All right, it's official. Welcome to Come Back with a Warrant, first episode of the podcast. Very excited to be here with you. I'm Brandon Dinetz. Monica Ishak. And together we are Come Back with a Warrant podcast. getting right into it, our origin story, if you will, how we know each other. I was a former prosecutor at the state attorney's office in Palm Beach County for four years, and had the privilege of having many cases against you at the same time that I was there that was you were a public defender, right? Yes. Yeah. And after a good amount of time trying cases against each other, you left the state, you left the government, I left the government, and we both opened up our own shops. Yeah, yeah. So I started at the public defender's office. I was there for three years and you were my first ever opponent, which is so crazy now because now we're like, it's like a full circle moment that we're here. So yeah. Well, your first trial ever was against me. Yeah. Yeah. I remember. Yeah. Well, technically it was my second because I had done my first one as a CLI. OK, but I barely did anything. But my first trial ever. Yeah. Technically it was against you.
How long were you a practicing attorney before you had your first trial? Do remember? my gosh, yeah. I think my first trial was in December and I got barred in September of that year. So was like a couple months. How did the trial go for you? my gosh. It was honestly, it was very nerve wracking for me as just like a brand new lawyer. feel like you come out not knowing anything. And then at the public defender's office here in Palm Beach County, they make you do the whole thing from beginning to end. I don't know if you remember that I did.
Literally every part of that trial right yeah, you had a second person sitting there with you But you did all the you had to do all the work on the trial Yeah, yeah where but like normally in trial like that's not how it goes like you had a partner you split your work with her and you know usually ever since then I've pretty much done that too, but Yeah, that was very nerve-wracking for me. Obviously it didn't result in a good result for my client, but When some lose some exactly I mean fair enough, I think I
Probably my wins and losses were in jury trials, especially at that level. You're as a prosecutor, you're about 50 50 because you're only taking the cases to trial at that stage that are toss ups. You're not taking the solid winners to trial. Well, I guess I guess it depends on you as a prosecutor. I guess it depends on the person, but I don't I don't think I took a slam dunk to trial. I think if it was, yeah,
Because if something's a slam dunk, then both parties are going to resolve it. Yeah. One way or the other. It's either going to get dismissed or it's going to, know, plea out. Yeah. Unless you have the energy from the defense. It's like going to war no matter what or vice versa with the state. Like it just depends on like the literally the players in the room, like who's defending and who's prosecuting. Cause I think like you're saying like, at least when I was prosecuting, you know, you didn't do certain things, but well, when you were defending.
I'm saying you were yeah, didn't take slam-dunk to trial you could have you could have been like no offer We're going to trial that's totally true, and I could have I could have done it But I don't think that's the right way to do that job and yeah I think the best prosecutors out there are the ones that understand their you know their role and that they're not just taking a DUI where there's a blood alcohol level above a point to
And everything is on video and the driving pattern is on video never they're not taking those cases Forcing those cases to go to trial just so that they can win in front of a jury at least of resources time energy Especially when it comes in the room, and they're like what's your plea offer? want it now Totally you know check out these awesome mugs. Yeah, super cool got our logo on them and the logos on the back I call Brandon our creative team because he literally takes care of this so
I help I had help I did not do it on my own so I Was just gonna ask you because I was interested when we were like preparing for this what your first impression was of me as a prosecutor my first impression of all of the public defenders coming in were this is gonna be somebody that is a challenge to work with off the jump because in my early experience, the younger public defenders were gung-ho to fight every single battle. Yeah. And there are certain situations, and we will definitely get into them in this show, where doing that is a disadvantage to your client, a disadvantage to just how you do your job, and it also hurts your...ability to practice consistently in the same courtroom with the same prosecutor and the same judge because they're seeing that you're just Being kind of unreasonable. Yeah, and I think it's really important that as a lawyer the opposing counsel and the judges Know that you are reasonable not that you're a pushover or not. You always give in but that you can be reasonable. Yeah, you can fight the fights that you should fight or that you need to
But you're not just making the choice to fight and everything. So that's a long way to say I my first thought was are you going to be like that? And I found no, I found that you were extremely reasonable. There's a stigma about public defenders, this true believer mentality that every single person is innocent that you're representing and not that you thought all of your clients were guilty or innocent, but
You were realistic. You know, if there was a case where there was surveillance evidence of your client doing something like you were able to say, hey, that's what the situation is. The evidence is that let's negotiate a deal. But you stood firm on the things that you believed in. You fought for what you wanted. And I respected that. I didn't always agree with you. But like I knew that if I was going to go to trial with you, it would be respectful. And
You know, I was definitely a hard ass as a prosecutor. I know that I was at times, but I tried to be as reasonable as possible, I think. I think I was pretty reasonable. were great. I think you were great. And you were the lead at the time in the courtroom when I got there. So for me, I was like, I have a case against the lead. What does that mean? now we know it's really just the one that's been there the longest. That's stuck in that courtroom the longest with that in front of that judge the longest. Which has its benefits. It's nice to be in a, you basically are walking into the same office every day. You're walking into the same courtroom and it's nice to practice in front of one judge and one, deal with one JA and one deputy and it's easier. Yeah, it's easier. But it also. camaraderie too.
