It was New Year’s morning 2016 when my client, a thirty-five year old man from New York and his young beautiful Sicilian girlfriend were leaving a concert at the Piazza in the Northern Liberties section of  Philadelphia. The complainant, a young woman from Philly, claimed that she was reading a menu at a food truck in the court yard when someone pushed her from behind, not my client, and when she turned to see who pushed her my client, suddenly and without warning, punched her for no reason. She denied that any words were spoken by either party and she could not provide a motive for the assault. My client was then confronted, by the complainant’s boyfriend and both men ended up on the ground fighting.  My client testified that he never touched her and that after her boyfriend took him to the ground, she, the complainant kept kicking him in the head with her spiked heels. He indeed suffered injuries to his face and head. She suffered an ugly black eye that required medical treatment. Both parties admitted to drinking vodka drinks, in her case five or six. I thought that I did a pretty good job in my cross-examination of the complainant and I think that the DA did a good job in his cross of my client. In fact, my client later admitted that the DA was “really pissing him off and that he was about to go off”! Of course I advised him prior to trial not to lose his temper or he would lose the case.  At this point the judge started reading his Crimes Code, usually a bad sign indicating that the Defendant is going to be convicted of something. But then I called as a character witness, the Sicilian girlfriend. Admittedly I’m Italian and very partial to Italian people but she was really special! The great figure, beautiful face, and the Italian accent, well I believe that the judge was impressed to say the least! I say this because in announcing his verdict he said “I find the Defendant Not Guilty based upon his evidence of good character!” So the moral of the story is that it can never hurt to have a beautiful, Sicilian woman as a character witness!