Friday marks the sixth annual remembrance of two local lawyers portraying the lead character in the book “To Kill A Mockingbird”.
It was seven years ago that Shane Phelps and Phil Banks were in a Brazos County courtroom yelling at each other nose-to-nose in front of a jury.
Phelps and Banks apologized to each other and came up with the idea of Atticus Finch day.
Phelps says it’s an opportunity for lawyers to gather “and rededicate themselves to the idea that the pursuit of law can be a noble pursuit and point to the ideal of the Atticus Finch” character in the Harper Lee novel.
The Finch character in the Pulitzer Prize winning book was a lawyer in the early 1960’s who at considerable peril to himself defended an African-American man accused of raping a white woman.
You’re invited to the Atticus Finch Day program Friday at noon in the county administration building.
You’ll see lawyers dressed in seersucker suits and skirts, read from “To Kill a Mockingbird”, and discuss ways that they can improve themselves as lawyers.
The guest speaker is Houston lawyer John Raley, who at no charge represented death row inmate Michael Morton, who was wrongfully imprisoned for 25 years.
Click below for comments from Shane Phelps, visiting with WTAW’s Patrick Zeinert.
