Georgia

Arraignment Date Set for Stephen McDaniel in Lauren Giddings Murder Case

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Stephen McDaniel cleans up nicely for court.

Stephen M. McDaniel, the Mercer Law School graduate accused of killing classmate Lauren Giddings, made an appearance in court this morning. As you may recall, Giddings’s decapitated torso was found on June 30 in Macon, Georgia, and thus far, police have been unable to recover the rest of her body.

Last month, we mentioned that Bibb County prosecutors intended to seek the death penalty for McDaniel. Today, in court, the alleged murderer received formal notification of his fate if he is found guilty of the charges levied against him.

McDaniel’s arraignment hearing has been set for February 7, but his lawyers raised some interesting issues today. What sort of motions will they be filing on their client’s behalf?

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Behind the Music, Behind the Bench: Meet Judge Jay Stewart

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Wielding power and oozing prestige, judges can be thought of as “rock stars of the law.” But some judges are, in a more literal sense, rock stars.

Several judges around the country possess impressive musical talents. For example, as we mentioned earlier this month, Judge Randall R. Rader recently rocked out at San Diego’s House of Blues with his band, DeNovo.

Judge Rader is not alone is making music as well as rulings. A Georgia jurist recently released a critically acclaimed album, in which his gavel-wielding fingers strum the guitar alongside some musical greats.

Keep reading for the Above the Law interview with this colorful and creative judge….

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King & Spalding Lawyer Received Key Email As Prosecutors Seek Death Penalty Against Stephen McDaniel

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As we mentioned in Morning Docket on Friday, prosecutors will be seeking the death penalty against Stephen McDaniel if he is convicted of the murder of Lauren Giddings, his former neighbor and classmate at Mercer Law School.

The Bibb County District Attorney calls the crime “outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible or inhuman in that it involved depravity of mind,” which is one standard the prosecution has to meet to seek the death penalty in Georgia.

The Macon Telegraph conducted a long interview with Lauren Giddings’s boyfriend, David Vandiver. The King & Spalding lawyer wonders if Giddings’s final email to him was entirely hers….

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Morning Docket: 12.09.11

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* DLA Piper is blaming the Occupy Wall Street movement for Biglaw’s sad, 2011 bonus season. It looks like we can expect a Cravath match from that firm. [Thomson Reuters News & Insight]

* We could really use some more law schools — fourth tier law schools, in particular. Say hello to the Savannah Law School, a John Marshall Law School Atlanta production. [National Law Journal]

* University of Texas School of Law Dean Larry Sager has been ousted from his position. Readers have flooded our inbox with the news, so we’ll have more on this later. [Texas Tribune]

* This Senate victory for gay servicemembers came with unintended consequences. It’s now kosher to have sex with men, women, and everything else under military law. [Washington Post]

* Prosecutors will be seeking the death penalty against Stephen McDaniel. If being drawn and quartered were an option, maybe this medieval scholar wouldn’t mind so much. [Macon Telegraph]

* Bueller? Bueller? Bueller? Although Ben Stein is the keynote speaker at this year’s ABA Techshow, legal tech nerds will likely be unable to win his money. [ABA Journal]

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Stephen McDaniel Indicted for Murder of Lauren Giddings

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Stephen McDaniel

This should not come as a great shock, since he’s been in jail since July, but Stephen Mark McDaniel has been indicted by a grand jury for the murder of Lauren Giddings. McDaniel and Giddings graduated earlier this year from Mercer Law School, where they were classmates, and they were also neighbors in the Barristers Hall apartment complex in Macon, Georgia.

In addition to being charged with the Giddings murder, McDaniel has been indicted for other creepy crimes….

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Quote of the Day: Baby Momma Drama

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Chief Judge Amanda Williams

Because of your disdain for the young man’s use of the term ‘baby momma,’ you ordered that the defendant be summarily jailed.

– An excerpt from a Judicial Qualifications Commission complaint filed in Georgia against Chief Superior Court Judge Amanda Williams, who oversees the operation of state’s largest drug court. Williams faces an ethics complaint for “using tyrannical partiality” on the bench.

