Mr. Ben Peeler provides his services to clients for real property, intellectual property, and general corporate matters. As a licensed Patent Attorney, Mr. Peeler is eligible to prosecute patent applications to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on behalf of his clients.
Mr. Peeler also has experience assisting clients with trademark and copyright issues in both the transactional and litigation settings. Mr. Peeler works with clients on a variety of software and technology issues, from licensing to works-for-hire. In addition to intellectual property matters, Mr. Peeler has also assisted many clients in the litigation of real property and home construction matters.
A Georgia native, Mr. Peeler graduated from the University of Georgia with both a bachelor’s degree in Microbiology and a J.D. While in law school, Mr. Peeler worked on intellectual property and general contract matters for a multinational financial technology corporation and represented Gwinnett County.
Mr. Peeler also served as the Executive Editor of the Journal of Intellectual Property, and the Events Coordinator of the Intellectual Property Law Society. After graduating from Law School, Mr. Peeler served a term as a judicial clerk to the Honorable Judge Wilbanks in
A resident of Canton, Mr. Peeler enjoys playing chess, cooking, and watching the Dawgs in his free time.
This transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.
TRANSCRIPT
Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Woodstock, Georgia. This is Fearless Formula with Sharon Cline.
Sharon Cline: Welcome to Fearless Formula on Business RadioX, where we talk about the ups and downs of the business world and offer words of wisdom for business success. I’m your host, Sharon Cline, and I haven’t done a show in like a month, so I’m so happy to be back at the studio. I’ve been missing my chit chats with various people here in Cherokee County, but today I’m excited to chit chat with an attorney with the company. I guess it’s called Field Connolly Walker LLP.
Ben Peeler: Flint. Connolly and Walker. That’s right. We’re a we’re a law firm in downtown Canton.
Sharon Cline: That’s right. This is Ben Peeler. He’s an attorney. And I just asked him what the difference between attorney and lawyer is, because I don’t know the difference. So why don’t you explain? Sure.
Ben Peeler: Well, there there is no real difference between an attorney and a lawyer. I’m sure. You know, back in the 1610, in England where, you know, we get all this, all of our legal system from or 90% of it. Um, there was some, you know, very critical difference. And if you called someone a lawyer and they were really an attorney, you would have to get into a duel.
Sharon Cline: But these days, they don’t do that. That’s right.
Ben Peeler: The the biggest difference is if you’re in Georgia, sometimes you’ll be called a lawyer. Um, and if you’re in New York, you’ll be a lawyer.
Sharon Cline: That’s about it. But they all do the same thing. That’s right. Ben, you are a Georgia native.
Ben Peeler: That’s right. I grew up in Sandy Springs. Um, was born in a hospital that doesn’t exist anymore. It was Dunwoody Hospital. Um, and lived in Sandy Springs, uh, until I went to UGA for undergrad. And then, because I couldn’t figure out what else to do, I went to UGA for law school.
Sharon Cline: Because you just weren’t sure. You just didn’t have that 100% know my direction kind of thing.
Ben Peeler: Oh, absolutely. I, I thought that I would go into medicine. Um, up until about my junior or senior year of college and then realized that that was not going to happen. Why?
Sharon Cline: Why did you realize that?
Ben Peeler: So I’m the only attorney in my family. Um, I didn’t have any sort of idea about what attorney. What being an attorney looked like. I didn’t know, really. You know, I didn’t know any attorneys, really. Most of my family were in medicine, and I figured I would follow in their footsteps until I spent a lot of time hanging out and, uh, shadowing with, uh, various doctors of different specialties. And they were all, you know, very wonderful people. Um, and it was, but I realized very quickly it was something that I was not cut out to do. Um. Do you know the work and the the patients and everything? Um, and medical school just would not have been for me. And so I had to take a very quick about face and figure out what I was going to do. Um, because my, my undergraduate degree was in microbiology. It was way too late at that point to change majors. And so I had to sort of roll with the punches and adapt and figure out what I was going to do. And, um, uh, I had basically decided that I was going to take a bunch of, you know, standardized tests out of, out of after finishing college. Um, while I did that, I spent a year working at a liquor store and stocking the shelves. I was not very good at that. Um, but I took the, uh, the Lsat, which is the law school test, and, uh, did well enough on that, that I figured, hey, you know, maybe I can stick around Athens for a couple more years. And so that’s what I did.
Sharon Cline: So when you were, um, contemplating law school, do they ask you to specialize in a particular kind of law? A particular kind of law?
Ben Peeler: No. So that’s one of the things that I think is very interesting about going to law school and being a lawyer is, you know, the person that negotiates LeBron James’s contract. Um, and the person on the Supreme Court and, you know, someone that you see, you know, commercials or advertisements for on the subway, they all got the same degree. Um, you know, sometimes from the same school. Um, the, the when, when you’re a first year, what’s called a one-l in law school, you take a standardized sort of regiment of courses, you’ll take your first semester. Um, and this is true pretty much any law school you go to across the country. Um, but at Georgia, at least, you’ll take torts, contracts and civil procedure and legal writing your first year. Everybody does it. Um, your second year, you get to, you’ll take, uh, constitutional law, criminal law. Um, and then you get to pick something else that, that you want to take. And, um, you know, Georgia is a really great law school. And so they offer all kinds of directions that you can go to. But, um, it’s really sort of up to you like, what.
