More King of the Courtroom

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Having played chess since the age of six, Gerash's devotion to chess has even played a part in one of his most notorious cases: People v. James King trial, featured on Court TV, in which a Denver ex-police officer was accused of quadruple homocide during a bank robbery. The acquittal Gerash won in this case was not only controversial, but personal. The accused, James King, was a chess opponent of his. In fact, part of King's alibi included his walking to the Denver Chess Club on the day the murders occurred.

The King trial, a testament to Gerash's keen ability to combat false media statements and assumptions, was one of the most stressful jury trials he has fought. "Waiting for a verdict, you sometimes lose weight. In the King trial, I waited for nine days for a verdict; it was pretty bad. But I stay in good shape."

Commenting on his firm belief in the ancient Roman wisdom of the interconnection of a sound mind and a sound body, Gerash, now 71, attributes his legal and chess prowess not only to his vast experience, but also to his ardent devotion to exercise. With an ambition to swim in every ocean in the world, he stays fit with regular swimming, running, bicycling, use of rollerblade(TM) skates, a NordicTrack(TM) exerciser, and by entering and winning triathlons.

These activities, he says, keep him prepared for either the life or death struggles of capital murder cases or the deadly battles he fights over the chessboard.

Although likening the adversarial challenge of trial law with the quest for checkmate, Gerash also points out the inherent differences, "There are more variations and surprises in a trial in that you have real live witnesses. Sometimes they don't come off. Or, you may do the greatest job in the world, and if you don't pick a sympathetic jury... the jury is the one that judges the outcome of the game; not the two contestants in the chess tournament which is based upon their prowess, intellectual power, and knowlege of chess. So there the analogy ends."

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