-old kids how to
introduce drugs with parents at an early
early age and then followed up by a book
called David’s discovery twelve year
olds all available free to any school or
any group that wants them through us we
developed something called the save a
life card it’s just a very simple
message and it tells you what the
symptoms are people are reluctant to
call nine
for a couple reasons number one they
think they’re going to get in trouble if
they have drugs so we were trying to
push along the Good Samaritan Law which
Governor Brown signed four years ago
that nobody can get arrested if their
have drugs themselves bringing somebody
to a hospital with drugs and we’ve sent
those out by the hundreds of thousands
they’re also on our website
brent shapiro org and then you know
around 2011-2012 people started to talk
about this disease and in public and now
it’s on the news and it’s talked about
about this epidemic that’s sweeping this
country and it’s a major epidemic and
we’re losing an entire generation of
young people and others from addiction
to prescription medication that is
another subject that we should talk
about at some point in time but we
decided you know let’s see what we can
do for prevention and so i met with the
head of addiction medicine at
cedars-sinai dr. Jeff Wilkins and I said
is there anything that keeps people off
drugs and he said yes we have found that
rewards work reward rewards if you give
a drug addict an alternative between
using drugs and a substantial reward
they will not use drugs that day I said
well what if we try this with kids what
if we tried to give kids rewards for not
using drugs
so I’m met with the Boys and Girls Club
of America and found out something very
interesting that kids once they became
teenagers leave the Boys & Girls Club of
America it’s no longer cool and I said
what if we had an incentive that we
could keep kids there and so we got vans
we closed down for blocks in East LA
Cincinnati Avenue in the heart of
gangland 900 families came we had food
trucks Ferris wheels and we pitched this
idea that there’s an epidemic and we can
help your kids if you and your kid will
allow us to test them randomly with
saliva for alcohol and drugs
welcome rewards will give them
educational opportunities we’ll take
them to college campuses to see what
college is like we’re going to make them
eligible for college scholarships if
they graduate as a silver high school
student that started about four and a
half years ago right now we have about
5,000 kids in this program we have six
clubs in Los Angeles one in Malibu when
in Long Beach
one in East LA one in Monterey Park Los
Angeles Dodgers just sponsored our club
AHA and in East LA Steve Tisch and the
New York Giants last summer were
sponsored our team in the Bronx our club
in the Bronx
so there’s kids in Bronx as well in the
brown Califano kal yeah this is in New
York
we’re opening a club in Chicago at the
Jordan boys and girls club that’s going
to be sponsored by the Chicago Bulls and
the Chicago White Sox and just yesterday
I got off the phone with the president
of the Oakland Raiders and they’re
sponsoring a club in Oakland so we want
to take this to every city that has a
major sports franchise the cost is
minimal
the rewards are amazing to date we have
not had one child fail a drug test
in over four and a half years you’re
kidding me not one in four and a half
years because the pure pressure now is
how cool it is to not fall into the
traps where they see what is happening
to people in their own families and
certainly in their own classrooms and so
that’s what we’re doing it’s called
Brent’s Club looked up let’s see what
we’re doing at the bread Shapiro org
brent shapiro org first of all the story
like that the last thing a parent ever
wants to experience is is something like
that every spoken a few parents who have
had experience i’m like they tell me
practice there’s nothing more painful
than this so sorry for your loss but on
the other to the fact that you and your
friend I think you said Michael King
that you decided to do that is turned it
to something like this the man upstairs
sometimes there’s some strange things to
us that lead into something that’s even
bigger than that that we don’t even know
about because one story like Brent can
end up influencing thousands of other
kids that secretly struggle with the
challenges of drugs that they’re so
embarrassed to talk about with their
parents we’re dealing with some right
now with very very close relative of
ours that we have to fly into a city and
state to take them in and it’s exactly
what you said it’s that part of while
you’re on it well finally I told my
family I said you just got to go address
it immediately you got to go surprise
the house and she did and when the
surprise happen it was exactly what we
expected so the accountability of that
it’s a lot of work so appreciate you for
doing that with the well thank you a
foundation and more importantly you know
like I said earlier class act thank you
so much for taking the time and allowing
us to come here to your office and
spending some time with you I really
enjoyed the stand with you Robert
truly so did I truly I mean you’re
you’re inspirational and you you bring
out a lot of things that I don’t talk
about and thank you for doing that thank
thank you for sharing it with the rest
of us thank you so much thank you
welcome thank you Oh
what do you think about the legal system
that we have in America today the system
is skewed in favor of the prosecution
even people that are innocent can
unfortunately get kind of the next
morning was Sunday morning and you know
the phone starts to ring the words were
Brent is not breathing and he’s turning
blue the day that I’ll never forget one
of the things I loved doing this
interview and interesting characters who
have an incredible background and an
experience with business and that’s
exactly who we’re sitting with here
today Robert Shapiro who was the dream
team leading the defense attorney for OJ
Simpson also the co-founder of Legal
Zoom as well as write counsel he
transitioned from what he was doing
there to also work in with civil
litigation right now so with that being
said thank you so much for making the
time and opening your office to us well
you’re welcome to release thanks for
being here I love your YouTube channel
great to be here with you so obviously
