Crime

He may be convicted but that doesn't mean he's stopped swinging!

After 52 years this man's name is cleared.

Even if a lawyer wants to settle, it doesn't always happen.

It's a known fact that thousands of people are wrongly convicted of crimes and spend decades of their lives in jail because of it.

* Given the fact that Senate Republicans have remained firm in their opposition to Supreme Court nominee Judge Merrick Garland receiving a confirmation hearing, it seems all the more likely that the vacancy left on the high court by the late Justice Antonin Scalia will remain unfilled until after Election 2016. [Bloomberg Politics]

* But is someone having a change of heart? “I would have to admit it’s a gamble.” Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, claims that while he hasn’t second-guessed his decision not to hold confirmation hearings for Judge Garland, that it’s anyone’s guess as to who Donald Trump would choose to fill the position if elected as president. [Huffington Post]

* “He said that I had to keep my attorney happy.” A Texas lawyer who was accused of trading sex with court-appointed clients for performing legal work was recently indicted on 18 counts of sexual assault and 17 counts of compelling prostitution. He faces up to 20 years in prison. We may have more on these allegations of misconduct later. [KSAT]

* As we mentioned previously, Judge Rosemary Collyer of the District Court for the District of Columbia will be taking senior status on May 18, but we didn’t know that she was chosen by Chief Judge John Roberts to take over as the presiding judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court the next day. Congrats! [National Law Journal]

* Biglaw gets in on the green rush: Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe has partnered with Americans for Safe Access Foundation, a medical marijuana advocacy group, to update a series of manuals on state medical marijuana laws. In the future, Orrick attorneys will man a hotline for medical marijuana patients in need of legal advice. [Am Law Daily]

* James Hurlock, former two-decade chairman of White & Case, RIP. [Big Law Business]

* Amal Clooney lays the smackdown on Donald Trump, all without even uttering his name. Classy. [Vanity Fair]

* If you’re convicted of a felony in connection with the murder of your mother, then you should probably expect to lose your law license. [Law Profession Blog]

* Yes, Ted Cruz is making a fool of himself, running a Sisyphean race for president. But does that mean the founding fathers were right about that natural born citizen crap? (If someone born in Canada to an American mother is even what they meant by the phrase.) [Lawyers, Guns and Money]

* BYU’s Title IX problem: Are they making sexual assault more likely by linking honor code investigations to reports of rape? [Slate]

* Hooah! Army Captain Kristen Griest, one of the first women to earn a Rangers tab, will be transferring branches, becoming the first female infantry officer. Combat arms branches were recently opened to women for the first time, and Captain Griest’s move is part of the Army’s effort to integrate those branches. [Army Times]

* Encounter with Ted Bundy! A victim of the notorious serial killer recalls the experience. [Huffington Post]

* Should a settlement deal with a federal agency include a clause to prevent people from speaking negatively about the agency to Congress and the press? [Volokh Conspiracy]

* The robots are coming for our jobs, but maybe, if we are lucky, some of us can survive. [Speechwriter Ghostwriter]

A well-deserved loss for these Biglaw partners.

The Thinking Like A Lawyer podcast chats with Making A Murderer's Dean Strang.

* Dig if you will the picture, of you and I engaged in a… probate battle? Uh-oh! In documents filed in a Carver County, Minnesota, probate court, Prince’s sister, Tyka Nelson, claims that the music icon — whose estate is said to have been valued at about $300 million — died without a will. [USA Today]

* “[L]ook, if he’s not our nominee, I think he would be a great replacement for Scalia.” Despite the fact that Senator Ted Cruz previously insisted that he wasn’t interested in being nominated to replace the late Antonin Scalia as a SCOTUS justice, House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) thinks Cruz is the man for the job. [The Hill]

* Dentons says $2 million was “erroneously allocated” to McKenna Long & Aldridge partners during a merger with Luce Forward, and now the Biglaw behemoth really wants the money back. Partner’s aren’t pleased, griping that “this is a cautionary tale for anyone thinking of merging with Dentons.” [National Law Journal via Big Law Business]

* Today is sentencing day for former House Speaker Dennis Hastert. The accused child abuser faces up to five years in prison for attempting to cover up his hush-money payoffs, but prosecutors have asked that he serve no more than six months. We wonder how his Biglaw supporters will feel if he receives a stiff sentence. [Chicago Sun-Times]

* Indiana Tech Law School will soon hold a commencement ceremony for its inaugural graduating class of 21 students. These soon-to-be law school graduates say that one of the main reasons they chose to attend the school was its low cost of tuition. Not having a lot of debt is a great thing when your job prospects are uncertain. Congrats! [21Alive]

* John LaTorre, the former chief financial officer of Barry Law School, recently pleaded guilty to second-degree grand theft after spending tens of thousands of dollars on school corporate card to finance his Hooters outings and pay his utilities bills. LaTorre faces up to 10 years of probation and will have to pay the school $24,838 in restitution in monthly payments of at least $175. [Orlando Sentinel]

