A founding member of legendary punk group The Offspring is undoubtedly in the good books with the courts right now after saving the life of a juror at his own trial.
As Punknews reports, Dr. James Lilja, who works as an obstetrician-gynaecologist, is currently in trial in California for medical malpractice.
However, on the first day of his trial, one of the jurors assigned to his case went into cardiac arrest. With instinct kicking in, Lilja reportedly began performing CPR on the juror before also using an external defibrillator to keep them alive until paramedics arrived.
Despite his good deed, it seems as though this won’t have any bearing on the outcome, as the presiding judge declared a mistrial, stating that this would likely cause the current jurors to become biased towards him. “No good deed goes unpunished,” Lilja was quoted as saying following the announcement.
James Lilja performed with The Offspring as their drummer from 1984 until 1987, when he left the group to attend medical school (frontman Dexter Holland would also receive higher education, becoming a doctor in molecular biology last year). Apparently, it was Lilja himself who put forward the idea of renaming the group ‘The Offspring’, as he thought their previous name, Manic Subsidal, has run its course.
Sadly, very little of James Lilja’s recorded work with The Offspring remains, with the drummer having only appeared on demos of the group’s early tunes and the original version of their first single, ‘I’ll Be Waiting’. Additionally, he is also credited with co-writing the song ‘Beheaded’, from the band’s eponymous debut album.
Lilja’s new trial is scheduled to start on April 4th.
Check out Jame Lilja’s writing skills on The Offspring’s ‘Beheaded’:
