C. J. Ford P. I. Philosophy:
An inmate client should handle their case and their wrongful conviction as a business entity would handle a business matter.

BUSINESS OBJECTIVES
An inmate must consider his goal for freedom as a business endeavor. The inmate should be the owner of his fate. This is because the inmate has the foresight of where they want this struggle to go, or what needs to be achieved. The inmate also has the most to risk, in most cases their life. No one has as much at stake.

EMPLOYEES
The inmates business should develop outside contacts,
organizations, and others who carry on activities and goals of the business.

MANAGEMENT
The inmate must get a manager to organize the employees of the business. These people or individuals must work on a regular bases to achieve the objectives of the business.
Business affairs should be handled by the management under the direction of the inmate or his designated individual. A designated individual is usually a Campaign Manager or other designated family member or someone personally attached to the inmate. The inmate must be aware of all of the possibilities.

The difference in this structure then that of the client/attorney relationship is that the attorney controls the fate of the client and wants to be the boss. The inmates organization formed by the inmate is made up by people that are concerned with the inmates fate, and the inmate is the boss and in control.

MARKETING AND ADVERTISING
As in all business, an inmate should be marketed. The fact that the inmate has been wrongfully accused should always be a marketable factor. Networking, speaking opportunities, fundraising, press related events, campaigns, conventions, or other events that can promote the inmates cause should be planned and produced. Web site advertising the inmates struggle should be produced and maintained.

Attorneys will always try to discourage a wrongfully accused person to not promote themselves. This is only because this self promotion will probably discredit them by calling attention to the work that they did on the case. However, the main purpose of the inmates promotion is to call attention to their case and their innocence, not to purposely seek revenge on the individuals that they feel are responsible for putting them in the situation that they are in. When the truth is bought forward these issues will be resolved and take care of themselves.

The most important reason for an inmate to market their
innocence is because no one will get interested in something that they do not know anything about. Inmates get public support when they can convince the public factual proof that they were wrongfully convicted. Promotion of the inmates case gets the attention of innocent projects, high profile attorneys, and attorneys that do pro bono work in the interest of justice. This is why activist spreading the word is essential to the inmates case. There are possibilities of attracting high profile people in entertainment, politics, and other areas getting involved with the case.

INVESTIGATION AND RESEARCH
Investigative efforts to seek out information regarding the case that was not developed and finding and developing new information must go on continuously. Early mistakes by attorneys and going through early discovery is essential. Many times there was discovery that existed or should have been developed that was pivotal to the case. Every effort to solve the case should be made. These investigative efforts should always be ongoing. Materials such as transcripts, police reports, and other documents relating to the case should be obtained and studied. This process is always the longest time consuming process regarding the case. This could take years depending on who has the information and the extent that you have to go through to get it, but this process is extremely necessary. It is not uncommon for the inmate’s former attorney’s to withhold this information or not be too cooperative in giving you this documentation for obvious reasons. However, the law generally favors the client as far as documents involving their case.

The whole entire case should be revisited. New interviews
should be taken. If relevant information that was not heard in open court for the jury to consider when they made their verdict, each jurors should be re-interviewed to see if that relevant issue, if known, would have influenced their decision. Witnesses that testified should be re-interviewed. Potential witnesses that were never called should be interviewed. Witnesses who should have testified that were never part of the witness list, should be developed and interviewed.

When all of the investigative work is completed, then it is time to find a way to get it back into court, or make it publicly known so that it will be forced back into court. Sometimes even after the discovery of an inmates innocence, it takes the judicial system years to release the innocent person. This is due to the prosecutors ego, and the slowness of the system. The prosecutor will try to fight this even when they know that the person was wrongfully convicted.

WHAT WE DO AT C. J. FORD PI
At C. J. Ford Private Investigations we feel that an inmate needs to work on their struggle to freedom as if they were running a business. We organize a business plan. We work with the family to organize a campaign and a campaign manager. We fully investigate the case. The ultimate objective is to solve the case. If this is not possible, our goal is to get the inmate exonerated of the crime. If that isn’t possible our goal is to get enough evidence to support a new trial.

There are many areas of concern in an inmates case that has to be addressed. Just having an investigator do piece work on the case is not enough. A case should be fully investigated. We get involved in the case and believe that we are in this thing until we get the results no matter how long it takes. We can not always guarantee that the inmates struggle will be successful, however, we can guarantee that we will be consistently working on the case, planning and going to events, speaking, marketing, and investigating.

Family support is important. There are families that just write off relatives in custody. Most of the time families can not afford investigative services. We know that the price of our service may be more than a family can afford, so we try to get a retainer fee and make payment arrangements to cover the balance. Our main concern is that we have to believe in our client and the family or indemnitor(s) have to believe in the innocence of the defendant.

I personally do not like devoting my time, even when paid, to working for a guilty person who is just trying to beat the system. This is why I carefully screen each client before I devote my time and efforts. My reputation as a criminal specialist, a community activist, and taking on just causes are important to me. The time that it takes to put into these types of cases are long and hard and are not too financially rewarding. I have a personal agenda against a justice system that wrongful incarcerates and imprisons anyone. I think that this is a traverse of what the justice system was set up to do and that the system should be exposed and pay for this act, which I consider criminal in itself.

So in summary, I take each case that I do personally. I do not accept more cases than I can handle. I respect my client. I understand that I am working for my client(s) and not visa versa. I like to win, be right in backing my clients position, and I love to be instrumental in righting a wrong and giving someone back their life.