Kahn represented convicted spy Andrew Daulton Lee in the case featured in the 1985 movie “The Falcon and the Snowman.” He also represented Ike Turner and Larry Flint. He would later sue and receive what he described as a “substantial settlement” from the movie due to his depiction as urging his client to inform on drug suppliers in exchange for reduced charges and then later helping Lee escape to Mexico.
He was famous for carrying a business card that read: “Kenny Kahn. World’s Funniest Attorney
Kahn’s moonlighting as a comedian was in some ways a return to the family business. He grew up on Ocean Park Pier (the Santa Monica amusement area) where his father worked as a carnival hustler. One of the jobs of his dad was to rig pinball machines and other games. Both his parent were heroin addicts. He was abandoned by his father after his mother went to jail for sex with a minor.
Kahn gave back to his community, as shown in this new clip.
In high school, he was hit with non-paralytic polio and had to use crutches.
That is quite a life’s struggle and he overcame all the odds when he graduated from UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law in 1965. Yet, his life struggle did not end there. In 1987, a defendant in a case involving an assault on a police officer stabbed Kahn in the chest in Torrance.
As a standup, he even used the attack as comedic material: “The guy was trying to stab me in the heart. But in a lawyer, it’s hard to find.”
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