Yeah, that's true. I think, you know, and one thing we'll talk about is our individual transitions from working for the government, working for the state, to working private, camaraderie and having people around and having that social experience, that's completely different when you leave and you go, you know, outside of working for the government.
That was probably one of the best parts about working for the state attorney's office was it felt like I went from law school to the state attorney's office and it was like another part of law school. And it was another part of growing and working with people, meeting people, having that feeling of being in the trenches with a group of people. That's really, really cool. That's something I definitely miss now
You the I work for me. I only have my self to To deal with and you know so real that's that's a different That's probably the biggest downside to being a solo practitioner is not having the like that support system camaraderie of all of the other lawyers in the office at the time which is Which is cool at some point. You know who knows if I'll hopefully I'll have something like that, but yeah But yeah, that was
one of the best parts about working for government. I felt the same way at the PD's office. you could tell, I felt that I could see that at the states too. You guys are friends, just like we were friends. You go into each other's offices, have lunch, talk, whatever, same thing. And then now when you're solo, you have to actively seek that community or those people or hit people up if you have questions about a case or whatever. Whereas before, you could just walk into someone's office and be like, hey. What do you think about this? What should I do? know? Right. And working the idea of working together and being able to just bounce ideas off each other. Even things that are that you take for granted that I take for granted now or I took for granted then. Learning new law and learning the new trends in the law and the educational factor that you got being atin that position, whether it was from classes that were being taught or it was from one of the other lawyers, your colleagues stumbling upon a novel issue and now you have something to research and that becomes a new topic, a new interest and something that either you could use in your cases, something that you see popping up.
big change in the law and it always helps you stay on top of everything. Now, know, the research that I do, I have to want to do it on my own. I have to dig deep and be find the legal nerd in me that wants to learn about certain issues if they are just new novel issues. It's just something, you know, not something that's coming up in a case. Yeah, the onus really is on us to like figure it out or subscribe to whatever, you know, we need to subscribe to in order to get the information we need.
to do our cases or to grow as attorneys. Whereas like, I think at the public defender's office and at state attorney's office, they expect like young and new lawyers. So they set it up in a way where it's like almost like they're schooling you all over again, just kind of like the junior leagues or something. It's like a residency program for doctors. That's so true, yeah. It's like they have to go to hospitals and spend time as a resident in a hospital. I think, I don't know, my wife watches a lot of Grey's Anatomy, so that's like basically as much.
Yeah, as I know about what a resident does but That's kind of what the period of time at the state felt like yeah Especially for us because we we spent like three to four years there versus other people who could spend forever there I mean there's a lot of people that are just seasoned lawyers there And they're great lawyers right now and then they move up in the chain and they start working on more serious cases or they start mentoring the new lawyers or whatever it is so I mean, that's I mean, what you're saying is so true and I think it applies on like both state and defense. But I loved, I really did love my experience at the PD's office, even though it was hard, you know, it was like, I really felt like what you said, like in the trenches, like every single day, just because every day was a battle because our caseload was so high that not every single client obviously is going to plea. And there's just trials and then not every case is with the same prosecutor. So you have to kind of figure it out if you're not.
if you don't have that good relationship with them. You know, I did with you and with the other state attorneys in the courtroom, but we had some turnover on our side and your side where it was kind of rough at times. I don't know if you remember sure. Yeah. No, no, no. had... With certain lawyers. Yeah. Yeah. That's like a specific person coming to my mind right now with you. There's some... I mean... But I felt like you were justified in a lot of... It was a mixed bag.
