No, this isn’t about Jerry Sandusky, but Utah lawprof cum former federal judge Paul Cassell.  It started with a post by  Doug Berman to a  new article on SSRN.  While the link was as neutral as could be, lacking even the most underwhelming adjective of “interesting,” the name of the article began with “Avenging Amy,” an  inflammatory beginning if ever there was one.

The article was written by Steven Joffee, an unfamiliar name. Even more curious, there was nothing on SSRN to suggest the writer’s scholarly affiliation, though this article was to be published in the Whittier Journal of Child and Family Advocacy, whatever that is.  The abstract of the article included verbiage that couldn’t be ignored:

Although Congress intended for Section 2259 to apply in any case in which a victim has “suffered harm” as a result of a defendant’s conduct, its inclusion of the term “proximate result” in the Act’s catchall loss provision has created much confusion amongst federal courts. As a result of this confusion, several courts have simply ignored the mandatory language of Section 2259 and have flatly refused to award victims of child pornography with restitution, ultimately rendering the Act mere rhetoric.

To resolve this debate, and to end the further victimization of child pornography victims by courts refusing to grant restitution, the United States Supreme Court should grant certiorari to resolve this issue, or alternatively, Congress should amend the Act to make the requisite level of causation more clear. Only by resolving this issue will Congress’ intent to provide all victims harmed by child pornography with full compensation be achieved, ensuring that those who harm the “Amys” of this world will be held fully responsible for their abhorrent conduct. (Emphasis added.)

While advocates of victims rights tended to flee reason and hide behind blatant appeals to emotion, no one had ever suggested that judges, by failing to extend restitution as far as their long arm could reach, were complicit in the “victimization” of children. The use of poor “Amy” as the mechanism to argue for blind extension of §2259 was cheap and tawdry. 

Interest could have died there, with some new jumper on the bandwagon, whoever he might be.  The “Amy” argument has been beat to death, like when the DEA passed the same O’Haus scale around from trial to trial, changing the evidence tag so no one knows they use the same one over and over.  But there was still the question of who this writer was, and why he made Berman’s radar.

It didn’t take long to get an answer.  Steven Joffee is a clerk at the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Six months before, he was a clerk at the Utah Supreme Court. And just over a year before that, he was the Executive Editor for the Utah Law Review, before he graduated in the “top 5%” of his class. 

He’s just a baby.  He’s never practiced law, though he may think that watching real lawyers from a distance is almost the same thing. If he holds true to form, will spend a few years in the United States Attorneys office before joining the faculty of a law school to take his rightful place as a scholar. 

But Utah law school?  Coincidence? I think not, as his association with Utah lawprof Cassell came into focus. As horrible as poor “Amy” has been victimized in the Misty series of kiddie porn (and let it be clear that this was horrific victimization of a child), there has been no one who has “pimped” Amy as the poster girl for restitution beyond any rational extreme. When will Amy stop being used?

What are the chances that bright law student Steven Joffee has fallen into the clutches of zealous victims rights advocate Paul Cassell in his position as teacher? For Joffee to embrace such an extremist view suggests that he’s been indoctrinated by his professor, the most renown advocate of such extremism.  When Joffee decided to go to law school, did he expect to become a adherent of Paul Cassell’s victims rights religion?

Steven Joffee’s career path is likely calculated to lead back to law school, where his polished resume (aside from attending Utah Law School rather than Harvard, a bit of a stumbling block) will be admired to some school’s faculty hiring committee.  He’s being groomed for scholarly greatness. It’s not easy to get a clerkship with a circuit court, and a good word from a former federal judge surely helps.

Will Steven Joffee, his mind filled with angry visions of Amy and his career obsessed with vindicating Paul Cassell’s dream of restitution for victims in every case, no matter how tenuous (or non-existent) the connection, end up teaching this ideology to law students one day? 

No doubt he was a good law student, and likely a very smart young man. But he will never have any business, none, of teaching law students, passing along the indoctrination he received to the bizarre and irrational world of victims rights to unwitting others.  It’s bad enough if his young mind was molded by an ideologue, ruining what might otherwise have been an thoughtful scholar. But law school isn’t an opportunity for religious conversions of impressionable minds by filling it with dogma.

Paul Cassell may have worked his magic, used his voodoo to fill the mind of his young adherent with his fiery images of a harmed child named Amy.  Steven Joffee may be lost to the religion of victims rights.  But there is no place for demagogues, ideologues, religious fanatics or the brilliant but blind in our law schools. 

Let no child be harmed by Steven Joffee, even though he may be the poster boy for the damage done by Paul Cassell.  Don’t let Joffee get ’em while they’re young.  Don’t let him anywhere near a law student.