By: Miranda Gatlin
Compassion
is defined as the emotional response to another’s pain or suffering, including
an authentic desire to help. Empathy is the feeling and understanding component
(i.e., detecting and mirroring another’s emotions and experiencing their
feelings); because compassion involves taking action, empathy is necessary to
motivate acts of compassion. Research suggests that compassion is something
intrinsic to the Human condition.[1]So, why do we miss many
opportunities for compassion? A primary cause for lack of compassion is
burnout. There are three symptoms of burnout, emotional exhaustion or being
overextended; feeling that one can’t make a difference, and the inability to
make a personal connection. Burnout causes a reduction of empathy. And without
empathetic concern, there can be no compassion.
Many
lawyers and paralegals practicing in the area of family law have come to see
our clients as a cluster of problems that we must try to solve rather than a
whole human being; therefore, they are unable to show compassion. Most do not
realize that compassion is a game-changer.
I
became aware of the intrinsic capability of feeling empathy and being
compassionate in the practice of law when I was still in school at the
University of Georgia School of Law. I was practicing under the third-year
practice act at a criminal defense non-profit organization in Atlanta, GA when
I first met a client charged with murder. I was sent to the jail to interview
him. He was on lock-down at the Fulton County Jail, which meant he could only
receive visits from his attorneys; he was not permitted to have direct contact
with anyone. All of our visits would be through Plexiglas. He was a young black
male who had grown up in an entirely different environment from myself.
However, as I sat there and listened to him talk, an intense feeling of
suffering came over me, and I knew I would be forever changed. We developed an
instant connection, which would last for years to come.
I
spent that entire year visiting him regularly at the jail. After graduating
from law school, passing the Bar exam, and spending some time working in
misdemeanor court, I was promoted to the felony division at the same
non-profit. I was reunited with the client and was now the lead attorney on his
case. Our relationship never ceased, and my compassion for him remained. We
picked up right where we had left off. Every time I went to the jail, I visited
him, and I would take him books on subjects ranging from art to history. I
would sit and listen to him for sometimes hours at a time. We not only
discussed his case, but we discussed his love for books and desire for knowledge
despite dropping out of high school in the tenth grade. I had already met his
family, but I now spoke to his mother regularly as well. His mother was a
recovering crack addict, but I saw no distinction in her love for her son and
that of my own mother’s love for me. I saw him as a human being who had
suffered greatly. I believed in his innocence wholeheartedly and set out to
ensure he was acquitted.
His
case didn’t go to trial for three more years, but when it did, it lasted two
weeks. Finally, after two days of jury deliberations, it was time to hear the
verdict. As the jury filed back into the courtroom, we rose together to face
his fate. I gripped his hand under the table, and he squeezed mine back as if
to say no matter what happens, I appreciate you. He was found not guilty on all
charges, and we were both barely able to maintain our composure. His mother was
not; she let out what can only be described as a very audible sigh of relief.
He was released from the Fulton County Jail, and he called me immediately. I
wasn’t prepared for the emotions I was still holding onto. I was finally able
to breathe.
We
stayed in touch over the next several months, and we planned to meet for lunch
one afternoon so that I could give him a book I had been holding onto for the
day he was released, The Innocent
Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town, by John Grisham.
The night before we were to meet, I called his phone to make sure our plans
were still on. I didn’t recognize the voice that answered; it was his cousin. I
asked to speak with him, and the voice asked me if I could go sit down. I was
confused, but I took a seat on my couch next to my dog. The following words I
heard I will never forget, “he’s dead, he’s been murdered.” It seemed like I
had only just begun to breathe, and then I felt the breath being sucked out of
me. I was devastated. I attended the funeral, and his family insisted that I
sit with them, as I had become a part of their family. After the funeral, his
mother pulled me aside and said, “You meant so much to him and to all of us. We
never thought a young, white, woman lawyer would be able to put herself in his
shoes. You really cared about him and about what happened to him, and when you
were up there in that courtroom, I think everyone knew it.” It was not until
that moment that I understood that by putting myself in someone else’s shoes
and showing them compassion, I had been able to change the course of someone’s
life and become the type of lawyer I went to law school to become.
I
tell this story not to illustrate how we as lawyers or paralegals should get so
intimately involved with a client; in fact, I learned over the years I
practiced as a criminal defense attorney that it is not advisable to get so
close to a client. However, with this particular client, who had all the
factors stacked against him, I was able to do my job and convince a jury to
keep one innocent man out of prison. I don’t attribute this to my exceptional
skills as a trial lawyer; I attribute it to the empathy I felt and the
compassion I showed him. I tell this story to illustrate that compassion is
truly a game-changer.
The
main reason I believe most lawyers and paralegals don’t show compassion is
because they are concerned it’s going to take time they just don’t have. But
seriously? No time for compassion? Compassion promotes adherence. The most
outstanding lawyers and paralegals can do everything they “know” to do to get a
client to take the correct course of action they need to in order to get the
best possible result in their case, but what good is the expertise of a member
of the legal profession if the client refuses to listen to them. A lack of
compassion by the lawyer or paralegal can also predispose the giving of a
poorer quality of representation. So, a lack of compassion isn’t just a missed
opportunity to improve the client’s outcome. Still, the lawyer or paralegal is
also more likely to provide poor representation and to remove the chance for an
acceptable outcome through omission. Additionally, without compassion, clients
will not feel empowered to cope with, understand, and manage their current
situation.
I understand that time is
money for most family law firms. However, it is client satisfaction that can
make or break a family law firm. It seems to reason that a client who is shown
compassion is going to be more satisfied with the representation provided by
that law firm; therefore, a satisfied client is going to create more revenue
for the firm.
Compassion
can make the unbearable, bearable. Some lawyers and paralegals just understand
this intuitively, and we are more likely to go above and beyond for our
clients. The only rational conclusion that can be drawn is that family law
firms with lawyers and paralegals who genuinely understand this and practice
compassionately are destined to succeed.
I have since moved back to South Carolina and decided I needed a break from practicing law, so I became a Paralegal. I am now a Family Law Paralegal with The Miller Law Firm, P.A., where I believe we certainly practice compassionately. I know I always try to put my feet in our client’s shoes before I do anything else. Miranda Gatlin is a paralegal for The Miller Law Firm, P.A., and previously served as the Death Penalty Habeas Attorney for the state of Georgia.