Angles
- Hampton Law Firm ⚖️
- Jun 28
- 8 min read
Updated: Jul 28
More Than a Statute
My first memory of a law office is not a courtroom, a hearing, or some dramatic legal moment from television. I was probably about five years old, and my dad’s office was in an old two-story white house on Main Street in Farmerville, where AutoZone now sits. It was his first office of his own in Farmerville, although he had practiced in other places before then. To me, it was simply Daddy’s office. I remember the reception area, the phones, the old house, and the feeling that grown-ups were always coming and going with something important on their minds.
There was a little boy about my age whose mother worked in the office, and we grew up around that place together. At first, we were just children playing while the adults worked. As we got older, we became runners for the office. We ran errands, carried things where they needed to go, and met people my father was helping or working with. We were in and out of that office enough that we slowly became part of its rhythm.
I remember the file room especially. There were hundreds and hundreds of files, stacked and organized in ways that seemed enormous to us.
Every so often, they had to make room for more. That meant taking down file after file, moving them over, shifting whole sections, and putting everything back in the right place. The little boy and I would trade off helping move them. At the time, it was just something we did because we were there and somebody needed an extra set of hands.
Looking back, I realize every one of those files represented a person who had walked through that old white house carrying a problem they could not solve alone. Some were scared. Some were angry. Some were grieving. Some needed help making a decision. Some had already made a decision and needed someone to help them deal with what came next.
I did not understand successions, criminal charges, title issues, custody disputes, property fights, business problems, or court procedure then. I did not know what those people were worried about when they came through the door. But I understood early that people usually do not come to a lawyer because life is going exactly as planned. They come because something happened, something changed, someone disagreed, someone died, someone made a mistake, or a situation became too heavy to carry without help.
Maybe that is where I learned to look at things from more than one angle.
Long before I went to law school, I had this belief that I could not truly beat an argument unless I understood it first. Not just the words someone was saying, but why they believed what they believed. What facts were they relying on? What were they afraid of? Where was their strongest point? What were they seeing that I might not be seeing from where I was standing?
You cannot honestly answer an argument you have never taken the time to understand. You can talk loudly from your own corner. You can repeat the position you already had when you walked into the room. You can knock down the weakest version of what the other side is saying. But none of that is the same thing as actually dealing with the real argument in front of you.
That does not mean every position is equally good. It does not mean every person is right. It does not mean the law cannot require a clear answer, a firm boundary, or accountability. It means that before I decide what I believe, I want to understand what I am arguing against and why. I want to know the strongest version of the other side’s position, not just the easiest version to dismiss.
Part of that is personal. I want to be capable of changing my mind if I am wrong. I want someone with a better argument, better facts, or a perspective I had not considered to be able to move me. But if I have honestly looked at the issue from every side and I do not believe I am wrong, then I want to know every angle of your argument well enough to counter every angle of it.
I think part of that instinct started with my history teacher, Coach Barmore, who knew exactly how seriously I took getting every answer right. I was determined to ace every test, every question, every class I took with him. On my very last final with him during my senior year, he slipped in a trick question. He got me. I remember him handing that test back with the biggest smile and laugh on his face, absolutely delighted that he had finally caught me. I was mad at the time, of course. I adored him, and I can laugh about it now, especially because he went straight to my mother, who also worked at the school, and told her he had finally gotten me.
But I never forgot it. Not because I missed one question, but because it taught me that the answer that seems obvious is sometimes the one that deserves a second look. He did it intentionally to both show me that I needed to look at the world with more of an open mind and to show me that being wrong wouldn’t kill me, but it may make me better.
That philosophy has followed me through every role I have held in and around the legal system. I have served as a prosecutor. I have served as a public defender. I have argued cases on appeal. My father is a judge and has also been both a lawyer, prosecutor and public defender in the past. I have also lived close to law enforcement through my former spouse and through family, including an uncle who was killed in the line of duty.
