As commenters here know, there is an email that comes verifying the commenter’s email address before your comment will be posted.  No big deal, and those who leave bogus email addresses may be surprised when their piece of genius fails to see daylight.

But today was a first.  A comment was left by a lawyer using the name, John Doe.  I suspect the name to be a pseudonym.  He left a message on July 2, 2009. on a post entitled What the Trial or Plea Issue Shows About Sentencing Disparities (Update).  It was a fine post, but nothing earthshattering.

Today, more than 14 months later, I received notification that Mr. Doe (which I still don’t believe to be his true name) has responded to the verification email.  There have been occasional delays in responding in the past.  A couple days. A week.  Maybe 10 days once.  But never, ever has there been a delay of this length of time.

Dear Mr. Doe. You need to make a serious effort to stay on top of your email.  Really, 14 months is too long. 

Years ago, I was representing a young attorney in a civil action who was being deposed.  Throughout the questioning, he kept glancing down toward his crotch.  For the record, there was nothing otherwise remarkable about his crotch.  What he was doing was looking at his Crackberry every few seconds.  I’ve got no idea what he was anticipating, if anything, that was so compelling that he would risk blowing the deposition, but his responses to questions were, to be kind, less than adequate.

I told the other lawyer that I needed a five minute break, and pulled my client toward the door with me.  Without a word, I continued to drag him until we came to the men’s room.  We entered, after which I grabbed the Crackberry from his hand and threw it down against the tiles.

This is what it looked like:

I cannot begin to put into the words the sense of satisfaction I felt as it shattered.

Yes, there is a generation gap.  I admit it.  Mea culpa.

H/T Turley (and looking forward to your returning the favor any day now.  Any day…)

There were two bad reactions in the blogosphere last week.  The first was the reaction to a post.  The second was the reaction to the reaction.  Both offer lessons.

The situation began with a post by University of Chicago lawprof Todd Henderson, who wrote at Truth on the Market (cached version of the original post, which Henderson subsequently deleted; more about that later) of the difficulty of surviving on a salary of $250,000 per year.  The point of his post was that the elimination of tax cuts for the “rich” wasn’t exactly limited to the “rich”.  Henderson explained how he could barely afford the gardener or the nanny.

In response, Berkeley Professor Michael O’Hare ripped him a new one in a post entitled, “The whining of the rich.” 

The next time you come upon a Chicago law professor in his scuffed Gucci loafers and tattered Armani on the sidewalk, holding up his libertarian down-with-government sign and shaking his tin cup to get his doctor wife and hollow-eyed waifs through another tough week in their million-dollar hovel, please don’t just walk by. Remember, it could be you. Be a mensch: throw a nice shiny 3/8″ washer and couple of nickel slugs in there, with my blessings.

And so the storm erupted.  Henderson initially removed his post, stating that while he stood by it, he had posted personal information that involved his family without his wife’s permission, and deleted the post to preserve their privacy.

In retrospect, it was a highly effective but incredibly stupid thing to do. The electronic lynch mob that has attacked and harassed me — you should see the emails sent to me personally! — has made my family feel threatened and insecure.

To my wife, my three children, and to anyone who was offended by my remarks, please accept my apologies. To those with pitchforks trying to attack me instead of my message, I feel sorry for you. You have caused untold damage to me personally. I may be wrong, even stupid, but I don’t think I deserved that.

Henderson offers no examples of the personal attacks that caused him “untold damage,”  It would come as no surprise that many who are forced to survive on a mere $200,000, even less, were unhappy about his post.  Maybe some, even many, sent him emails that called him horrible names and told him that they thought bad things should happen to him.  If the comments to his post are any indication, they were no doubt vicious, and it was probably very unpleasant to be Todd Henderson.

It was more than Todd Henderson could take.  Rather than face the heat, Henderson quit.

But as Kashmir Hill writes in Forbes, tough nuggies.

I must say that while strong opinions are rewarded on the Internet, so is thick skin. Personal attacks come with the territory when you write online.

It’s a shame that Henderson is e-retiring. But maybe with the extra time he’ll have not blogging, he can find some odd jobs to make more money for that potential tax increase.

The verity of the blawgosphere depends on both of these things, the ability to say what you believe, and the will to take the heat for it.  Henderson had the former, but not the latter. 

