Crime

Morning Docket: 07.12.13

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* You’ve seen Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg give Justice Antonin Scalia the finger in prose, but now you can hear what it would sound like in operatic form as composed by a recent law school graduate. [NPR]

* The Fourth Circuit upheld Obamacare’s employer mandate against Liberty University, calling it a constitutional tax, just like the individual mandate. Now’s a perfect time for a sip of Campari. [WSJ Law Blog]

* The Fried Frank toner bandit was sent to the slammer, but alas, it’s unlikely that the firm will be able to recover any of its losses. Too bad, it could use the cash after its 2012 performance. [Am Law Daily]

* Crisis? What crisis? The dean of UC Davis Law refuses to trim class size, but that doesn’t really matter — the application cycle is handling the situation quite nicely. [Sacramento Business Journal]

* Pennsylvania’s Attorney General Kathleen Kane won’t defend the state against a lawsuit seeking to overturn its ban on same-sex marriage. She’s choosing the people over politics. [New York Times]

* With his trial quickly drawing to a close, George Zimmerman is growing increasingly worried about his future. Let’s face it, even if he’s acquitted, living in hiding isn’t a very good look for him. [ABC News]

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Non-Sequiturs: 07.11.13

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* Authorities are exhuming the Boston strangler suspect to attempt to match his DNA with a sample recovered from a victim killed almost 50 years ago, highlighting advances in DNA harvesting technology. In other news, COBRA Command claims that Project: Serpentor is moving along nicely. [NY Times]

* Ninth Circuit Judge William Fletcher dissents in the case of Deere v. Cullen. Judge Fletcher writes: “The majority holds that a judge suffering from dementia may sentence a man to death.” He’s so unreasonable. [PrawfsBlawg]

* The Texas student that Tamara Tabo wrote about this morning, whose arrest for making terrorist threats sparked a Facebook phenomenon, has been released on bail. [The Blaze]

* Kash Hill reports on the decision in the Sarah Jones case. The former cheerleader and current paralegal won $338,000 in her defamation suit. [Forbes]

* The advent of a new job in the field of sex work: The “Coparazzi,” documenting cop mistreatment of sex workers. This job title is offensive because it suggests that the Paparazzi are doing something admirable. [Jezebel]

* An argument for compromising reputation for scholarship money when selecting a law school. As one of the commenters on the article (steponitvelma) put it: “Congratulations. How wonderful.” [The Billfold]

* Women are realizing that husbands are crimping their style. [The Careerist]

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Terroristic Threat Laws & A Texas Teen: There But For The Grace Go We

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“What I said was terrible, mean and downright stupid…. I wasn’t trying to scare anyone, I was trying to be witty and sarcastic. I failed and I was arrested.”

– Justin Carter, in a letter to District Judge Jack Robison

On February 14, in New Braunfels, Texas, Justin Carter was arrested on terroristic threat charges. Carter, then age 18, had been posting on a Facebook page for the game League of Legends. When a friend called Carter crazy, Carter allegedly volleyed back that, yeah, he was messed up in the head and that he was going to “shoot up a kindergarten, watch the blood rain down and eat the beating heart out of one of them.” A Canadian woman who viewed the comment reported Carter to law enforcement officials.

Carter’s father insists that his son immediately followed his first Facebook comment with “LOL” and “JK,” clear indications that Carter was . . . laughing out loud and joking when he wrote. Lest you think that explicitly stating that you are joking is enough to insulate your comments from criminal liability, Justin Carter was arrested, then charged by the Comal County Criminal District Attorney. In Comal County, txtspk cannot save you….

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Non-Sequiturs: 07.10.13

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* Apple has lost the e-books trial. Didn’t see that coming after Apple’s lawyers ripped the government’s witnesses. [New York Times]

* Vault released its Regional and Practice Area rankings. Yeah, we get it Wachtell, you’re awesome. [Vault]

* Who ever said losing at the Supreme Court was the end? Myriad is suing to enforce its patents in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes. [Patently O]

* Woman caught on camera planning her husband’s murder because it’s “easier than divorcing him.” Fair enough! [Lowering the Bar]

* Senators pledging to block court nominee “irrespective of [her] very fine professional qualifications.” Oh. [The Blog of the Legal Times]

* Some jurisdictional nerdiness regarding EPIC’s original filing seeking mandamus, prohibition, or certiorari from SCOTUS to review a FISA judge. [Lawfare]

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George Zimmerman’s Lawyers Too Exhausted To Go On, But Judge Is Too Pissed To Care

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Judge Nelson is tired… of your sh*t.

