I’m writing this from 30,000 feet in the air, flying home to Houston from Atlanta where yesterday I argued a First Amendment case before the Georgia Supreme Court. Most lawyers never get to argue before their own State’s highest court, much less another state’s. Georgia was very hospitable to me. Brunswick criminal-defense lawyer Jason Clark ((For the Texas criminal-defense lawyers: Jason's a Georgia version of Tony Vitz.))

In a series of posts almost five years ago I wrote about the idea of a criminal-defense skunkworks: Building the Criminal-Defense Skunkworks; Fleshing Out the Criminal-Defense Skunkworks; and Potential Topics for the Criminal-Defense Skunkworks. Since then the project has not gotten far off the ground. I had some discussions with some people, but we all have very busy lives and other jobs took higher priority. Late last

In the last three years, I convinced Texas courts to hold five statutes unconstitutional under the First Amendment. ((Also one statute under Texas's separation of powers clause.)) I filed briefs in the Georgia Supreme Court, will argue the unconstitutionality of a Georgia statute next month, ((February 22 in Atlanta. There will be steaks, wine, and hilarity. Mark your calendars.)) and will be assisting Jason Clark in the

Josh Blackman sent me the link on Christmas Eve: Humbach on the Constitutionality of Revenge Porn Statutes https://lsolum.typepad.com/legaltheory/2015/12/humbach-on-the-constitutionality-of-revenge-porn-statutes.html John A. Humbach (Pace University School of Law) has posted The Constitution and Revenge Porn (Pace Law Review, Vol. 35, No. 1, 2015) on SSRN. Here is the abstract: Most of the recently enacted revenge-porn laws are unconstitutional as content-based regulations of speech unless (as is unlikely) they can

The great thing about having blogged for more than eight years (eleven, if you count my first shortlived attempt) is that I have a record of my own increasing understanding of my subject. I wrote in 2010 about fighting back against common sense—preempting and responding to the State's argument that a jury should find a defendant guilty because of "common sense": "Common sense" has nothing to do

It might be pardonable to refuse to defend some men, but to defend them negligently is nothing short of criminal. Cicero did not take into account the case of Tyler lawyer James Volberding and Houston lawyer Seth Kretzer, whose treatment of their client Raphael Holiday was not merely negligent but malevolent. The idea that lawyers would turn on their own client, trying to speed his execution, was

The article is offered by everydayfeminism.com as a "one-stop 101" for those "not sure what people mean by triggering." So while this may look like a weak-man argument, it is not. In the motte and bailey of triggering, the motte is people with actual post-traumatic stress disorder, the symptoms of which are triggered by some event. These people hate their disease, and seek help.The bailey is people

It all went wrong at the second word: We don't have a whole lot in common. We never have, not even back in the days when we were dumping tea into harbors and sneak attacking Hessians on Christmas Eve. America has always been less melting pot than Mulligan stew, an improvised conglomeration of ingredients, a loose affiliation of flavors, barely held together by the thin gravy of

From Holiday v. Stephens, 557 U.S. ___ (2015): Statement of JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, respecting the application for stay of execution and denial of certiorari. A federal statute entitles defendants sentenced to death to court-appointed counsel during “all available post-conviction process.” 18 U. S. C. §3599(e). This statute requires counsel to “represent the defendant in … proceedings for executive or other clemency as may be available to the defendant.”

I do not like lawyers making censorious threats. I do not like lawyers failing to understand the ethical rules. I especially do not like lawyers making censorious threats based on their failure to understand the ethical rules. So when I saw that Wes Volberding (Baylor, clerkship) and Seth Kretzer's (UT Law Review, clerkship) in their letter to Gretchen Sween, who was trying to help Raphael Holiday get