What makes this bang-up particularly instructive is that it happened in the academic blawgosphere, where subtlety and nuance reign supreme.  Usually, the harshest thing anyone ever writes is that another prof’s post is “curious”, meaning that it stunk to high heaven.  They have an entirely different vocabulary, where never a negative word is uttered.  To see this sort of harsh rhetoric was, well, unimaginable a short time ago.  The wall of gentility and civility has collapsed.

In the practical blawgosphere, once inhabited by practicing lawyers who were used to the rough and tumble of court battles and capable of standing their ground when faced with a frontal challenge, this would have been taken in stride.  This wasn’t a world populated by hand-wringing sissies, happy to throw a punch but unable to take one.  We said what we meant, and we took the heat for it.  When it turned out we said something stupid, we were tough enough to admit it.  Either way, we didn’t cut and run. 

As the academic blawgosphere gets rougher, the practical blawgosphere has, curiously, gotten softer, collapsing under the weight of shameless self-promotion, cowardice and disingenuousness.  We used to call the lawprofs teacups, but they’ve gained an appreciation of integrity that used to belong to the practical blawgosphere.  It looks like the joke’s on us.

A significant investigation by USA Today was revealed yesterday, concluding that misconduct happens at the Department of Justice.  As my knees wobbled, I grabbed the arm of my chair to prevent my falling on the ground in shock, trying desperately to catch my breath.  Misconduct?  Department of Justice?  Really?

Why do they call it the Department of Justice?  Because the Department of Convictions doesn’t sound as good.  It’s not as if any federal prosecutor has ever celebrated an acquittal as “justice being done,” so that it comes as a surprise that prosecutors push the envelope is, well, a surprise. 

The gist of the article is that there is a pattern of misconduct at the Department of Justice.  Nathan Burney, a former prosecutor, deals with the excuses.

• We’re sorry, a caseload of 14 went up to 28?  Boo freaking hoo.
• The whole “they’re not used to losing” thing is just cockiness.
• And the lack of supervision and training isn’t much of an explanation, either.  An honest person isn’t going to cheat, regardless of whether someone else is watching or not.
• The most insightful explanation here is the observation that the end justifies the means.  Breaking the rules is fine if, at the end of the day, it ensures that the criminal gets convicted.

Then again, maybe that cockiness really is a factor after all.  We said as much just last week, so it must be true.  Only we called it “hubris” instead.

Federal cases usually are rock-crushers.  The sentences are beyond belief, even for the stupidest stuff.  The rules are stacked against defendants.  In many cases, even the best lawyers advise clients to take whatever the feds deign to offer, which is usually not much.  So it shouldn’t come as much surprise that the feds can sometimes get sloppy.  They just don’t get a lot of pushback, and it’s easy to slide into a “good enough for government work” mentality.

But the USA Today article, while taking on certain aspects of this long-known, flagrantly obvious problem, falls into the same apologist trap that permeates mainstream discussion of flaws within the criminal justice system.

Judges have warned for decades that misconduct by prosecutors threatens the Constitution’s promise of a fair trial.

And yet judges, the putative neutrals in an adversary system, turn a blind eye to allegations, even proof, of misconduct in all but the most flagrant and undeniable of cases, or those involving the most politically or economically powerful.

Yet USA TODAY documented 201 criminal cases in the years that followed in which judges determined that Justice Department prosecutors — the nation’s most elite and powerful law enforcement officials — themselves violated laws or ethics rules.

Out of tens of thousands of cases, a mere 201?  Bizarrely, USA Today takes credit for “documenting” cases in which judges have already determined that prosecutors did wrong.  We call this a Lexis search.

The Constitution, Congress and courts have set elaborate rules to ensure jurors get the facts and aren’t swayed by emotion or fear. Rules are particularly exacting for prosecutors, as they act with government authority and their mistakes can put people in prison.

One of those rules, established by the Supreme Court nearly 50 years ago in a case called Brady v. Maryland, is that prosecutors must tell defendants about evidence that could help prove their innocence. Withholding that evidence is “reprehensible,” the court later said.

Nonetheless, USA TODAY identified 86 cases in which judges found that prosecutors had failed to turn over evidence to defendants.

While “elaborate rules” seems a bit excessive, given that Brady turnover is notable for its near-absence of specific requirements aside from the long-time joke of prosecutors deciding what constitutes Brady and turning it over at the last possible second, if at all, the real culprit in this passage is that USA Today identified 86 cases,  EIGHTY-SIX!, where judges found prosecutors failed to turn over Brady material. Damning with faint condemnation. 

