The Client by John Grisham - Book Report/Review Example

Since there was no body the prosecution had anything against Barry. However during the brief moments Mark had spent with the lawyer in the carbon monoxide filled Lincoln he got to find out the whereabouts of the senator’s body making him the prime target of the mafia. Reggie Love is a children’s lawyer with a shaky past who takes on the Mark Sway case for only a dollar. It is with this start that the novel takes a spiraling turn at the unfolding of each event. Issues of the Law: Murder and suicide; In the beginning of the novel the lawyer Jerome Clifford is seen to be committing suicide. In the U.S.

A suicide is illegal so if you are caught “not dead” you will be liable to face justice making his frustrations at Marks efforts to stop him understandable, on page 11 he says “I had planned a nice little suicide, you know just me and my hose and maybe a few pills an d some whiskey” later on he was “shouting obscenities” page 19 on realizing that Mark had left when he had fallen unconscious. In Canada there is no specific law against suicide however one can be charged for aiding a suicide.

If mark was being charged in a Canadian law court he would be found partially guilty or an accessory to suicide because of the presence of evidence such; his fingerprints at the scene of the crime and because his brother was in a state of shock he couldn’t give his side of the story to validate Mark. Under the criminal code of Canada acts such as threatening sick persons and children is categorized as culpable homicide or murder if the child actually dies. If Barry was to be tried in a Canadian court he would be charged on two accounts that is first degree murder of the senator and threatening a minor with the intent of murder, and will be subject to capital punishment on the first account with a minimum of twenty five years before he is legible for parole.

Existence of mafias and gangs; There is no rule against the formation of gangs but there are rules that govern the activities of the gangs. The common guiding laws against things like tax evasion, murder, threatening civilians, embezzlement also apply to gang members no matter how big or powerful the gang is. With this rules in place it is clear that corrupt people like Barry will need even more corrupt lawyers like him to defend their law breaking activities. Gangs in Canada in the past were very pronounced and more organized but the current laws have led to their containment.

It is clear in the novel that the Mafia had connections with high end politicians as in the case of Senator Boyd and other people in government. In Canada the Mafias influence is seen even in the Quebec construction company. Children and crime; Children in Canada are allowed the privilege of a lawyer when they have committed or witnessed a crime. In the case of Mark, Dianne Sway, Marks mother has very little say on this matter. Mark actually went out and looked for a lawyer himself. Much as he was sick in hospital Dianne is still obligated to mark by law.

Mark is clearly a disturbed child who is too mature for his age. With no father figure to look up to he relies more or less on himself for his and his brother’s survival. This is a reflection on the current state of the modern family in Canada where studies have shown that children coming from broken homes are more vulnerable to emotional and psychological detachment with the probability of them engaging in criminal activities when they are older. Child services should also have had a role to play in this instance, the mother was too distraught to take care of Mark and the hospital is not exactly a place to bring up an eleven year old boy.