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Plain writing about the law, for people who did not choose to learn it.

Notes on California criminal procedure, civil litigation, business licensing and family law. Written for the person on the receiving end of it rather than for other lawyers.

Latest writing

Practical guidance drawn from matters this firm actually handles in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

Criminal defense

Arrested in San Bernardino County: what to do in the first seventy-two hours

The window between an arrest and an arraignment is short, and almost everything useful happens inside it. A practical guide to the decisions that matter, and to the one mistake that makes every case harder.

August 18, 2026 / 9 min

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Podcast

In the Grey: the firm’s podcast on the parts of the law that resist a clean answer

Discretion, judgment calls, and the distance between what the statute says and what happens in the room. Hosted by Lee W. Gale.

May 19, 2017 / Series

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In the Grey

Most of what is interesting about practicing law happens in the space the statutes do not cover: the discretion a prosecutor exercises, the judgment a judge makes, the difference between what a rule says and what happens when a real person stands in front of it.

In the Grey is the firm’s conversation about that space. It is not legal advice and it is not a substitute for a consultation. It is an attempt to make a genuinely opaque system a little more legible to the people it acts upon.

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Guides we are writing next

If one of these is your immediate problem, do not wait for the article. Call.

The DMV hearing after a California DUI, and the ten-day deadline most people missCriminal defense
Expungement under Penal Code § 1203.4: who qualifies, and what it actually changesCriminal defense
Wobblers and Penal Code § 17(b): the single most consequential negotiation in many casesCriminal defense
Buying a liquor store in California: an ABC license transfer timeline that survives contact with realityBusiness
AB 5 and owner-operators: classification exposure for Inland Empire trucking companiesBusiness
The six-month deadline that quietly kills claims against California public entitiesCivil litigation
You won a judgment. Now what? A plain guide to collecting one in CaliforniaCivil litigation
How California guideline child support is actually calculatedFamily law
When a restraining order and a criminal case run at the same timeFamily law

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