LA I lived here for 25 years I’m now in
Dallas and every time I come back here
there’s an affinity to this city I got
growing up seeing I was telling you
earlier I said you know there’s a lot of
attorneys out there that you’ll see on
TV and a lot of them that have different
approaches they take and I don’t know
what it is
every time I see you I watch any of your
content I’ve seen you on TV you read
about you you’re so consistent and a
class act I just wanna make sure I give
you that props because I know sometimes
you don’t hear that what attorneys well
that’s the reason you’re here but yeah I
knew you’re gonna say nice thing one
thing about you so but let’s get right
into it prior to you becoming who you
are today you’ve represented a lot of
different characters you know Paul and I
are big on baseball he’s a KC guy he was
talking about Vince Coleman Canseco
whether we know or strawberry that’s
right strawberry your list of people you
rub her car – and recently there’s a
list of a lot of people that you’ve
worked with but take me back to what I
want to know about is if I’m in high
school with Robert Shapiro who was
Robert Shapiro on high school I was this
very very small undersized kid had a
good memory but didn’t really study hard
was not really athletic when I entered
high school I was in five feet tall I
had struggles in high school on a social
level
because of my size and my lack of
maturity from a middle-class working
family my father drove a lunch truck my
mother was a sales lady in a clothing
store had a nice family existence only
child did fairly well I was able to get
accepted to UCLA directly out of high
school and spent the next five years of
my life there because I liked it so much
UCLA well you stayed a little little
longer than usual I took the long term
program well you haven’t found where you
were you a guy that I have fun with if I
was in college with you were you so
focused on classroom and reading your
books and all that stuff I see I see a
fun humor side of you as well well there
was an organization at UCLA called the
kelps and there was really a fraternity
within a fraternity so every fraternity
would put up a certain number of people
and it was primarily made up of athletes
kareem abdul-jabbar was a kelp when I
was there a lot of the football players
and there was a spirit organization but
the spirit had no limits so we pretty
much we pretty much exceeded
expectations of having fun I like that I
mean answering you’d like an attorney
the spirit had no limits you know you
gotta read into it that’s great for me
my spirit had no limits in the army I
wanted to make sure I contributed to
society when I was in the army there
were a lot of fathers that loved us when
we lived in Kentucky so so I was in the
ROTC oh really
yeah it was mandatory at UCLA okay I
went in I entered UCLA in 1960 the draft
board was right across the street on
Westwood Boulevard and it was mandatory
for two years of ROTC if you decided to
stay four years
you immediately went in as a second
lieutenant if you did two years then you
were eligible for the draft and I was
one a fit and ready to go when I was at
UCLA I never wanted to be a lawyer and
never thought about being a lawyer I
never knew what lawyers did and it was
only upon graduation when the war in
Vietnam was raging and
there were a couple of ways not to go
into the service one was to burn your
draft card and become a conscientious
objector which I wouldn’t do to was to
move to Canada or three was to go to
graduate school and I was a finance
major at UCLA and they didn’t have any
graduate business school at that time so
myself and a few of my fraternity
brothers who were in the same position
said you know what why don’t we apply to
law school we sent out applications
virtually flew any fluke to anything
that was below a first-rate law school
because we hadn’t done any education we
hadn’t prepared for testing etc and the
three of us got accepted to the
University of San Diego law school and
we went down to San Diego enrolled and
the first day of class I get a call from
Loyola where I had been wait-listed that
one seat opened in the night school I
said guys you know Loyola was a lot
closer I don’t have to live away from
home they were a little bit it’s pushed
off yeah to say the least I went up to
Loyola to start at four years in night
school I get to Loyola and lo and behold
the last guy in the day school drops out
and one seat opens up in the day school
and they asked me if I want to take that
turned out to be the beginning of my law
school career something I never never
thought about something of its own high
school you weren’t somebody said I’m
gonna grow up and be a lawyer that
wasn’t you my mother wanted me to be a
dentist that’s why I spent five years in
UCLA my first year was as a pre dental
major and I was doing okay until I met
physics and chemistry with these
geniuses that were at UCLA so but I was
able to struggle my way through those
classes what I didn’t know is they give
you a piece of chalk and an exacto knife
and they say cut a tooth no preparation
I’m not really good with my hands other
than when I box every time I did it I
broke the chalk so my first year I had
to drop out a free dental program and
get into the finance interesting so now
your other friends who once you see UC
San Diego you said and they went to law
how do they end up doing in their
couriers did you end up staying and long
you know one ended up being an assistant
to the Commissioner of baseball Richard
Levin who was a lifelong friend and the
other became a lawyer and still
practices still practices so all three
of you went to the top all three of you
did well for yourself yeah in that
amazing yeah when you were a kid were
you one that would debate all the time
where you won that would always argue
because you’re the only child will you
argue with your mom or your dad was
there some of that in you or not really
yes okay yeah I had a gift for gab you
did I could talk my way out of most
things and into a few things so you knew
you could go this route and do something
with this gift that was given to you
yeah so now you are now a lawyer you’re
coming up how was it and what was the
first breakthrough you had upon
graduating law school I said you know
what I’m gonna give it a shot being a
lawyer one thing that happened in law
school was we had Moot Court Competition
