Sunday, April 1, 2012

The lawyer next to Lindsay Lohan-Los Angeles Times

Lindsay Lohan showed up for court on Thursday, the crowd was not as large as it has been for the actress — anticipating perhaps a resolution, rather than the kind of dramatic turn who has created her five year legal saga as compelling as any TV reality Show.

The 25-year-old Lohan been in and out of jail and rehab so often, her story line seemed to arc to failure.

They blew therapy and community service, angry counselors and judges. You never knew what to expect from her in the courtroom — a tearful plea, a beetle, a fingernail painted with a vulgar taunt.

But one thing never seemed to change: the constant presence of lawyer Shawn Holley, which is like movie star free as her client, but has the gravitas Lohan's rough edges smooth.

I have been pulling for Lohan from the beginning. She is a talented actress whose angsty portrayals on the screen are a mix of innocence and rebellion. Her films "Mean Girls" and "Freaky Friday" are classic favorites of my daughters.

But talk about bad role-modeling. As a fan I found Lohan's missteps disappointing. As a mother I found her jaunts tiring. They became a symbol of the reckless self absorption that has become routine for some young women — and I don't just mean Hollywood starlets.

As I watched her legal troubles mount — two DUIs and a jewelry theft — I took a strange kind of comfort of Holley's presence. They seemed to me more than client and lawyer.

When Lohan was sentenced to prison in 2010, she sobbed in the courtroom on Holley's shoulder. When Lohan was handcuffed in 2011, Holley looked down as her client was led from the Court, if the lawyer could not bear to watch.

Scribbled notes on Thursday on her legal path if the judge Holley, Lohan's progress complimented. She showed the slightest smile when the judge pronounced Lohan's probation "ended".

We witnessed the hug between Lohan and Holley. We didn't get to hear that Lohan's whispered "I love you."

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A few hours after Lohan was released, I went on her way to meet her lawyer. In my 30 minute drive I heard the story of the Lohan's court session three times on the radio. She wore a "tight blue Pantsuit," intoned one announcer.

She was not. It was more like teal, and it was customized and tasteful — conservative, if you're 25.

It seems that we can't resist a dig, even at its most triumphant morning. That reflects our investment in her bad-girl persona. And those problems Holley.

"Lindsay's incredibly strong, but she's also very vulnerable," Holley said. "I can't imagine what it must have been for her to be and feel how many people kind of waiting your demise. That's difficult, hurtful. And they don't deserve it. "

That is the celebrity lawyer speak-but it is also the mother of a 9-year-old daughter, a lawyer who got her start as a public defender, a woman who has her own youthful misadventures still recalls.

"Let's just say that I had fun," said Holley, who went to UCLA of Fairfax, spent a year teaching English in high Washington Prep, then enrolled at the southwestern Law School because they don't know what to do with her life.

They spent much time around lawyers. Her mother — who was single and 19 when Holley was born — was a legal Secretary who earned her MBA in night school and years long management of law firms.

Holley got her legal start interviewing car thieves and crack addicts. "You walk in this [courtroom] company tank, and it's hot and it stinks and it is nasty," she said. And nobody understands their legal rights. Most were ready to plead guilty, she said, even if they had a legitimate defence.

"You start to see that you with the concept of freedom in real life."


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