Aw, come on, guys.   This is the basis for your conclusion that there is a pattern of misconduct?

USA TODAY found a pattern of “serious, glaring misconduct,” said Pace University law professor Bennett Gershman, an expert on misconduct by prosecutors. “It’s systemic now, and … the system is not able to control this type of behavior. There is no accountability.”

Notice that Gershman speaks to systemic failure, while USA Today comes up with a grand total of 86 Brady violations?  It sure sounds to me as if this falls under the rubric, not perfect but the best there is.  They’ve trivialized the problem, minimized its scope and diminished its impact to a handful of cases. 

Didn’t anyone tell USA Today that there might be a few cases where bad things happened and judges failed to rush to the rescue by finding prosecutorial misconduct?  Or maybe that never happens, since judges are so deeply concerned about the defendant receiving a fair trial, and bend over backwards to make sure that the prosecution complies with the rules. 

Among the consequences of misconduct, wrongful convictions are the most serious, said former U.S. attorney general Dick Thornburgh. He said, “No civilized society should countenance such conduct or systems that failed to prevent it.”

Dick Thornburgh?  Would that be the same former Attorney General who in 1989 issued the infamous Thornburgh Memo that concluded that federal prosecutors were exempt from ethical and disciplinary proscriptions that apply to all other lawyers?

This nugget contains one of the most insidious implications of the article, that only the innocent are entitled to a fair trial, free from prosecutorial misconduct.  Years ago, Daily News newspaper columnist Murray Kempton wrote, “there they go again, framing the guilty.”  These words have rung in my ears ever since. 

“Prosecutors think they’re doing the Lord’s work, and that they wear the white hat. When I was a prosecutor, I thought everything I did was right,” said Jack Wolfe, a former federal prosecutor in Texas and now a defense lawyer. “So even if you got out of line, you could tell yourself that you didn’t do it on purpose, or that it was for the greater good.”

Burney, the former prosecutor, agrees:

The most insightful explanation here is the observation that the end justifies the means.  Breaking the rules is fine if, at the end of the day, it ensures that the criminal gets convicted.

Sadly, few member of the public would disagree with this, since the guilty are bad and deserve whatever happens to them.  Prosecutors agree.  Cops and Agents agree.  Judges agree. The public agrees.  No harm, no foul, as determined by the outcome.

No one, myself included, wants to discourage a newspaper, even one as white bread as USA Today, from doing an investigation into prosecutorial misconduct.  But such efforts come along so seldom that such a pale, superficial one as this does little to clean up the mess, and covers up the culpability of other cogs in the wheels of justice. 

Judges have found prosecutorial misconduct in 201 cases.  Judges have found Brady disclosure failures in 86 cases.  There has been a grand total of one federal prosecutor disciplined.

How often prosecutors deliberately violate the rules is impossible to know. The Justice Department’s internal ethics watchdog, the Office of Professional Responsibility, insists it happens rarely.

Well then, I guess we can all sleep well tonight, as long as it’s not our butt on the line.  USA Today has it well under control.

Reading this post by Doug Berman, it dawned on me that Paul Cassell hasn’t posted anything at Volokh Conspiracy in a while.  Given his position as a leading advocate for the rights of crime victims since his quitting the federal bench, it’s left me with the impression that all is quiet on the CVRA extremist front.  I’ve had occasion to take issue with Judge Cassell’s positions.

Doug’s post has shaken me out of my complacency, and reminded me that there are people doing dastardly deeds even while Paul Cassell sleeps.  More particularly, in Pennsylvania, producing this decision out of the Third Circuit.

Petitioner David Zackey, victim of a fraudulent scheme perpetrated by Defendant Joseph P. Donahue, seeks a writ of mandamus to enforce his right under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (“CVRA”), 18 U.S.C. § 3771(d)(3), to be reasonably heard at sentencing. 18 U.S.C. § 3711(a)(4). Under Count Fifteen of the Indictment, Donahue was found guilty of credit card fraud under 18 U.S.C. § 1029(a)(2) for engaging in a course of conduct in which Zackey was victimized. Zackey seeks full restitution as provided by law, including attorneys fees, and an upward departure of the sentencing guidelines.  Zackey contends that the District Court failed to afford him the full scope of his rights available under the CVRA by improperly denying his motion to allow Attorney Jessica Richman to enter an appearance on the record and represent Zackey at sentencing.

