Jerry E. Smith

5th Circuit

Morning Docket: 05.07.12

* While Dewey’s former culture gets roasted on a spit, and the seemingly unending drama gets turned into a montage of living lawyer jokes, we’re still waiting for the final punchline. [New York Times; Wall Street Journal] * Don Verrilli tried so hard, and got so far (depending on who you ask), but in the end, it doesn’t even matter. When Linkin Park lyrics apply to your oral argument skills, you know you’re kind of screwed. [New York Times] * The 9/11 arraignments went off without a hitch this weekend. And by that, we mean that it was a 13 hour hearing filled multiple interruptions, and grandstanding about “appropriate” courtroom fashion. [Fox News] * In a “re-re-reversal,” Judge Jerry Smith, on a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit, reinstated Planned Parenthood’s injunction against Texas, without even so much as a homework assignment. [Dallas Observer] * The It Gets Worse Project: if you thought that the Law School Transparency debt figures were scary before, then take a look at them now. Six figures of debt just got a lot harder to swallow. [National Law Journal] * Scalia gets busted on a case of hot-dog hooking. No, not that Scalia. A woman from Long Island has been accused, for the second time, of selling swallowing foot-longs in the back of her food truck. [New York Post]

By Staci Zaretsky
Barack Obama

Morning Docket: 04.05.12

* “I think that you know what the president said … was appropriate.” While the DOJ scrambles to meet Judge Smith’s memo deadline, Attorney General Eric Holder is busy defending Obama’s con law faux pas. [CNN] * Six more partners have fled from Dewey & LeBoeuf, bringing the grand total of partner defections to at least 46 since January. Good Lord, somebody needs to get this firm a freakin’ tourniquet. [Wall Street Journal] * Facebook filed a motion to dismiss Paul Ceglia’s ownership claims, but he isn’t going anywhere soon. Ceglia’s got two months to submit expert reports as to the authenticity of his fake contract. [Associated Press] * Joe Jamail, America’s richest practicing lawyer, donated his $3M law library to TSU’s Thurgood Marshall School of Law. Now students can learn more so they don’t have to sue over being graded on a curve. [Fox] * McDonald’s doesn’t have to worry about its G-rated Happy Meal toys in California anymore. It’s that XXX-rated lawsuit over a former employee’s “Filet-O-Fish” that the company’s really got to keep an eye on. [Reuters]

By Staci Zaretsky
Non-Sequiturs

Non-Sequiturs: 04.04.12

* The best part of this story isn’t how the company analogizes itself to a pack of hyenas, it’s how it fundamentally misconstrues the hunting habits of hyenas. [Dealbreaker] * So this school bans a “Jesus is not a Homophobe” t-shirt because it’s indecent? Saying that the so-called Lord and Savior doesn’t hate people is indecent? Man, I love God, but the people working for him are a$$holes. [The Volokh Conspiracy] * A sex offender’s probation banned him from Facebook, but he couldn’t stay away, and now he’s in jail for ten years. I don’t see why he couldn’t stay away, most of it is just pictures of babies and… oh man, that’s freaking sick! [Not-So Private Parts / Forbes] * Was this a tip or drug money? I don’t see why it can’t be both. [Associate Press] * This must be how Jones Day gets so many clients. [What About Clients?] * Lat said he was on the fence about Judge Jerry Smith’s benchslap of the DOJ and President Obama. Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post has stronger opinions. [Washington Post] * Between the Supreme Court authorizing strip searches and the ongoing travesty of the TSA, I’m pretty close to just walking around naked all the time to save everybody the trouble of disrobing the Big Sexy. [Borowitz Report]

By Elie Mystal
5th Circuit

Morning Docket: 04.04.12

* AG Eric Holder can thank Obama for this homework assignment from Fifth Circuit Judge Jerry Smith, because it seems like our president, a former con law professor, forgot about Marbury v. Madison. [CBS News] * Dewey need to buy this Biglaw firm a functional calculator? New information shows that the imploding firm was off by roughly $153M when partners reported 2011 earnings to the American Lawyer. [Am Law Daily] * You know there’s got to be something questionable about a law school when the accreditation machine that is the ABA gives it the side eye. And no, Duncan Law, a judge still won’t force its hand. [National Law Journal] * Stephen McDaniel pleaded not guilty at his arraignment for the murder of Mercer Law classmate Lauren Giddings, but will he be released on bail before trial? Only if he’s got $2.5M sitting around. [Macon Telegraph] * More law school lawsuits are coming down the pipeline, but local lawyers in Massachusetts don’t think that they stand a chance. Why? The highly-educated consumer argument strikes again. [Boston Business Journal] * Thanks to Gloria Allred, transgender beauty queen Jenna Talackova may be able to participate in the Miss Universe pageant if she can meet the legal requirements for being a woman in Canada. [MSNBC]

By Staci Zaretsky