Those are not things I say to collect credentials or to suggest I have some special claim to always being right. They are simply part of the reason I have spent much of my life seeing the legal system from more than one place.
I do not pretend that sitting in a courtroom gives me the exact same perspective as the person standing on the side of the road making a decision in real time. It does not. But I have seen enough to respect the pressure that comes with law enforcement work, the split-second safety decisions, the limited information available at the beginning of a situation, and the reality that an officer does not get to pause a scene and ask everyone to come back tomorrow with better facts.
At the same time, I know what happens when that moment becomes a file. A prosecutor has to ask whether the evidence proves the case and whether the burden can be met. A defense attorney has to ask what facts are missing, what assumptions were made, whether constitutional protections were followed, and whether the State can actually prove what it says happened.
An appellate court may read the same case years later, after everyone has gone home, after memories have faded, and after the moment itself has passed. At that point, the court has the record: the report, the testimony, the rulings, the objections, the evidence that came in, and the evidence that did not.
Sometimes one sentence matters. Sometimes one missing fact matters. Sometimes the issue is not whether someone had good intentions or whether someone was generally right about what was happening. Sometimes the issue is whether the law was followed closely enough for the result to stand.
That same principle is not limited to criminal law. It matters when someone is trying to divide property after a death. It matters when family members disagree about what a loved one would have wanted. It matters when a buyer and seller see the same real-estate transaction completely differently. It matters when someone comes into my office angry because they believe they have been wronged, while the person on the other side is equally convinced they are the one being treated unfairly.
Every legal problem has angles.
The person who calls my office usually has one version of the story. The person on the other side has another. A judge may see questions neither side wants to focus on. A family member may be carrying grief that does not fit neatly into a legal argument. A business owner may be worried about the money. A parent may be worried about the children. An officer may be worried about safety. A prosecutor may be worried about proof. A defense attorney may be worried about whether the government has gone too far.
More than one angle can exist at the same time, even when those angles do not fit neatly together.
When a file lands on my desk, one of the first things I do is start asking questions from every side. What would the other lawyer say about this? What would a judge need to know? What facts are we taking for granted? What would hurt our position if this case ever ended up in court? What would the person on the other side say if they were sitting across from me?
What does the law actually require, not just what feels fair in the moment? I want other law enforcement officers and other lawyers reading my work and showing me what is missing. I believe in proofreading until I am cross eyed, but I’m cross eyed with a stronger argument.
Hand me a file and tell me where I am standing.
Tell me I am prosecuting it, defending it, advising the family, protecting the business, reviewing the appeal, or deciding what the law requires. I can work the problem from that place. I can tell you what must be proven, what must be challenged, what questions will matter later, and where the other side is likely to press.
I can look at it as a prosecutor and see what the State will need to prove. I can look at it as a defense attorney and see what must be challenged. I can look at it from law enforcement’s perspective and understand why a decision had to be made in real time, while still recognizing the questions a court may have to answer later. I can look at it as an appellate lawyer and see how a record may be read years after the moment itself has passed.
Then, when we walk outside the courtroom, conference room, closing table, or office door, I can also tell you which position I personally agree with and why.
Not because I think I am always right. I am not.
But because I have made myself look at every angle before deciding where I stand.
Maybe that is the lesson that started in that little white house on Main Street, moving files that carried whole pieces of people’s lives.
Every file has more than one angle. Every person who walks through the door has a version of the story. Every legal problem has facts that matter, fears that matter, and arguments that deserve to be understood before they are answered.
My job is not to pretend otherwise.
My job is to see the angles, understand them, and then know exactly where I stand, but with room to move my ground when I am wrong.
Would you prefer a lawyer who sees only one side of the story or a lawyer that can see all sides?
0%One Side
0%All Sides
You can vote for more than one answer.
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Judith L. Hampton
Attorney-at-Law
Hampton Law Firm
This article is for general informational purposes only and is not legal advice. Every legal matter depends on its own facts, circumstances, and applicable law.
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