About David Seth Michaels
An Accomplished Columbia County Attorney at Law
I have successfully represented clients for more than 30 years. I am an honors graduate of Amherst College (1968), and I graduated from the University of Michigan Law School (1972). I was awarded Reginald Heber Smith Community Lawyer Fellowships in 1972 and 1973 and moved to Tennessee and then to Mississippi.
In Tennessee I was a part of a team that successfully represented prison inmates in establishing due process in prison discipline and enjoining mail censorship. In Mississippi I directed an effort that caused thousands of Mississippi State Hospital inmates to be released, enjoined electroshock, and required the state to provide humane conditions. I was part of a team that represented the NAACP in the Claiborne County boycott. Later, I was counsel to the Southern Prison Defense Committee and successfully represented Tennessee inmates shot by police in a prison riot.
Recipient of the Thurgood Marshall Award by the Association of the Bar of the City of New York.
After 7 years in the South, I moved to New York where I worked initially with Brooklyn Legal Services Corp B and then with the Federal Defender Services Appeals Unit. My argument on appeal in United States v. Valencia led to the first appellate recognition of a derivative entrapment defense. And my pro bono representation of James Moffett in the Mississippi Supreme Court led to vacatur of a death penalty conviction, and my being awarded a Thurgood Marshall Award by the Association of the Bar of the City of New York.
I entered the private practice of law in New York City, and after ten years, moved upstate, to Spencertown, Columbia County, where I have practiced since 1976.
When I am not working as a lawyer, I am a writer. My first novel, The Dream Antilles, was published in 2005, and my second novel, Tulum, is now available in soft cover and eBook formats. I also write a blog, The Dream Antilles, and am a frequent contributor to Daily Kos and Docudharma.