Frankly, I think the Justices are waiting to see how absurd the press coverage can get. The Washington Post has reported on two awesome ways to guess what the Court’s decision will be. First, use a stopwatch and a few mp3 files. If that doesn’t work, poll former SCOTUS clerks.
Both methods predict that Obamacare is going down.
The Post has not opined on a more reliable method to learn what the Court’s decision will be: chill out and wait for the Court to issue its decision next week. But they have pages to fill; one can forgive a bit of silliness.
The Court did, however, issue four opinions today, in some of the big cases on its docket.
Maybe it’s time for us to have a national conversation about legalizing drugs. It’s interesting to see how many folks in charge of enforcing and administering our nation’s drug laws seem to have drug problems themselves.
We all recall the sad story of former federal judge Jack Camp. After years of sending offenders off to prison for narcotics offenses, ex-Judge Camp pleaded guilty to drug offenses of his own. He was sentenced to 30 days in prison — less time than what Paris Hilton got.
And speaking of Paris Hilton, it seems that one of her former prosecutors — a top drug-crime prosecutor in Las Vegas — was just arrested.
Last month, Marin broke down the Paris Hilton defense to a drug possession charge. Put simply, saying “it wasn’t me” when confronted with drugs found on your person strains credulity.
Especially if those drugs are found in your ass. Which is what happened to a Florida man over the weekend…
If you’re like most people who have an important drug test coming up — say, for a new law firm job or for probation (kind of the same thing) — you probably prepare by doing things such as guzzling water, sucking pennies, or ladling your roommate’s urine into a pocket flask.
A somewhat less effective way to prepare involves going on a cocaine and amphetamine binge hours before your drug test and hoping for the best. But that didn’t stop Lindsay Lohan from trying last week:
Lindsay Lohan’s probation has been revoked and a bench warrant issued for her arrest…. Although the bench warrant was issued, it’s being held — i.e., on hold — until Friday at 8:30 AM, when Lindsay is ordered to appear in court.
The move by Judge Elden Fox comes after Lindsay failed two drug tests recently … one showed the presence of cocaine and another showed amphetamines.
Under the terms of her probation, Lindsay could get 60 days for her latest misstep, and the bench warrant comes just weeks after Lindsay completed a 14-day jail stint and 23 days in UCLA’s in-patient celebrity-enabling sanctuary rehab for another parole violation.
As an occasional taxpayer (albeit in a different state), I’m annoyed California has to waste precious time and resources monitoring and jailing Lindsay, when they could be doing something useful, like banning Jay Leno. As a lawyer, I’m itching to blame someone or something(s) for her downward spiral, and I have found the proximate clause: her boobs.
As you’ve probably heard, last week Las Vegas cops arrested partying hag Paris Hilton for cocaine possession, after pulling her over in a Cadillac Escalade that was trailing marijuana smoke. And as you’ve probably also heard, the police would have never found the coke in the first place if Paris hadn’t been such a vain twit:
According to Sgt. John Sheahan, while police were questioning Waits, Hilton, who was in police custody inside the Wynn Las Vegas, allegedly reached inside her purse for “a tube of lip balm. At the same time, says Sheahan, a bindle of cocaine in a plastic bag came out of her purse” in plain view of police in the room.
Paris shrewdly floated several excuses – that the purse wasn’t hers and that she had no idea that the coke was in there, or that she had seen the coke in there, but mistook it for gum* – before settling on the airtight alibi that the purse was in fact hers but she had loaned it to a “friend” who left coke in there. Throw the kitchen sink at the police and see what sticks, that’s what I always say….
Here’s a quick update on the “celebrity justice” beat. There has been a rash of break-ins in Los Angeles, targeting the homes of various stars. Is there a vigilante group of Robin Hoods lashing out at ostentatious displays of wealth during the recession? Not quite. Our sister site Fashionista reports:
While this is not surprising in itself, given that there would likely be some very nice goods found in any of the above, what is surprising is the news of who allegedly committed the crimes and why–a band of teenage girls obsessed with clothing and jewelry.
As we’ve mentioned before, Paris Hilton was in court in Miami last week after being sued for $8 million for refusing to promote the apparently terrible 2006 movie “Pledge This!”
We’ve told you about how Chief Judge Federico Moreno (S.D. Fla.) was enchanted by Paris. He was perplexed by her use of “BFF,” so she explained the meaning. He displayed his comprehension by remarking, “This will be my best case forever.” To which Hilton replied, “You’re my best judge forever.” Update: There is a minor disagreement over what exactly Judge Moreno said. See here (comment #2; gavel bang: commenter).
Here’s the court artist’s depiction of the Hilton-Moreno relationship. We’re not sure if Judge Moreno is bored or infatuated.