* Professor Sujit Choudhry may have resigned from his position as dean of Berkeley Law School after being accused in a sexual harassment scandal, but now he says the school is trying to strip him of his tenure, and he’s not going to go down without a fight. In a grievance letter, Choudhry claims school officials smeared him in the press and violated his due process rights. We’ll have more on this development later today. [WSJ Law Blog]

* This “sets back every blind person who wants to be a lawyer out there”: Three blind law students have filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against BARBRI, alleging that the bar exam test preparation company violated the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to properly accommodate them with usable study materials, thereby “preventing them from fully, equally, and adequately preparing for the bar exam.” [Dallas Morning News]

* Just when you thought this ugly legal dispute couldn’t get any messier, one of Dennis Hastert’s sexual assault accusers decided to sue the former Speaker of the House for breach of contract. Identified as James Doe in his pleadings, he alleges that Hastert agreed to pay him $3.5M in hush money for keeping quiet about the abuse he endured when he was a teen, but thus far, he’s only seen $1.7M of those funds. [CBS Chicago]

* It’s late April, and if you’re still looking for advice on your personal statement for your law school applications, then you’re probably already in trouble. However, if you’re desperate for a helpful hint even this late in the game and your law school of choice has a late submission deadline, you may want to try including a thesis — it’ll keep your essay from becoming a regurgitation of your résumé. [Law Admissions Lowdown / U.S. News]

By not reading the Miranda warnings, the cops risk forfeiting your statements, not the arrest itself.

Turns out there are some things the FBI just can't do.

* “My album will never never never be on Apple. And it will never be for sale … You can only get it on Tidal.” Uh-oh! Kanye West and music-streaming service Tidal are facing a proposed $5 million class-action lawsuit over the availability of the rapper’s album, The Life of Pablo, on other streaming services when it was supposed to be exclusive to Tidal. [Rolling Stone]

* Eighteen-year-old Marina Lonina stands accused of livestreaming her friend’s rape on Periscope, and faces charges of rape, sexual battery, and pandering sexual matter involving a minor. The prosecutor alleges the teen hoped the broadcast would stop the rape, but she “got caught up in the likes” instead. [The Cut / New York Magazine]

* Given that “Americans are less likely to support the court when it is portrayed as a political body — as it is during confirmation proceedings — and not a legal body,” it may not be wise for Chief Justice Roberts to enter the debate about nominee Judge Merrick Garland, especially since the SJC’s chair has already criticized him. [New York Times]

* Think twice before you hack a Biglaw firm’s computers, because it’ll cost you a pretty penny. A former IT employee who wreaked havoc upon Locke Lord’s computer network by disabling and deleting hundreds of user accounts was sentenced to more than nine years in prison and ordered to pay $1.69M in restitution. [Courthouse News Service]

* He’s biased, but Dr. Arthur E. Snyder, the president of Indiana Tech, says there is a resounding need for a “different kind of law school” in Indiana. He calls out other schools for growing too large and having to perform layoffs, and says Indiana Tech Law is dedicated to remaining small (likely because no one knows it exists). [News-Sentinel]

Just letting people out of jail is not the answer, it's only the beginning.

Maybe try a little harder next time… like an aunt, perhaps?

* Ted Cruz may not like dildos, but he doesn’t seem to mind legal weed. Earlier this week, the Republican presidential candidate said that while he opposes federal legalization of cannabis, states should be free to experiment because the Constitution allows for it. Colorado’s legalization of recreational marijuana is safe and sound, for now. [Denver Post]

* “It was a very pleasant meeting, but it has changed nothing.” Senate Republicans may want nothing to do with confirming D.C. Circuit Chief Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, but they’ve sure been taking their sweet time telling him “no” during their courtesy meetings with him. Some of these seemingly pointless meetings have gone on for more than an hour. [New York Times]

* Chief Judge Garland may be wasting his time with these lengthy meetings, though, because if the jurist isn’t confirmed before the upcoming presidential election, Senator Bernie Sanders said during last night’s Democratic debate that if he wins, he’d ask President Obama to withdraw his nomination, as he doesn’t think that Garland would pass his progressive litmus test on Citizens United. Are you still feeling the Bern? [TIME]

* Lawmakers in several states have passed bathroom bills that enable bigotry in the name of protecting religious rights, but what you may not have known is that there is one lawyer behind them all. Mathew Staver of Liberty Counsel — who was recently in the news for representing Kentucky clerk Kim Davis — says he’s doing it to push back against the Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling legalizing same-sex marriage. [CBS News]

* Professor Richard Sander of UCLA School of Law, whose claim to academic fame is his “mismatch” theory of affirmative action, has been trying to get more than 30 years’ worth of data from the State Bar of California for quite some time in an effort to continue his research into the “large and persistent gap in bar passage rates among racial and ethnic groups,” and now he’s finally going to get his day in court. [WSJ Law Blog]