I was fortunate to win the oral argument
in moot court they got the highest grade
in the school and became the chief
justice of the wood court and got to
meet judges that would be judging the
next competition and so they said you
know you you really should go into trial
law and at that time I thought I need to
get some experience so I had a choice of
becoming a deputy district attorney a
public defender or City Council City
Council lawyers rarely if ever got to
court the public defender’s had long
hair and were on the very liberal side
and I was on the liberal side but my
hair was short and then I said you know
if I’m a public defender I’m gonna be
going up against DA’s who know as little
as I know but as a DA I’m gonna get
exposed to other lawyers who are in
private practice and that’s what I did
for about 18 months then went into
private practice and I got the first
publicized case in America when I was
out of the DA’s office for about six
months I got a call from somebody I
didn’t know
who identified themselves as Liza
Minnelli and said I was told to call you
because David winters a choreographer
who I knew because our sons went to the
same preschool and Linda Lovelace just
got arrested in Las Vegas for possession
for sale of cocaine went to the airport
rented a plane flew to Las Vegas and
ended up representing Linda Lovelace on
the first nationally publicized case in
America how was that adjustment for you
from being not in the limelight to all
of a sudden everybody’s it just gets a
momentum of its own you don’t plan on it
and all of a sudden that’s Linda
Lovelace the first legitimate porn star
prior to stormy Daniels that people knew
her name actually showed her movie deep
throat in theaters where people would go
on dates she inspired a lot of men yeah
oh she was she was an inspiration to a
lot
she had god-given talents I get national
publicity and now it’s it’s the 70s and
it’s drugs sex and rock and roll and I
seem to be getting calls from lots of
people in the music business who are
getting arrested for drugs and developed
a niche for representing people in
high-profile cases so let me ask you is
a good friend of mine Rick he was a
criminal defense attorney in the 80s for
20 years and he was doing very very good
for himself here locally in LA and then
he started kind of getting a little bit
too deep into it where he ended up
picking up the bad habits of the people
he was representing and then obviously
lost his license went to prison for 20
years and you know god bless his soul he
passed away six months ago just a
sweetheart of a guy he could tell
stories all day honestly if he sat here
and told stories the guy was a non-stop
four to three full days how did you
yourself while you were representing and
while you’re in this world how did none
of that like get to you where you’re
like this is just purely business none
of this associations gonna rub off on me
well I’ve always viewed being a lawyer
as something that was a profession and I
always separated personal life from my
life I never socialized with clients and
was always anti-drug even though I was
representing people in the 70s primarily
for possession of drugs
I mean marijuana in the 70s was a felony
and today it’s legal in some form in 29
states are in this country I never got
to the point where I got seduced by
anyone in the drug business or people
that were using drugs and and was then
and still I am very anti-drug that’s one
of the reasons why you start your
foundation which is something yes talk
about the later on going back to your
career are you as you were coming up
from seeing it from your standpoint
Robert what is different between the
legal world you were in then versus what
it is today what dynamics has
dramatically changed in the last 4050
years with social media one word the
internet I wrote an article about 20
years ago it was called how to deal with
the press I gave a speech only the
lawyers and they said you know that
there was a great article can we have a
copy of the speech and I don’t write
anything out so I said no it was you
know I’ve done extemporaneously and they
said what why don’t you try to put it on
paper so so I did and became one of the
ten best articles of the decade from the
legal journal then the news was on a
daily basis not on a second-by-second
basis so there were ways you can get
messages across the way you would like
got it you could have more time to be
intentional versus today it’s more
spontaneous –is its instantaneous Wow
instantaneous and so that’s why you can
catch people at an off moment saying
things that they hadn’t thought about
making statements that they regret they
made that they have to claw back on but
then you know I mean if a reporter would
call it said you know give me a few
minutes I’ll get back to you get your
get your thoughts together and well it
was that article stole a bill is there
still public key can it still be found I
think it Kenya has opportunities for the
law as an industry obviously you you
were also co-founder right counsel and
the legal zone is the business and
amount of opportunities for lawyers to
go
to business higher today than it was 40
50 years ago yes no I think it’s much
it’s much higher I mean today today
anybody can put a website up doesn’t
matter what their office looks like it
doesn’t matter about anything they can
put up the most gorgeous website and
have walked out of law school yesterday
I think about today when you’re saying
that you know makes you think people are
getting caught with mistakes more today
than they did before which means there’s
more of a need to have somebody
represent them today than 30 40 50 years
ago yeah and you know what we said is is
one of the reasons we started both of
the companies LegalZoom in 2000 which is
now 18 years to make legal documentation
available to virtually everyone at an
affordable price and more recently right
counsel because today any person can put
up a fancy website and people don’t know
where to find lawyers especially if
they’ve been injured if they’ve been
injured either in an auto accident if
the insurance companies haven’t treated
them fairly if they’ve been
unfortunately affected by bad drugs if
they’ve been injured in the workplace if
they’ve been discriminated against any
kind of case that a lawyer would take on
a contingency that is they’ll get their
fee at the end of the case as part of
