Lanny A. Breuer

3rd Circuit

Non-Sequiturs: 12.30.13

* You can go to jail for possession, but if you actively aid and abet drug cartels, you can walk away with a fine worth 5 weeks of your income. It also helps if instead of “poor” you’re a bank. Hooray for “Too Big To Hold Accountable For Anything!!! [Rolling Stone] * Disney has gotten fed up with “mockbusters,” films that jack the studio’s logo to confuse people into buying a different DVD. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve been itching to check out this new flick September: Osage County. [Jezebel] * Dahlia Lithwick explains that too many schools feel the cure for the trauma of school shootings is… creating more trauma. [Slate] * Chief Judge Theodore McKee of the Third Circuit rules that the government can detain you for carrying Arabic flashcards. This doesn’t even make racist profiling sense: “bad guys” would already know how to speak Arabic, right? [The Raw Story] * Defendants need to understand that getting an acquittal requires them to expend some personal effort, too. [Katz Justice]

By Joe Patrice
Bankruptcy

Morning Docket: 01.25.13

* Lanny Breuer’s resignation from his post as the assistant attorney general for the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice is neither fast nor furious enough for his critics. [Blog of Legal Times] * “I don’t reimburse for taxi and car services around Manhattan.” Judge Martin Glenn is none too pleased with costly expenses billed to the Dewey & LeBoeuf bankruptcy estate by Togut, Segal & Segal, and he's started slashing fees left and right. [Am Law Daily] * The Florida Space Coast School of Law? This totally necessary school has a name that no one will ever be able to make fun of. Please let there be an equally necessary space law concentration. [Daytona Times] * “Being rude is not illegal,” but thanks to The Dirty, it might have some damning consequences for CDA § 230. Maybe it’s a good thing the jurors in this sexy teacher’s defamation case were deadlocked last night. [KY Post] * Julie Taymor settled her suit against the producers of Broadway’s musical adaptation of Spider-Man. It turns out all the judge had to do was schedule a trial date to get the parties to turn off the dark litigation. [Bloomberg] * Here’s an example of legal Kaepernicking: the NFL got to flex its muscles when it strong-armed a football fan into abandoning his trademarks on “Harbowl” and “Harbaugh Bowl” in anticipation of the Super Bowl. [ESPN]

By Staci Zaretsky