by Mike Houlihan
How do you get an Irishman to stand when you enter the room?
Simple, just say, “Will the defendant please rise!”You don’t usually see an Italian guy helping an Irishman in court. Most of the time they’re trying to put each other in jail.
But recently a goombah saved my bacon.
Last month it was my turn to be the defendant in a courtroom. I was there to fight the system and plead not guilty to a traffic citation issued unjustly.
The court in question was located in lovely Maywood and although I wasn’t the only Irishman there that day, we were definitely in the minority. Oh I’m sure there were a few Fitzgeralds and Murphys in court that day, but primarily the Ella and Eddie variety.
A rookie Oak Park cop had nailed me weeks earlier for a moving violation on my way to visit editor Cliff Carlson. Cliff sensed my exasperation as I entered his swingin’ bachelor pad, offered me a beer and then listened as I moaned about how I couldn’t afford the fine. The check I went to pick up that day was less than the cost of the ticket I got going to get it.
Yeah, I was pissed, but I had inadvertently touched a nerve with editor Carlson as he launched into a diatribe about parking on the street in Oak Park. He beefed that he had three different stickers on his vehicle just so he could park in front of his crib, and still he had to set an alarm for every Tuesday at 3pm to infinity to remind him to go out and move his car, wind, rain, snow, hail—and he’s not even a postman! His pet peeve parking rant had him practically frothing at the mouth. Don’t get him started!
I left with my scrip and took the same route home as I had getting there. Coming through the intersection I saw the young cop sitting in his car and then watched him pull another guy over at the exact same spot he had nailed me. Hey, this is a stinkin’ setup!
Now I was really irked and decided then and there that I was going to fight the power.
A postcard arrived in the mail with my court date a few weeks later and I started building my case. I drove over to the intersection and took two dozen photographs of the sign in question. I made some charts which I rehearsed with in my basement as I bellowed like Hamilton Burger, “So you see your honor, the sign is clearly misleading, especially at dusk when these photographs were taken, on a day not unlike the day my client Mr. Hooligan zipped across the street. As you can see, the sign says “Only”, but I ask the court, only what? Yes there is an arrow next to “only”, but that arrow could be interpreted a hundred different ways, your honor. Only what? Up? Down? In the barrel? What?”
On the morning of my trial I took the day off work and walked into the courtroom confidently carrying my dossier of photos and charts. There were no seats left because the entire population of Detroit was sitting in that courtroom. I squeezed next to Moms Mabley in the front row and surveyed the room, sizing up the states attorney. I overheard him castigating another Irish guy for trying to get his case dismissed.
Uh oh. The judge entered the courtroom and he looked like Golda Meir in drag wearing black robes. I was doomed.
And then I saw a familiar face from the neighborhood, Bill Gamboney.
Bill is a friend from Sunday mass and we’ve shared a cocktail or two at my neighborhood saloon, Kevil’s. Better than that, Bill Gamboney was a lawyer, and he looked like he knew his way around this room. We nodded and I wondered what my next move would be.
Gamboney sidled up to me, leaned over and said, “Do you need some help here?”
We hustled out into the hallway and I showed him my charts and photographs and asked for his honest opinion of my chances. He looked at me like I had antlers growing out of my head. “Well it MIGHT work, but I wouldn’t count on it. Why don’t you just plead guilty and pay the fine? It’s probably only another couple bucks since you bonded out. You want me to handle it for ya’?”
“Do I have to pay you? ‘Cuz I don’t have any dough.”
My antlers now had grown their own antlers and Gamboney said, “No, of course not.”
And that was that. They called my name and Gamboney brought me before the judge and I was out of there in ten minutes, a free man! I felt bad because my tapioca would prevent me from duking Bill Gamboney and offered him a complimentary issue of this great paper, with the caveat, “Well I know you’re Italian, but here’s a copy of my paper.”
Gamboney took the January issue filled with judges I want to get elected, (Russ Hartigan, Tom Hogan, Mary Katherine Rochford, John Griffin, Dan Malone, and Jimmy Ryan) and he smiled, “No I’d love to read it, my mother was a Phelan!”
Well, that explains everything!