The argument made to the jury about the person whose crimes are forgiven, who is taken into the DEA fold, is that when angels are involved in drugs, witnesses will be angels. Until then, the government is constrained to use the services of scoundrels to win the War on Drugs. And it works. All the time.

So what if the “confidential informant,” the euphemism for the mutt who yesterday was the worst lying scum alive but today, in the service of the DEA, is somehow rehabilitated into a reformed sinner repenting for his misdeeds. And, usually, working them off any way he can.

But just how bad must a snitch be to fall below the threshold of DEA love? Edward Quintana tested the depths to which the government would go, and the DEA failed the test. Or, according to the Tenth Circuit, the DEA won, because qualified immunity precluded culpability for their allowing Quintana to be out and free to sexually molest Jason Estrada’s minor son, and then murder Estrada. Continue reading →

My pal, Brian Cuban, has been a strong voice for lawyers who suffer, whether from mental illness or addiction, to seek help, pushing to remove the stigma that prevents lawyers from doing so for fear of ridicule and rejection. He’s taught me to appreciate the problem and value of dealing with it.

To be fair, it hasn’t been easy. While I can certainly appreciate Brian’s, not to mention other lawyers with whom I’m good friends and for whom I hold great respect, perspective, the flip side of the equation is clients. What about clients? Should they be represented by lawyers who, at any moment, might slip into mental illness, disappear in a fog of addiction?

Is there a way to reconcile the needs of lawyers to help themselves and the needs of clients to be helped by mentally healthy, non-drug addled lawyers whose foremost concern is them? Isn’t that why lawyers exist, to serve clients rather than have a place to go to every morning where they can feel comforted and secure? Continue reading →

In his April 13th letter to Steven Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury, demanding Trump’s tax returns, Chair of the Ways and Means Committee Richard Neal relies on a foundational principle that is critical to making government function, the presumption of regularity.

Third, concerns about what the Committee may do with the tax returns and return information are baseless.  As my April 3rd letter noted, this request falls squarely within the Committee’s oversight authority.  It is well-established law in the D.C. Circuit that “[t]he presumption of regularity supports the official acts of public officers and, in the absence of clear evidence to the contrary, courts presume that they have properly discharged their official duties.” Sussman v. U.S. Marshals Serv., 494 F.3d 1106, 1117 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (citation omitted); Exxon Corp. v. FTC, 589 F.2d 582, 589 (D.C. Cir. 1978) (“committees of Congress will exercise their powers responsibly and with due regard for the rights of affected parties.”).  In other words, the IRS, Treasury, and Justice must assume that the Committee Members, like all government officials, will act properly in the conduct of their official duties.

Does anyone still believe it? There is certainly a significant contingent of the citizenry who doubts Trump’s good faith and honesty, mostly because he can’t tell the truth about much of anything and keeps getting caught in ridiculous lies. Is Congress any more credible? Is the attorney general or the treasury secretary? Continue reading →

They were on sale, and I needed a new pair of pajamas, so Dr. SJ bought me a pair. After all, they were from Brooks Brothers, so they had to be good, amirite? Like me, she’s a sucker for legacy, the memory of when a haberdasher like Brooks Brothers sold clothing of exceptional quality, fit and finish, design; the sort of clothing one would have and wear for many years to come.

The pajamas arrived. They were not good. So I went to the website and left a comment, giving them two stars out of five and explaining that the flannel was thin, the details of manufacture were inadequate, lacking pockets or elastic in the draw-string waistband, which was minimally expected of a decent pair of pajamas.

These might be fine in the bargain bin of a big box store, but not what one should expect of a store like Brooks Brothers. I said that I would not recommend that anyone purchase these pajamas. It wasn’t a long review, but sufficient to register my view. Continue reading →

Building on his work over more than a decade, Radley Balko asked 20 Questions of the candidates seeking the 2020 Democratic nomination for president. Put aside whatever quibbles you have about the framing of the questions, as he’s tried to be as neutral as possible in how they’re framed in order to ask a question that would get a meaningful response. And he’s done a fine job of it.