the recovery but people don’t know who
these lawyers are so they’ll just type
in a keyword accident lawyer and up will
pop a bunch of very fancy websites of
lawyers who you may know nothing about
and so people would ask me even in my
own law firm a friend of ours was in an
accident who was a good lawyer for this
or we had a wrongful death we had a
horrible injury through the years of
practice I’ve gotten to know lawyers
across the country and so rather than
having a service where people are
actually buying territories you have
this 1-800 dentist for
example well people will come in and say
I’ll pay so much to get referrals in Los
Angeles so much in Orange County
lawyers do the same thing we said you
know you’re not getting the best lawyers
you’re just getting somebody who is
paying to get a referral what if we did
this with no charge to people if they
called and used our expertise and our
backgrounds and people that were working
with and put them in touch with the best
lawyer had no cost to them and then we
would try to put together the right
lawyer with the right person for the
right case almost like a matchmaker
exactly that’s right exactly and that’s
right counsel com so right counsel comm
is a matchmaker between the client and
the lawyer how do I as a lawyer to get
filter to make it on right counsel you
would not qualify I didn’t tell the
media but but how does somebody like to
be all right counsel okay so first of
all it’s people I’ve known throughout
the years lawyers that I’ve worked with
lawyers that I’ve seen in court lawyers
that have distinguished themselves by
getting special recognition being the
tops in their field are people that are
coming to us are getting the best
representation shotta
how many total lawyers are right counsel
well we don’t have any lawyers on right
counsel every case is individually so
they analyze little venue match make
exist well I’m not gonna really know who
it is
you’re gonna direct me and you give a
few options you say here’s this here’s
this you know typically what we try to
do this we probably try to say you know
you’ve filed the claim for insurance
you’ve had tremendous flood damage in
your house and you think it’s gonna cost
you two hundred thousand dollars to fix
the insurance company says no we think
it’s twenty thousand dollars well you
can either give in to the insurance or
try to find a lawyer who will say
they’re acting in bad faith I’m sure all
the people here would have no idea where
to find a lawyer
that deals with bad faith I happen to
know the top lawyer in the country that
deals with bad faith yeses bomb right
counsel you connect me with them exactly
and in all legal sin which were a
customer about we use LegalZoom God
knows for how many years
phenomenal sight easy to use all of it’s
pretty simple to find the documentation
there so LegalZoom was inspired for
reasoning to find what to do the basic
stuff obviously we know right counsel
how about legal okay so so league
LegalZoom started out with a simple
simple premise that people needed
important documentation basically wills
everybody should have a will and should
at least have a living will durable
power of attorney if god forbid
something happens to you get ill and it
started with this concept that we had
four founders Brian Lou Brian Lee and
Eddie Hartman and myself each had
different roles and in putting this
business together
and we were hoping to do forty wills a
month and breakeven and today it’s the
biggest company in the world doing legal
documentation biggest company in the
world doing legal documentation so how
many wills do you do per month now to
break you it wills is not the biggest
thing that we do primarily its
incorporation okay we do more
corporations than everybody else
combined in California even though
you’re nationwide though in California
you have to in California okay but
LegalZoom is it’s the nation nationwide
nation yes so so let me ask you I’ve
hired a lot of attorneys I’ve fired a
lot attorneys that somebody that runs a
business himself we’ve had some
incredible attorneys Cooley law firm we
worked with a lot of guys here locally
we have them some in New York we have
some in San Fran but when you get a good
one you got to keep it because it’s
tough to find a good one good lawyer
good doctor all things that you always
have keep them keep them for a long time
right the question becomes I’ve also had
some bad experiences with attorneys when
I was early on coming up so I didn’t
know how to decipher between the two and
hold them accountable right and that can
be pretty costly for a lot of people how
does a client who is running a business
you’re running a budget so you don’t
have a lot of money you don’t have
$300,000 in trying to get this business
going and every $10,000 counts every
$5,000 counts every single penny you put
counts to make your business last how
does a client hold an attorney
accountable so when you get the
statement that says this really took me
42 hours at 380 dollars an hour you owe
me this much versus he had his other
guys doing the legwork assistant who are
$120 you know $75 an hour how do you
hold them accountable with the math it’s
a question that’s it’s something a lot
of entrepreneurs struggle with and with
good reason
sure because the law practice is really
a law business from a business model
talking to entrepreneurs perhaps the
worst business model anybody could come
up with only lawyers could think of a
business model like this number one most
lawyers work on an hourly basis only so
many hours in a day only so many hours
in a year that you can bill for number
two there is no passive income you have
to continually put in hours to build
people tremendous overhead tremendous
back support needed hours are incredibly
long because judges require
documentation almost instantaneously
overnight to be filed but then the worst
part of the practice of law is you could
build up the best law firm in the world
and at the end of the day you can’t sell
it it has no capital value whatsoever
the only time a law practice has some
value is when you get a divorce
and the goodwill is put to the other
side but other than that there’s no
passive income and there’s no residual
income so having said that and that
capitalization and I hear that a lot so
that’s why on the other side but there’s
also a lot of money to be made on the