Sharon Cline: What what resonates with your heart or exactly.
Ben Peeler: To figure out. You know, I like this. I don’t really like this. I learned very early on, I do not like criminal law. So I stayed away from that. Um, and I found out, um, pretty early on that, that I liked intellectual property, um, you know, going into law school, like I said, I didn’t know any lawyers. I didn’t know really anything about the law. I didn’t know what a tort was. So that was an interesting first day of that class.
Sharon Cline: I bet there’s so many. I mean, it’s just the idea of understanding all of the different laws and reasons we have them and how complicated they can be and how litigious this whole world can be. I imagine it’s overwhelming.
Ben Peeler: Yeah. You you know, I think that’s a big part of what going to law school is about, is it’s not training you to be, you know, a lawyer in the sense that as soon as you get out, you’re ready to, you know, get into practice and get into court. Obviously, they prepare you a little bit for that, but mostly it’s about how do you think, like a lawyer and how do you think in a way where you can, you know, make an argument, make a argue a position and serve a client? But before you, you know, realistically, it took me about a year or so out of out of law school and clerking to, um, really understand the business side of law. That’s something that they don’t really cover. True, true.
Sharon Cline: Because you are going to potentially I mean, you you have to understand the law, but then you have to understand how to navigate a business of law. Exactly. Which is fascinating too. It’s like being a doctor. But then you have to figure out the the part of you that is like the the doctor’s practice. You’re going to be on your own, or are you going to be part of a family practice or how are you going to contract yourself out or whatever? Exactly. It’s a lot. Yeah.
Ben Peeler: And I don’t think that it’s something that they cover in medical school, from what I understand that at least. And but yeah, in law school, 90%, 95% of what you learn, um, is not, you know, how do you file something with the court? Um, how do you talk to a client who’s angry about, you know, how their case is going? Um, you know, how do you how do you get business? How do you get a new client in, um, that’s something that you have to learn when you’re sort of when you’re already out, when you’re when you’re in practice, sort of on the streets, so to speak.
Sharon Cline: When you talk about intellectual property, it’s so interesting because it’s not like we’re talking a physical something sometimes. Right. So how do you how do you okay. Explain, if you don’t mind what intellectual property is. Sure.
Ben Peeler: So the best explanation that I can come up with to differentiate, um, you know, real or personal property with intellectual property is if I have an apple and I eat the apple, or I grow the apple, or I sell the apple, you can’t have the apple. Just, you know, by the laws of physics, if I have it, you can’t also have it. But the same isn’t true for an idea or a song or a story. Um, you know, or a trademark, anything like that. If I tell you the story now, there’s, you know, functionally, there’s two copies of the story in the world. And if you tell somebody, it can go on. And me having the story doesn’t stop anyone else from holding on to it in the same way it would for something physical. So, uh, law sort of developed around how do you protect something that, that, you know, we want artists to be able to, to profit from their work. We want to encourage, you know, in the sort of, um, John Lockean, um, you know, Adam Smith style of, of capitalism and, and, um, sort of the ideals of the free market and, you know, enjoying the fruits of your labor. How do we allow somebody who creates something to enjoy the fruits of their labor. If somebody can take those fruits without, you know, physically lifting them off the ground. Um, and so that’s where intellectual property came from. There’s sort of three. Well, no, there’s four big, um, I guess branches on the intellectual property tree. Um, as I said before, there’s trademarks, which has to do with, um, protecting the identity of your business. So if your business, you want, um, to let people know that a product or a service is yours and you want to stop competitors from passing it off as theirs. Counterfeiting, that sort of thing. Um, you know, this sort of, sort of whole idea came about in the, um, you know, the Middle Ages where they would people would blacksmiths would stamp their work or artisans would stamp their work bread.
Sharon Cline: I heard bread companies would put their own like, like almost logo on top of bread when they baked it so they could say it was theirs.
Ben Peeler: Right. Yeah. Some some identifier of source so that, you know, people know, hey, this is good quality because I made it. Um, but I don’t want other people to take this mark that I’ve come to identify it as mine and use it because they might not have as good of a quality as I do. So that’s sort of where trademarks came out of. And as you sort of said now, a lot of, a whole lot of things can be a trademark. Obviously you’ve got, you know, the, the pretty standard ones, like the word um, Amazon is trademarked, um.
Sharon Cline: Even just the word, but not just the logo. Exactly right.
Ben Peeler: Just the word can be a trademark. The logo can be a trademark. You know, you think Apple the the you know, the picture of the apple with a bite taken out of it. Um, that alone is a trademark. Things like colors can be trademarks. The John Deere tractors That green. Yeah. That’s trademarked. Interesting sounds can be trademarked. The Taco Bell ding. That’s trademarked. You know, if I, if I open up a taco stand, I can’t use that same ding to advertise my my tacos. Um, I am sure.
Sharon Cline: Every place I look there is some trademark associated with some even Business RadioX with their own trademark.