I was blessed to have worked with excellent public defenders. And then there were some times where I didn't have the very best. And ultimately the people that I worked with that were not the very best at that office left working at that office at the same time that they were either in my courtroom with me or shortly thereafter. So I don't think that was all.
Yeah, that was me and I know you know it just happens. It's just like you're just anyone having nervous breakdowns is not something that I'm gonna take responsibility for Although I don't know I don't know how many nervous breakdowns there were in that courtroom, but I imagine there were a few that Yeah, Don't think I contributed. No, I would say that you know it's a stressful environment a hundred percent it is is especially certain people and you know
Also, some people just are not cut out to do that job. Whether you're working as a prosecutor or a public defender, you have a huge caseload, there's a lot of pressure on you, you are going to be in trial, you have obligations to get very specific work done on each case that you have. Each case you have to go through discovery, each case you have to go through an offer and speaking with the parties that are involved in the case.
everything involves work, even if it's the least serious type of case to the most serious that you're handling at any given time. I think that going to work for the public defender's office or the state attorney's office, I think is something that everybody out of law school should do. Certainly if you want to find yourself in being a litigator or being a trial attorney.
I think there's no better way to learn. It's almost like I think every single person should also have to be a waiter at some point and wait tables because I think there's just certain, and I did it, and I think there's just certain jobs that you do that teach you a lot about life and about what you're gonna do in your profession and how you're gonna do it and how to interact with people. I think if you're gonna be a trial attorney,
you know, there's no better place to start than where you have a huge caseload and you're gonna be in trials frequently. And can get on trials by asking people to sit with them whenever you want. How many times do we like, hey I have a try on you to second chair, can you jump on it? Yeah. Day of, you know. Yeah, all the time. I mean it's not ideal practice, but it is what it is when you're at the state PD's office. and I trusted, I...
I trusted the people that would ask me to, if somebody said to me, you, there are a lot of really good prosecutors and a lot of them are defense attorneys now that I worked with that if they ever asked, you know, the day of the trial, they said, I need a second, I would jump on. It was never, I trusted that they had worked up the case and that we were there trying a case that was worth trying. really teaches you teamwork too and like collaboration because
I don't know, I remember trying cases with certain people where I didn't have that kind of chemistry with them during trial that I had with some people I had already tried cases with and I was like, why? And it's because certain people just don't have that teamwork, they never learned to be someone's support and vice versa. So I think I really got better at being a teammate and...
Supporting someone and needing like being able to just ask for help because I always personally just always had issues asking for help so I really did like the collaborative environment of like trial to you know and like being able to do that because that really I think is something that Not everybody can do obviously, you know, I I agree with that Which is why I think you're saying it's hard to be solo now because you had that that's where we started, you know with all of that
ability to be collaborating constantly with all of that, you know, surrounded by a the social the social atmosphere which also fosters continuing to learn and Progress as an attorney and try new things. Yeah, which you you don't get the ability to try new things or exposed to try new things as much as a private solo attorney as you do as a government attorney, but
Ultimately the bottom, you know, the bottom line is it's not all Sunshine and rain was working for the government, right? And those were the perks for sure, right? And that's why you know, we find ourselves We have found ourselves in a position where we've moved on from from that as the majority of people do that go to work for the government, but why why did you ultimately make the decision to leave?
