Be Kind To Lawyers Day

Today is International Be Kind To Lawyers Day...and you really should be.

You never know how hairy their day is...as evidenced by "The Amazing Trial Of John (Gorilla) Doe!" by John Broome, Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella. 

Strange Adventures #100 (January, 1959), under a cover by Gil Kane and Joe Giella, features a story of a gorilla who steals school books, records and radium....then shows up to turn himself in to the law, requesting a trial.  At the trial, the gorilla tells how he was taken by the gorilla like beings from Agmoran, who advanced his intelligence, and taught him to speak their language...and he also learned they planned to invade Earth in two years.  Learning how to pilot their spaceship, he came back to Earth, but needed to learn English to tell humans of the alien plot, and the radium to build a weapon to defeat them.  

The humans were successful, yet the gorilla paid the price, shortening his own life to do the exposure to radium, just wanting to go back to Africa and live life in peace.

This story was reprinted in Strange Adventures #239 (November-December, 1972), this time, with a cover by Nick Cardy showing how great the American legal system is, where everyone accused is allowed a lawyer, and a swift and speedy resolution to their legal woes.