The Lawyer Who Helped Jim Morrison Ride Out a Legal Storm
- by DAVE ITZKOFF
More than 40 years after Jim Morrison was convicted of indecent exposure and profanity for his behavior at a Florida rock concert the Doors’ front man is once again drawing headlines for that event, at Miami’s Dinner Key Auditorium on March 1, 1969, following remarks by Florida’s outgoing governor, Charlie Crist, that he was “willing to look into” a pardon for Morrison before his term expires in January.
As the saying goes, if you can remember the 1960s you probably weren’t there. But one person who contradicts that adage is Robert C. Josefsberg, a commercial and criminal litigation lawyer and partner at the firm of Podhurst Orseck, P.A. in Miami, who was one of the lawyers who defended Morrison at his 1970 trial and helped get him acquitted of the more serious charges of drunkenness and lewd and lascivious behavior.
Mr. Josefsberg, 72, spoke recently to ArtsBeat about his memories of Morrison, who died in 1971, and the possibility of his receiving a posthumous pardon. These are excerpts from that conversation.