* David Gherity, a former Minnesota lawyer who was falsely accused of setting his girlfriend on fire using accelerants like alcohol, lotion, hair spray, and fingernail polish remover, has filed a civil rights suit against the police and prosecutors who kept him in jail for about two months. Gherity, who was suspended from practice in 2004, alleges a violation of the “protected interest in his good name.” [Twin Cities Pioneer Press]

---

Staci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

* A statistical look at this Supreme Court Term tells us what we already suspected: Paul Clement and Jones Day are all over this biyatch. [Empirical SCOTUS]

* What if you ran across a law firm partner who was a jerk? What if the sun rose in the East? [Am Law Daily]

* PROOF THAT TRUMP’S A TROJAN HORSE!!! HIS LAWYER’S A DEMOCRAT!!! That may or may not be what they’re writing over at Drudge. But maybe it’s just that any New Yorker not registered as a Democrat basically forfeits their right to vote on any office of import. [The Hill]

* Wanna hear something stupid? A dumb but ultimately harmless internet attack has landed a guy a two-year prison sentence. I mean, there’s no crime in that — like molesting a dead horse, it’s your right as an American. [Slate]

* Should law schools be forcing students to take on certain kinds of pro bono work… and, for that matter, should faculty be held to the same standards? I don’t know why we’d start holding faculty and students to the same standards now. [TaxProf Blog]

* Have law schools become the “Reverse Robin Hood”? [Chronicle of Higher Education]

* State legislator with oxygen tank not allowed to sit in his assigned seat. He could have been accommodated with an aisle seat, but “those are usually reserved for House committee chairs and senior leaders.” Well, that sounds more important than treating a guy with basic human respect. [WTOP]

A Morgan Stanley managing director was charged after following and confronting a woman whose car he suspected had recklessly cut him off... four days earlier.

* “You’re not getting out of jail today.” Affluenza teen Ethan Couch has been sentenced as an affluenza adult to serve four consecutive 180-day terms for each person who was killed in a fatal drunken-driving car crash he caused in 2013. The judge may reconsider Couch’s sentence in two weeks. [NBC News]

* Who will be the next chair of Baker & McKenzie? Four prominent partners have put their names forward to compete for the title. This would be much more entertaining if it were a Biglaw ladder match where we could watch Paul Rawlinson, Gary Senior, Claudia Prado, and Eric Lasry fight for the shiniest brass ring of them all. [Big Law Business]

* If only law schools had more clinical opportunities for future corporate drones: Law schools have offered students more chances to perform public interest work, but this law professor worries schools are “inculcat[ing] law students with a responsibility of social justice that reflects the morality of the faculty and administration.” [WSJ Law Blog]

* “It doesn’t cry out as a triable case.” Andrew Caspersen, the high-flying Harvard Law grad charged with a $95 million fraud scheme, likely won’t face trial. His lawyer says that he thinks his client’s criminal case will be resolved within the next 60 days. He thinks the case will end in a settlement with the SEC. [DealBook / New York Times]

* Sources say that Donald Trump’s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski will not be prosecuted for battery after an incident with former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields following a press conference in March. Apparently the Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office has a “higher standard to go forward with a prosecution.” [POLITICO]

---

Staci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.

* You may think that your law school graduation speaker is cool, but you should think again, because your law school graduation speaker probably isn’t Vice President Joe Biden. This spring, the Veep will be delivering the commencement address at Syracuse Law, his alma mater. [Syracuse.com]

* Bill Mateja, one of Polsinell’s finest white-collar criminal defense attorneys, will be representing Texas AG Ken Paxton in his latest foray into the wrong side of the justice system. How do we know Bill Mateja is good at getting his clients off? “Unlike many attorneys, Bill Mateja does not expect repeat business.” [Big Law Business]

* The Supreme Court may be behind the times when it comes to technology (cellphones are typically banned inside the courtroom’s walls), but the justices will allow a group of about a dozen deaf and hard-of-hearing lawyers to use them to see a live transcript during their swearing-in ceremony next week. Congratulations to all! [ABC News]

* FBI Director James Comey acknowledges similarities between arguments made in the gun-control debate and Apple’s quest to maintain privacy through encryption, but says “[w]e can’t resolve these really important issues that affect our values — technology, innovation, safety and all kinds of other things — in litigation.” [WSJ Law Blog]

* “There’s a plaintiff who’s sure, his tunes could’ve made gold, and he’s buying a lawsuit in C.D. Cal.” Ever seen a cause of action for the falsification of rock n’ roll history? It’s taken about 40 years to happen, but now Led Zeppelin is going to trial over a copyright claim to its hit song “Stairway to Heaven.” [THR, Esq. / The Hollywood Reporter]

---

Staci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. Follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.