by Dallas Baxter, Staff Writer

    Blues fan, snake collector, motorcycle aficionado… and district attorney for the 83rd district of Texas: Frank Brown (above) is a serious lawyer with serious hobbies.
    While he lived in Wichita Falls and San Angelo in the 80’s and 90’s, Brown increasingly visited the mountains of the Trans–Pecos to collect the Gray Banded King snake. The hobby caused him “to spend 60 to 90 nights a year” hunting the Chihuahuan Desert native, which Brown describes as “colorful, unique and great pets because of their easy–going dispositions.” Brown still keeps a few and speaks knowledgeably about his favorite reptiles.
    Brown does not dabble with a few favorite music groups. He is dedicated to one. When the Allman Brothers Band toured Texas in 2001 and 2004, Brown got tickets to all their shows in the state and followed them from Austin to Dallas to Houston to listen to their “unique form of blues music.” He’ll be in the front row this month at their Houston concert.
    Following a band is not the only reason for Brown’s travels. On a motorcycle, alone or with friends, Brown sets aside a period of time each year, chooses a destination and “follows his nose” along scenic back roads. Last year, it was Oregon, this year Colorado for two weeks.
    The dedication to his hobbies reflects the dedication Brown says he feels for his work as prosecutor for this part of Texas.
The job of district attorney is a mystery to many. Evenhis friends ask Brown “what is it you do?” when he talks about his work as D.A.
    “The criminal justice system is like a conveyor belt in a factory,” Brown said. “Once a crime has been committed, various law enforcement agencies each have a part in seeing it through to a conclusion, and the D.A. is one of those parts.”
The district attorney must be vigilant about building cases that warrant grand jury consideration. During the grand jury session behind closed doors, the district attorney puts the case in context for the grand jury. Then the case agent – the primary investigator from the law enforcement agency investigating the crime – presents the case.
    The grand jury members keep the facts of each case before them, take notes and are free to ask questions of the investigator and or the district attorney.
    The grand jury must find that there was probable cause for the crime, that at least 51 percent of the evidence supports indictment. They vote in private. Of the twelve grand jury members, at least 9 must vote to indict to carry the case on to trial.
    Paraphrasing Bill Moyers’ quotation about journalism, Brown said, “justice is not a destination, it is a journey.” For this reason he allows the defendant and their lawyer into the Grand Jury room, and keeps the files open, allowing the defense lawyer see in each file what his or her client is up against.
    Brown said this leads to more plea bargains than it might if the defense had no idea about the case against it.
Brown defended the plea bargain against the negative connotations it sometimes has. The plea bargain is a way, he said, to achieve mutually agreeable justice without the stress and cost of a trial.
    In addition, if Brown had to prosecute all of the cases that reach the docket, he said, there are not enough people in his district, nor is there the time nor money to try all the cases.
    Plea bargaining has other advantages, Brown said: in addition to being cost effective, saving litigants and the community considerable money, it cuts to the chase, allowing everyone to know what is going to happen. The defendant is not left hanging, wondering about the future. The victim is also helped by being able to get closure. If a case goes to trial, it is almost certainly going to be appealed, a process that can go on for years, keeping victims and their families in limbo.
    Brown also pointed out that cases have a shelf life – witness can move or die, evidence can be lost, many factors that could leave the litigants hanging, waiting for some kind of closure. Plea bargaining eliminates the wait, while making it possible for both sides to get at least some of what they want.
    Brown points out that it is key for a prosecutor to understand what the juries in his/her jurisdiction want, so that when a plea bargain is entered, the result is similar to the decision that would have been reached in a jury trial.
    Brown sees the grand jury as very much a democratic thing, citing the 8 to 4 vote that can no bill a case.
     “The grand jury is one of the greatest engines of democracy the world has ever known,” Brown says, noting that the concept is in both the U.S. and Texas constitutions, giving power to the community.
    “Law enforcement and the district attorney are here to work for the grand jury, which is the conscience of the county for 6 months.”
    “The number one characteristic of a good prosecutor is restraint,” said Brown.   
    “This is not high school football – you can’t get mad at defendants; you can’t retaliate. You’ve got to have honor and integrity,” Brown said.

    Brown was born in Sonora but moved as an infant to Wichita Falls where his father was an Episcopal priest and his mother a schoolteacher.
    After graduating from Midwestern State University in 1982, Brown went on to law school at the University of Houston and then, in 1985, though he wanted to work in a legal aid office, he entered private practice in El Paso.   
    About this time, Charlotte Harris, who had taught trial advocacy at the University of Houston law school, moved to Wichita Falls to open the first public defender’s office in Texas. A mutual friend learned Harris had an opening on her staff and alerted Brown, who interviewed for the job in May of ‘86 and got it.
    Along the way, he and Harris discovered they had more in common than the law, and in February 1987, they were married and left public defense work to go into private practice in Wichita Falls where Harris had received her board certification in 1986.
    In April 1988, Harris moved to San Angelo to work for the district attorney’s office. In January of the next year, Brown joined her.
    “We tried a lot of cases together,” Brown said, “we’re a good team.”   
    After nearly 10 years in San Angelo, during which Brown received his board certification and was named Prosecutor of the Year by the Texas Narcotic Officers Association in 1992, and Harris served as district attorney of the 51st district, the couple found themselves drawn to the mountains of Far West Texas. They arrived in Alpine in 1997 resolving “to quit.”
    The closest they got to quitting, however, was going into private practice together, until Harris became a federal public defender in 1998// and Brown was elected district attorney in 2000.
    Brown likes his job. It appeals to the part of him that worked as a public defender, seeking justice for those without the means to pay an attorney, and it appeals to the part of him that is the trial lawyer, fitting parts of the puzzle together to get the best answer for his client.
    “If one is interested in justice, a prosecutor can do more for that cause because of the discretion the prosecution has – to give a break when necessary or to give the maximum penalty, too. You have to make hard decisions in this business,” Brown said.
“I try to be fair and do what’s just, deal with cases to the best of my ability.”
    With all his feelings of satisfaction, however, Brown still sees how things might be better.
    “I’d like to see the end of the erosion of the 4th amendment – search and seizure. There has been a tremendous shift away from individual liberty in this country. The most recent precipitating event was 9/11. Appellate courts are not as vigilant in protecting individual freedom. There have been huge changes.”
    He applauds citizens in this part of Texas who cherish those freedoms, are independent and value liberty. Brown cites his hero, Martin Luther King, Jr., “He died for what he believed in. Not many people around will make that sacrifice. He had unbelievable courage.”
    “Not very often, but once in a while, you get to be a part of justice.” This line from the movie Philadelphia is one that resonates with Frank Brown. “That is why I love being a prosecutor.”

Dallas Baxter, with a BFA Design, UT-Austin &  M. Div., New York Theological Seminary, finds her garden is the natural place for design and theology to coincide. She has been a student of the Big Bend since arriving here five years ago. She can be contacted directly at: dallasbaxter@bigbendgazette.com.