Tajudeen Oladiran is an Arizona attorney who is currently of counsel at Aguilera International Counsel. A Biglaw refugee, he spent a year at Greenberg Traurig, as well as a year working for the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.

Given those credentials, we were surprised that he would file one of the craziest motions we’ve come across here at Above The Law.

From the U.S. District Court of Arizona:

It is a motion in a case that Tajudeen Oladiran and his wife filed against Suntrust Bank for racketeering. We gather from the motion that Oladiran was not pleased with the ruling by “the Dishonorable Susan R. Bolton” (as she’s identified in the caption). Oladiran wrote: “I just read your Order and I am very disappointed in the fact that a brainless coward like you is a federal judge.”

A lesson on how not to address the court, after the jump.

Could the nomination of Judge Denny Chin (S.D.N.Y.) to the Second Circuit be derailed by his ruling in Chiscolm v. Bank of America?

Click on the link below to read about this lawsuit filed by an irate customer (or purported customer) of the banking giant.

Area Man Has One Month To Prove Why Bank Of America Owes Him 1,784 Billion, Trillion Dollars [Dealbreaker]

Who hasn’t “killed off a grandparent” in order to obtain an extension on a paper? I had a friend who went through six grandmothers in four years of college.

But one University of Connecticut law student is not joking around. As we understand it, an editor of the Connecticut Law Review received an email this morning from a rising 2L who is trying to write on to law review. The submission is due tomorrow, but the 2L is seeking an extension because of troubles back on the home front. The 2L pointed the law review editor to this article in the Hartford Courant, which allegedly concerns the 2L’s parents (one of them a local lawyer):

Police continue to negotiate with an armed man who they believe is holding his estranged wife hostage and who claimed that his house is wired with explosives.

We hope the 2L received that extension — and that everything turns out okay.

For students who do not have crazy situations like parental terrorism taking place at home, I imagine your requests for extensions are weak.

Update (9:15 PM): According to the Hartford Courant, the hostage has been safely released.

Update (11 PM): Not surprisingly, the 2L received the requested extension. All’s well that ends well.

Hostage Drama Unfolding In South Windsor [Hartford Courant]
Hostage Situation May Involve Hartford Lawyer [Connecticut Law Tribune]

There is little chance that the American experiment would have survived a serious outbreak of the bubonic plague. The Athenians fought a war while stricken with the plague. Granted, it didn’t go so well, but that’s not the point. But a couple of kids get a new strain of spring flu (which is at least as accurate of a name for it as “swine flu”) and people start losing it.

Of course, law students are nothing if not susceptible to mass hysteria. Take this message that students at Loyola - Los Angeles received:

Dear Students,

Please be advised that students will be permitted to wear breathing masks during an examination. If a student chooses to do so, he/she will be permitted to bring and use the mask at his/her seat in the examination room. This policy will remain in effect through the end of the 2009 Spring examination period. Thank you.

Office of the Registrar Loyola Law School

On the one hand, are people really wasting precious exam cramming time worrying about swine flu? Really?

Back in 2007, Judge Ernest B. Murphy won his libel case case against the Boston Herald. The Herald had reported that Murphy was soft on crime and, well, nobody puts Baby in the corner.

But winning just wasn’t enough for Judge Murphy. After he won he sent two threatening letters to Patrick Purcell, publisher of the Herald, on court stationery. The letters, which included the use of all-caps as pioneered by Chief Justice John Marshall, demanded that the Herald drop its appeal and hand deliver a check for half a million dollars more than the judgment, plus interest.

According to the Boston Globe, “Purcell testified that the letters were intimidating and looked like ransom notes.”

Yesterday, Murphy agreed to resign. Murphy claimed to have post-traumatic stress from his battle with the Herald. The Commission on Judicial Conduct had recommended a $25,000 fine, but they may amend their report in light of Murphy’s resignation.

We’d make a joke about how a judge could incur psychologically destructive stress from participating in a lawsuit, but we’re terrified that Murphy will sue us under the ADA.

