John A. Kindley, Attorney at Law

04/19/2025

On April 15, 2025, Judge Jeffrey Sanford of St. Joseph County Superior Court No. 3 in Indiana granted Exoneration Justice Clinic (EJC) client Kara Beaty...

04/19/2025

Happy Easter!!

FINALLY!!! The truth could be secreted and ignored no more, and Kara has been EXONERATED!!

Special thanks and appreciation go out to one of the biggest hidden gems in legitimate local criminal defense counsel John Kindley.

His tireless work and persistence in her case led to an Indiana milestone in achieving a PCR bond from the Indiana Court of Appeals in a UNANIMOUS decision, freeing her from PRISON as he worked towards proving her innocence.

John Kindley is one of the most passionate, intelligent lawyers I have ever worked with and frankly, I personally had never met a lawyer that was as selfless and dedicated,in spite of the many deep frustrations in dealing with our “justice system” and some of those in it, all while taking my incessant calls, emails, and texts late into the night.

If you have been the victim of shoddy, inept police action and/or manipulative prosecution resulting in your wrongful conviction, there is absolutely not anyone else that bring to the table what John will. If by some miracle he’s available to take your case, do not hesitate and lose your opportunity!

Additional special thanks go out to the entire Notre Dame Law Exoneration Justice Clinic, who carried literal ‘words of life’ for Kara to a successful ‘touchdown (thank) Jesus’!!

I cannot say enough about this team and the depths they went to expose the unbelievably shoddy work presented by the FACT Team and perjurous testimony by its members and lead civilian witness they hinged their entire ‘investigation’ on.

“If you or a loved one have been arrested and/or criminally charged as a result of an investigation by the St. Joseph County (IN) FACT Team, you may be entitled to compensation!”

08/21/2024

The word on the street (i.e., Reddit) is that the confused partisan on the right is none other than the elected Prosecutor for Marshall County, Nelson Chipman. Tami Napier is Chipman’s Chief Deputy.

03/12/2023

I haven’t addressed a judge as “Your Honor” in probably ten years. This habit started — in part — as a corollary of the Quaker “plain speech” testimony, which eschews among other things titles of nobility. The article linked below, by a state court judge, links to and responds to another article about a federal judge who has rejected “Your Honor” as a title for a similar reason, albeit one grounded in the Constitution rather than the Bible. (I’m no longer a practicing Quaker, but it remains the religion with which I probably still most closely identify.)

The main point of contention between these two judges is whether judges make, or merely discover, the law. The judge who says the latter thinks calling judges “Your Honor” is at odds with the humbleness of the function of merely discovering the law. The other judge says that judges not merely discover but make the law, and therefore “Your Honor” is appropriate (if “aspirational”) because it reflects their great power.

The real problem with calling judges “Your Honor” is that being elected, or appointed by politicians, to a judgeship is by no means proof or even evidence that the person so honored is in fact honorable, or even is more honorable than the general run of lawyers about whom the jokes are legion.

Granted, “honor” means something fairly specific and straightforward to me. It is informed by my experience of the “Honor Concept” at the U.S. Naval Academy, which holds: “A midshipman does not lie, cheat or steal.” Basically, an honorable judge or lawyer is an honest judge or lawyer.

In my 20+ years of being a lawyer I have encountered on well more than one occasion judicial decisions, some in high places, that for lack of better words are simply horrible and mind-boggling. Law school prepares and even whets your appetite for the intellectually stimulating gray areas in the law highlighted by the judge in the article linked below — the “close calls.” It doesn’t prepare you for the judicial decision that, for example, demolishes an argument that wasn’t made and studiously ignores the argument that was made, with catastrophic consequences for the client you’re standing beside. I can find no evidence of honor in such a decision, regardless from how high of a place the decision emits.

I have encountered many judges who I regard as honorable because they seem to follow the law and to decide close cases reasonably and fairly. I even know of one magistrate who I regard as particularly honorable because of the steadfast performance of his former duties as a prosecutor in service of the truth and justice vis-a-vis a sitting judge in a case where performing those duties couldn’t have been easy and required courage. And isn’t that what we really mean when we speak of “honor” — not just doing one’s duty and being honest but doing and being so when it takes courage to do and be so?

But of course I don’t distinguish between judges, and address even the most honorable only as what they clearly and indisputably are: “Judge.” That has gotten me by without any problems for at least the past ten years. The problem for “plain speech” remains in the higher courts, however, where the judges insist on being called “Justice.”

I’m a judge, and I admit it: I like being called “your honor.” Call me entitled if you want, but I disagree with the Kentucky federal judge who made headlines last fall for saying that modesty forbids him from accepting this distinction.

08/20/2021

A nice thought and laudable intentions by the sheriff of the very progressive city where I went to law school, but, like the author of the blog post linked below, I feel that “inmate” is an innocuous and accurate enough term. In fact, when contacting prison staff, who always refer to inmates as “offenders,” I always consciously make a point to instead refer to them as inmates, which is what they are. Calling them “offenders” may help prison staff sleep better at night, but I happen to know for a fact that many of these so-called “offenders” — even the ones in prison who have been convicted of crimes, as well as the ones in jail still awaiting trial — are not offenders at all.

According to the Wisconsin State Journal, Madison, Dane County Sheriff Kalvin Barrett has ordered staff to stop calling incarcerated persons “inmates” or “prisoners.” They a…

07/27/2021

“The case isn’t an anomaly, and the pattern it represents could have huge ramifications for ShotSpotter in Chicago, where the technology generates an average of 21,000 alerts each year. The technology is also currently in use in more than 100 cities.”