Your Honor, we’ve been working very long hours.

…

So have I!

– an exchange between Mark O’Mara, one of George Zimmerman’s defense attorneys in the Trayvon Martin murder trial, and Judge Debra Nelson, after a 12-hour day in court. When defense attorney Don West piped up to say he didn’t think he could “physically keep up this pace much longer,” Judge Nelson gathered her belongings in a huff and left the courtroom, ignoring him.

(Keep reading to see video footage of the incident in question.)

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Woman Concealed a Handgun… Where?

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Here’s your fact pattern. You’re a young prosecutor and you get assigned a file for a troubled young woman.

She’s charged with a number of crimes, mostly revolving around meth, because it’s Oklahoma and there’s nothing else to do but meth and trade complaints about Texas.

But then you study the file a little more and see that the woman was caught with a loaded gun. Nothing too surprising there.

In her vagina.

Wait, what?!?

You know what they say, if you outlaw guns jammed in vaginas, only outlaws will have guns jammed in vaginas…

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Cooley Student Is A ‘Cooler’ — Loses $29K In Casino

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A hand that this kid apparently never got in over two hours at the casino.

If you’re a law student and looking to get fired from your clerking gig, at least find a fun way to go out. The sort of exit that really looks at those bridges and says, “Flame on!”

Pleading guilty to embezzling from the city, then lying about your assets and hitting a foreign casino with $60,000 in cash?

Sure, that’ll work.

Guess where the kid in question goes to school?

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‘I’m Going to Kill You’ Not the Best Strategy for Getting Your Job Back

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Getting laid off must really suck. The victim is not only left without a steady income and with a blemish on the résumé, but with a deep sense of betrayal. Trusted co-workers and team members who provided positive feedback one day turned a cold shoulder the next.

And worse, the person being let go is rarely the “proximate cause” of this career black mark. The economy takes a bad turn, or some partner has botched a case and lost a key client, triggering a layoff.

That’s a recipe for depression.

But it’s important not to let that depression reach the level of “calling former colleagues and threatening to kill them.”

Unfortunately, federal prosecutors say a top law school graduate didn’t get that message…

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Morning Docket: 07.02.13

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The preferred methodology for phone threats.

* Bad boy! After last week’s dramatic bench performance by Justice Samuel Alito, the Alliance For Justice, a liberal watchdog group, is petitioning the Supreme Court to adopt and adhere to a code of conduct. [National Law Journal]

* There’s been a changing of the guard at the Supreme Court, where Scott Harris will be stepping into the role of Clerk of Court in September. Here’s hoping he can fill William Suter’s shoes. [Supreme Court of the United States]

* If you’re in-house and searching for the best outside counsel, you may be best served by going to one of these Biglaw firms. But which were the “absolute best”? Take a wild guess. [Corporate Counsel]

* “Let’s record this as a threat…” If you say so. Wherein a former Bryan Cave attorney gets federally indicted for threatening to murder a colleague still employed at the firm. [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]

* And just like that, the tide keeps on rolling. With the departure of Kenneth Randall, Alabama Law has appointed Professor William Brewbaker as acting dean until an interim dean is chosen. [AL.com]

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Morning Docket: 06.28.13

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* Do you think Chief Justice Roberts is the Supreme Court’s “peacemaker”? To be fair, at least he does a better job of tempering all of his judicial rage than his colleagues. [Politico]

* According to Prof. John Eastman of Chapman Law, the SCOTUS decision striking down DOMA means Prop 8 is good law in California. Try and wrap your mind around that one. [OC Weekly]

* The Senate approved a bipartisan immigration reform plan with a 68-32 vote, and now it’s up to House representatives to take the bill and summarily wipe their asses with it. [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]

* The good folks at Hobby Lobby quilted for hours yesterday to celebrate the Tenth Circuit’s reversal of a lower court’s denial of an injunction blocking the ACA’s contraceptives mandate. [The Oklahoman]

* Texas A&M still hopes to acquire Texas Weslyan’s law school; they’re just waiting for the ABA to look over the paperwork. Welcome, Texas A&M Law, since the takeover will obviously be approved. [WTAW]

* Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has been indicted on 30 counts of violence and weapons-related charges. Right now, he’s looking at a possibility of life in prison or the death penalty. [CNN]

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