Judge who sued Herald agrees to leave bench [Boston Globe via WSJ Law Blog]

Earlier: Murphy v. Boston Herald: Some Beantown Benchslappery

Quite possibly. From the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

Embattled District Judge Elizabeth Halverson will be required to undergo a mental health evaluation if she wants to bring up personal medical conditions during an August hearing before the Nevada Judicial Discipline Commission.

Claiming it doesn’t want a “trial by ambush,” the commission on Wednesday ordered Halverson to submit to an examination by a Reno-based psychiatrist by July 18 if she intends to argue that her mental or physical conditions contributed to her behavior on the bench, according to the commission order.

Judge Halverson has a few physical ailments too:

In a 2007 meeting with editors and reporters at the Review-Journal, Halverson enumerated several personal health issues. She has difficulty walking and uses a steady supply of oxygen. She’s overweight, has been a diabetic for more than 10 years and has experienced severe hypoglycemic attacks.

Halverson said she also suffers from Crohn’s disease and the after-effects of cancer. She said she’s also been troubled by congestive heart failure and survived a bacterial infection that eroded the bones in her feet. A knee injury restricts her ability to walk, and a shoulder injury limits her arm motions.

Right now you’re kicking yourself for not going to medical school — ‘cause you KNOW you want to be all up in her judicial business. Time to play doctor, Your Honor.

In case you’re not familiar with it, symptoms of Crohn’s disease include “abdominal pain, diarrhea (which may be bloody), constipation, vomiting, weight loss or weight gain.” Judge Halverson doesn’t seem to exhibit the “weight loss” symptom, but others may be present.

Halverson told to have mental exam if she intends to blame health problems for behavior [Las Vegas Review-Journal]

Parents of an Ohio eighth grader are suing their son’s teacher, principal, and school superintendent, as well as the Mt. Vernon City School District. Apparently the teacher is among the one in eight biology teachers who don’t believe in evolution, and he espouses his religious beliefs in class. And oh yeah, he burned a cross into their son’s arm!

From the Courthouse News Service:

The John Does claim Freshwater has unconstitutionally taught his religious beliefs in his science classes for more than a decade. They claim that in 2003 Freshwater sought, and was denied permission, to teach “intelligent design,” but does it anyway. They claim his classroom is festooned with Biblical posters, that he tells his students that “although he is forced to teach from the textbooks, the teachings are wrong or not proven according to the Bible.”

The complaint [PDF] states: “On Dec. 6, 2007, Mr. Freshwater burned a cross into James Doe’s arm using an electric device manufactured by Electro-Technic Products, Inc., Model BD-10A. The manufacturer of Model BD-10A warns that the electric device has a high voltage output that should never be used to touch human skin. … Mr. Freshwater applied the electric device to the arm of at least one other eighth grade student on Dec. 6, 2007. The area burned with Model BD-10A resulted in an easily identifiable cross consisting of red welts with blistering, swelling and blanching in the surrounding area…

The complaint also states that Freshwater, as adviser of the school’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes, claimed to drive Satan out of a speaker at a club meeting, told club members that “they are saved, whereas the other students playing on the playground are going to Hell,” distributed Bibles at school, gave “extra credit” to students who did work on “intelligent design,” and that school administrators knew all this but failed to discipline him for it.

Last time we checked, exorcising demons from your students wasn’t part of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Eighth Grader Says Teacher Burned A Cross Into His Flesh [Courthouse News]

We previously wrote about pro se litigant Julio Mora, who asked the members of the Florida Supreme Court to “kiss his a**hole every time the justice[s] will retire going to their den.” The requested relief was denied, and Mora was sanctioned.

Everyone thinks of Canadians as darn so “nice” — but defendants up there can get saucy too. From the Halifax Chronicle-Herald:

A psychiatric assessment has been ordered for a homeless man who dropped his pants in a Halifax courtroom Friday and invited the judge to perform oral sex on him.

Motion denied. If only he had appeared before this judge.