front end right there’s a lot of money
to make if you do it right again the
right market but how do you hold the
attorney accountable how does the
entrepreneur the CEO hold so for
instance have you ever had anybody
represents you have you had lawyers
represent yes so how do you hold them
accountable to make sure they don’t
charge you 50 percent more than they
typically would your in the world so
teach us as an expert
how do you hold you attorneys
accountable alright so the first lesson
that I learned and I actually learned
this from the general counsel at Wynn
where I was just involved in in a very
significant case for the last five years
and she said I hire lawyers
I don’t hire law firms so any lawyer
that was going to work on the case had
to be interviewed by the general counsel
to see whether or not this was a lawyer
they wanted number two they don’t pay to
train lawyers so if you have a first
second or third year lawyer that you’re
giving an assignment to that lawyer is
learning on the job and the client is
paying for it I’d recommend to
entrepreneurs number one make sure
you’re hiring a lawyer not a law firm
number two that the person that’s going
to work with them has experience is not
there to learn on the job and number
three don’t spend a lot of time talking
on the phone because lawyers build by
the milind good at it
don’t talk on the phone hole hold it
until you really know I see a lot of
people last long except us as attorneys
know how to have a run-on sentences for
18 minutes and 18 minutes get you past
the first fish that’s right now you’re
paying for 30 that’s right Oh believe me
I put the phone they’re not watching us
so you know I know what he’s doing I
said this okay I gotta go so for me it’s
okay I gotta go or else we’re gonna get
that bill and I make the note so hire
lawyers not law firm to if you are gonna
hire the lawyer don’t hire a lawyer
that’s gonna be a $200 an hour I think
this is what I’m taking from what you’re
saying be willing to pay to 450 right
because he’s not gonna just come in
trying to learn on you he’s already had
it before him with ten plus years of
experience paid to X the price you know
I closer while our law firm here that
I’ve been a partner for thirty years we
don’t hire lawyers to train we don’t
have first second or third year lawyers
here all our lawyers are lateral
transfers who have proven themselves at
other firms and what I want to come to a
place where there’s a great atmosphere
great camaraderie and
legal services available I like that so
what makes a great lawyer by the way I
mean being in the world that you’re in
you watch everybody see somebody and you
say this guy has it or dead girl has it
or the lawyers that people know are the
trial lawyers are the attorneys that are
in court and the ones that you see to be
a great lawyer as a trial or number one
you have to be able to be very quick on
your feet you have to be able to analyze
things quickly and you have to be able
to present things to a jury of 12 people
who may know nothing about the law in an
understandable way I’ll give you an
example years ago there was a major
lawsuit here by the NFL against the
Raiders who were at the Coliseum this
lawsuit was whether or not the Raiders
could move from Oakland to to Los
Angeles even though there was some
controversy with the NFL and I knew Pete
Rozelle and I knew one of the owners
Jean Klein who was the owner the charges
was uh was a good family friend and so
they asked if I would come watch part of
the trial and so I went to the opening
statements and there were two different
styles one was a lawyer from a major law
firm who got up and gave the greatest
treatise on monopolies and lack of
competition that you could ever hear and
he had behind him about 15 other lawyers
and in those days there were file boxes
not computers in the courtroom he was
stunningly brilliant then a guy named
Joe Alioto lawyer from San Francisco got
up he didn’t have anybody sitting next
to him other than Mac’s bleach or
another lawyer who was representing the
Coliseum he was representing al Davis
and they got up with no notes and there
was six people sitting in the jury box
and they just started talking to him
the way the NFL was manipulating and
taking advantage of these small people
we had lunch and lawyers were sitting
around and the team owners that were
with the NFL they were talking about how
brilliant their lawyer was and the other
lawyers didn’t even know anything about
antitrust and about monopolies and I
said you know what they knew one thing
that you guys don’t you know how to talk
to those jurors those jurors were
listening your lawyer was great if he
was teaching a class in antitrust at
Harvard Law School six people sitting
there after five minutes had no idea
what he was talking about and Al Davis
won Wow that’s what makes a great lawyer
you see it also style wise you see some
is very in-your-face you’re not an
in-your-face type of a an attorney you
think the fact that your pacing is
slower than the most gives you an edge
because the way you know the same
sentence a person can say in two seconds
I think you say in four seconds and I
think that gives you an additional two
seconds to think about an answer and
maybe allows you to think a little bit
more of a better answer you think
there’s an edge for you I see it from an
outside as an edge for you
you know I picked up lessons in life one
of the people that I got to know during
the practice was Jack Nicholson and he
said something to me that has stuck with
me throughout my career speak low and
speak slow I took that advice to heart
oh you big movie guy that you do you
watch a lot of movies about law and all
this stuff where you know you don’t
really go no I hate these about law
really I and real reason is because
they’re legal fiction I mean there’s
some 12 Angry Men stands out as a
realistic movie but the rest of them are
legal fantasies legal fiction it’s
nothing that takes place in the
courtroom you don’t have lawyers running
up to the bench and yelling at a judge
or going back in chambers alone I mean
and so those kind of things frustrate me
and that’s really one of the reasons I
have always advocated cameras in the
courtroom so the public can really see
what lawyers do how it’s done yeah so
have you watched primal fear
there’s a part of it where I think you
said in a megyn kelly interview you said
