“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon: 

So why would somebody want to hire a civilian military defense lawyer instead of just staying with their detailed military counsel? I think between the four of us, we’ve got, what, 73 years of legal experience. Most of that is in the military, and I think all four of us have served as trial defense counsel in some form or fashion. So, we’ve been both the military detailed counsel on cases and have been practicing as civilian military defense counsel. Why should somebody hire a civilian military defense counsel instead of just sticking with their military defense counsel

Warrior AdvocateTM Andre “Dre” Le Blanc:

Right. And not only that, most of us have been prosecutors for years, and that gives us a perspective on most cases that a lot of [military] defense attorneys don’t have.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. So why a civilian military defense counsel?

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

I would say, from the client’s perspective, I think a big aspect is availability. TDS are great folks, but they are overburdened. They see a lot of cases. They see every Article 15, every administrative separation, and any client that walks through the door, and they’re really overburdened a lot of the time. With us, with civilian military defense counsel, we’re on the phone with them anytime they want 24/7. I think that’s a big thing for clients.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. I’ll tell you, my experience when I was a detailed military defense counsel[for TDS], I didn’t have the freedom or luxury to necessarily defend every case the way that I wanted to because I had institutional limits that prevented me from maybe doing some of the things that I can do liberally as a defense counsel, civilian military defense counsel.

Warrior AdvocateTM Natalia “Nat” Helmsing:

And part of that too is the TDS PCS timeline. So, there are chunks of the year, specifically in the summertime, when the TDS counsel are packing up their house and they’re getting their families ready to move. And that’s just part of life in the military. But when the new backfill arrives, then they have to unpack and in-process and take their TDY. And that whole time, typically, the TDS offices are pretty undermanned. So, they are going to be focusing on their high-priority clients and maybe not able to get back with everybody else. And those folks still need a competent military defense attorney.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

And let’s face it, even when they’re dealing with their high-priority clients and cases, the most experience that a trial defense counsel (TDS) will have is three years probably. Right? And that’s if you’re lucky. So, the Army particularly, but other services too, have this system to where if you want to advance within the ranks, you need to go from job to job to job to get that broad base experience, so you become promotable to major.

Warrior AdvocateTM Andre “Dre” Le Blanc:

Right. And only two of those jobs are going to have anything to do with military justice, either as a prosecutor or defense lawyer, so they go to an OPs Law job or something. It has nothing to do with the military justice system. So that experience is –

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Yeah, that experience isn’t very beneficial when you’re representing somebody.

Warrior AdvocateTM Andre “Dre” Le Blanc:

Yeah, I guess what I was trying to say is that experience is perishable. It goes away, and then they might come back to military justice later. But during all that time, we have been practicing criminal and military justice.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

Let’s not forget as well that it’s a military assignment to serve in TDS. A lot of TDS [lawyers] are there voluntarily, they want to be there, but many are assigned there. We all want to do this. We all want to be in this position. We have not necessarily volunteered, but we’re passionate about what we do. None of us has to do this for the money. We are here because we genuinely feel that we want to be here.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

I would think that most civilian military defense counsel, whether it’s our law office or another law office, are practicing because that’s what they want to do. I mean, all of them could’ve stayed in the military, made a career out of it, or maybe some of them did stay in the military, made a career out of it and this is just what they want to do. So, when you’re making a decision between a detailed military defense counsel only or augmenting your team with a civilian military defense counsel, I think almost in every instance, if you’re facing the loss of your career, confinement, loss of rank, and reduction, I think you should always consider what is the benefit that you’re going to gain from hiring a civilian military defense counsel. And the bottom line for me is you’re gaining experience, competence, and passion.

Warrior AdvocateTM Natalia “Nat” Helmsing:

And the return on that investment can be hundreds of thousands of dollars up to millions of dollars of lost retirement. I mean, when you really break down how much loss of a rank at the senior ranks can mean over the course of a retirement, the numbers are really staggering. So, it’s an investment in yourself and your future to nip these problems in the bud as early in the process as possible.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

And if you’re talking about your personal liberty, if there’s a possibility that you could go to confinement, you should want to know that you are absolutely having the best person to represent you.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. And about a court-martial, it is impossible for a military detailed counsel, just impossible for them, to get the experience that a civilian military defense counsel has. For me personally, I’ve tried to “a jury” over a hundred cases. There’s just not that opportunity in the military system to have that much litigation experience.

Warrior AdvocateTM Andre “Dre” Le Blanc:

No, there’s not. And most TDS counsel have not going to be, have tried homicide cases, or sexual assault cases in the numbers and for the years that we had. That’s the benefit of civilians too.

Warrior AdvocateTM Natalia “Nat” Helmsing:

It’s just not possible in the system. And by the time they get those numbers there, they’re managing. They’re no longer in the courtroom.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. Your senior experienced detailed military defense counsel, when they become majors and lieutenant colonels, that’s all they do. They make sure that their counsels are properly trained, they get their evaluations, they have awards when they PCS, and they work with the branch managers to have replacements coming in. By the time you do all that admin work, there’s no time left for these senior defense guys to litigate or represent or file rebuttals or advise clients.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

And detailed military defense counsel at the end of the day are still soldiers. And think about the number of distractions that any soldier has in any MOS, any assignment, any position on a daily basis. How often do you really get a chance to purely do your job on any given day, your assigned job, with all the other distractions that come with just being a soldier in the United States Army?

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. Times you have to go to the field, the mandatory training, the SHARP training.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

Updating your MEDPROS.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Having to move office A to office B, your morning “fun runs”, the organizational days. You add all of that up, and you’re right, you don’t get a full week’s worth of work out of any detailed military defense counsel.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

On any given day, you might have an hour or two that you’re purely able to dedicate to a particular case. Whereas with us, that is our number one priority all day long, your case.

Warrior AdvocateTM Andre “Dre” Le Blanc:

Let’s not forget that TDS still has a chain of command. We don’t. Our only interest is our client. We don’t answer to anybody except our client.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

It’s true.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

I mean, that is true. And at the very end of the day, detailed military defense counsels are in the military. And whether they tell you this or not, they want to get promoted. They want to get it to the next rank. And who sits on those promotion boards? Those are not trial defense lawyers who are sitting on the promotion boards. It’s SJA, it’s former SJAs, it’s convening authorities. And if you’re too much of a “pain in the ass” to one of those guys, they might remember it. They just might remember it. And that really sometimes governs some trial defense counsel’s (TDS) attitude towards defense. And the thing that I find most troublesome about TDS… And I’m a TDS guy. I grew up in TDS. I love TDS and there are great lawyers there. But the most troublesome is if I go in as a client, I don’t get to choose who my lawyer is. I have absolutely no choice. I could be given the best lawyer, or I could be given a lawyer who’s just there biding time, and I don’t have a choice in the matter.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

Nor would you know. You don’t know. You don’t. You have no personal relationship with a TDS attorney as you would with us.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

And they can’t even advise you until certain points in the process. We can start advising as a civilian military defense counsel the moment you pick up the phone and call us. We can create that relationship and start working on the case. TDS has to wait until-

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

There’s an adverse action.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Until there’s an adverse action. Other than giving you your basic rights, they don’t form an attorney-client relationship until that adverse action happens. And as civilian military defense counsel, we can do a lot of work before the adverse action is even born to try to prep the battlefield for what that adverse action will look like.

Warrior AdvocateTM John Caulwell:

We can be proactive as opposed to being reactive.

“The Warrior AdvocateTM” Will M. Helixon:

Right. Well, I think that basically covers some of the advantages of hiring a civilian military defense counsel. So, thank you very much.