The CVRA entitles a crime victim, “or a crime victim’s lawful representative,” to be heard.  Zackey, the victim of Donahue’s credit card fraud that destroyed Zackey’s credit and caused enormous problems in his life, went out and hired a lawyer to represent him.  Way to go, Zackey!  The lawyer, Jessica Richman, sought to do what lawyers naturally seek to do, enter an appearance and speak.

Zackey sought full restitution, including Ms. Richman’s legal fees, as well as an upward departure at Donahue’s sentence.  The government was right there with him, agreeing to pursue his demands.  But that left Richman in the well, all dressed up but nowhere to go.  Not good enough, Zackey said.

The CVRA provides that a “crime victim or the crime victim’s lawful representative, and the attorney for the Government” may assert a victim’s rights under the act. 18 U.S.C. § 3771(d)(1). In denying Richman’s motion to enter an appearance, the District Court held that the CVRA “does not require that [a victim] be represented by counsel when being heard, or that victim’s counsel be allowed to speak during the sentencing or any other proceeding in the case,” and it concluded that the assistance of the U.S. Attorney would be “sufficient for determining a proper sentence.”  Significantly, the District Court held that it “recognizes that David Zackey has a right to be heard regarding the defendant’s sentence and any restitution ordered in this case, and nothing in this order precludes the victim from exercising that right.”  

The Circuit denied Zackey’s writ of mandamus to force the district court to let Richman do her voodoo, holding that since the government was already on board with the program, the district court didn’t abuse its discretion.  But then, left open are a few rather troubling aspects.

What if the government didn’t agree to pursue everything Zackey demanded?  Notably, the government agreed, in seeking restitution, to include Zackey’s legal fees.  Consider that proposition, when tendering a bill for services rendered in the amount of a gazillion dollars, that its payment becomes a part of the restitution order at sentence.  That doesn’t mean it gets paid, since not every defendant has the wherewithal to pay the restitution, but it’s sure a great place to go for the big bucks.  After all, the only person affected is the defendant, and it’s not like anybody gives a hoot about him.

This insinuation of the right to counsel of victims was part of the message sent to Berman by his reader who forwarded the decision.

The helpful reader who forward this ruling to me refers to Zackey as a “victim Gideon case.”  In one sense, this reference seems somewhat apt because it seems like a stretch to expect that victims will always (or even usually) be able to secure all the rights to which they are entitled under the CVRA without the assistance of a lawyer in the courtroom. 

But Doug spells out why the analogy ultimately fails.

But, obviously, the context and legal issues here are distinct: the right to counsel for criminal defendants is set out in the Constitution, and at issue in Gideon was whether the state had to provide counsel to defendants who could not afford them; there is no comparable right to counsel for criminal victims, and at issue in Zackey is not whether the victim could get counsel from the state but whether his retained counsel would be allowed to represent his interests in court.

Still, the issue of reimbursement of legal fees by the defendant as part of restitution remains unaddressed.  While not quite the same, it’s also not so dissimilar as to ease the tension of the comparison. 

It strikes me as not much of a stretch that in the next round of political pandering to victims, the issue of Gideon for victims, and paid for by defendants, is placed on the table.  Forget the irony that the funding is inadequate to fulfill Gideon for defendants, since nobody loves defendants.  Victims, on the other hand, are victims, and there’s nothing we can’t do to ease their pain.

Can somebody please check on Paul Cassell and make sure he’s feeling well? 

Minneapolis police officer Tony Adams is no kidnapper.  We know because a judge dismissed the kidnapping charges and a jury acquitted him of disorderly conduct and interfering with a 911 call.  It isn’t that he didn’t do what was alleged, however.

A Hennepin County jury on Tuesday found that an off-duty Minneapolis police officer did not break the law when he handcuffed two boys he suspected of playing ding-dong-ditch and breaking into a car in his Brooklyn Park neighborhood, then drove them to his house while their parents feared they had been kidnapped.

Apparently, ding-dong-ditch is taken very seriously in Minneapolis.  Maybe it’s a gateway crime that could lead to more serious conduct, such as, well, kidnapping.