Public Defender's office. I left and I went into insurance defense and that was like civil litigation So I had never done anything civil related not even in like law school like everything up until that point my like legal experience had been solely criminal defense I never even like intern at the states or anything like I was always just criminal defense and then when I went to civil practice I was like Nothing against civil litigators Before I start this go on but and
You know, whatever, we'll talk more about that. I felt like the first job I had in insurance defense, because I two different jobs in insurance defense, it was very much so like a desk job. I felt like I was just like kind of, I worked as an associate for someone I had a partner at a big firm and I was just like doing discovery responses all day. was like copy and paste. I felt very bored. I just like missed, and I had so many of my PD clients call me at my firm and be like, hey, are you...
Are you like private now? can you hire, can I hire you? And I was like, no, I'm working in civil insurance defense unless you have like, not even then, because I'm representing insurance companies. So I don't even know. But it really like made me miss like criminal defense. So then I went back into criminal defense and worked for a solo. And then I went back into insurance defense and I had a trial, I was on trial team for that. So I was in trial like all the time, but.
Then I just missed the I just missed doing what I love and I just like it made me I feel like I had to try different things in life to confirm that I love like to do what I do, which is criminal defense. And then, you know, there were different aspects of civil litigation that just didn't make sense to me. I felt like there was a lot of hostility over minor things that didn't matter. And I think that coming from a criminal defense background or even just criminal in general, it put a lot of things in perspective like
These are not issues worth fighting over. Like in civil litigation, there's a lot of issues about like not, if you don't comply with certain deadlines or timelines, know, everything's stricken, your case falls apart. And for me, I'm like, usually the defense just has to make a constitutional argument and we get what we need to get done, done in the case, you know? Like, that's not an issue. So like, I just felt like there was always like this technicality.
that like we were arguing about and then like there was no sense of like respect between the parties or the attorneys. There's always this hostility between the attorneys. So I just felt like, you know, like I didn't even have this when I was fighting for my client's freedom, you know, like even when it was hostile, it was never, I feel like it, it reached a point where it like never really went beyond the courtroom. Like we would hash it out in the courtroom, go outside, like we don't have to be friends, but we're not disrespectful to each other. And I feel like that's something that is like kind of a culture in the criminal
field for the most part. when I went from that to crazy like hostility between the parties on top of the stressful job that we do every day in terms of like litigating and like dealing with our clients, our bosses, whatever it is, I was like, I'm, just not interested in this. You know what I mean? So I decided I just wanted to start my own firm because I was like, I feel like life pulled me in this direction. And you know, this is where I'm at now, but I'm, so grateful to be doing what I do. And I love that.
part of solo that I love or being in private is that your clients choose you. Obviously there are different ways like I'm on the wheel so I get appointed on some cases where my clients don't choose me but for the most part like I choose my client, my client chooses me and like at the PD's office you don't have that luxury. It's always like I want a real lawyer. I don't want you on my case but you're the only one that's really fighting for them or like telling them what like what they need to hear or whatever. So I just felt like I just feel like this is
a new season that I need to be in and I am so grateful to be in it. But there's like, again, every single time you do something, there's there's not always rainbows and sunshines. Like you're saying, there's the downside. There's downsides to everything. So. I do miss the PD's office, but and aspects of it, I should say. But ultimately, I still feel like whenever I go to court and I see like the familiar faces and like, it's always nice to just like see the same people or like even like
the judge is always like, it's good to see you. when I moved up to felony, was in the same courtroom pretty much the entire time until I left the office. So, you know, I was in that courtroom for like, and you stay in the corner for like over a year, you know, you're dealing with the same people over and over and over again every day. you, whether you like, whether you like them or not, you will end up having some sort of camaraderie cause you show up to work every day and you see them. So, it's always nice to like,
have those familiar faces too. So there are just different aspects of each job that I feel like, I missed, but like, this is ultimately like, I think where I'm supposed to be. So I'm so grateful. Otherwise I also wouldn't be here with you. You know, that's also another perk. Yeah, that's true. So, and also I wanted to mention when you were talking about the social aspect of, and I'm kind of going off topic, please, but the social aspect of the state attorney's office, you met your wife. I did. At the state attorney's office. did.
And you propose in court, like you have to talk about that. Yeah, we'll talk about that at some point. The viral proposal. that one viral. And now they have a cute baby. Yes, we do. We have a very cute baby. So yeah, we'll get, we'll talk about all that fun stuff. You're like, we'll tap that for later. Yeah, well that's sure. And we're gonna have, you know, spoiler alert, we'll have her on an episode. My wife, Jen, she'll come on and talk. She's...