Joel David Arseneau, 40, was being arraigned in Halifax provincial court before Judge Barbara Beach on two charges of breaching probation or court orders when he let his pants fall to the floor, displaying his underwear.

Sheriff’s deputies hustled Mr. Arseneau out of the courtroom. As they were taking him downstairs to the holding cells, they received word that Judge Beach was prepared to proceed with the arraignment as long as the defendant was willing to keep his pants up.

Glad to hear they have some standards of courtroom decorum up in Halifax.

Hopefully Mr. Arseneau was wearing boxer shorts. Briefs come perilously close to male Speedos.

Man drops his pants in court [Halifax Chronicle-Herald]

Earlier: Pro Se Litigant of the Day: Julio Mora
If the Court Has Gone Down on You, Is Recusal Required?

At around noon, the jury reached a guilty verdict in the week-long trial of Jack Jordan, alleged stalker of Uma Thurman. The jury deliberated for one full day. Presumably the jurors were moved by the beautiful actress’s dramatic reading from Jordan’s disturbing correspondence.

Jordan was convicted of stalking and aggravated harassment. Sentencing is set for June 2nd.

Jordan, by the way, is rather well-educated. He’s a 1994 grad of the University of Chicago (undergrad, not law), who has also done some graduate work. But he’s had mental health issues over the years; in late 2005, he was involuntarily committed. He rejected a plea deal that would have placed him in a mental facility for 18 months.

Thurman testified that she was terrified by Jordan’s overtures. But if he had tried to do her harm, we suspect he would have encountered a world of hurt. If you’ve seen Kill Bill, you know that Uma Thurman is a badass.

Guilty verdict in Uma Thurman stalking trial [WABC via Gawker]
Jury Finds Accused Thurman Stalker Guilty [WCBS via Drudge]

Indiana lawyer Tony Zirkle is making a run for the Republican nomination for a congressional seat. There is a general rule for political candidates that involves not being photographed in front of Hitler’s portrait.

Apparently, Zirkle missed that one:

A congressional candidate is defending his speech to a group celebrating the anniversary of Adolf Hitler’s birth, saying he appeared simply because he was asked.

Tony Zirkle, who is seeking the Republican nomination in Indiana’s 2nd District, stood in front of a painting of Hitler, next to people wearing swastika armbands and with a swastika flag in the background for the speech to the American National Socialist Workers Party in Chicago on Sunday.

“I’ll speak before any group that invites me,” Zirkle said Monday. “I’ve spoken on an African-American radio station in Atlanta.”

Zirkle compares talking to a white supremacist group to talking to African-Americans. Nice. We wonder if he discussed his segregation plans during the radio appearance.

Zirkle has the following “defense” up on his campaign website:

I’ve been getting a flood of e-mails and phone calls, some of which include death threats, about my attempt to raise awareness of how the great porn dragon inspires Jews into pornography and prostitution and then, like the snake he is, turns the public against the Jews…. Let’s save our Jewish brothers and sisters from this tyrant king porn dragon before we get to another world-wide pogrom after a war with Iran or some other conflict and after the Jews get blamed again.

Cuckoo. The tyrant king porn dragon sounds like something out of a dirty version of The Lord of the Rings.

Candidate speaks at Hitler birthday party [The Times via Respectful Insolence]
Tony Zirkle’s Segregation Plan: Crazy Enough To Work? [Wonkette]

What is it about Florida that causes its lawyers and litigants to misbehave so egregiously? Just last week, the Florida Supreme Court sanctioned colorful attorney Jack Thompson. And now they’ve expressed their displeasure (PDF) with pro se litigant Julio Mora.

What did Mr. Mora do to upset the court? From its opinion:

Mora has filed pro se pleadings containing scandalous and obscene language. Specifically, in his “Petition to Inhibit Jurisdiction From this Very Supreme Court of Injustice,” Mora maintained that through its show cause proceedings with DOC, the Court has proven itself “to be a pack of incompetent cowards, without balls, testicles, courage or valor.” Further, Mora urged this Court to

“take this case and the ultimate decision, if ever, and please shovel it to the chief justice and every other justice’s a**hole, in order to have a common place to store the justices’ crap, together with the justice crap from their’s mind, properly disposed through the sewer system, in order to prevent the contaminants to reach the citizen of Florida, and also kiss Julio Mora’s the idiot seeking justice, kiss his a**hole every time the justice will retire going to their den… . Please kiss my a** one more time.”

