Heilberg really did a shit job for Chris when you think about it
If Chris defended HIMSELF in the beginning when it was just a misdemeanor, the worst that could've happened would be him saying on the stand "I fucked Barbi-chu to heal her because I'm Sonichu Jesus!" and getting a year in jail.
Instead, Heilberg kept wasting the court's and Chris's time until the prosecution upped the charges to a felony, and even though he got out with a clean record, he still spent two years in custody.
Chris literally did twice as much time with Heilberg's council as he would have if he had represented himself
This is my opinion. Heilberg, for all his "Matlocking", has only been defending drunks, drug addicts and other types of low rent folks. Long are the days when he actually defended folks with hefty charges, like the DC Sniper's tax case. Aged lawyers like him tend to take on "hard luck cases" mostly to boost their image of being sleazy lawyers, and one look at Chris, and Heilberg thought he a had slam dunk case.
Chris is trans, and by a cursory look, crazy. Heilberg believe Chris was crazy and sent him on to all kinds of forensic psychological exams to prove this. Chris getting booted to Western for being incompetent to stand trial was Heilberg thinking Chris's apathy was actually insanity. After all, who in the right mind would be so blase about the charge Chris was facing, instead ranting about how he's a god. Nope, Western booted him out in a month, which about the time for intake, exam and get the fuck out of here, you're not nuts. Western finding him a tard house was difficult because those professionals knew Chris was just apathetic about the whole thing and not at all insane or incompetent. Chris knew he had the tard card from all the other arrests and diversions so why would then be any different for him?
Chris even said Heilberg rarely talked to him, probably because every time he did, Chris would yammer on about Jesus and how he's holy and this and that, refusing to even give two shits about what was going on.
And what happened after all these exams? A grand jury was convened to bump his misdemeanor into a felony. That's what Heilberg's "expert lawyering" got Chris. Heilberg had to finally just throw down the autism deferral and leave it at that, because that's all the experts found with Chris. That shit could have been done when Chris was just looking at a misdemeanor. And like you said, if he had just plead guilty to the misdemeanor, Chris would have been out with time served and maybe even still easily put into a group home.
Lets take another approach, Chris obviously talked himself into all this. He could have said he was just bullshitting on the call, or that he had no idea what was going on, and here's Barb, whom he was taking care of. Obviously Chris's big mouth contributed a
lot to what he went through.
