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Yesterday, a Nassau County Supreme Court judge ruled that the Nassau County Police Department had improperly withheld records about its relationship with Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, and agreed to release them at 10:30 this morning. About 45 minutes before the documents were due to become available, Nassau County attorneys appealed the decision and obtained a stay of the order. More »
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You know what the state of Arizona needs? More xenophobia. Also, less knowledge of Mexican-American history and more fear and distrust between white people and immigrants. So thank god that a judge has upheld an earlier ruling by Arizona's school superintendent that a Mexican-American studies program in Tucson is a violation of the law, in part because it promotes "resentment toward a race or class of people." White people in Arizona, specifically! More »
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In France, people are all very sensitive about things, and prefer to approach sensitive issues (all) by arguing sophisticated points of serious political philosophy, while making dismissive hand gestures and holding cigarettes. This is why the French are such a bunch of pussies who aren't even tough enough to be involved in several doomed wars of choice in the Muslim world. Le wimps! Amirite? More »
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Congratulations, America: you've gotten what you wished for. You elected Barack "Hussein" Obama as commander in chief. He quickly allowed homosexuals to serve as proud members of the US Armed Forces, standing buttock-to-buttock in foxholes next to normal young American boys. (After the war is over, they can marry, now.) It was only a matter of time before our fighting men were encouraged to start fucking dogs. More »
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A bankruptcy attorney recently filed a 75-page brief with the Connecticut statewide grievance committee arguing that laws limiting relationships between lawyers and their clients are "unconstitutional." Not only that, lawyers tend to work harder for clients whom they date. Makes sense! More »
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Medical marijuana is a very controversial issue for cities across America, pitting individual freedoms against municipal concerns with a backdrop of blah blah, [boilerplate "on the one hand, on the other hand" here]. The real question is: how can medical marijuana win, forever? A foolproof legal strategy is now emerging. More »
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The Supreme Court heard arguments today in a case about whether the police have the right to track your every movement electronically without a search warrant. Things got awkward when an attorney for the government conceded that, under the government's view, even Supreme Court justices could be tracked. More »
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Justice gets at least one positive bit of justice news this week: the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 went into effect yesterday, bringing the huge disparities in sentencing for powder cocaine vs. crack cocaine somewhat closer to sane levels. According to the NYT, there was previously a 100 to one disparity between the amounts of powder and the amount of crack that would draw equal sentences; now, it's 18 to one. Yeah, that's... somewhat less terrible. U.S. lawmakers truly are beacons of fairness. More »
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Jerry Brown struck a mighty blow to the Occupy Foreskin movement on Sunday, as the California governor signed a bill preventing local governments from banning circumcision in males. Back in July, a judge had ruled a ballot proposal outlawing circumcision in San Francisco, backed by 7,700 supporters, to be unconstitutional. Now, thanks to bill AB768 — or what will eventually come to be known as "Jerry's Bill" — no male child in California will ever be denied his God-mandated right to circumcision again. Let the protests commence! Bay Area Urban Docking League, you have the floor. [AP] More »
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Barack Obama wants to expand the umbrella of "protected classes" against which it is illegal to discriminate in hiring to include the unemployed, so if like almost everybody else you don't have a job, you can just apply for the next job you see and sue them if you don't get it. Problem. Solved. More »
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The Georgia Supreme Court has removed Catoosa County magistrate Anthony Peters from his position and banned him from ever returning to the bench in Georgia. His "crime?" After his father died and he had an auto accident in 2005, he started taking large quantities of pain medication and acting erratically. That could happen to anyone, you monsters. More »
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With statewide unemployment at 8.8% and a withering manufacturing base, the good men and women charged with conducting the People's Business in the Ohio Statehouse are doing what any right-thinking statesman would: Considering the installation of a bar in the state capitol, for drinking. More »
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Marvell Scott used to be the sportscaster guy on WABC-TV in New York City. Now he's a doctor. A doctor who just got sentenced to zero jail time for being "inappropriate" with a 14 year-old prostitute. Huh? More »
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In your simmering Thursday media column: Rick Sanchez pipes up again, CNBC's bizarre PR scandal, James Risen's judicial defender speaks, News Corp is flooded with lawsuits, and the WaPo's punchy editor is retired. More »
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Guns! Guns! We need more guns! We need more people carrying guns! We need more people carrying guns outside, in public, everywhere, constantly armed! What America needs are more armed citizens in public, ready to shoot! More »
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And it's official: as expected, a judge in California has ruled that a ballot proposal to ban circumcision in San Francisco "violates the U.S. Constitution's guarantee of religious freedom," as well as California law. It's off the ballot. More »
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You may want to block your aunt on Facebook for the next couple days: Casey Anthony was released from jail just after midnight, 12 days after being acquitted of charges that she murdered her daughter Caylee. [CNN] More »
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To move into his brand-new home, all Kenneth Robinson had to do was fill out a form, write down that the home had been foreclosed upon and abandoned, take the form to his local courthouse, and hand over $16 to the nice clerk lady. So easy! More »
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Tonight on HLN (aka the Casey Anthony Network), grief pornographer Nancy Grace opened her two-hour broadcast with a predictably angry statement about a Florida jury's decision to acquit Casey Anthony of murdering her two-year-old daughter, Caylee. More »
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Our old friends at the Westboro Baptist Church—you know, the "God Hates Fags" guys—briefly expanded their gross little empire! To the FBI, of all things, where church big-shot Tim Phelps was invited to address agents several times "as part of the bureau's counterterrorism training program." Hmm. More »