The court declined to grant Mora the requested relief. Instead, it sanctioned him, directing the clerk of court to reject any future filings from Mora “unless signed by a member of The Florida Bar.”

In a court of law, it’s the parties who do the ass-kissing — not the judges.

Mora v. McNeil (PDF) [Supreme Court of Florida]

This must be the most profanity-laced piece of transcript since Aaron Wider’s deposition. It’s the transcript from the sentencing hearing at which Assistant U.S. Attorney Carolyn Pokorny (E.D.N.Y.) was attacked by the defendant, before the court reporter and defense counsel tackled the assailant.

The transcript was prepared by Ron Tolkin, the court reporter involved in the incident, from an audio recording. Even the heroic Mr. Tolkin can’t simultaneously (1) kick the a** of a kid decades his junior, and (2) transcribe the proceedings for posterity.

Excerpts appear below. For the full transcript, see the link at the end of this post.

Update: Another choice excerpt, pointed out by several of you in the comments:

To read the full transcript, click here (PDF). If you do, the “press it in” discussion might be confusing (and sound completely filthy). An E.D.N.Y. source clarifies:

[“Pressing it in” refers] to the CSO, Marshalls and Deputy discussing how to activate the panic button. In the old E.D.N.Y. courthouse, you push in, but in the new one, you pull out.

Sentencing Hearing Transcript: United States v. Victor Wright (PDF)

Earlier: Lawyer of the Day: Harry Batchelder (And Court Reporter of the Day: Ron Tolkin)

The Empire State is sending all sorts of craziness our way lately. From the New York — no, not the Washington — Post:

A female federal prosecutor was viciously attacked by a hulking, razor-wielding drug dealer in a Brooklyn courtroom yesterday - and was saved when the thug’s 72-year-old lawyer and others tackled him.

“He was going to slash her throat,” said defense lawyer Harry Batchelder, who, along with a court reporter and two marshals, slammed Victor Wright, 27 [or 37?], to the ground and grabbed an inch-long razor blade from him.

Criminal defense lawyers are badass — even the septuagenarians. And don’t forget the court reporter:

“Why don’t you try me instead of her?” stenographer Ron Tolkin shouted at the cowardly criminal as he leaped on Wright, before the group fell to the ground in a heap.

Both the elderly lawyer and Tolkin, 60, are former military men who served in Vietnam.

And what about Judge Frederic Block (E.D.N.Y.) — what did he do? From Newsday:

Block immediately left the bench after the melee started, and more marshals rushed into the courtroom and helped subdue Wright, court officials said.

That’s too bad. This story would have been perfect with the addition of a black-robed avenger, whacking the criminal into submission with a gavel.

P.S. Despite our admiration for federal judges qua judges, if we needed to be defended against a knife-wielding lunatic, we’d go with a state court judge any day of the week. E.g., Judge Ira Robinson.

RAZOR MANIAC JUMPS FED PROSECUTOR IN COURT [New York Post]
Drug dealer attacks 2 in Brooklyn courtroom [New York Newsday]

Sweet home Alabama. It’s the home of law schools that have given us great stories in the past.

A fairly recent story, involving a student at the University of Alabama School of Law who got into a silverware spat with his roommate, was on the lighter side. But our latest tale from UA is more serious — especially in the wake of yesterday’s tragic shootings at Northern Illinois University.

Read more, after the jump.

Earlier this month, we posted an open thread on the law school gunner. It generated a spirited discussion — perhaps too spirited — and we eventually closed it to new comments.

