Darwin Award: Convince the jury

Editor's note: This Shark was reminded that mundane fatal acts such as sucking up gasoline with a vacuum cleaner or photograph posing at a cliff edge are exempted from Darwin Awards.  Only classics like the man who affixed an aircraft JATO (Jet Assisted Take Off) unit to the back of his Buick. His car became airborne at 250 mph and crashed 60 feet high into the side of a cliff.  (Lucius Verenus, Schoolmaster, ProbateSharks.com)

Darwin Award: Convince the jury

Confirmed by Darwin 16 June 1871


Proof that the only good lawyer is a dead lawyer


Clement Vallandigham was a well-known Northern Democrat who campaigned for state’s rights during the Civil War. In 1863 Vallandigham was convicted of treason for his speeches attacking the administration of President Lincoln. He was banished to the South, where he continued to voice his political views.

After the war Vallandigham became a lawyer. In his last appearance in the courtroom he represented a client on trial for murder. The accused man’s defense was that the victim had drawn his own gun in a fashion that caused it to fire, killing himself. To prove the defense argument, Vallandigham demonstrated the victims method of drawing a gun - using the loaded evidence gun as his prop. The firearm went off, and he lost his life - but proved his case.

(Reference; Klement, Frank L. The Limits of Dissent: Clement Vallandigham and the Civil War. Fordham, Mass.: Fordham University Press, 1998)

Law Enforcement: Crime does pay