Ed Mullins has a way with words. A really bad way with words.

You are all a disgrace. You sit on your ass and target the NYPD all while growing up on the nipple of what’s easy. You have no clue what a NYPD officer does yet target us and disparage our integrity. One day you will dial 911 when evil is at your door and thank god for the NYPD. https://t.co/8I00FD7hny

— SBA (@SBANYPD) May 5, 2018

Mullins is the president of the Sergeants Benevolent Association, the second-string bargaining unit in the NYPD. And it’s his job to say whatever he must to defend the honor of his union members or get ousted and be required to work for a living. Continue reading →

Nice business you have there. It would be a shame if anything happened to it. Whether the threat comes from the mob or the governor, it’s not a threat one takes lightly in New York. This time, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has ordered it be used against the National Rifle Association.

“I am directing the Department of Financial Services to urge insurers and bankers statewide to determine whether any relationship they may have with the NRA or similar organizations sends the wrong message to their clients and their communities who often look to them for guidance and support,” the governor wrote in a statement.

Whether anyone looks to bankers and insurers for “guidance and support” is a question few consider, probably because no one has ever done so, but what other words could Andy use to explain why he was using his authority over regulatory agencies to deny basic availability of private services to an organization that supported a cause he didn’t? He has to say something, and “because they’re awful and we need to destroy them” sounds a little negative. Nobody likes a governor who is negative. Continue reading →

The Connecticut Supreme Court reversed Michael Skakel’s murder conviction. Years ago, this would have been huge, but memories fade. The murder occurred in 1975. Skakel was convicted in 2002. His conviction was vacated in 2013, and reinstated in 2016. Now it’s been reversed again and remanded for a new trial. The basis was ineffective assistance of counsel.

Almost no one gets a reversal based on Strickland, as the test is essentially impossible to meet. Skakel did.

Mickey Sherman is a handsome guy with one of the most magnificent smiles ever. For a while, his smiling face was everywhere. He was a media darling, available on a moment’s notice for every cable new show. He knew which green rooms had the good food and which served tap water. He was, for a brief and shining moment, the media’s “It” lawyer. Heady times to be Mickey Sherman. Continue reading →

Trump says they’re all rapists. Some people in Arizona applauded Crazy Joe’s roundups of everybody with an accent, darkish skin or a vowel on the end of their name. But yesterday, on the fifth, people held parties, drank Coronas with a wedge of lime, ate guac without peas and maybe wore a sombrero.

Most of the festivities surrounding #CincodeMayo in the US are textbook examples of cultural appropriation, relegating the history and culture of Mexican people to novelty items. Mexican culture cannot be reduced to tacos, oversized sombreros and piñatas. https://t.co/kffsaJWPUJ

— Southern Poverty Law Center (@splcenter) May 5, 2018

It’s absurd enough that a once-honorable group has allowed itself to become a parody in search of a mission, but what could be gained by shifting from condemning lynchings and unmasking the Klan to scolding party-goers for enjoying a taco? Continue reading →

The first thrust was to include more writers of color, but once Reedies Against Racism tasted blood, they went for it all. And they got it.

Reedies Against Racism, a student group at Reed College, is demanding that the school’s Humanities 110 course remove all European texts and replace them with non-European reading materials as “reparations for Humanities 110’s history of erasing the histories of people of color, especially black people.”

Those classics that every moderately well-educated person reads in college? Racist. All white men, Europeans. And they even came up with a cool name for it. Continue reading →

Following news of Eastern District of Virginia Judge T.S. Ellis’ putting some pointed questions to Michael Dreeban, the prosecutor from Bob Mueller’s Special Counsel office prosecuting former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, a segment of the internet exploded in outrage at his disrespectful lack of civility.

“I don’t see what relation this indictment has with anything the special counsel is authorized to investigate,” he said, according to a transcript of the hourlong hearing on a defense motion to dismiss the charges. He added, “What we don’t want in this country is we don’t want anyone with unfettered power.”

Of course, this was a judge appointed by Reagan, so he must have been biased, as is assumed these days of all judges by dint of their patrons. That made his more explicit question all the more uncivil. Continue reading →

It’s an old joke. Much like the “dirty old man” jokes that were commonplace years ago, this harkens back to the days of fancy department stores with elevator operators who would announce what Macy’s had for sale as the door opened on each floor. And Professor Richard Ned Lebow, told it.

Those two words — the speaker remembers saying “ladies’ lingerie,” a passenger who was offended recalls hearing “women’s lingerie” — have turned into the latest exemplar in the academy of political correctness gone wild.

The episode, which has not been previously reported, occurred last month in San Francisco at the annual meeting of the International Studies Association. Richard Ned Lebow, a professor of political theory at King’s College London and the 2014 recipient of ISA’s distinguished scholar award, made the remark after someone in his elevator called out to ask for floor requests.

Not funny? Fair enough. You don’t have to find somebody else’s joke a knee-slapper. In fact, you can find it pretty bad, stupid, even awful. But Simona Sharoni found it more than she could take. Continue reading →

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that he’s now in favor of safe injection sites. Whether you think it’s a good idea (I do) or not isn’t important for the purpose of this post. What is important is that it comes from the mayor. Not Cy Vance, the district attorney.

Why? It’s not Vance’s job. In contrast, Philadelphia district attorney Larry Krasner announced the same for his jurisdiction, to the applause of reformers. It’s understandable, as they strongly support the initiative, and it wasn’t coming from anyone but Krasner. He also announced that he would stop prosecuting people for shooting up there. And for using pot.

These may well be great initiatives, the ones people had long hoped would change. But they changed not because legislatures changed the laws, or executives changed the policies, but because reform district attorneys decided to change their job. This has become the new push for reform. Continue reading →

A question was posed by an honorable Nebraska fellow as to how an old trench lawyer might view the efficacy of a president having a chat with a special counsel charged with investigating him. While I may lack the inscrutable tactical acumen of former United States Attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who foretold that he would have this wrapped up* in “a week or two,” a few considerations come to mind.

It’s often beneficial to agree to an interview.** It allows a target or subject the opportunity to do so at his relative convenience and to fully prepare in advance for the interview. There is much to be gleaned from the questions asked, the tone of the interrogation, even the people at the table. Everything from who does the questioning to the “tells” of those taking notes provides insight into what they’re truly interested in, what they’re trying to get out.

Understand that there are invariably questions posed which they already know the answer to, or at least believe they do, so as to create the “perjury trap.” Often, these questions are posed in a tricky way, often overbroad or impossible to answer with complete accuracy. Any crack in the response can be exploited as a lie by a reasonably competent prosecutor. Still, knowing this going in makes it far easier to address. Continue reading →

Saifullah Khan was acquitted. The allegations brought against the Yale grad student went before a jury and, after due deliberation, the jury said no. Not Guilty. In a rational world, that would be the end of that, but this isn’t a rational world. It’s Yale.

Saifullah Khan, the former Yale student who was found not guilty of sexual assault by a criminal court in March, said on Monday that the University Wide Committee on Sexual Assault has resumed its hearing process on his case to determine whether he can re-enroll at Yale.

Before you mumble anything about double jeopardy, it’s not. The Yale process isn’t criminal, but regulatory. More importantly, the same distinction that allows a federal defendant to be sentenced for acquitted conduct, or an acquitted defendant to be put on the sex offender registry, comes into play. Continue reading →