Rich Hutton: a gentleman and a scholar

About 15 years ago when I was a young public defender in the Beverly Hills Courthouse, my supervisor told me to watch a lawyer who was in the middle of a DUI trial in the neighboring courtroom. He said he was one of the best DUI lawyers out there. I eagerly made my way over to the courtroom, expecting to see a ferocious and intimidating trial lawyer. To my surprise, I encountered a friendly, charming and professorial-style lawyer.

I marveled at the way Rich Hutton connected with the jury. He had a distinguished, yet endearing personality that you would expect to see in a small town where everybody knows each other. He warmed up to the jury in a natural way, by just being himself. He dressed respectfully but not flashy. Everyone in the room had admiration for him – the judge, the prosecutor and the court staff.

During his trial break I went over to him to introduce myself and asked him if I could ask him questions from my own cases. He didn’t hesitate to say “yes” and from then on, he became a trusted mentor in the field. I would run all my defenses by him, such as GERDS, rising blood alcohol, fermentation, and many others. He always took the time to discuss my cases at length with me. He took pride in the fact that I was willing to go to trial on any set of facts. In fact, one year at the CACJ DUI Seminar that he ran in Palm Springs, he had the crowd give me a standing ovation for having an unusual set of DUI trial victories. He was really proud to see that he was inspiring the next generation of courtroom warriors.

Every time I won a DUI trial, I immediately called Rich to let him know about it. The first question he always asked me was “who was your expert?” We would chuckle about the unexpected things that would happen in trial, rulings by judges and different approaches that prosecutors took on our cases.

Anything Rich told me to do I did without question. He told me which seminars to attend, which experts to use, and which panels and associations to join. The only thing I did contrary to his advice was to practice federal criminal defense. I told him it was something I really wanted to do. He said he understood but warned me that it would wreck my calendar. How right he was. Now, every time a federal judge reschedules a court date during a scheduled vacation without asking me about my availability, I think of Rich.

When I started my own practice, Rich immediately referred me cases to help get me off the ground. I was more excited that I had earned Rich Hutton’s stamp of approval than whether the client retained me. That tells you about the greatness of this man.

As the years passed and I gained more experience, I didn’t reach out to Rich as much. Looking back I’m sad about that. We would still see each other often in court and he would tell me about the latest impossible defense that he just pulled off. And they really were impossible. He obtained acquittals in cases involving very high BAC levels and accidents. He always stuck to the science and made complicated forensic defenses easy to understand.

All his trial victories were done with the highest degree of ethics and integrity. He was such a talented trial lawyer that he was able to rely solely on his ability to persuasively argue the facts and the law. That is what really made him stand out among the best of today’s trial lawyers.

A lawyer like Rich Hutton comes along once in a lifetime. We will all miss him dearly. All we can do to pay tribute to Rich is to practice law like he did – with dignity, class and proper preparation. If you come across a case that seems unwinnable, just look through old Rich Hutton trial transcripts, and I’m sure you’ll find a way to win.