This Lawyer walked softly - and carried a big stick.
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posted by Bob at Friday, September 07, 2007
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6 Comments:
This lawyer spoke loudly - and carried a big stick
BY TAD VEZNER
Pioneer Press
Article Last Updated: 09/06/2007 11:20:20 PM CDT
When speaking of the late Louise Miller O'Neil, many St. Paul judges and attorneys begged to talk in euphemisms about the defense attorney who married a convict, carried a shillelagh "for protection" and had her lingerie debated in the courtroom during St. Paul's most-crowded 1950s trial.
Miller O'Neil, who died Sunday at United Hospital of a heart condition at the age of 83, was the first female St. Paul courtroom lawyer many can remember. As late as last year, Miller O'Neil was still cutting a swath in the Ramsey County Courthouse in her wheelchair.
"I think I'd almost hate to have Louise on my back than some judge, frankly. She was upfront, didn't mince words. She would tell prosecutors (in chambers about her clients), 'Hey, he's guilty as sin - now what are we going to do about it?' " said Ramsey County District Judge Margaret Marrinan.
Miller O'Neil always had firm control over even the most hardened clients.
"I've watched grown men about 6-foot-6 come to tears after she got done scolding them," said son Patrick O'Neil. "I watched a guy getting lippy during a court session, she turned around and backhanded him and told him to shut it."
Former St. Paul Mayor Larry Cohen remembered one exchange between Miller O'Neil and her client while he was a Ramsey County judge. Cohen asked the client whether he'd been threatened by anyone to take a plea.
"Yeah, kinda," the client replied.
"Who?" Cohen asked.
The client pointed to Miller O'Neil - at which point she yelled, "You go ahead and tell 'em why! I told him he better damn well tell the truth and 'fess up on this case!"
Collecting fees from clients was a problem Miller O'Neil solved by going to the local watering hole on payday.
"Her clients - a lot of blue-collar guys - would go down to the bar, and she'd be waiting for them," her son said.
Miller O'Neil graduated from the University of Minnesota's law school in 1951 and that year was sworn into the bar, the lone woman alongside 42 men.
As she sought work at a law firm, the first question she faced was how fast she could type.
"All the law offices said they wanted her to be an educated secretary," said lawyer Terrance "Terry" O'Toole, who asked Miller O'Neil to join him in 1951.
O'Toole hardly regretted the decision: "She's as tough as they come," he remembered one judge telling him.
In 1956, she married Eugene Kenneth Joncas.
Four days after the wedding, St. Paul police were staking out her apartment.
Her husband - a burglar she had met while representing him - had violated his parole on a forgery charge by marrying her without the permission of his parole board.
That, and the fact he was subsequently convicted of a Rochester robbery.
"She left a note on the door of the parole board, saying, 'Kenny and I are getting married.' The parole board was very ticked off," remembered attorney Thomas Burke.
Joncas took the last name O'Neil because his wife liked the Irish sound of it, friends remembered.
The Miller O'Neil stories are nearly endless: One Duluth attorney quit the day after he lost a drug case to her. Attorney Earl Gray remembers Miller O'Neil and her husband once drove into the side of a moving train. They sued the railroad and won.
Later, she went into solo practice, working out of her Summit Avenue home. Perhaps her most famous case, however, was filed against her when she was 30, after she had been appointed a commissioner of the St. Paul Housing Authority - a post that required she be a resident of the city. She claimed to live in a St. Paul apartment, but others said she lived in West St. Paul or South St. Paul.
Attorneys debated the size and style of underwear hanging in the St. Paul apartment, purportedly belonging to Miller O'Neil. While going to hearings, Miller O'Neil carried a shillelagh - a club - "for protection."
"The Louise M. Miller case has been drawing the largest crowds into Ramsey county district court since the Arthur Dezeler murder trial of 1946," a 1954 Pioneer Press article said.
In the end, the judge ruled against her.
Miller O'Neil attended South St. Paul High School and entered the University of Minnesota at age 16. She was a second lieutenant in the Air Force and a national officer of the Young Republicans before she became an avid DFLer in her later years.
Besides her son, she is survived by daughter Mary O'Neil, sister Henrietta Kessler, brother Gus Miller, three grandchildren and countless surrogate children.
"I couldn't even tell you how many people my mom adopted over the years that have lived in this (Summit Avenue) house. She'd take in just about anybody," Patrick O'Neil said.
A public gathering of family and friends will be held after 4 p.m. today at the North End Legion Hall, 72 W. Ivy Street in St. Paul.
Tad Vezner can be reached at tvezner@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5461.
This comment has been removed by the author.
Neither one of you would have liked Louise, she was a good old fashioned LIBERAL Democrat.
JMONTOMEPPOF
Chuck Repke
Hi Chuck, this woman and I had something in common. She believed in second chances, or she would of never married an ex con.
And, I like honest bold people. She seems to of been all that!
This comment has been removed by the author.
Nancy, you are asking Chuck to be un-diplomatic.
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