There was no question that Adams put Tyler Farrell and Jake Robinson, ages 13 and 12, in his police-issued Cadillac Escalade and drove them to his house, after which he drove them to their parents as the Farrells were on the phone with 911 calling about their kidnapped son.  Adams never told the boys he was a cop, but then, they’re just kids.

When Adams brought the boys back, he wasn’t in a mood to put up with the parent’s beef.

On the 911 tape, when the Farrells and other neighbors said they were calling police, Adams was heard responding, “I am the goddamn police” and “Don’t tell me I can’t grab them.” [Prosecutor] Martie alleged that Adams then took Tara Farrell’s cell phone from her and threw it into the street just as Brooklyn Park police officers arrived. Those officers later let Adams go.

Clearly, Adams had a point.  Don’t tell him he can’t grab them. He can.  He did. He beat the rap.  After all, he’s the “goddamn police,” and when the “goddamn police” snatch two kids and spirit them away to the cop’s house, it’s not like some sicko sex offender hand-cuffed them,forced them into a non-police-issued Cadillac Escalade and drove them to his house.  Oh no, it’s entirely different.

There is the sense that some may be wondering at this juncture whether this is standard operating procedure for the police, and thinking to yourselves that if this isn’t, as some may think it shouldn’t be, then why isn’t it kidnapping when a police officer engages in conduct that would pretty much bring universal condemnation down on anyone else in the world.  Hah!  You silly people.  You obviously weren’t paying attention, or else still believe in the tooth fairy.

“I am the goddamn police.”

This alone is all that’s needed to distinguish between a crime, one that would suffice to put its perpetrator on the sex offender registry (just in case you were wondering), and a police officer protecting and serving.  It’s all in the shield.

There are some who will see this in an Andy Griffith/Mayberry RFD sort of way.  Better that a cop puts the fear of God into two yutes and thus leads them away from the path of ding-dong-ditching and onto the path of righteousness, than arrest them and send them to juvey jail.  The old woodshed method of justice, if you will.

Of course, Andy would have brought the boys straight home after a stern talking-to, and their pappy would be the one to take them behind the woodshed.  These days, its not merely creepy for Adams to keep two boys in handcuffs at his home, but eerily close to the rationale for turning your basic everyday kidnapper into a sex offender.  It’s not left to a cop to decide to circumvent the precinct and use his house instead, though it doesn’t seem to present a problem to the fair-haired folks of Minneapolis.

And after all, it’s entirely different when the kidnapper is a cop.

H/T James

Virginia is poised to put a woman to death, the first in almost a century.  The story has already been told, that Teresa Lewis is borderline mentally retarded, suffers from a dependent personality disorder and, if this strikes one as consequential, didn’t actually commit a murder.  Rather, she’s alleged to be the mastermind behind the death of her husband, having two killers for hire do the work.

Cries to let her live came from around the world.  No dice, says Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell, who found “no compelling reason” to commute her sentence.  And so the court of last resort was petitioned.  And took a pass.

The decision by the Supreme Court of the United States was 7 to 2 against a stay of execution. 

But I’m struck by something in that Supreme Court entry.  The two dissenters, the two (and only two) who thought her murder should be stopped and the case should be heard, were Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor.  And they are, of course, two of the women on the Court.  Is that relevant?  Just maybe.

As Gamso notes, there was a third woman on the Court who got a vote on this petition.  Elena Kagan, hot off her confirmation hearing.  Fresh out of the Solicitor General’s corner office, cum Harvard Law School, that bastion of knee-jerk liberalism on the Charles, Associate Justice Kagan gave us our first real glimpse of what she brought to the table.

The obvious question, given that the only justices who would have granted the stay were women, is whether this was a gender thing, an empathy that a woman justice might better appreciate than a hardened male.  Perhaps no love for the death penalty, but the law nonetheless.  Judicial modesty demands deference, even if it’s not the preferred choice.

By voting with the men, Justice Kagan has dispelled any notion that there would be a progesterone trio, too soft to do the hard work demanded of a Supreme.  She broke ranks with the gals and proved she was one of the boys.

It strikes me that Justice Elena Kagan may well have just proven what some have said about her from the outset; that she is a shrewd player.  As Doug Berman notes:

But those hoping (or concerned) that Justice Kagan will be a shrewd junior justice who will build bridges/allies among more conservative Justices should be pleased (or troubled) that Justice Kagan seized an early opportunity to show that she will not always vote for death penalty stays.