We’re going to try this again. Here’s another open thread to share your gunner stories. But please keep the discourse civil, and please don’t call out anyone by name. If you’re mentioned in a story and want to defend yourself, come up with a pseudonym for doing so. You really don’t want ATL to come up when someone Googles you (e.g., around recruiting season).

As is our practice, we’ll kick things off with a story. From a tipster at a law school in New York:

last semester a 1L decided to spread a little rumor. he said he knew what was going to be on one of the finals (civ pro) — actually he dropped another person’s name who people trusted and said that the prof told her what was going to be on the exam. word spread pretty quickly that the last question of the exam would be a policy question, and that preclusion wouldn’t be covered. it was a complete lie; he just made it up. most people studied everything anyway, but there were definitely a bunch who spent a lot of extra time trying to study “policy” issues and less time on preclusion (which of course ended up being a question on the exam).

p.s. this guy studies with a small group who call themselves the “dream team” - haha

some other things that i was told later on but didn’t experience first-hand:

1) he allegedly conspired to mislead the class for weeks about this

2) his facebook status said “[his name] is exploiting situations like Geraldo Rivera” after he spread the word about what was supposedly on the test

Earlier: Law School Gunners: Open Thread

We were pretty lucky in the law school roommate department. During our 1L year, we lived with a high school friend who was in New Haven doing medical research. During our 2L year, we roomed with a friend from college: the brilliant Steve Engel, a former law clerk to Judge Kozinski and Justice Kennedy, who currently serves as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel (and who recently testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in that capacity, on the legal rights of Guantanamo Bay detainees).

Both were highly considerate roommates. Neither tried to purloin our silverware, which is the allegation made in this angry letter from a University of Alabama 2L to his former roommate. It begins:

Dear Roommate:

This is a letter regarding your use and possession of my silverware and tableware. I regret that I have to tell you this in writing, but all of my attempts to speak to you in person were thwarted by your unwillingness to speak directly to me.

I wish to be as tolerant as possible so we can live together peaceably. However, your impermissible possession and misappropriation of the bulk of my silverware, as well as my stoneware bowls, is no longer acceptable.

The silverware in question was purchased entirely by me for my use. It is relatively new, bought in 2007, and cost approximately $75. The silverware in questions [sic] consists of Oneida’s “Journey” (4 setting) and also an Oneida Silverplate (2-setting which is coated in actual silver). I did not object to you using it at first (although you never asked for permission), but I reasonably thought you understood that your use had to be within some bounds of reason. You have continually used silverware without returning it to the kitchen. This has meant there is insufficient silverware for me, the owner, to use. This is unacceptable under any condition. Placing dishes and silverware in the kitchen does not waive my right to have reasonable possession or use of it.

The letter gets more over-the-top as it goes along. It culminates with a threat to bring a civil action for the tort of conversion.

Read the rest, after the jump.

It appears that Jonathan Lee Riches — ATL’s favorite pro se litigant, who filed that famous $63,000,000,000.00 Billion lawsuit against Michael Vick — has some competition in the contest for craziest complaint.

Pro se litigant Gregory Newman has filed a lawsuit against “Covert Action Air Operations.” This entity does not exist. But that hasn’t stopped Mr. Newman from alleging that it erased his videotape of a “magnetic tornado” that descended upon his backyard.

Here’s an excerpt from the memorandum opinion dismissing the complaint, which describes some of Gregory Newman’s more colorful allegations:

You can read the two-page opinion — which includes some boilerplate and citations, perhaps helpful to the law clerks among you, for the proposition that complaints “that describe fantastic or delusional scenarios are subject to immediate dismissal” — by clicking here.

Memorandum Opinion: Newman v. Covert Action Air Operations [U.S. District Court (D.D.C.)]

Today’s open thread focuses on someone who is near and dear to all of your hearts: the law school gunner. He’s sitting on your left; he’s sitting on your right; or maybe he is you. If you don’t know who the gunner in your class is, then look in the mirror.

