February 08, 2012

Report on Sen. Stevens' prosecution to be public

A report on the #Justice Dept.'s botched #prosecution of the late Sen. Ted Stevens must be made public, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. In a 55-page decision, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan rejected arguments that the 500-page report be sealed up and never seen.

Instead, the report, potentially with some redactions, will become public in March. Wrote Sullivan:

"(The) Report chronicles significant prosecutorial misconduct in a highly publicized investigation
and prosecution brought by the Public Integrity Section against an incumbent United States Senator. The government’s ill-gotten verdict in the case not only cost that public official his bid for re-election, the results of that election tipped the balance of power in the United States Senate. That the government later moved to dismiss the indictment with prejudice and vacate the verdict months after the trial does not eradicate the misconduct, nor should it serve to shroud that misconduct in secrecy."

 

February 07, 2012

PEER wins FOIA claim v. boundary commission

The #whistleblower group PEER has won a #FOIA fight with the U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission, a usually obscure group that nonetheless might be hosting some interesting untold stories.

In a 10-page ruling this week, U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth sided with the Public Employeers for Environmental Responsibility in its effort to secure documents from the boundary and water commission. The conflict dates back to the commission's 2009 removal of its general counsel, Robert McCarthy, and the commission's subsequent hiring of Jackson Lewis to represent it.

PEER, Judge Lamberth explained,  "somehow learned about Mr. McCarthy’s case and the Commission’s hiring of Jackson Lewis, and became concerned that the Commission’s payments to that law firm might constitute misuse of government funds." PEER requested retainer documents and others. The commission, Judge Lamberth summed up, responded with "intransigence." 

Whereupon, Judge Lamberth opened his can of judicial whup-ass, as follows:

"At this point, after the Commission has been given multiple opportunities to get it right, it is patently obviousto the Court that the Commission, for reasons unknown, is simply persisting in  blowing-off PEER’s FOIA request.  This is a sad state of affairs that this Memorandum Opinion and accompanying Order will begin to rectify."

 

February 03, 2012

D.C. pot rules survive challenge

The #DC rules for future #medicinal #marijuana dealers have survived another legal challenge. In a six-page ruling this week, U.S. District Judge John Bates rejected the latest in a series of challenges filed by attorney Montgomery Blair Sibley.

Sibley claimed, in part, that he was being asked to incriminate himself by signing certain forms. The judge reasoned, in part, that Sibley had already signed the required affidavit, and had been turned down by the city.

February 02, 2012

Occupy DC fails to forestall eviction

#OccupyDC failed to convince a #judge that the #Constitution protects the demonstrators from eviction by the National Park Service.

Rather than arguing about the First Amendment free-speech protections, the Occupy DC demonstrators claimed the Fourth Amendment and Fifth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure should give the park service pause.

In a 16-page decision, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg  concluded that the demonstrators "have not shown any imminent actual injury that threatens their tents and as any future closing of (McPherson) Square remains too hypothetical for the Court to address."

January 30, 2012

Lamberth and the art of judicial writing

Kudos for #legal writing to #Judge Royce Lamberth, who starts off a new opinion with a literary bang. Writes the judge:

Picture a law written by James Joyce and edited by E.E. Cummings. Such is the Medicare statute, which has been described as 'among the most completely impenetrable texts within human experience.'

But Judge Lamberth, a Suits & Sentences favorite for the tang of his writing style, doesn't stop there. Puckishly, he includes, in the opinion in Catholic Health Initiatives v. Sibelius, this footnote elaborating the James Joyce reference:

The Court clarifies, however, that by making this analogy, it is referring not to Joyce’s early work, such as Dubliners or A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, but his later period, specifically Finnegan’s Wake.

As for Cummings, also a Suits & Sentences favorite, here's a taste of his editing style:

Buffalo Bill 's
defunct
            who used to
            ride a watersmooth-silver
                            stallion
and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
                                                                        
                            Jesus
he was a handsome man
                            and what i want to know is
how do you like your blueeyed boy
Mister Death

 Or perhaps, as some read the Obama administration's health care reform law:

and what I want to know is

how do you like your blueeyed boy

Mister Death Panel

January 27, 2012

Ford wins reversal on $56 million patent case

An #appeals court has given #Ford a huge #patent victory.