There is always a tendency to take flagrant characteristics and extrapolate from them a person’s motives.  Whether it be race, gender or political persuasion, we jump to the assumption that someone in power will exercise it in a predictable way.  Justice Kagan did not.

Maybe Elena Kagan really isn’t the liberal devil that the conservatives claimed.  Maybe she’s not as empathetic as Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor.  Maybe she doesn’t have a problem with the death penalty, or with putting a woman to death even though she didn’t actually kill anyone.  Maybe she thinks Teresa Lewis’ low intelligence and susceptibility to manipulation don’t matter.  There are plenty of maybes here.

One of them is that the shrewd woman, who became the President of Harvard Law School despite a dearth of scholarship because she knew who to kiss and flatter, and parlayed that into a black robe on First Street, knows how to play the game better than anyone else. 

If this is why Elena Kagan failed to vote for a stay, then it’s one of the most cynical moves by a justice in long memory.  It will mark her forever, as the liberal justice whose first vote was to put a woman to death.  It will take the wind out of all those Americans who thought that electing Obama president would mean Supreme Court appointees who would stand up to the pretense of originalism as an excuse to strip constitutional rights whenever they got in the way of a really good execution.  Talk about a disappointment.

Justice Kagan’s vote against a stay for Teresa Lewis may well buy her applause from that wide swathe of America who believed that she would be the knee-jerk liberal, the empathetic woman, the activist justice who would undermine all that made America special.  With one vote, Justice Kagan bought herself a whole bunch of good will from the conservative side of the Court.  And all she had to pay for that good will was the execution of one sad, pathetic woman.

Watch out for Justice Elena Kagan.  She’s an up-and-comer, and if her vote here is an indication that she plans on owning the center of the court, controlling the destiny of American law by the cheap purchase of votes from either side, she’s not done yet.  Forget that she’s a woman.  Forget that she came from Harvard and was appointed by Obama.  Just don’t forget that Justice Kagan voted against a stay for Teresa Lewis.  I wonder if she has ordered a robe with velvet stripes on the sleeves yet?

While the original thought, not to mention chutzpa, that went into it are remarkable, the scheme is just more than a rational mind can take.  Via ATL, it appears that a second year law student in Manhattan posted an advertisement on Craigslist seeking an intern. No really, she did.

So I am a full time second year law student at a very good law school in Manhattan. I am also the chairperson of many groups on campus, have a part time job, and a lot of administrative stuff that I always need to do.

Lately I have been extremely busy and I have not had time to get all my school work done on top of all the other administrative things I need to do. I am looking to hire an undergraduate intern who is interested in going to law school or is pre-law to help me get some of this stuff done.

Identified as a student at New York Law School, the Harvard of Worth Street, her very busy law student life demanded an assistant.  Not to do the routine, like fetch the dry cleaning or make a Starbucks run, but to cover her law school studies that she can’t get to while performing the important face jobs that “rising law students” need to handle for themselves.

Although I cannot pay you I promise I won’t bore you to death, I won’t give you a ton of bitch work, and working with me will be a great experience in learning the ins and outs of doing well in law school. I wouldn’t ask you to do my school work either. I would need you to read and review certain cases and certain articles and summarize them for a few papers I will be writing throughout the year. I might also need you to send a few e-mails.

Back in my day, reading cases and articles was still considered “school work.”  Not any more, apparently, though it leaves me to wonder what exactly constitutes school work these days.  And what’s in it for the intern?

In return you would get GREAT experience in the legal field as well as a GREAT networking connection to someone who will be an attorney in a year and half (as well as entrance into my web of legal connections). Surely the most important thing you learn in law school is that is not what you know its who you know.

That’s right, the intern would get to “network” with the law student, who (she hopes) will be an attorney in a year and a half, (woo hoo!!!) and entre into her “web of legal connections.”  It looks like somebody’s been paying attention to the Social Media gurus.

It would be overkill to note the narcissism and entitlement inherent in this scheme, where some nobody law student believes that being close to her, a self-proclaimed inchoate center of power, is worthy compensation to someone even lower on the totem pole than she is.   But it really isn’t that much of a stretch, given what happens regularly online. 

The elevation of networking and connections above not only competency but, for any college kid who might be foolish enough to buy into this insanity, payment reflects the Slackoisie ideal of compensation.  This is what’s being sold constantly in the blogosphere and on twitter, that superficial connections to others has its own intrinsic value, enough so that it’s worthy of trade.  This is nuts.

