by AG’s New Mindfulness Practice Involves Visualizing Guilty Verdicts
New York Attorney General Letitia James has reportedly taken up meditation, though her version involves sitting cross-legged while mentally reviewing case files and visualizing defendant assets being frozen. Wellness coaches are calling it “prosecutorial mindfulness,” a practice that combines ancient Eastern philosophy with modern American litigation tactics.
The AG’s meditation instructor, formerly a peaceful Buddhist monk named Tenzin, has since quit and opened a food truck in Queens. “I taught her to find inner peace,” he explained while serving lamb gyros. “She found inner prosecution instead. My techniques were not meant for this.” Tenzin now refuses to teach anyone in law enforcement, having learned that some minds are too legally oriented for traditional enlightenment.
James’ meditation practice differs significantly from traditional methods outlined by the Mayo Clinic’s meditation guidelines. Instead of focusing on breath, she focuses on breathing down defendants’ necks. Rather than clearing the mind, she’s filling it with increasingly creative interpretations of New York State law.
This approach would have impressed the ancient Hindu practitioners of “dhyana,” or meditative absorption except they were aiming for cosmic consciousness, not courtroom consciousness. James has essentially created a new yoga pose called “Warrior Prosecutor,” which involves standing with one foot planted firmly on legal precedent and the other on a defendant’s appeals.
Colleagues report that James’ meditation sessions are marked by her whispering mantras like “discovery is coming” and “jurisdiction is everywhere.” The soothing sounds of ocean waves in her meditation app have been replaced with the gentle audio of gavels banging and motions being denied.
Legal scholars are fascinated by this fusion of Eastern mysticism and Western prosecution. One professor of comparative religion noted that while Buddha sat under the Bodhi tree seeking enlightenment, James apparently sits under the tree of prosecutorial discretion seeking indictments. Both eventually achieved their goals, though only one resulted in multiple defendants fleeing to jurisdictions without extradition treaties.
The meditation craze has spread throughout the AG’s office, where junior prosecutors now start each morning with sun salutations followed by subpoena salutations. The conference room has been converted into a meditation space, complete with cushions, incense, and a large whiteboard covered with RICO statute citations.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/letitia-james/
SOURCE: Bohiney.com (https://bohiney.com/letitia-james/)