there’s a and by the way the fact that
it’s since the OJ Simpson case you’ve
done you did to interview says right off
the bat and you said you did one just
recently with megyn kelly 20 years later
so we’re not going that side because
you’ve consistently said I’m not
commenting on the case and you have been
like that for all this time three
interviews to write after one recent
with megyn kelly but I thought it was
interesting when you said when it comes
down to it there is moral justice there
is legal justice right so you see a lot
in the movie primal fear you see Edward
Norton the character comes out and
Richard Gere’s just doing his jab and
all of a sudden is like oh my gosh I was
representing you did you ever have an
instance yourself where you were
thinking how do I set aside my emotions
when Robert you’ve represented God knows
how many people over the years
were you ever in a position yourself
where you’re sitting there saying I
really don’t like the gun representing
but you know what I’ll get the job done
were you ever in that position lots of
times
lots of times especially as a young
lawyer when I relied on court
appointments there were conflicts with
the public defender’s office and judges
would would ask you to represent
somebody I recall representing one of
the people that was in the Aryan
Brotherhood sitting next to me with a
swastika on his neck you know I had to
put aside the hatred I had for seeing
that symbol and focus on the facts of
the case and he was acquitted Wow that
tells me you’re very emotionally tough
and you’re very mentally tough what is
your formula to keep yourself mentally
and emotionally tough in situations like
that to still go out there and do the
job I’ll give you an example and I used
this example well shortly after a
controversial verdict I was in the
hallways leaving my doctor’s office and
a doctor came up to me with a name that
was obviously a Jewish surname and he
said how could you ever represent
somebody like that that you knew was
guilty and I said doctor let me ask you
something have you ever worked in an
emergency room yeah I mean that’s part
of our training we do
so well I want to give you an example
let’s say you’re on duty in an emergency
room and the cops come in with a guy on
a gurney and the cops are saying you
know we caught this guy in the act of
molesting a child and he tried to get
away we had to do a pursuit he wouldn’t
stop so we had a shooter and
unfortunately we didn’t kill him but
this is really a bad guy doctor and the
guys coming in now on a gurney and it’s
a code blue and you’re called to attend
to them and so you have to do a
emergency tracheotomy open up his shirt
and I use this example because it
happened to me and you see a swastika on
his neck what are you gonna do you say
well I’m gonna call another doctor well
let’s say it’s two o’clock in the
morning and you’re the only doctor there
what are you gonna do is it well I’m
obviously going to have to do my best to
save his life there’s the answer to your
question I’m not a judge I’m not a juror
most cases are not cases of who did it
most cases are cases of something did
take place who is responsible and if
they are responsible what is it so for
example you could take a set of facts
where two people are in an argument one
person takes a baseball bat hits the
other person and kills them so you would
say that’s got to be murder if you
weren’t there perhaps there was an
argument before and the other guy had
the baseball bat and was disarmed and
this guy held or fell down and fell on
the baseball bat or it could be an
accident
so you could have anything from not
guilty to involuntary manslaughter
voluntary manslaughter or second-degree
murder we know a crime took place we
don’t know what it was
do you want to know do you want it I
always been you know I want to know I
don’t want to drive down the road really
I don’t want to drive down the road and
somebody says you know just go straight
you’re not going to have any
shoes and if I hit a bump in the road
and I don’t know about it I’m gonna be
taken off guard so I want to know the
facts I don’t know the true facts and
not make any judgment on so first step
is tell me everything is that what the
first step is with you before you take
them up as a client is that that is that
the problem no no you have to really sit
down you have to get confidence with
somebody and then once you start getting
into the facts whether it’s a civil case
or a criminal case so is a process
except first then information or it’s
give me the info let’s sign that I’m not
going to disclose anything and an
acceptance what’s the process in the
world you’re in the way I do it if
somebody comes in I want to hear them I
want to listen to the about their case I
want to tell them whether or not
uncomfortable with this type of case
whether it’s something that I have the
time to do and and want to do especially
now with civil matters and then once we
get into the preparation I make it very
clear that you know everything you tell
me is privileged I will not share it
with anyone without your permission
and I want to know exactly what took
place it’s not going to affect the way I
represent you however I will not let you
take the stand and lie or misrepresent
maybe we won’t have you testify but I
need to know all the facts that’s do you
approach you take okay so when you are
getting that information
how are you processing the information
to say okay create a baseball bat he hit
him no maybe the other guy hit and the
other guy grabbed and hit him maybe if I
let me hit the head on the baseball bat
right so is there a part where you say
these are the facts if I go this fraud
we’re gonna lose if we go this right but
I’m gonna go this rod because I know
this is gonna be the argument that’s
gonna be beneficial to this case is that
what the creative you know look at the
stuff I’m doing now and the stuff I’ve
been doing for years are serious major
things especially on the civil side and
it’s really an intelligent
fact-gathering
method of getting a tremendous amount of
information being able to put it
together in a way that you can present
to a Trier of fact that’s understandable
and advocate your clients position the
best you can what do you think about the
legal system that we have in America
today would how its set up with the fact
that we have did percentage that we have
in prison and some that probably don’t