Ellie Mystal questions this 2L for her mistaken self-perception, that she’s important enough to command an intern, that being close to her is worthy enough for someone to do her bidding.  Despite Ellie’s snarky emphasis on her law school and appearance, would her advertisement be more realistic if she was a buttoned-down law review editor from Columbia?  Ellie seems to think that then, at least, her “web of connections” might prove a bit more valuable.

Consider what happens daily on twitter before you laugh.  Experienced lawyers are busy twitting up children for personal validation and approval, not to mention a few more followers.  Law students are lecturing lawyers, while failed and disbarred lawyers are framing the language of conversations.  Why shouldn’t this 2L have an intern to bask in her web of legal connections, as she’s just as likely to be a part of the Happysphere as any of the other law students and baby lawyers who think they’ve got all the answers, and who are absolutely certain that their engaging with lawyers will bring them all the respect and success they’ve earned by amassing a coterie of important followers.

Of course, when this 2L appears before a judge some day, if she is capable of passing the bar exam despite her not having the time to read the cases, I can’t help but wonder whether her response to a question by the court as to the basis for her motion will be, “but judge, I have 10,000 followers on twitter. I must know what I’m talking about.”

In updates, Ellie notes that the law student took down the Craigslist ad. She says that it was all just a big joke and can’t believe that anybody took her seriously.  She gets a “C” for persuasiveness, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some enterprising college student takes her up on her offer nonetheless.  After all, what wouldn’t some college kid do for access to her “web of legal connections?”  It’s not what you know, but who you know.

Can’t get enough on the cops arresting people for videotaping them doing their job?  Then you’ll love the Cato Institute’s latest entry.

Notice that incredibly good-looking, erudite yet dynamic fellow? No, the bald one. That’s Balko. Yes, that Balko.

H/T Grits for Breakfast  and Carlos Miller’s Photography Is Not A Crime

The official report would make any cop’s chest swell with pride:

Police say Daniel J. Daley, 84, of Orlando was transported to Florida Hospital Orlando after he “struck” an officer and the officer subdued him outside the Ivanhoe Grocery at 1820 North Orange Avenue about 11 p.m.

Struck an officer?  Well then, it’s a good thing he was subdued.  But wait, he was 84 years old?  84?  That’s a pretty old guy to go around striking cops.  The Palm Beach Post story provides a bit more color, although nowhere does it tell us the name of our hero cop.

Daley’s son, Greg Daley, said the World War II veteran was in critical condition with a broken neck. Two witnesses said the officer threw the man to the ground after he touched the officer during the dispute.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Scott said. “He hip-checked the guy and slammed his head into the pavement. He [Daley] is too old for that.”

Nicole Butler, a bartender at The Caboose, said the officer “body-slammed” Daley to the ground after the veteran put his hands on the officer’s shoulders.

There’s a basic rule that you don’t touch a cop.  Not a nice, little tap.  Not a kindly old hand on the shoulder. Just don’t touch, because cops are trained to respond to a touch, any touch, with prejudice.  

Palm Beach County has more than its share of World War II vets.  Good weather and gated communities seem to appeal to them.  And World War II vets tend to be kinda old.  And they tend to take some liberties that were more common years ago than they are today.  One of them is putting a hand on a young man, a touch to the elbow or perhaps a hand on the shoulders.  It’s a grandfatherly thing to do.  It may have something to do with many of them being grandfathers.  Even great grandfathers.  They’re that old.

As it turns out, the problem developed because of a parking dispute, with Daniel Daley parking across the street from the Caboose, the bar where he was having a drink or three.  Some old guys enjoy getting out on the town.  When he saw his car being towed, Daley tried to stop it and cops were called.  Daley had no priors despite 84 years of opportunity,  

The owner of Ivanhoe’s Grocery, the store across the street, didn’t like bar patrons parking in front of her store.  It was bad for business.  Of course, having an 84 year old WWII vet with a broken neck over a parking spot isn’t good for business either.  As for Daley, there’s a pretty good chance he won’t survive.  Old men don’t seem to heal nearly as well as the young.

But he touched a cop, and got what’s coming to him.  Let’s call this the Pugnacious Octogenarian Rule, just in case they want to use it for future police training.  A proud moment in law enforcement, to be sure.