On Thursday, the quiet-but-important U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a trial judge whose rulings had resulted in a $56 million patent infringement hit to the Ford Motor Co.. The trial judge, Illinois-based James B. Zagel, had determined in 2009 that Ford had willfully infringed on the "puddle lamp" patent of inventor Jacob Krippelz, Sr.  A jury had awarded the Krippelz team $23 million, and the judge had added $33 million for enhanced damages and prejudgment interest.

The appellate court, in its 17-page ruling, declared that Zagel had "erred in holding that the patent-in-suit could be found novel over the prior art."

January 26, 2012

Judge hints at endless tobacco litigation

A weary #judge hints that #tobacco #litigation will go on until the sun cools and the last lawyer drops, in a brief opinion issued Thursday.

Or so it might appear, from this little parenthetical in the three-page opinion issued by Judge Gladys Kessler in the case United States v. Phillip Morris:

"It is perfectly clear from Defendants’ Response that the litigation challenging the Regulations promulgated by the Food and Drug Administration, Required Warnings For Cigarette Packaging & Advertisements... will not end (if ever) for an extremely long period of time."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Technorati Tags: gladys kessler, phillip morris, tobacco litigation

Inside the minds of Chandra Levy jurors

#Jurors in the Chandra Levy #murder trial had to answer a lot more questions than usual, because of the pre-trial notoriety resulting from Levy's relationship with former congressman Gary Condit. A McClatchy article today tells the basic story; here are some additional details about some of the 12 jurors and four alternates.

A 72-year-old male education researcher said that tattoos are "sometimes an art form."

A 58-year-old female journalist reported that she had a second cousin who is an FBI agent in Las Vegas. She said she didn't know much about gangs.

A 55-year-old female receptionist said she believed immigrants should arrive legally but she also understood "they flee difficult circumstances."

A 46-year-old male journalist said his opinion of gang members was "not great."

A 29-year-old male research associate said he had no problem with gang tattoos since "it's gang culture."

A 51-year-old engineering assistant said "it's their right to tattoo themselves."

A 37-year-old female billing assistant identified MS-13 as "a notorious gang that has dissembled body parts of victims."

A 62-year-old female interior designer said of the gang members that they are "going down the wrong road."

A 51-year-old female Federal Trade Commission lawyer said she has no tattoos herself but "I know people who do have them."

A 59-year-old female claims supervisor said of gangs that "(I) don't make them part of my lifestyle."

January 23, 2012

Porn producers seek court help

Porn producers going after #copyright abuse in #court faced a setback Monday, and some sneaky Internet porn-watchers may be breathing a sigh of relief.

The producers or copyright holders of such movies as "Supergirl XXX: An Extreme Comixxx Parody" and "XXX Avengers," as well as others with more emphatically descriptive titles, know the Internet Protocol addresses of the alleged illegal downloaders. Now, they want subpoenas to compel the Internet Service Providers to provide the names of the people associated with those IP addresses.

In four related cases Monday, U.S. Magistrate Judge John Facciola seemed to step back from an earlier discovery ruling issued last year. Facciola stated that "has had an opportunity to reconsider the issue and has now concluded that such early, wide-ranging discovery is...not warranted." Now, Facciola says, he wants the companies to show why the D.C.-based court actually has jurisdiction over the computers involved.

January 20, 2012

Chandra Levy juror info outted

#WaPost wins, as a D.C. #appeals #court has ordered release of juror questionnaires in the high-profile, now-concluded trial of Chandra Levy's killer.

In a 20-page decision issued this week, elavorated upon in this fresh-from-the-oven McClatchy article, the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled that the trial judge went too far when he blocked release of the 11-page, 55-question forms filled out by the Levy jurors.

"The values underlying the First Amendment right of access _ for example, the public trial as a check on the fair functioning of the criminal justice system _ are served even after the verdict is in," Associate Judge Kathryn A. Oberly wrote.

The trial ended in November 2010 with the conviction of Ingmar Guandique, now serving a 60-year prisoni sentence. The Washington Post led the way on the fight to open up the juror questionnaires, first with the paper's dogged courthouse reporters Keith Alexander and Henri Cauvin agitating to obtain the forms and then with lawyers weighing in. Attorney Bruce D. Brown successfully argued the case last fall before the appellate court.

Separately, attorney Bruce Gottleib filed an amicus brief on behalf of 16 media organizations including the Associated Press, Atlantic Media, Inc., Dow Jones and Company, Inc., Gannett Co., Hearst Corporation,  National Public Radio,  The New York Times Company and The New Yorker.

Superior Court Judge Gerald I. Fisher will now have to specifically identify what parts, if any, will be redacted before the questionnaires are released.