belong in there and some guys do belong
that are not in there what are your
thoughts on okay so we’ve got two parts
we’ve got a civil system and a criminal
system so you’re talking now about the
criminal system first of all it depends
where you are in the country in some
parts of the country it’s relatively
sophisticated in the federal courts it’s
more sophisticated in the state courts
and in some areas it’s more
sophisticated than others the system is
skewed in favor of the prosecution
there’s just no question about it
the judges are generally former
prosecutors police are generally believe
more than private citizens and the
overwhelming majority of people that get
involved in the criminal system end up
working out a settlement a plea bargain
hmm why because the risk of going to
trial in serious cases is overwhelming
even people that are innocent can
unfortunately get convicted can Kemp and
half sure reality we’ve had historically
innocent people executed which is the
worst thing that could ever happen and
so we’ve developed the system that cases
get evaluated by prosecutors and defense
lawyers and judges and get settled
because people cannot take the risk when
they’re facing 20 years if they can
settle a case for probation and house
arrest and so you have a tremendous
amount of people that if they went to
trial may quite often be successful but
they can’t take the
because the exposure is unknown so does
it need to be changed systematically or
socially like do we need to start
talking about it more to minimize it or
systematically some changes need to take
place for that percentage to go lower
you know the problem is this is that
financial resources limit the ability in
criminal cases judges are simply
overwhelmed with calendars federal
judges have one calendar themselves they
may have three four hundred cases a year
on a calendar state court judges are
hearing on criminal matters ten or
fifteen cases a day until they get to a
point where they’re sitting there with
high-profile trials the system is just
too big to fit the individual needs
which is very unfortunate
and so people fall into categories so
you think it’s gonna continue to wait as
right now yeah I think it is first of
all we have too many laws on the books I
think we have to start focusing more on
on things that are really important to
society and to individuals and try to
minimize the smaller cases and find ways
to take them outside of the court system
which we’re doing there’s a lot of
diversion programs for first-time
offenders on drug cases especially and
there’s been tremendous in advancements
in not incarcerated people who have a
drug disease and we’ll talk about that a
little bit later so why don’t we
transition to that you know I read up on
I was also speaking to your assistant
and she was talking about your passion
for the brain Shapiro foundation this
story I don’t want to say the story I
wanted you to say the story on why it’s
friendship hero so in 2005 my wife and I
lost our son to the disease of alcohol
and drugs brent was 25 years old we had
discovered that he had a drug addiction
probably from the
17 or 18 but we didn’t discover it early
enough I had some suspicions about it my
wife thought it was part of growing up
and experimentation and so there were
there was some some conflict within the
family but then it got to the point
where it was very very obvious that that
he was in trouble and needed help
fortunately was a bright kid so he was
able to cover it up and and you learn
through experience that people who have
this this addiction in which I am
convinced as a disease are incapable of
telling the truth so the mother may
accept statements that would seem
incredulous to most people drug addicts
have have a way of being very cunning
and being able to convince you that they
are not addicted to drugs and that
there’s no real problems and then you
get to the point where where you know
that there’s a problem and your friends
and their friends start telling you and
so then you start the process of
rehabilitation a real problem in this
country number one there are no
standards for rehabilitation – nobody
has ever come up with any proven way to
treat this disease it’s all based on oh
we have great results here out in Malibu
and we have great results in Florida
it’s not true it’s just not true so
there are very few people who have the
expertise of how to deal with mental
diseases in general and drug disease in
particular and that was the experience
we had with Brent he went to a 30-day
program and like most people on a 30-day
program on the 31st day they relapse I
could put him a drug addict in my home
lock him up for 30 days feed them and
talk to them and they’re not going to
use drugs for 30 days
and next day they leave that they will
definitely relapse there’s just no
question about it
then you go back and then you try to go
to sober living unless somebody’s in a
program for a year or more there’s
really virtually no chance and Brent
fortunately at the end got into a
year-long program in Virginia got sober
went to SC was on the Dean’s List was
ready to graduate core Law School and he
relapsed
he took a half of ecstasy and two shots
of Jagermeister according to everybody
who was at a back-to-school party not a
wild crazy party something at the Elks
Club in Hollywood and he got sick he got
really sick and started to projectile
vomit and nobody wanted to call the
paramedics for a very simple reason they
didn’t want us to know that he had
relapsed he was engaged the wedding
would be off he’d have to go back into
rehab
so they said just let him sleep it off
and he went home with his fiancee and
the next morning was Sunday morning and
a day that I’ll never forget that you
know the phone starts to ring and it’s a
little too early and it seems to be
ringing a little bit too long and the
words were Brent is not breathing and
he’s turning blue did you call the
paramedics yes just before I called you
where are you
we’re in West Hollywood I wake up my
wife Linnell we get in the car and go to
cedars-sinai and we got there before the
paramedics arrived I knew that wasn’t a
good sign
and the news wasn’t good he wasn’t
breathing and he was in a coma doctors
worked with him and the next day
conclusively told us that he was not
going to recovery and so we had to make
that decision that parents never want to