Ben Peeler: Absolutely. Yeah. And they’re very important. Um, but they’re just, like I said, one branch of the intellectual property tree. Um, you’ve also got copyrights, which are basically any sort of work of they typically fall into works of art, but really any sort of work of creativity. Um, you know, books, songs, poems, it can if it can be. I’m going to get a little technical. Um, if it can be fixed in a what’s called a tangible medium of expression. So anything creative that can be fixed in a tangible medium of expression, that means paint it on a wall, put on a CD, um, you know, a photograph.
Sharon Cline: Something that you’ve created that’s out of your mind and actually into the world, into.
Ben Peeler: The world, and that someone else can look at and experience what was what, what was in your mind. Wow. Um, all.
Sharon Cline: Of these definitions are so important, right? Because someone could come and say, well, I mean, they didn’t do this. It’s just because it exists here doesn’t mean that it’s this. I could just imagine someone trying to use semantics. Oh, yeah. To make it seem like they’re not doing something wrong. Well, that’s.
Ben Peeler: Our job, you know? Yeah, in a sense, that’s, um, you know, sometimes when you don’t have the facts on your side, you’ve got to really wiggle the law to try it, to try and, um, get your client out of a jam, but, um, yeah. So copyrights, um, those, those are more, more so for sort of artistic works, but anything creative. The bar is basically as low as a phone book. If it’s any more creative than a list of names and phone numbers in alphabetical order, it can be copyrighted.
Sharon Cline: Okay.
Ben Peeler: Um, the third branch are patents. Um, without getting too deep into it, that’s one of the things that I specialize in. Um, uh, patents are basically a contract between you and the government to say I’ve invented this thing. Um, utility patents, which are the most common kind, are, uh, have to do with inventions. They’re what you typically think of with a patent, you know, something that you’ve created that’s useful and helps people. Um, and a patent is basically a contract with the government that says in exchange for me telling everybody else how this thing works, um, the government will give me a monopoly on my my invention for 20 years. Realistically, it’s more like 17 years. But, um, in essence, that’s what it is. It’s. I’ve invented this thing. I will tell everybody else how this thing works so that when my monopoly expires, everyone gets to use this thing. Everyone gets to enjoy sort of the benefits of my of my creativity, my ingenuity. Um, but for now, because we’re trying to protect that idea, protect, um, incentivize people to spend the time, you know, tinkering. You think of the person tinkering in their garage, right? They invested time, they invested money, and they invested their, you know, intellectual capabilities into making this thing. We want to be able to reward them, and not just as soon as they make it. Someone else comes along and gets to use it without. Yeah, they don’t.
Sharon Cline: Get to profit if in some way, you know, for their own inspiration and hard work. Got it. Exactly.
Ben Peeler: So. So that’s a patent, a utility patent. There’s also design patents, but they’re they’re a little bit more niche. I don’t really need to get into it right now. And then the fourth big branch are trade secrets. And I know getting getting close to Halloween.
Sharon Cline: And there’s attorney client privilege too, right. So you’re going to have some trade secrets. What’s an example of, like, a fake trade secret, one that doesn’t get you in trouble?
Ben Peeler: Well, I can I can give you an example of a of a real trade secret that I don’t know the secret of. So we’re all good. Okay. Um, the the formula. Well, there’s two, I guess. Since we’re in Georgia, I’ll say the Coca-Cola secret formula is a trade secret, right? I know that that they have a secret formula, but I don’t know what it is. So as long as they try to keep it a secret, They can protect it. And I can’t, you know, sneak into their office, try and crack the safe to get to get to it. Okay. Trade secrets are sort of the flip side. The other side of the coin of patents, right? Patents. Are you telling everybody how this thing works? Trade secrets are. Nobody can know how this works. Um, because, again, I’ve spent time and, you know, money and intellectual capability to develop this, um, this ingenuity. Right. This way of doing business, this chemical, this whatever. Um, and so people should be punished if they try and, you know, break, break the secret. Uh. Got it. So, yeah, WD 40 is the other. Oh, the other example of a of.
Sharon Cline: A trade secret.
Ben Peeler: Right. How how what the formula of that is.
Sharon Cline: So how often are you defending The okay, my brain runs very fast, so I’m trying to articulate what I mean. No problem. So let’s say that I have my own podcast here, Business RadioX. And I want to use a quick, uh, sound from Joe Rogan’s podcast because it applies, right? I’m taking his voice and putting it into my podcast, but that’s his voice, right? Am I allowed to use that?
Ben Peeler: So you’re touching on something that’s that’s very important, especially like you said in sort of today’s media environment, um, you know, streaming and YouTube and podcasts, people can take.
Sharon Cline: Lots of things, right? You know.
Ben Peeler: Um, uh, this comes up a lot. It’s something called fair use. Um, and this applies to, uh, mostly pretty much copyrighted material and trademarked material. Um, you know, think, you know, you watch SNL and they have, you know, maybe target or something, right? You know, target isn’t sponsoring that skit, but they can still use it. Fair use is, you know, we’ve recognized that there are limits to protection for intellectual property and that there are some times when you’re using it where it’s not, um, harming the creator of it in the way that we, you know, the way that we want to protect them. So, um, an example of fair use that you’ll see fairly often is, uh, or particularly on things like YouTube are commentary or criticism. You know, if you, if you’re providing commentary, if you’re, you know, reviewing a movie, you can show parts of that movie, you can show, uh, parts of that podcast, you know, whatever, whatever it is that you’re commenting or reviewing, because otherwise how could the people that you’re giving the review for know what you’re talking about? Um, but, you know, your review isn’t a substitute for the movie. People aren’t watching your review View normally aren’t watching your review instead of watching the movie, they’re watching your review because they want to know what you think about the movie.