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A federal appeals court judge who was nominated by George W. Bush and clerked under Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia made an embarrassing error today when he ruled that Barack Obama's health care reform law was constitutional. More »
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Earlier this month, employees at a New York Target store voted against unionizing after a long, protracted battle between union organizers and corporate operatives. Now, the union's filed an official challenge, alleging that Target broke the law. More »
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The Supreme Court has just ruled that what would have been the largest sex discrimination suit in history—more than a million women suing Wal-Mart—cannot proceed as a class action suit. The women are all free to sue the company separately, but the mega-humongo class action suit would have been a serious financial threat to the company, while various isolated lawsuits will not be. More »
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Though we are loath to continue pointing out the myriad ways in which the practice of law has become a degrading wallow in the depths of human desperation, we will simply note—for those of you keeping score in your law-school-graduation-present moleskines—that, thanks to a handy new website that allows you to order up a lawyer at any time of day or night, the legal profession has, at long last, become just as respectable as the fast food profession: More »
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Horrible news for all of you criminals who already have Two Strikes and would really, really prefer not to get a third: the Supreme Court ruled yesterday that fleeing the police in a car is, by definition, a "violent felony." More »
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Chin up, poor lawyers! The humble American attorney has had a hard go of it lately—it officially sucks to be a law student, a young lawyer, or, really, any lawyer, except for the super rich ones. More »
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A federal judge in Seattle ruled that organizers of the Gay Softball World Series can continue to enforce their rule of allowing a maximum of only two "non-gay" players per team. The decision came in a lawsuit filed by three San Francisco men from a team called D2, whose second-place finish in 2008 was nullified because they are bisexual, not gay, and therefore broke the gay softball covenant to keep vagina-lovers out of the outfield. (Unless it's lesbian softball, in which case, good luck with that.) More »
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Attorney general Eric Holder has come out in favor of reduced sentences for thousands of people currently imprisoned on nonviolent crack cocaine convictions. (A recent law corrected the insane sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine; Holder is simply recommending that the new sentencing guidelines be applied to some people already in jail.) That's a great first step. Then can we let out all the other drug war victims, too? More »
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Inspired by recent litigation involving the copyrightability of Mike Tyson's Maori-inspired facial tattoo, some of America's law professors have contemplated a different-but-similar issue: whether American copyright law protects nose doctors' surgical masterpieces. The answer? Probably not, but it's not completely impossible. More »
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The villainous Recording Industry Association of America, which loves to sue children for millions of dollars for downloading songs that deprived wealthy entertainers of a penny: what is their latest outrage? Pissing on the U.S. Constitution, naturally. More »
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Kevin Glasheen is a lawyer in Texas. He is also a lobbyist. He successfully lobbied the state to pass a bill raising the amount of money that it pays to inmates who are exonerated and freed after being wrongfully convicted and imprisoned. For completing this fine deed, Glasheen expects to be paid handsomely—by the freed inmates themselves. More »
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President Obama had "two teams of specialists" at the ready after the Osama Bin Laden mission: "One to bury Bin Laden if he was killed, and a second composed of lawyers, interrogators and translators in case he was captured alive." (Or so "senior officials" tell The New York Times.) If he had been captured alive, he'd have been taken, in order "to preclude battles over jurisdiction," to a Navy ship — the U.S.S. Carl Vinson, most likely — where he would have been interrogated. (Even so, "the mission," officials say, "was always weighted toward killing.") The question remains: Did the interrogators have six-packs? Was there a dog with the lawyers? Did it have titanium teeth? Because otherwise, seriously, bo-ring. [NYT; image via AP] More »
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In Louisiana, a black man who was convicted for murder is seeking to overturn his conviction on several grounds, the most interesting of which is this: he contends that the fact that the Confederate flag flies in front of the courthouse where he was convicted is evidence of discrimination. More »
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Mexican You-Don't-Even-Want-to-Know-How-Many-Billionaire Carlos Slim is the richest man in the world (and subprime lender of choice for the New York Times!). He's also a monopolistic bastard, unsurprisingly. More »
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If you're a lawyer for one of the 170 or so remaining detainees at Guantanamo Bay, you're probably happy that Wikileaks has finally dropped the classified case files for each defendant showing just how spurious, thin, and ludicrous much of the evidence against them is. That sort of information could come in handy for a trial or tribunal. Too bad it's classified, and therefore, according to the Justice Department, can't be used in court unless we say so nanny-nanny-boo-boo. More »
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Associate Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan was a no-show for one-third of the cases seen by the Court in her first term. She had an excuse—something about recusing herself from cases she worked on as solicitor general in the White House—but come on! Roll out of bed once in a while, lady. More »
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John Thompson (pictured) was convicted of a 1984 armed robbery, and later of murder. He spent 18 years in prison, including 14 years on death row. Problem: the prosecutors who sent him to jail withheld some evidence—including eyewitness reports describing a perpetrator who looked nothing like Thompson, and a blood test that proved Thompson's innocence. More »
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Miami! A town where you can stroll through South Beach in fashionable clothing, or—if you happen to be a black male—you can be shot by the police. Either/ or. More »
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Wal-Mart is currently the subject of one of the biggest workplace discrimination lawsuits in history. Female employees say the company systematically discriminated against them in hiring and business practices. But is a million-person class action suit fair? More »
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The Supreme Court yesterday declined to review a federal appeals court ruling against the University of Wisconsin, which said that the school is required to fund religious groups and activities with its student activities budget. You know what that means! More »
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