Just tossing out here some remedial american history:
In the cold war, an American was arrested in the USSR under the accusation of being a USA spy. He was assigned by the government of the USSR a defense attorney. Who worked his hardest to twist the law and his government's need to prosecute America since they were, you know, at war, and instead get the American acquitted. When questioned why, he explained that he had pride as a lawyer, and was a lawyer first and foremost. His job was to get an innocent verdict, and that was a job handed down to him by his Motherland, to attempt to get the American "spy" executed via self-sabotage and throwing the trial would be dishonoring not only himself, but the class of lawyers and the USSR as a whole.
Governments literally at war with the USA, trying spies, with a need to show a win for propaganda purposes, assigned attorneys with more fairness and honesty than the modern USA.
Was it in the late 1980s? It was a different time, actually more free than it is now in the most of the former Soviet Union (even against the backdrop of violent suppression of nationalist movements, including massacres of protesters by soldiers).
Just tossing out here some remedial american history:
In the cold war, an American was arrested in the USSR under the accusation of being a USA spy. He was assigned by the government of the USSR a defense attorney. Who worked his hardest to twist the law and his government's need to prosecute America since they were, you know, at war, and instead get the American acquitted. When questioned why, he explained that he had pride as a lawyer, and was a lawyer first and foremost. His job was to get an innocent verdict, and that was a job handed down to him by his Motherland, to attempt to get the American "spy" executed via self-sabotage and throwing the trial would be dishonoring not only himself, but the class of lawyers and the USSR as a whole.
Governments literally at war with the USA, trying spies, with a need to show a win for propaganda purposes, assigned attorneys with more fairness and honesty than the modern USA.
Was it in the late 1980s? It was a different time, actually more free than it is now in the most of the former Soviet Union (even against the backdrop of violent suppression of nationalist movements, including massacres of protesters by soldiers).