Moreno — who hasn’t made a ruling yet — may have found Paris enchanting, but the court artist apparently didn’t. Paris looked much less like a 50-year-old transvestite in the photos taken by the Associated Press. Earlier:Prior ATL coverage of Paris Hilton
Down in Miami, celebrity heiress Paris Hilton is charming the robes off of Chief Judge Federico Moreno (S.D. Fla.), who is hearing a film contract dispute in which she’s the defendant. Reports Davis Markus:
Paris Hilton is on the stand. And Judge Moreno is getting in the act. In one exchange, Moreno was puzzled by the title of Hilton’s current reality show, “My New BFF.” “What does that mean?” he said. After Hilton gave the full title “Paris Hilton’s My New Best Friend Forever,” the judge remarked “This will be my best case forever.” Without missing a beat, Hilton replied “You’re my best judge forever.”
Celebrity heiress Paris Hilton apparently likes the courts as much as the tabloid headlines. Try as she might, she can’t stay out of them.
We previously covered her misadventures in the criminal justice system (culminating in her prison stay). This week she shows up on the civil side. From the AP:
Paris Hilton hated her 2006 movie “Pledge This!” and refused for months to make promotional appearances for it despite a contract requiring her to do so, lawyers for the film’s investors said as trial opened Thursday in an $8 million lawsuit against her….
With Hilton nodding vigorously from her defense table seat, her attorney Michael Weinsten insisted she did numerous appearances for the movie but was unavailable to meet many requests by the film’s producers because of her extremely busy schedule. Hilton also had the right to refuse some promotion events that might harm her brand….
Was she required to wear panties to said events?
More discussion, including an eyewitness account of how Paris looked in court today, after the jump.
* Who says Loyola 2Ls can’t land good jobs? [SCOTUSblog]
* Lobster rolls. And Chipwich. Yum. [Gawker; Althouse]
* It’s nice to know that you can neglect your caseload, fabricate documents, and still get reinstated to the bar. [Boston Globe]
* Law firm ranking schemes are kind of like blogs. If everyone has one, who’s supposed to read them all? [WSJ Law Blog; Wall Street Journal (subscription)]
* Don’t forget: Paris Hilton will be on Larry King tonight (9 PM Eastern time). [CNN]
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Ed. note: The Asia Chronicles column is authored by Kinney Recruiting. Kinney has made more placements of U.S. associates, counsels and partners in Asia than any other recruiting firm in each of the past six years. You can reach them by email: asia@kinneyrecruiting.com.
Deal flow has clearly picked recently up for most US associates, counsels and partners in Hong Kong/China and Singapore. We are on the phone with a lot of these folks on a daily basis, many of whom we have known for years. Further, the head of our Asia team, Evan Jowers, and Kinney’s founder and president, Robert Kinney, frequently meet in person with leading US partners in Asia to assess their needs and keep on top of the inside scoop at as many firms as possible. The need for legal recruiting help in Asia from experienced recruiters appears to be live and well. In March, Evan and Robert were in Beijing at such meetings, in April, Evan was in Hong Kong, and for half of June Evan will be in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Thus its pretty easy for us to tell when there has been an across-the-market pick up in capital markets and corporate work.
On an average day in Asia when Evan and Robert visit firms, they typically have 5 to 9 meetings a day, mostly with US partners in the market. The reason they have these meetings is not simply because Kinney makes a lot of US attorney placements in Asia and that a particular firm may have openings; instead these are just visits with friends. After years of working together as business partners, the folks at Kinney are actually these peoples’ friends. The firms Kinney work closely with in Asia (which is just about every law firm – call us if you want to know the one firm in the world we will never place anyone with again, ever, and why) look forward to the visits, or at least act like they do. After seven years in the market, many of the client partners are former associate candidates. Also, these US partners see Kinney as a very good source of market information as well, because they know how deep their contacts are in the market and how frequently they are speaking to counterparts at peer firms.
In a land that is right here and in a time that is right now, a technology has arisen so powerful that it can replace basic human document review. Is it time to bow down before our new robot overlords?
First, here’s a little story about me: my life in the legal world began as a paralegal. My first case was a GIANT patent infringement case that was already six years old and had involved as many as five companies, multiple US courts, the ITC and an international standards committee. I knew nothing about any of this.
On my first day, my supervisor (a paralegal with at least eight other cases driving her crazy) sat me down in front of a Concordance database with a 100,000+ patents and patent file histories. “Code these,” she said. I learned that “coding”, for the purposes of this exercise, meant manually typing the inventor’s name, the title of the patent, the assignee, the file date, and other objective data for each document. I worked on that project – and only that project – for at least the first six months of my job. After a week or so, time began to blur.
What I know, in retrospect and with absolutely certainty, is that as time began to blur, so did my judgment. So did my attention to detail. If you could tell me that I did not make at least one mistake a day – one inconsistent spelling, one reversed day and month, one incorrectly spaced title – I frankly would need to see your evidence. I would not believe it. The human mind is trainable but it is not a machine.
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Alas, no decision came out today in the health care reform case. 
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