One of these civil attorneys that you're you speak so highly of I would love to work a case against her though Yeah, well, she's as ethical as they come and she's also a complete badass in her own right and I think I Call her one of the top lawyers in the county, but yeah, I think that that's I Can say that you know?
biased or unbiased, think that that's just, she's really the real deal. So we'll have her on at some point. But yeah, I definitely, she was a supervisor when I first met her. So we'll scandalize. my, I did not know that information. Yeah, you can't even have that nowadays. No, they have policies. That poor guy from Astronomer or wherever he was, that guy.
Oh my god, I had no idea that's so funny. I remember how you used to talk about her Which was like so so cute, which is the same as how you are now? She's yeah, she's very cool this woman. Yeah, she's done. She was a prosecutor now. She's a She does personal injury and products liability, and she's got her own firm, so she's a real the real deal well, we'll talk about we'll talk about her, but Yeah, I mean I I would guess that for you
not having to hear any of the public pretender or any of the other slang that you got thrown anymore is probably quite nice for you and not something that you have to deal with. No, yeah, it was definitely very, very stressful. My first batch of cases were actually PD clients because the office gave me some cases under contract, which was nice, but I still heard it I was getting PTSD. was like, my God.
Yeah, that was always one thing I never liked. I never liked that because I feel like the public defenders get a bad rap and I know from being a prosecutor how much better a lot of the public defenders were than private attorneys and the quality of representation that people would get that would hire a private attorney versus having the public defender.
I can't speak for everywhere, but I can speak for Palm Beach County at during the time when I was there and present and For the majority of the time the public defenders knew what they were doing and that was like that was beneficial for me because it allowed me to do my job effectively and It also made it interesting to to fight and argue because it was with intelligent competent people. Yeah, yeah, so that that's also a twist but
I I spent four years at the state attorney's office and then I left I always wanted to do the I always wanted to be in the criminal law world. Okay always and That's from being a little kid and that's from you know watching different TV shows and Growing up as you know growing up thinking Boston legal was one of the greatest shows ever like I used to I mean I used to love different
I know that's an odd one to pull, I used to love different TV trial lawyers and I had a family member that got into some trouble. So I saw up close what, you know, defense attorneys did. And I always wanted to find myself in that realm. At the end of law school, I asked a local attorney what I should do if I want to find myself in a position where I'm...
kind of doing what I'm doing now. they told me start your career at the state attorney's office and specifically try to start at the Palm Beach state attorney's office. And that's what I did. um, that's interesting. Really the, the interview story with me there is pretty funny too. I, I'll, that'll, that'll, that's a, we'll put a pin in that one. That's a very funny story for another time. But, I got the job there and I had a privilege of working there for four years.
a little under four years and Then I left and went and worked at a criminal defense firm locally for another four years and that I loved and then after that I left and opened up my own shop and I have BD law now and I get the privilege of Doing what I love which is practicing the law and representing people that are in you know terrible situations
And get the freedom to do things like this where I get to have like this show and I get to spend a lot of time with my son and my wife and that stuff makes me happy so The flexibility on that no you really can and the flexibility to be able to do all of that is worth it is is worth it I mean Obviously, know everybody complains when you're working for the government like the money sucks, and that's true, but that's not really why you're doing it now
You're doing it more for the for the experience. Yeah, and there's also the benefits are great too. Yeah, that's that's The government benefits are you know that's worth something you know so We have to pay for our own insurance now before it was eight dollars, so you know Eight dollars a month insurance. Yeah, that was really nice Thinking about that now. I'm like that was really nice and it covered everything Anything you needed any type of like surgery. no problem. Yeah
Yeah, it was yeah, it was really great, but man those days. miss that I do miss the government and insurance But like you know yeah, yeah, but you take what you exactly and there's a hopefully like you buy your time back eventually You know like there's this freedom sense where that's true able to just Hopefully eventually be you know able to have all your time and make money at the same time, so that's
an opportunity that you can have by starting your own business in general, maybe not just firm, versus at the government, you're working a nine to five. Right. Or whatever time. I mean, you don't worry about, obviously when you're in that position, you're not worried about any of the business expenses that you have or the actual things that come with running a business. Yeah. That's all stuff we'll talk about on this show also is just being a young entrepreneur and
Specifically being here in South Florida where we do get a lot of privileges to be able to run our businesses here because of the financial benefits that come with having a business in in this part of the country. Yeah, that's a huge benefit. I think you see so many new businesses and whether that's law firms or anything else in our area because of some of just the Incentives financially to do it here. Yeah
Which is which is awesome, but I think one other thing that we obviously should talk about is how We came about starting the show together. Yeah, so I'm when I opened up my own firm a little under a year ago I saw on social media that you were killing it like you had a ton of social media stuff going on you were putting up videos constantly and I I was like
I can watch these videos and enjoy them and not think like, this is just like another like legal ad that I am sitting through. Yeah. I liked the content and I had worked with you in the past as when you were a PD and when we we had cases together, we worked well. And I figured, you know, I wanted to see if there was some sort of combined marketing that we could do. And this kind of was the.
