While people have pretended to be cops long before, the problem of fake cops took flight during the crack days of the 1980’s, when thieves would rob drug dealers by pretending to be police busting them. The “brilliance” of the scheme was that the victims of the robbery couldn’t run to the cops to complain, since the thieves stole their drugs and drug money.

Since then, others have come to realize the beauty of pretending to be cops in order to commit crimes, ranging from theft to rape. They use the submission to authority Continue reading →

The other day, Rick Horowitz sent me a link to series of twits that were purportedly sent by a woman named Robyn Swirling, and then aggregated on Storify. They told a disturbing story of a child punched by a D.C. cop, and a woman who came to the child’s aid being arrested.

Continue reading →

If you’ve never seen Real Housewives of New Jersey, consider yourself fortunate. I’m not so lucky, having been introduced to this exercise in narcissism, banality and stupidity by a woman who lives in my home who shall not be named. But that’s my problem.

One of the stars of the Bravo “reality” series is Teresa Giudice, who also did a stint on Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice, when they were apparently unable to get anyone who was relatively interesting to appear. Continue reading →

It really shouldn’t require a business owner to mount seven video cameras around his place of business to protect himself from the police. On the other hand, had Donald Andrews not done so, he would be staring down a two to seven year sentence rather than pondering the ad damnum of his suit against the cops.

The video is, to be blunt, perfect. Via Cory Doctorow at Boing Boing, not to mention Turley and Reason, the video from Andrews’ head shop in Scotia, Continue reading →

I’m going to take a charitable view that this was done in good fun, to get the guy noticed (which it appears to have done) and to make all other music videos look good in comparison.

I refuse to assume that he meant this to be taken seriously because, well, nobody could possibly think that.  ‘Nuff said.

Sarah Chayes used to be the special assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2010 to 2011.  Remember the outrage when she went public by proclaiming how America has sacrificed liberty in the blind pursuit of safety from terrorism? Neither do I.

What about the former head of the TSA, Kip Hawley? Remember when he scrapped the absurd rules that made everyone’s life miserable and forced children and the elderly to be groped by blue-shirted agents who got their jobs off pizza boxes? Continue reading →

Stephen Fairley, head of the Rainmaker Institute, Avvo’s Lawyernomics “columnist” and inspirational speaker, was called something new according to Courthouse News:

PHOENIX (CN) – A law firm claims in a RICO lawsuit that The Rainmaker Institute – which calls itself “the nation’s largest law-firm marketing provider” – charged it $49,000 to increase its visibility on Google, knowing that its work violated Google’s guidelines.

Seikaly & Stewart, of Farmington Hills, Mich., sued The Rainmaker Institute and its CEO Stephen Fairley, in Federal Court.

Seikaly & Stewart claim the defendants created Continue reading →

I was an early adopter. I know, hard to believe, but true. I bought my first computer in the mid-1980’s, a 286 with ten MB of memory. The computer guy, because everybody who bought a computer used a computer guy back then, told me I would never use up that much memory.

The 286 replaced a word processor, which in turn replaced my beloved IBM Selectric III. It was a miracle to see what I was writing before it permanently hit the 20 lb. Esquire Bond. The trauma of carbon paper typos was over. Continue reading →

For criminal defense lawyers, Supreme Court decisions are big things. What seems to others like a smallish change in the law, one way or another, can mean thousands of people getting orange jumpsuits rather than “welcome home” parties. Sure, it depends on lower court judges actually knowing and following the law, but that’s a story for another day.

Linda Greenhouse makes a significant point in her New York Times column about no one’s favorite justice, Sam Alito. Sam who?  Well, of course we lawyers know all about him, right?  Right? Well, at least criminal defense lawyers know that the former Third Circuit judge, Continue reading →

Make popcorn. No, that’s not right. Get a sixpack. Closer, but still not right. I know, pull out your yellow pad and a pen, and take notes. The documentary, Scenes of a Crime, tells a story you need to hear.*

The movie centers around the creation of a case against Adrian Thomas, whose 4 month old baby was initially, and it would appear mistakenly, diagnosed as having a skull fracture caused by abuse that would inevitably lead to his death. Thomas was subject to ten hours of interrogation based upon this assumption, that his child would die from his crime, Continue reading →