I’ve been involved in the process by which courts of appeal review rulings and final judgments entered in trial courts for nearly twenty years.  I’ve lived on both sides of the street, so to speak.  I started as law clerk to a state supreme court chief justice, then became a staff attorney to three other justices of the court and spent five years seeing the appellate process from the inside.  Since then I’ve spent more than thirteen years in private practice, writing briefs for a wide variety of clients to a wide variety of courts on a wide variety of issues.  I find the appellate process both fascinating and frightening in the manner in which the courts make their rulings. I’m going to use this blog to share my thoughts on the appellate process, the politicization of the courts, the work of writing appeals briefs, and opinions of the Alabama Supreme Court or Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals that I find interesting or noteworthy.