Sharon Cline: So it’s okay to use a clip of or just in the background or whatever, a little bit of the movie, right? Yeah.
Ben Peeler: To to explain.
Sharon Cline: Context. Right.
Ben Peeler: To explain what you’re talking about. Um, another example is things like parody or satire. Um, there’s the sort of quintessential case in, in the legal world for for parody and satire is the song Pretty Woman by Roy Orbison. Okay. Uh, two Live Crew did a cover of that song. Um, but a parody of it, um, where instead of Pretty Woman, it was big hairy Woman. Um.
Sharon Cline: What? I have missed that in my history of life. I don’t know how I’d never heard of this. Okay. Go ahead. Sorry.
Ben Peeler: But it’s it’s a pretty funny. Um. It’s a pretty funny parody. But, yeah, the the record company who owned Pretty Woman sued two Live Crew saying, hey, that’s that’s our song. You can’t, you know, you. And obviously they used a, a big portion of the Pretty Woman song. They used, uh, enough to make you think that they were covering Pretty Woman. Mhm. Um, and, uh, two Live Crew was successful in arguing. No, it it’s a parody. We’re allowed to make fun of this thing. We’re not. You know, people aren’t wanting to listen to Roy Orbison and then saying oh, well, you know, two Live Crew will do. It’s they want to listen to someone make fun of Roy Orbison and and you’re.
Sharon Cline: Allowed to do that.
Ben Peeler: And you’re allowed to do that and sort of that’s where, at least for me, the really fun, intellectual part of it gets in because in the case of parody, You want to get as close as you can to the thing that you’re making fun of, because it’s not. It’s not a good joke if the people watching can’t tell what you’re making fun of.
Sharon Cline: Like Weird Al Yankovic doing all that kind of parody of Michael Jackson and everything else, you know?
Ben Peeler: Exactly. And in Weird Al’s case, I think he gets permission from the artist, but it’s more of a respect kind of thing. He just wants to be respectful and make sure the artist you know is okay with their song being made fun of. But he legally, in all you know, I don’t want to make a blanket statement, but in nearly every case, he probably could get away with making the song without their permission.
Sharon Cline: He just he just asks out of respect. I mean, that’s great. Exactly. Well, so can someone’s voice be trademarked? Like, um. Oh, gosh, who’s got an amazing voice? All right. Let’s say Demi Moore has a very distinctive sort of raspy sound. Can her voice be trademarked in some way where someone can’t take it and use it for something.
Ben Peeler: So that gets into it’s a very good question, and it gets into what are called the your rights of publicity, which are very related. It’s sort of an offshoot of this copyright, this intellectual property and how it and it’s how it relates to sort of your rights as a person. Um, obviously this is a huge topic right now with all, you know, AI coming out where you can get AI copies of, you know, celebrities singing songs or, um, you know, even paying a.
Sharon Cline: Bunch of things they’d never say in real life. Right?
Ben Peeler: Exactly.
Sharon Cline: How do you deal with that?
Ben Peeler: It’s tough. Um, you know, sort of. Practically speaking. Um, it’s a violation of your right to publicity. You know, if if I, Um, have, you know, an eye of Demi Moore’s voice saying something or singing something and that she didn’t sing. You know, just philosophically, we can understand. That’s not fair. That’s not right. Um, and she has a right to her image. This is coming up to, you know, we’re hitting a lot of topics is coming up to, you know, college sports with the name, image and likeness. Um, you know, developments that are happening there that, um, we have a right to our our name, our image, our likeness. Uh, you know, what our voice is. And and that’s that’s something that is in a very sort of cutting edge area of the law right now. The law is a little slow to catch up to technology. The law is almost always way behind technology and just barely catching up before the new sort of technological advance happens. But um, but yeah, the, the. So to get back to your original question, um, you wouldn’t necessarily copyright your voice, um, or excuse me, trademark your voice. Um, but you would have a right to the use of your voice. And so if someone else tried to use it, um, to, you know, to promote something or just to just to use it, um, you would, you would be able to, to stop them and.
Sharon Cline: Well, so I’m thinking about how much is okay. Let’s say, for example, I go on TikTok and someone has got a little quick screenshot of someone else’s TikTok and they want to talk about what the story is. Those things are okay. I mean, this is like happening, like you said, real time all the time. And the law cannot predict that there’s going to be AI or TikTok where these things come up. So they do have to catch up, I imagine. Oh yeah. But are those the kinds of cases that you specifically deal with?
