This is an LA Times Studios podcast.

They're not alleging that I was there.

It's just that I said it all in motion.

And it's not true.

That's the voice of Frank Carson, a criminal defense attorney in California's Central Valley.

When I met him in 2019, he was on trial for first-degree murder, accused of being the kingpin of a complicated murder conspiracy.

But local prosecutors had already botched the case so badly that a judge had been forced to let him out on bail. It was one of

the strangest cases I had seen in my nearly 30 years as a reporter covering the criminal justice

system. In one courtroom at the downtown Modesto courthouse, Carson would represent clients

accused of serious crimes, including homicide. Then, he'd walked down the hall to

another courtroom where he was facing his own murder charge. The ordeal had punished Carson

physically. He'd spent 17 months in jail. His body was failing. You can hear the fatigue in his voice.

But he carried himself through the courthouse with characteristic defiance.

Even with a cane, he moved with a kind of swagger.

It's disconcerting to them.

It's not what they expect.

I mean, they expect that, I mean, I should be going through that courthouse cowering and hiding my head.

And I won't do it.

Maybe I should, but I won't do it.

People told Carson that he was paying the price for putting his thumb in the eye of the man

for 25 years, which is how he thought of his work as a defense attorney.

His style had always been hyper-aggressive and personal, and it had made him enemies.

...