We both love to talk. Yeah. So this is like the best way to do it. I Yeah, this is a awesome way to do it. I mean, look at that artwork. Isn't that something? Made by the creative team. Yeah. Love it. I love it. It's so good. And we both have lion logos, so it's like perfect. Yeah. I do a lot with lions. like to go, I go a little lion heavy, I think, at times. Yeah, no, I love when you post like the
Line in the lion head in a suit. Yeah, it's so cool. He's This is badass. I think it's awesome Line in a suit yeah, yeah for sure the one thing that comes up when I do When I put up the lion in the suit on Instagram that are not on Instagram on or sometimes on Instagram, but on LinkedIn okay, usually is where I put up stuff with line in a suit And I'm not advocating for anybody else to do this because I'm not saying it's very helpful or not But it's definitely enjoyable for me
When I make the lion and he's got his suit on, oftentimes I look and I see he's got either human hands, he's got like finger, you know, human hands. And then I have to decide, is that weird that the lion in a suit that's giving legal advice has human hands? I literally never even noticed that when I looked at it. So, you know, I'm proud say these lions don't have hands for it to be an issue. No, they have mics though. They do have mics.
But that is my lion in a suit issue is whether or not they have human hands or not Maybe we can find out in the comments you guys let us know what should be Which one should Brandon do? I five fingers, like but like looks furry almost like a paw Yeah, like a really hairy hairy human hand. Yeah Yeah People out there with lion paw looking at hands. Yeah, he's getting like zero dollars ROI on this. Yeah nothing
Lion in a suit brings me nothing but personal joy. Yes, exactly. But I'm gonna keep posting it. gonna keep posting it. Lion in a didn't ask me anything on LinkedIn and I put, I think I put somewhere in the comment that I wrote that the lion in the suit will be there. Make sure to expect the lion in suit. Don't be startled if there's a full grown lion in a suit at your next meeting. Oh my god, that's so funny. We need to have like, that's what you should do for like Halloween or something.
Is a lion in a suit? Yeah, like wear a suit and put a lion head on or something. Now we have an idea. Yeah, you and your son can match. that would be cute. Maybe a little cub. That would be really cute. I like that. That's pretty good. I love that. So we are basically wrapping up our first episode. We have talked about a lot about just how we got here to begin with.
But what people can expect in the future from us is gonna be a lot of conversations about local legal issues that are popping up, national stories that are interesting. We'll talk about experiences that we've had. Specifically, we'll talk about courtroom stories that we can get into. We're gonna have guests.
Yes, so we need to I've already hinted I hinted at one of them and we'll we're gonna have more But we are very excited. This is gonna be a really really fun show and I think if people enjoy it and they listen and Like it and you know, you'll tell them what they need to do and that's that yeah for sure So check the show comments follow us on all of the social media platforms
Yeah. I guess that's it. Like, follow, subscribe, do all the things that you need to do. And if not, if you don't like it, then come back with a warrant. Yeah. Come back with a warrant.