Ben Peeler: So those those are among the case types of cases? Yes. We, um, you know, we deal with on on both the plaintiff, the, the person bringing a lawsuit and the defendant, the person defending a lawsuit. We, uh, both bring cases for people and defend, uh, people in a variety of intellectual property issues, um, copyrights trade. You know, there’s a trademark dispute. Someone, um, you know, someone has a business name that they’ve been operating under for 15 years, and then they find out that somebody else in Tennessee or somebody else in Mississippi or wherever is using that same name and just started. And, you know, customers are being confused. They, you know, Google. I’m just going to make up a name, you know, um, you know, A1 delivery or something, you know, Um, they, uh, you know, they’re googling for that. And then the business in Mississippi comes up, and they what? They wanted the business in Georgia. Um, you know, you we, we assist people in, in those sorts of cases with help with, you know, protecting their, their mark, protecting their the name of their business. Because, you know, if people don’t if you can’t protect the name of your business, ultimately that is your business.
Sharon Cline: Wow. Okay. So is there a particular case that you’ve worked on that is sort of the one that stands out in your mind, something you think about a lot or was specifically like either the most challenging, the most rewarding. Is there something that sort of, I don’t know, takes up space in your mind more than something else?
Ben Peeler: Oh, gosh. Um, that’s a that’s a hard one. I I’d have to think about that. You know, every case is so unique and has its own sort of challenges. And, you know, there’s times where, um, there’s there’s times where it’s, you know, looking rough, and then and then you pull out and you’re like, wow, we killed it. We we did great on that. Um, you know, we I work with an office of just absolutely fantastic lawyers and fantastic people. Um, and so for for any given case, I there’s a few that probably come to mind. I don’t I don’t necessarily want to get into specifics about, you know, what what they were about just, um, you know, trying to trying to be respectful of everyone’s privacy, of course. But, um, yeah, there’s, um, there have been an interesting patent case that I worked on that involved, um, that that involved sort of this software that was, um, sort of on the cutting edge of, of assisting businesses in, um, in their, their marketing efforts and sort of the challenges of something that cutting edge, trying to get that going with the Patent and Trademark Office the USPTO got you. And yeah, they’re interesting trademark cases. Um, the but the other thing that I do as well is, you know, we do a little bit of just general litigation. Um, so anything really involving a business, you work on a lot of construction cases. Um, and just, you know, just business disputes between businesses or between business partners.
Sharon Cline: What do you think you’ve learned about humans, human nature? Uh, in your, your, um, interactions with people?
Ben Peeler: Wow. Uh, really pulling out the the deep ones, huh?
Sharon Cline: That’s what fearless formula is all about.
Ben Peeler: No, it’s it’s a great question. Um, what have I learned about human nature, I think. I think part of it is that people can be a little quick to, um, they can be a little quick to judge, and they can be a little quick to sort of want justice or want, um, I guess a quick resolution to things without, you know, without understanding, you know, the sort of the legal processes is ever moving, but it is ever slow. And so one of the things that I always try and tell people when, when they start off with is when they start off with us is, you know, this is not going to be, you know, an easy breezy process. And unfortunately, there are probably a lot of lawyers that will tell you otherwise, you know, that will try and sell you and say, you know, sign up with us. You know, we’ll get you won’t have to do anything. Um, that’s not how it works. Um, but, you know, slow and steady wins the race, as they say. Um, And so we usually come out pretty well. But but I think people. From what I’ve observed, um, I think people are generally fundamentally good and that they want justice and that very few times, in very few cases that I’ve worked, there has ever been a bad guy. You know, most of these are just people with all kinds of life stresses.
Ben Peeler: Um, you know, outside of the case that we’re working on that have their own problems in their lives. And, you know, we we see a piece of it, but they’re not they’re not the villain. You know, it’s easy to it’s easy to tell yourself, particularly when you’re on the other side of a case with someone, when you’re in a fight with somebody, that they’re a villain and that you’re a hero. But part of our job is to stay objective. You know, Abraham Lincoln said, whoever hires, you know, represents themself as an attorney has a fool for a client. Our job is to sort of stay objective and stay sort of outside and be able to see, um, sort of the big picture and sort of take the emotion out of things. And I think that, um, being in that role, you do get to see, you know, that ultimately, you know, we have a duty to our client, but that that our client is just a person dealing with another person. And at the end of the day, people don’t typically want to fight, they want to get along. And so if you can help them do that, I think that’s um, I think that’s that’s sort of what we’re here to do.
Sharon Cline: How challenging is it to keep your emotions out of of your. Um, I don’t know. I want to say work, but being able to relate to people who are in a very highly charged emotional state, because oftentimes we’re talking about money, right? So and money just kind of can, can bring out some of the worst in people. So how do you keep yourself from becoming emotionally involved? What do you do?
Ben Peeler: Well, you know, I think that’s a great observation that, you know, a lot of the times people come to us in sort of highly charged circumstances because money is involved and they want, you know, people care a lot about their money, of course. And so keeping keeping out of that emotional state, I think, is, is not terribly difficult because it’s not it’s not my money. Right. Okay. Um, and I can sort of be a little bit more objective and say, hey, you know, um, there, you know, you’re, you’re out, say $20,000 and they’re offering you 15. I get $5,000. Is a lot of money. Yeah, but maybe it’s worth it to buy your peace sort of thing.
Sharon Cline: Interesting, interesting.