We asked the tipster who suggested this topic to us to provide us with some fodder to kick off the thread. Here’s what we got:

It all begin at Admitted Students Weekend last spring, when this particular individual had to be shushed and told to “STOP TALK-ING” by a professor running a mock class. This was after he interrupted another admitted student and said, “Well, he gave a BAD example, but what he was clearly trying to say was…” There was other bizarre admitted students weekend behavior, but that should give you an idea.

Then, we arrived at school in August and there he was…ready to embark on a semester full of interrupting other students and professors, sharing awkward personal stories, and even telling professors that material they assigned from casebooks was “irrelevant.”

For finals, he decided that typing on his laptop keyboard would not allow him to type quickly enough to get all of his thoughts down in EBB, so he got special permission from the Registrar to use an external keyboard and a stand for his laptop. The whole contraption takes up lots of desk space and looks like he is sitting at the controls of a spaceship. From what I hear, he also used it for the last week of classes to “practice” for the exams.

He also once asked a particularly well-known professor to autograph his casebook…

And, finally, the event that precipitated my message to you. During a lunchtime speaker event, this individual pulled out a set of nail clippers and started clipping and then filing his fingernails! The entire room heard and was staring at him—naturally this got around the law school pretty quickly. Did I mention this individual is older and should know better (not that a 22 year old straight from undergrad shouldn’t…but he’s significantly older)?

So there’s a few examples for you.

Have gunner horror stories of your own to share? Please do so, in the comments (without naming any names, per our standard operating procedure around here). Thanks.

Gunner [Wikipedia]

(We missed this case because it happened over the holidays, when we were away from ATL. But we’ve received several requests to cover this super-juicy story, so we’ll go for it, despite being so late to the party.)

We described Schoenfeld v. Allen & Overy, a lawsuit by a Jewish associate against his former law firm, as “the Jewish version of Aaron Charney v. Sullivan & Cromwell.” Now we’re looking at “the pervert-who-has-sex-with-13-and-15-year-old-sisters version of Charney v. S&C.”

From the New York Daily News:

A disgraced lawyer who paid a mother to allow him to have sex with her underage daughters is looking for a payday of his own - from the elite law firm where he once worked.

James Colliton is suing Cravath, Swaine & Moore for $1.45 million, accusing the white-shoe firm of stiffing him on an annual bonus, salary and vacation pay.

Reached by phone at his home in Poughkeepsie, the convicted sex offender refused to talk about his suit, which was handwritten on notebook paper.

“It’s all in there,” Colliton said.

That’s what he told her. Also, we’d expect better than a complaint “handwritten on notebook paper” from James Colliton. If Aaron Charney can type up his pro se complaint against his former firm, surely an ex-Cravath lawyer can do the same.

More discussion, beyond the jump.

Because it’s much better to have a toy manufacturer as an enemy than an angry mob of club-wielding Sudanese. Here’s the latest news about the whole “Teddy Bear named Mohammed” controversy, from the Daily Mail (via Drudge):

Thousands of Islamic fanatics wielding clubs and knives are marching through the streets of Khartoum demanding the execution of teddy bear teacher Gillian Gibbons.

As the mother-of-two started a 15-day prison term, protestors left mosques across the Sudanese capital to denounce the “lenient verdict” and call for the death penalty.

For those of you who haven’t been following the story, here’s some background:

Mrs Gibbons, a divorced mother-of-two, was arrested on Sunday and on Wednesday charged with insulting Islam, inciting hatred and showing contempt for religious beliefs.

It came after seven-year-old pupils chose to call a teddy bear Mohammed at the Unity High School in Khartoum, where she had worked since August.

During the court case behind closed doors yesterday it was revealed that the school’s office assistant, Sara Khawad, had complained to the education authorities - leading to the teacher’s arrest.

In a statement read to court, Mrs Gibbons tearfully stressed she had not meant to cause offence and pointed out that it had been her pupils who had chosen the name.

Executing someone for naming a Teddy Bear “Mohammed” might raise an Eighth Amendment issue. But we don’t think they have that over in Sudan.

Thousands of Islamic fanatics wielding knives demand jailed teddy bear teacher is executed [Daily Mail]