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So my resume is very transactional/corporate heavy -consultant before law school, all bullets on the resume talk about drafting contracts/doing finance stuff. I really want to be a litigator and the few firms I did interview with for 1L always asked me "wait, we pegged you as a transactional guy". So I took a job at a local county prosecutor (admittedly, not by first choice, but still looking forward to it) to at least get some courtroom/procedural experience that I can at least spin for my litigation interest. My question is, will the fact that this is criminal prosecution at the small-county level hurt me at all come OCI? I also will be splitting the summer as an RA to try and make some money. FWIW, I'm at a T14 grades a little north of Top 25%.

Firms don't really care about your 1L summer. Just make sure you keep your grades.

If you do something nonlegal then it can hurt. If you do a small handful of positions then attorneys might like it (e.g. in house at their clients). But outside those things, firms are pretty indifferent to what you do as a 1L.

Any real legal experience as a 1L will help you

I worked in a very minor DA's office 1L summer. Did fine at OCI. Don't worry.

No.

Nope, sure won't hurt. You might even get a good courtroom story or two to tell at OCI -- I found that those were well received by interviewers, probably broke up the monotony of non-stop small-talking.

From my OCI experience, the only way it could hurt you is if you also have a PI focused resume, in which case a firm might be wary that you actually want to do corporate work. Since you say you don't, just enjoy the experience! Criminal stuff is very interesting, so try not to get used to it if you wanna do corporate.