Ben Peeler: So, you know, keeping myself out of it, out of sort of the emotional state is usually not that difficult. Um, particularly, you know, because I view my job as sort of being a counselor of some sort. You know, sometimes attorneys are called counselor, and it’s certainly not in the same way that, you know, a therapist or something is a counselor, but a little bit. But, yeah, we’re there to give advice and we’re there to help sort of simmer people down. And, you know, they can they can be upset and they can yell, um, and then at the end of it, I know they’re not yelling at me. I can sit down and say, okay, now that we’ve got that through, let’s move forward. Let’s figure this out.
Sharon Cline: Several years ago, I saw this series. It was like a limited series. I think it might have been on HBO. It was called The Night Of, and it was about this, uh, gentleman who met this girl, and he went home with her. And the next morning she was killed. She had been murdered. And he didn’t he didn’t recall anything that had happened. So of course he was arrested. And the issue that his attorney, who was played by John Turturro, which I think I’m saying his name correctly, um, he was he was saying to this guy, this guy is like, I’m innocent. And his attorney, John, was like, it really doesn’t matter if you are or not. It’s what can be proven as enough to give people doubt of your of your innocence. That’s. So he just kind of kept this. This kid kept saying, you know, but I didn’t like what about the fact that I didn’t do it, you know, and he was like, you really just need to kind of give up the idea that even though you believe you’re innocent, you know what? Can someone else encourage a jury to believe, you know, and can that be proven or disproven? Really? It’s like how it’s the way that the truth can be used, or the way a perception can be used to make you look kind of guilty. And I just remember that feeling of dread I had in my stomach, like, what if I were in this situation and it sure looked like I did something bad, but I know I didn’t. How would I be able to fight? Because there is this this feeling in me like the truth is the truth, you know? Right, right. But it really doesn’t apply in, um, when you’ve got a law that can be, I don’t know, maybe not manipulated. I don’t know if that’s the right word, but the perception of of the truth can be used in a way that doesn’t work for you. Is there anything that surprises you about your your profession in this way?
Ben Peeler: Sure. So so that sort of, you know, on on that point, it’s why basically any lawyer will tell you, you know, if you’re arrested, ask for a lawyer, don’t, you know, have your have your rights read to you and plead the Fifth Amendment. Um, don’t don’t tell the don’t tell the police anything. Because even if you’re well-meaning, their job is to solve the case and find a find a suspect and get them, you know, get them arrested and then get them ultimately convicted of the crime. They’re not there to sort of they’re not there to help you. Um, they’re there to help society. Yeah, they’re there to help solve the case. So, you know, that’s why the golden advice, if you were ever arrested, you know, be quiet. Don’t don’t tell, don’t tell anybody anything except that you want a lawyer. Um.
Sharon Cline: Would you do that? Would you do that if you were arrested? Would you be like, I need an attorney? Oh, absolutely.
Ben Peeler: Like, you know, like I said, number one, I don’t know. I do not specialize in criminal law. Right. And just like we were talking about before, when it’s your own case.
Sharon Cline: Yeah. You’re not going to be.
Ben Peeler: The emotions come into it and you’re convinced and you’re saying, well, if I just make this argument or if I just, you know, present this, then everyone will know that I’m innocent. And when you have someone, you know, looking over your shoulder who has more experience than you and is more objective than you to say, having someone there to say that’s not a good idea is when you’re when you’re playing with your your freedom, you know, it’s priceless.
Sharon Cline: Stakes are too.
Ben Peeler: High. Exactly. Um, the the the plot of the show that you were just talking about reminded me of a of a story that I’d heard. You know, people, attorneys always trade old, you know, war stories. They call them war stories. Yeah. Um, and I heard one about, uh, about an attorney that was representing a defendant in a murder case, and, um, he was fairly certain that his his client was guilty. Um, they had a lot of evidence against them. Um, and so he went into the last day of the trial, and he decided that he needed he needed a Hail Mary, that they weren’t going to be able to get out of this on a technicality. And so he is making his closing argument, and he ends it with something along the lines of, um, and, you know, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I can promise you that my client is not guilty. And you know how I can do that? Because the victim is going to walk through these courtroom doors right now. And he pointed at the doors of the courtroom, and the jury all turned, you know, and looked. And, of course, nobody walked in, right? You know, nobody came through those doors. And then he said, ah, but you see, you thought that I might be telling you looked you thought that I might be telling the truth. You thought there was a chance someone would come through that door. That’s what a reasonable doubt looks like. You for one second. You had a doubt that that the that that there really.
Sharon Cline: Was a victim.
Ben Peeler: Right. And so they go back and deliberate. The jury goes back, and then they come back out some hours later and they find his client guilty. And afterwards he goes back and he says, well, you know, well, why did you find him guilty if, um, if you all looked and the foreman of the jury says, yeah, we all looked, but your client didn’t.
Sharon Cline: Oh. Ooh. I need a minute. Yeah.
Ben Peeler: And so that, um. Wow. Yeah, that that story always stuck with me about, you know, the idea of a reasonable doubt and what that looks like to different people and how you introduce that, um, in a case, obviously, you know, we deal with civil cases, right? So the burden is a little different, right? Um, but you’re always even in a civil case, you know, where you have to convince a jury or you have to convince a judge. In some cases, you’re always looking for that one little piece, even if even if you’re not going to, you know, even if you feel like you’ve you’ve got a stinker. You’re always looking for that one little piece that can maybe break it for you. Yeah.
Sharon Cline: Uh, what do you think people don’t know about what it’s like to be an attorney like you are? What would you want people to know? Do they have misconceptions of what it’s like to be an attorney?
Ben Peeler: Um. You know, I think that a obviously, you know, I’m going to come out and say it. Attorneys are not the most popular people. Um, there, you know, there are a lot of great attorney jokes. Um, I don’t know if I can even say a lot of the ones that I know on the air, but, um, you know, I think that the thing that, that maybe most people don’t know is that it’s at the end of the day, it’s a job like any other. Um, you know, we’re certainly not, you know, these, you know, ivory tower, um, you know, people that that look down on everybody else and. Yeah.
Sharon Cline: Infallible.
Ben Peeler: Right. Exactly. Yeah. Everybody makes mistakes. Yeah. Um, and a lot of our I would say a lot of our job is not, you know, showing up. This differs, you know, attorney to attorney, but a lot of the times you’re not showing up to court every day to argue to the judge. You’re trying, at least in my line of work, trying to work out between two people that have a problem. You’re there to figure out the solution without, you know, costing your client as little money as possible. Um, you know, there are some attorneys out there who, you know, like every profession, there’s some, you know, there’s some unscrupulous ones who will, you know, bill their client for everything just to keep the case churning just so that they can keep billing. But, um, I think the really good ones, um, they’re there to save as much money as possible to, to stop the case, you know, as early as possible and to prevent it from, you know, becoming one of these Charles Dickens esque things where, you know, that’s.
Sharon Cline: Such a good concept that you just pointed. Yeah, that goes on and on. And I imagine you’re right that there are, of course, in every profession there are people who have nefarious intentions. But you’re saying for the most part, most attorneys and lawyers that, you know, are really they’re doing the best job they can for their client.
Ben Peeler: They’re there. And, you know, it’s sort of like doctors. They’re there to help you on one of your worst days. Um, you know, like, pretty much like going to the doctor unless, you know, you’re, um, you’re you’re you’re giving birth or something like that. Most of the time when you go to the doctor, you go to the hospital, you’re not having a good time.
Sharon Cline: Yeah, it’s a problem.
Ben Peeler: Right. And most of the time, the similar exception is adoptions. Most of the time when you’re going to an attorney, you’re not having a good time. There’s a problem and it’s usually an expensive problem. Yeah. Um, and so the really good attorneys are there to help guide you through, you know, I think I think a lot of people maybe only have, you know, hire an attorney, maybe once in their life or twice in their life, you know, and it’s probably one of the lesser experiences that they have, you know, that they’re having this bad problem. But our job is to, you know, be there for you and help you solve that problem.
Sharon Cline: What do you think your fearless formula is? In other words, you know, obviously everybody’s got we’re all human and have all of these different emotions. And fear oftentimes limits people’s lives. Um, in terms of the the legal world, I’m sure, because the stakes can be so high in so many different ways. There’s there is fear or, you know, maybe trepidation or dread. What is your fearless formula? How do you work around those feelings that so that it doesn’t hinder you?
Ben Peeler: Um, so I try and remember, number one, that, you know, I made it this far. Um, it can be easy to get wrapped up in, you know, the, the minutia of a problem that you’re working on. But if you sort of take a step back, take a deep breath, you know, and realize I’ve gone through a whole lot worse than this. Um, you know, I think back to, for example, when I was in undergrad, um, and didn’t know what I was going to do, um, had a microbiology degree that I didn’t think I was going to get any use for and was stocking shelves at a liquor store. And the other job I had was getting up at five in the morning to work at a restaurant, um, the breakfast shift at a restaurant. And just, you know, where I am now is, is, um, you know, I’ve come a long way since then. And so being able to sort of sit back and say, okay, I’ve made it this far. I’ve made it through challenges that are worse than this. Um, I’m here because I can think. Um, now, let me think about it is I think how I, you know, deal with deal with problems where I, you know, I’ll have self-doubts or I’ll have, you know, fears about. Well, what you know is this the is this the right step for me to take career wise? Is this the right step for me to take professionally, you know, personally? Is this the right. Um, we were talking a little bit earlier, um, that I had recently bought a house, um, first time home buyer. And, you know, there’s a lot of stress involved in that and the same the same idea, sort of stepping back and thinking, all right, I’ve made decisions in the past. I’ve made good decisions. I think I can make a good decision here. Let me just think about it. Is my so I would say my if you had to put it on a bumper sticker, I’d say my fearless formula is you’re good at thinking. Let’s think about it.
Sharon Cline: It’s a good one. Because basically what you’re saying is, I’ve proven to myself that I can solve problems, that I can use my best judgment I have. Obviously, my life isn’t complete disaster. You know, I’m able to point to instances where I had a tough decision and I reasoned it out and I made the best decision I could. There’s something kind of releasing about that, I guess, in a way, in that we all just make the best decisions we can in the moments that we’re presented them, and then you hope you’re okay to live with whatever the consequences of that. But if we are all just making the best decisions in the moment, what else can we be expected to to do? Right, right, right.