South Bend is one of them.

Prosecutors in Chicago are being forced to withdraw evidence generated by the technology, which led to the police killing of 13-year-old Adam Toledo earlier this year.

03/05/2021

I do a fair amount of federal habeas corpus work, which not many criminal lawyers do. This misbegotten statute makes it far more difficult than it should be.

https://sentencing.typepad.com/sentencing_law_and_policy/2021/03/making-the-case-for-repealing-aedpa-and-a-reminder-that-joe-biden-was-one-of-the-most-vocal-critics-.html?fbclid=IwAR2hlW48vYpenxmeXONJGBFkMQso4pHu0YxLPGfcYVFgU0hb4GIkG9I7w6s

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03/05/2021

Something rotten in the Hoosier State.

As part of a call by The Sentencing Project to abolish the mindset of locking people up and throwing away the key, Indiana is being highlighted as having the highest percentage of individuals in the nation who are serving 50 years or more in prison.

12/31/2020

I received the following message this morning from the WNDU reporter who did this story, and gave him my two cents as indicated:

"Good morning,

This is Ibrahim with WNDU-16 in South Bend. Had a few legal questions I was hoping you could answer on camera for us about self defense and stolen property.

I was recommended to contact you. Are you available for a few minutes to talk today?"

Me: Good morning. I’m sorry but I would not be able to speak on camera today. I assume you’re contacting me with regard to the news of the arrest of a woman who allegedly shot a person who was attempting to steal her vehicle. I do not know enough about the specific facts of the case to venture an opinion on that specific case. I can say, because I think it’s important for the general public to know this, that under the Indiana Code a person does have the right to use reasonable force to protect property, but can only use deadly force to prevent the commission of a “forcible felony.” A “forcible felony” is defined as a felony that “involves the use or threat of force against a human being.” So, in other words, a person has every right to physically confront and attempt to forcibly stop someone who is trying to steal their property. And once that confrontation occurs, depending on how the thief responds, it is easy to see how the thief’s crime may quickly evolve into a “forcible felony” justifying deadly force, if it wasn’t one already. I say all that as a criminal defense attorney, who tries to defend people after the fact from government injustice and oppression. But a person facing the theft of mere property in the moment has to ask themselves whether that property is worth the legal jeopardy that usually attends the use of fi****ms and worth possibly taking a human life. Granted, it’s not always easy to ask oneself such questions in the heat of the moment.

Ibrahim‬: I appreciate your response, which provides some clarity on the situation. So to be clear, if someone realizes their vehicle is being stolen and fired at the fleeing car in defense of their property, that would not be justifiable because their was no use of threat or force against that specific human being (if that's what happened)?

Me: I don’t want to speak on whether a particular use of force would or would not be legally justified in a hypothetical fact situation. And again, I have no idea what the facts were in this specific case. But I would simply strongly advise against the use of deadly force to defend or recover property unless you are being threatened with force yourself.

A woman who shot an killed an alleged car thief sparks a debate online on if her actions were justified. Legal experts don't think so.

12/27/2020

I could not have asked for a better present than to be able to tell this young man's family two days before Christmas that the Court of Appeals had reversed the trial court's denial of his petition for post-conviction relief. Tyre, who was only 15 years old on the day of the awful events that led to his conviction, deserves a new trial.

A split Indiana Court of Appeals has reversed the denial of a teenager’s petition for post-conviction relief of his murder conviction, finding his attorneys performed deficiently in a 2017 trial related to the fatal shooting of a South Bend toddler.

12/26/2020

This “practical advice” from an outstanding expert on handguns and self-defense is well worth reading and considering, but, as he is careful to note, it should not be construed as “legal advice.” (Nor is my recommendation of his article or anything I post on Facebook “legal advice.”) It varies slightly from the ubiquitous mantra of defense attorneys to “never talk to the police” except to tell them clearly and firmly that you want to speak to a lawyer. Every situation is different, and you will have to use your own best judgment in those first minutes immediately following the use of deadly force in defense of self or others, while remembering that the less said the better. If you do choose to say anything to police, the focus should be on what the person lying on the ground tried to do, not on what you did. I would disagree with the article’s recommendation that you tell police you are willing to “sign the complaint.” That seems pointless, counterproductive, and an unnecessary invitation for the cops to try to go over the details of the encounter with you in order to draft the “complaint.” Above all, you don’t want to find yourself sitting in one of the interrogation rooms at the police station for a little “chat” with detectives without counsel present. I’ve watched far too many recordings of such uncomfortable conversations, after the damage is already done. It is very easy to keep yourself out of such a predicament. All you have to do is say: “I want to speak with a lawyer.”

Massad Ayoob outlines a five-point checklist of things a righteous shooter needs to establish as soon as possible after a defensive shooting event.

07/09/2020

“The American people have an understandably negative view of politicians, public opinion polls show, and an equally negative view of lawyers. Conventional logic would seem to dictate that since a judge is normally both a politician and a lawyer, judges would be perceived by the public as being lower than whale waste. But on the contrary, the mere investiture of a twenty-five-dollar black cotton robe elevates the denigrated lawyer-politician to a position of considerable honor and respect in our society, as if the garment itself miraculously imbues the person with qualities not previously possessed. . . .
It’s always a great relief and pleasure to walk into court and find a judge who has had trial experience, knows the law, is completely impartial, and hasn’t let his judgeship swell his head. There are, of course, many such admirable judges in this country, but regrettably they are decidedly in the minority.” — Vincent Bugliosi