This Wednesday I was able to attend the talk by Honorable Judge Miller, who is very humorous and easygoing. I have to confess that I watch a lot of law and order dramas and I am really interested in this topic.

During the talk, Judge Miller discussed about some dilemmas he has faced as a judge and previously as a defense attorney. One of the most interesting topics was defending clients that are inconsistent with his beliefs. I learned that as a defense attorney, you still have to do your job and protect your client, even though there is substantial evidence against your client or your client confides to you that they are guilty. When questioned that if he would feel bad if the confided client ends up without a guilty verdict, Judge Miller made three points. Firstly, there is a distinction between moral guilt and legal guilt–knowing someone is morally guilty does not make that person legally guilty. Second of all, convicting innocent people keeps him up at night more than letting go of possible criminals; as Thomas Jefferson once said, “It is better for one hundred guilty men to go free than one innocent man to go to jail”. Finally, the rule of thumb–people are innocent until proven guilty–suggests that the legal system in the U.S. is designed to convict fewer suspects.

We also engaged in the discussion of drug use and safe injection sites. I learned that the ban on drugs only results in more illegal activities and health issues . Safe injection sites, in particular, provide medical help to drug users and promote rehabilitation programs. Yet as a judge, Miller cannot support those sites. Personally, I agree with the idea behind safe injection sites and I believe that when prohibition is not effective in protecting lives, it is important to try from another perspective. Moreover, I know that while drugs have lots of negative impacts on one’s health, medical cannabis can be used to treat veterans with PTSD and people with epilepsy. I think that more researches should be conducted on the subject of cannabis in order to better regulate its uses.

In short, I have benefited a lot from this talk. I hope I could attend more talks by Judge Miller in the future Rose Cafe series.