But his 19th question raises an issue that was a hot topic here a decade ago, as I took the position that Sonia Sotomayor was an excellent choice for the Supreme Court. While she checked the boxes for female and Hispanic, which was a big issue at the time, neither of those factors commended her nomination. There was no doubt an Hispanic woman could be a justice, but being an Hispanic woman wasn’t enough. Not by a mile. My support was based on her legal experience. Continue reading →

Who cooks? Cleans? Does the laundry? Cares for the sick child? Women are pissed that it’s assumed they will do it all. Not those women who are married to shitlords, but women who thought their spouses were allies, the “good” husbands.

The optimistic tale of the modern, involved dad has been greatly exaggerated. The amount of child care men performed rose throughout the 1980s and ’90s, but then began to level off without ever reaching parity. Mothers still shoulder 65 percent of child-care work. In academic journals, family researchers caution that the “culture of fatherhood” has changed more than fathers’ actual behavior.

Fathers still shoulder 95% of the lawn mowing and spider killing, but spiders are yucky. Continue reading →

Much like cops, who believe they have a magical ability to tell when someone is lying, prosecutors similarly believe they possess that skill.

The prosecutor, Stacey Tenney, later told me that she knew Michelle was lying. Of course she was lying.

People often wonder why, after DNA proves a defendant innocent, prosecutors maintain their certainty of guilt, often using it to justify their hiding the Brady or fighting to the end to prevent the DNA from being tested after a conviction. It’s because they’re magic. They know. They’re not going to let that filthy scum get off just because of . . . evidence. He’s guilty. They just know it.

The New York Times brings that same delusion to domestic abuse, with its headline writer asking perhaps the dumbest possible question. Continue reading →

The battle arose from one of the most unfortunate but pervasive problems in family law. A couple with kids divorces, and decisions are made at the time about who gets physical custody and decision-making authority over the children of the union. Often, it’s by agreement between the parents. Sometimes, the bitterness requires a judge to intervene.

Unsurprisingly, the mother almost always gets the kids, even if the father cares deeply, is fully prepared to be the nurturing parent  and is the better choice. You have to really suck as a mother not to prevail, claims of equality and mental labor notwithstanding.

But then, the ordinary expectation is that the decision-making parents will deal with the unpleasant choices of bed time, schooling, religious training and whether to coerce their child to eat peas. When the decision involves something more dramatic, does the agreement reached between spouses, or imposed by judicial fiat, still suffice? Continue reading →

When I was a kid, the television told me that if I wore Keds, I would run faster, jump higher. Did they work? I wouldn’t know, as my mother bought my sneakers from the big bin at the supermarket. But a little more than a decade later, Adidas was selling sneakers with three stripes for a lot more than PF Flyers and people were buying.

They stopped calling them sneakers and started calling them athletic shoes. Soon, there were different types for specific sports, and everybody knew that you should run in running shoes and play hoops in basketball shoes. Did the kids wearing the expensive sneakers athletic shoes play better? Maybe, but if so, it wasn’t because of the shoes. They just played better.

Castor Semenya runs faster. No doubt she’s got some sweet shoes, but even if she wore Keds, she would run faster. Isn’t that the point of being a middle distance runner, to run faster? Continue reading →

The analogy Keith Kaplan made to me was a good one. Can you imagine some biglaw firm coming in as amicus on behalf of the government in a criminal prosecution? It seems ridiculous, but then, it occurred to me that it’s not as outlandish as it would appear at first blush. What, for example, if the government cut a sweetheart deal with a billionaire? Or maybe some judge approved a plea deal to let a statutory rapist off with probation? As Judy Tenuta used to say, “it could happen.”

My hope and expectation is that the Texas Tornado, Mark Bennett, will get down in the weeds to parse the substance of the argument made by the Duke Law School First Amendment Clinic in its amicus brief arguing against the challenge by criminal defendant, John Rivello, for sending an “animated strobe gif” to “known epileptic” Kurt Eichenwald. The particulars of the case are one thing; the fact that Duke’s First Amendment Clinic proffers its mission to be to limit the First Amendment to speech that law students deem worthy goes well beyond the particulars of this case. Continue reading →