make and and let him go we had a
memorial 2,000 people came a a lot of
our friends and a lot of his friends
very popular very social kid and one of
my friends who has since unfortunately
passed away Michael King came to me and
said you know I’m so moved by what took
place because at the memorial we only
talked about drugs and addiction we
dealt with it head-on and the only
people who spoke were his friends who
were also drug addicts and his counselor
and myself and he said I want to make a
donation in your son’s name to your
favorite charity and I said you know I
don’t know that I have a favorite
charity but I want to start one for drug
and alcohol awareness and he wrote me a
substantial check within eight weeks we
had a public charity called the Brent
Shapiro foundation for drug and alcohol
awareness from 2005 to about 2011 we
went around the country we published two
children’s books one called so mo says
no for five-year-old kids how to
introduce drugs with parents at an early
early age and then followed up by a book
called David’s discovery twelve year
olds all available free to any school or
any group that wants them through us we
developed something called the save a
life card it’s just a very simple
message and it tells you what the
symptoms are people are reluctant to
call nine
for a couple reasons number one they
think they’re going to get in trouble if
they have drugs so we were trying to
push along the Good Samaritan Law which
Governor Brown signed four years ago
that nobody can get arrested if their
have drugs themselves bringing somebody
to a hospital with drugs and we’ve sent
those out by the hundreds of thousands
they’re also on our website
brent shapiro org and then you know
around 2011-2012 people started to talk
about this disease and in public and now
it’s on the news and it’s talked about
about this epidemic that’s sweeping this
country and it’s a major epidemic and
we’re losing an entire generation of
young people and others from addiction
to prescription medication that is
another subject that we should talk
about at some point in time but we
decided you know let’s see what we can
do for prevention and so i met with the
head of addiction medicine at
cedars-sinai dr. Jeff Wilkins and I said
is there anything that keeps people off
drugs and he said yes we have found that
rewards work reward rewards if you give
a drug addict an alternative between
using drugs and a substantial reward
they will not use drugs that day I said
well what if we try this with kids what
if we tried to give kids rewards for not
using drugs
so I’m met with the Boys and Girls Club
of America and found out something very
interesting that kids once they became
teenagers leave the Boys & Girls Club of
America it’s no longer cool and I said
what if we had an incentive that we
could keep kids there and so we got vans
we closed down for blocks in East LA
Cincinnati Avenue in the heart of
gangland 900 families came we had food
trucks Ferris wheels and we pitched this
idea that there’s an epidemic and we can
help your kids if you and your kid will
allow us to test them randomly with
saliva for alcohol and drugs
welcome rewards will give them
educational opportunities we’ll take
them to college campuses to see what
college is like we’re going to make them
eligible for college scholarships if
they graduate as a silver high school
student that started about four and a
half years ago right now we have about
5,000 kids in this program we have six
clubs in Los Angeles one in Malibu when
in Long Beach
one in East LA one in Monterey Park Los
Angeles Dodgers just sponsored our club
AHA and in East LA Steve Tisch and the
New York Giants last summer were
sponsored our team in the Bronx our club
in the Bronx
so there’s kids in Bronx as well in the
brown Califano kal yeah this is in New
York
we’re opening a club in Chicago at the
Jordan boys and girls club that’s going
to be sponsored by the Chicago Bulls and
the Chicago White Sox and just yesterday
I got off the phone with the president
of the Oakland Raiders and they’re
sponsoring a club in Oakland so we want
to take this to every city that has a
major sports franchise the cost is
minimal
the rewards are amazing to date we have
not had one child fail a drug test
in over four and a half years you’re
kidding me not one in four and a half
years because the pure pressure now is
how cool it is to not fall into the
traps where they see what is happening
to people in their own families and
certainly in their own classrooms and so
that’s what we’re doing it’s called
Brent’s Club looked up let’s see what
we’re doing at the bread Shapiro org
brent shapiro org first of all the story
like that the last thing a parent ever
wants to experience is is something like
that every spoken a few parents who have
had experience i’m like they tell me
practice there’s nothing more painful
than this so sorry for your loss but on
the other to the fact that you and your
friend I think you said Michael King
that you decided to do that is turned it
to something like this the man upstairs
sometimes there’s some strange things to
us that lead into something that’s even
bigger than that that we don’t even know
about because one story like Brent can
end up influencing thousands of other
kids that secretly struggle with the
challenges of drugs that they’re so
embarrassed to talk about with their
parents we’re dealing with some right
now with very very close relative of
ours that we have to fly into a city and
state to take them in and it’s exactly
what you said it’s that part of while
you’re on it well finally I told my
family I said you just got to go address
it immediately you got to go surprise
the house and she did and when the
surprise happen it was exactly what we
expected so the accountability of that
it’s a lot of work so appreciate you for
doing that with the well thank you a
foundation and more importantly you know
like I said earlier class act thank you
so much for taking the time and allowing
us to come here to your office and
spending some time with you I really
enjoyed the stand with you Robert
truly so did I truly I mean you’re
you’re inspirational and you you bring
out a lot of things that I don’t talk
about and thank you for doing that thank
thank you for sharing it with the rest
of us thank you so much thank you
welcome thank you Oh
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