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Georgia State Law Students Poke a Little Fun at Their Classmates

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Gun hard!

Last week, we told you about some law students who were holding tryouts — and charging a $20 application fee — to fill the final two spots in their study group.

The students in the group were roundly mocked. Charging an application fee made demanding an undergraduate transcript from applicants pale by comparison.

Now, if the school had been a place like UVA Law, the student body would have gotten defensive and lashed out about how the study group post “didn’t tell the full story.” They’d whine about how the study groupers didn’t “represent” the student body. They’d claim that ATL “planted” the poster, because we “had it in” for the school.

But some students at the Georgia State University College of Law didn’t feel the need to defend their school or the silly students in the study group. They realized that nobody would impute the toolish behavior of a few 1Ls to an entire institution.

Instead, they chose to have a bit of fun with it. Confidence and a sense of humor are beautiful things….

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Morning Docket: 10.17.11

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* Wait, is this real? People actually sued al-Qaeda and expect to be paid billions of dollars in damages? Seriously? Having a major “what is this I don’t even” moment over here. [Bloomberg]

* Judith Kaye is the new centerfold for the New York State Court of Appeals. She’s the first woman in history whose portrait will hang in the state’s highest courtroom. [New York Law Journal]

* Thompson Hine partner Leslie Jacobs was charged with tax fraud last week. As could be expected, the Biglaw firm now wants nothing to do with him. [Am Law Daily]

* Another law firm’s confidential files mysteriously ended up in the garbage, but this time at a Georgia newspaper’s office. Just as an FYI, our office is located in New York. [Gainesville Times]

* GTL doesn’t just stand for “Gym, Tan, Laundry” anymore. Apparently, it also stands for “Get The Lawyer.” The Situation is suing a guido lifestyle company for trademark infringement. [Examiner]

* Lindsay Lohan’s alleged probation violations might send her back to the slammer, but she doesn’t want to be made “an example of” in court. Sweetie, it’s called “a mockery.” [Daily Mail]

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Law Graduates DENIED Opportunity To Sit For Bar Because They Lied To Law Schools About Their Criminal Records

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The other pics for bipolar disorder were more freaky.

Back when only recent college graduates went to law school, you didn’t have to worry much about law students sneaking into law schools with extensive criminal records. How much trouble can you really get into when you were busy performing well in college, earning a useless liberal arts degree?

But in our day and age, there are enough law schools hanging around that pretty much anybody can get in. Barriers to entry are pretty much at the level where as long as you can fill out a loan application, you can get into law school. Heck, as we reported recently, convicted murderers can get into law school.

But you have to tell the truth. You can get into law school with a criminal record, but you have to tell your law school the truth about your record.

Apparently, telling the truth is a problem that some people are having….

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Did America Just Learn That We Have The Death Penalty In Some States?

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We live in a country where some states have the death penalty. Capital punishment. The “ultimate justice,” people like Rick Perry say with a smirk, as if justice that ends in death is somehow preferable to justice that respects the dignity of human life.

Do you not know what those sanitized words mean? Do you not know what the death penalty is?

We live in a country that sanctions murder of supposed criminals. That’s what we’re talking about: murder. It’s not “self-defense.” Death row inmates are locked down, strapped down, and would be in jail for the rest of their natural lives but for our societal decision to kill them first.

And the people we kill, we suppose they are criminals. We have a system that spits out a verdict that a person is guilty. It’s a flawed, imperfect system. In any given case, witnesses, counsel, judges, or the jury could be wrong, stupid, or both. We, as a society, take their word for it because it’s the best way for dispensing justice that we’ve come up with so far.

But since we have this flawed system, and we do kill people, then it is inevitable that occasionally we’re going to murder the “wrong” person. To support the death penalty is to support the occasional murder of innocent people. That’s been true since the first barbarian hunter-gatherer thought it’d be a good idea to gather the whole tribe together to watch the death of another defenseless person who claimed innocence.

So my question is, why the hell are people so worked up over Troy Davis?

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