The midnight pole
Shannon “Redd” Roy
Trial Lawyer · Former Judge · Speaker · Co-Founder
Fifteen years as a criminal trial lawyer taught Shannon what actually changes the direction of a life, and what never does.
Her story
Shannon “Redd” Roy has spent fifteen years in criminal defense, standing next to people on the worst day of their lives. The courtroom taught her something no classroom could: the story a person tells about themselves is the most powerful piece of evidence in the room.
She has also sat on the bench, which means she has watched the same arguments land and fail from the other side of the courtroom. She is a mother, a founding partner of her own firm, and a global explorer who has carried that courtroom insight across continents. On stage she does what she has always done for a jury. She takes a story everyone thinks they understand and shows them what it actually says.
For more than a decade she has personally mentored young professionals and people affected by the criminal justice system. Talent written off because of one chapter: that pattern is the reason Polar Opposite Life exists.
Work with Shannon
Two stages and a case file
It’s Never Too Late to Recreate
Reinvention is not a personality trait. It is a sequence, and Hugo and Shannon have both run it in public, from opposite starting points.
The full talk →Becoming a Lawyer: The Path to Justice
Shannon’s candid map of the legal profession: what it takes, what it offers, and how to determine if it’s for you.
The full talk →Not a talkConsulting with lawyers on difficult cases
Case theory, jury narrative, and witness preparation for defense counsel, from someone who has argued these cases and judged them.
How it works →For defense counsel
Consulting with lawyers on difficult cases
The hardest cases are rarely the ones with bad evidence. They are the ones where the jury has already decided who your client is before openings.
Shannon has spent her entire career in criminal defense and founded Roy Law Firm to do that work and nothing else. She has tried cases from theft and assault through sexual assault and first degree murder.
She has also served as a judge, so she has watched the same arguments land and fail from the other side of the courtroom. That is the view most defense lawyers never get.
She consults with defense counsel on the files that will not resolve: the facts are ugly, the client is unsympathetic, or one chapter of a life is doing all the talking. It is the same problem she works on stage, with a jury instead of an audience.
What a consultation covers
- Case theory. Which story the evidence actually supports, and the one a jury will build on its own if you leave the gap open.
- A client’s record as narrative, and how to put it in front of the jury before the prosecution frames it for you.
- Preparing a client or witness for testimony that is going to be attacked.
- Voir dire themes, and the questions that surface the juror you cannot seat.
Send your jurisdiction, the posture, and your trial date. Please keep privileged detail out of a first email.
Bring them to your stage
One conversation. Zero pressure.
Tell us about your event and audience. We reply within two business days with a straight answer on fit, dates, and format.
Every engagement is quoted to the event.