Ben Peeler: That we only get sort of, you know, we only get one moment at a time and we can use our past decisions, our past moments to help make this one. But, you know, time only moves in one direction and you’ve got to make a decision. Not making a decision is a decision. Yes. Um, and so, you know, sort of accepting that and accepting that a decision has to be made and that thinking about, okay, now that I know that I have to make a decision, let’s make it is, I think, like you said, freeing.
Sharon Cline: I mean, it’s so interesting because like you said, there’s this balance between being such a feeling person, you know, and living in the world of feelings, but then also, uh, detaching from feelings and using what you know intellectually to guide people. You have a lot of hats you wear.
Ben Peeler: I suppose. Yeah. There’s, um, you know, like, like anybody else, you know, I can get I can, um, you know, get excited, get mad, you know, whatever. I’m certainly not, you know, a robot, a robot. Yeah.
Sharon Cline: That’s good to know.
Ben Peeler: But, um, yeah, it’s all about, I think. Knowing, you know, through experience or intuition what hat you need to wear in that moment. Sometimes you know, your client just needs to just needs to yell or they just need to, you know, be angry for a little bit. And at that point, you know, nothing I learned in law school is helpful. They don’t need to know about, you know, the personal jurisdiction question or the Erie Doctrine or anything. They don’t need to know about that. They just, you know, they need to to have someone who can listen to them and say, okay, let’s fix it. And then sometimes they come to you and say, okay, you know, I’ve been sued. Here’s what’s going on. You say, all right, this is a classic case where, you know, we need to make a standing argument. Here’s the things that I need from you. It’s it’s all about, you know, having the experience and the intuition to know what hat you need to wear when.
Sharon Cline: Wow. Been your job or profession, I should say is really fascinating to me, and I’m excited to chat with you again at some point as we get further into the notion of intellectual property and AI and all of the advancements that seem to be happening even as we’re sitting here having this conversation, you know, um, that the world is moving so fast in a certain way, and to get the law to keep up with it is is challenging. But as as time goes on, I imagine we’ll be making more precedences regarding.
Ben Peeler: Absolutely. That. Absolutely. There’s that’s something that I actually write about a lot on our firm website. Um. Com has a section for blogs, and I have a one that I keep try to keep active. Um, where I discuss developments and things like, uh, the Copyright Office allowing AI art and how they handle that, or the patent office and how they handle patents that were drafted by AI or involve AI.
Sharon Cline: Good lord. Okay. I just before we go, I wanted to ask you if you’ve heard about this. There’s a program that is an AI program that if I were to type up a bunch of notes from a lecture. I can upload all of those notes, and it gets translated into podcast form, where two people are speaking and they’re explaining in a conversation style the notes that someone took off.
Ben Peeler: That’s freaky.
Sharon Cline: It is. I’m just like, where? Where do we go from here? I just can’t my brain cannot keep up. But it sounds amazing because it’s spoken. It’s not told in like a dry way. It’s almost like you’re just listening to a conversation and you can learn in a different way. Yeah, well.
Ben Peeler: It reminds me of, like, Blade Runner, where at some point you’ll have, you know, the AI summary, you have a lecture and then you have the AI make a summary of it, and then you upload that summary to the podcast AI format. Yeah. Format. And then you have another AI digested and summarized that it’s like you have the computers talking to the computers.
Sharon Cline: And making a movie out of it. Oh, Lord. It’ll be so fascinating to to observe. We’re in a very interesting time right now.
Ben Peeler: Oh, absolutely. I’m a I’m a big sci fi guy. And, um, you know, there are all these questions that get asked about, you know, our place in a world with AI and computers. And, you know, what does it mean to be alive? We I could talk for an hour.
Sharon Cline: I know right about that. Well, I want to thank you so much for coming to the studio. It was somewhat of a last minute addition into my my fearless formula world, but I’m so grateful to have had a moment to chit chat with you, because on the times that I see you, we’re usually very distracted and surrounded by lots of people. So anytime I get a moment of one on one here in the studio and get to ask some deeper questions, I really feel like I get to understand someone a little bit better. And so thank you for being so generous.
Ben Peeler: Absolutely. I had a phenomenal time. Thank you again for having me.
Sharon Cline: Of course, if anyone wanted to get in touch with you, how could they do that?
Ben Peeler: Sure. So, um, you can call our. I work at the. As I said, at the Flint, Connelly and Walker firm in downtown canton. You could give us a call at (770) 720-4411. You can shoot me an email at BPR at law firm.com. Um, or just look me up on the web. Um, I think you can find me there. I don’t I don’t do a whole lot of social media stuff. Just never been my thing. But, um. Yeah, those those are the. Or just call our office and and ask for me, and I’m helping. I’m happy to, you know, help any way I can.
Sharon Cline: Well, Ben Peeler, thank you so much for coming to the studio today. Yeah.
Ben Peeler: Thank you Sharon.
Sharon Cline: Sure. And thank you all for listening to Fearless Formula here on Business RadioX. And again, this is Sharon Cline reminding you with knowledge and understanding we can all have our own fearless formula. Have a great day.
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