Criminal justice is available, for sure. If the defendant has money for professional defense.

I've just put in a blog about acquittal - after a 4th trial - of Cal Harris in New York, of charges of murder of his wife Michele Harris.

Here is the list of criminal defense attorneys who represented Cal Harris throughout the proceedings:

Joseph Cawley who represented Cal Harris in 2007, who has found an easier job as a judge in 2008, and who now is a supervising judge for county (criminal) courts in New York 6th Judicial District. 

Cawley recently engaged in ex parte communications with the prosecution for which I have documents on file, so I wonder whether he sold his client out as a defense attorney, too.

Another defense attorney for Cal Harris was Albany-based and recently retired veteran criminal defense attorney Terence Kindlon.

Cal Harris also had representing him the law firm of Easton, Thompson, Kasperek & Shiffrin, L.L.P., Rochester that represented Cal Harris 

• on the losing appeal in the Appellate Division 3rd Department in 2011, 
• on the winning appeal in the New York State Court of Appeals in 2012 where Judge Pigott recently said at the swearing-in ceremony of Chief Judge Janet DiFiore on February 8, 2016 that NYS Court of Appeals "gets to pick its cases" - so Pigott "picked" People v Harris and reversed it, that is another "piece of luck" in having the case reviewed by the Court of Appeals that may have been influenced by the wealth of the defendant's family

And, finally, for the last, and successful, trial, Cal Harris hired attorney Bruce Barket and made the last-minute decision to go with the bench trial rather than a jury.

Bruce Barket is a partner in Barket, Marion, Epstein & Kearon, LLP of Garden City, NY, and is famous for his

"booming voice, constant objections and visible outrage" that reportedly "have been constants at the trial".

The defense team also included, a younger female attorney Aida Leisenring (admitted in 2008) and an older female attorney Donna Aldea (admitted in 1999), 

Presence of female defense attorneys was psychologically beneficial, it was balancing out the "booming voice" of Bruce Barket and preventing the impression that female opinions - and lives - do not matter.

By the way, in Delaware County court, when I was present as a second-chair in criminal trials handled by my husband, Frederick J. Neroni, I was constantly shut down by the usually presiding judge Carl F. Becker who complained behind the scenes of our "double-teaming" and introduced his own rule - "no second chairs", only one attorney can do the trial, the other should be silent.

Apparently, such rules were not applicable - fortunately for the criminal defendant - in Cal Harris'  trial.

It is a big relief for Cal Harris, and a big victory (and, no doubt, an extremely lucrative and expensive case) for his defense attorneys.

Once again, the case of Cal Harris shows what CAN be done in a case where supposedly, all is lost - after 2 jury convictions, one affirmed on intermediate appeal - only with one condition: if criminal defendant or his family has money.

But, a situation where justice is available only to wealthy criminal defendants is not justice at all.