Guest post from Dr. Anastasios Kaburakis, a professor at the John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University:

After St. Louis’ beloved Cardinals lost Albert Pujols to the L.A. Angels last week, there was quite a discussion on how a small market like St. Louis can compete in intense, financially challenging times, and indeed in a cut-throat industry like sports. St. Louis ranks 18^th in metropolitan area size in the U.S.

So we haven’t had a post on here since May.  That’s mostly my fault.  I’ve been busy with the practice and haven’t made much time to write anything for this blog.

I practice a good amount of criminal law at my firm.  Sometimes my clients don’t have strong grounds, if any, for a defense.  In other words, my clients are sometimes, allegedly, guilty as sin and there are pictures to prove it.  Once we make that determination, my job becomes more about damage control than testing the State’s case.  For example, in a driving-while-intoxicated case, I might want to get my client into drug and alcohol counseling to show that my client takes the offense seriously, is showing contrition, and taking steps to ensure that the behavior that led to the offense is being addressed in a timely and responsible manner.  This is just common sense.  Sometimes, even if a client has a potentially great defense, I’ll still try to hedge our bets and get my client on what the court is going to see as “the right track.”