The First Rule of Fight Club is you do not talk about Fight Club. The First Rule of Policing, on the other hand, is make it home for dinner. Surprisingly, that was the primary argument offered by Delaware County, Ohio, Sheriff Russ Martin when debating Radley Balko* on John Stossel’s television show.

When questioned as to the virtue of SWAT raids to carry out police functions that didn’t intrinsically require such aggressive shows of force, Sheriff Martin’s response was that it is far safer to use a SWAT team to capture Continue reading →

Forget the fact that this involves something that has been discussed at length, if not ad nauseam. The idea is new to the incoming president of the Amerian Bar Association, and therefore, well, new. So what if others have pondered, discussed, argued about it for years before it came onto the radar of the very important officials who think of themselves as Leaders.

Via the ABA Journal:

Accepting the presidential gavel today at the gathering of the ABA House of Delegates, new ABA President James Silkenat of New York laid Continue reading →

From the outside, it’s quite possible, maybe even likely, that libertarian sensibilities would cause us to feel sympathetic toward Alfred Anaya.  After all, he wasn’t personally doing the evil the law sought to prevent, but selling something that was in great demand. Isn’t that the American way?

Anaya was an artist of sorts, and his artistry was in the creation of traps. He began as a star installer of stereo systems, and took enormous pride in his ability to conceal his work. HIs skill morphed Continue reading →

Via Walter Olson at Overlawyered, a decision out of Florida’s First District Court of Appeals in Parrish v. Cummins Power South holding that it does not violate a litigant’s constitutional rights for lawyers to use Latin. You can’t make this stuff up.

Parris, a pro se (to which Wally observes, “oh dear, there we go doing it ourselves”) plaintiff whose complaint was dismissed on the bases of res judicata and collateral estoppel, raised the damning claim:

A main focus of this appeal is Parris’s contention that the company (and presumably its lawyers) “chose to dredge up these esoteric terms from a dead language Continue reading →

In the aftermath of Attorney General Eric Holder’s announcement that the Department of Justice will change its charging mechanics slightly by omitting the quantity of drugs involved in order to circumvent mandatory minimums in certain drug prosecutions, the internet has done what it does best: create mass confusion and reflect common misunderstanding.

At Popehat, Ken White provides a clear, if lengthy, explanation of the mechanics of charging. Yet, the comments to the post Continue reading →

Judge Shira Scheindlin’s opinion in Floyd v. City of New York could not have come as a surprise to anyone remotely knowledgeable about law, but her handling of the delicate intersection between law and politics was about as masterful as a judge can get

I emphasize at the outset, as I have throughout the litigation, that this case is not about the effectiveness of stop and frisk in deterring or combating crime. This Court’s mandate is solely to judge the constitutionality of police behavior, not its effectiveness as a law enforcement tool. Continue reading →

Reports have been coming out for the past few days that Attorney General Eric Holder will make a major announcement today at the ABA Annual Meeting. From the New York Times:

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., in a speech at the American Bar Association’s annual meeting in San Francisco on Monday, is expected to announce the new policy as one of several steps intended to curb soaring taxpayer spending on prisons and help correct what he regards as unfairness in the justice system, according to his prepared remarks.

Saying that “too many Americans Continue reading →

At A Public Defender, Gideon offers a blurb from the concurrence of some otherwise unremarkable Connecticut opinion that sums up one of the nasty little sucky secrets of the system.

ROGERS, C. J., concurring. I agree with the majority’s conclusion in part II of its opinion that appellate review of a waived constitutional claim that the jury instructions failed to include an essential element of the crime charged is barred by this court’s decision in State v. Kitchens, 299 Conn. 447, 482–83, 10 A.3d 942 (2011). I write separately to emphasize Continue reading →

At My Shingle. Carolyn Elefant writes about the “persecution” of Carl Malamud for the making law available to the public to see.

Looks like ABA Legal Rebel,  Carl Malamud, leader of the “free law movement” is at it again. This time, reports the Washington Post, Malamud has been busy posting building codes that govern at his website, Public.Resource.org. Trouble is, the building codes — enacted by state and local law — incorporate industry-developed standards which are protected by copyright law. Some of the industry groups that develop these standard have now filed this  Complaint against Malamud alleging copyright violation.

While calling a complaint for copyright violation “persecution” Continue reading →

The initial word was that police were called in to help stop a “riot” at the Citrus Center for Adolescent Treatment Service in Pembroke Pines, Florida.  It was a facility for severely mentally ill adolescents, which should have been the first clue for the cops that they weren’t dealing with people who would respond to their authority in the manner they usually demand. That’s the nature of mental illness.

Yet, the notion that these were sicks kids didn’t seep into one (unnamed) cop’s head. Continue reading →