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Encouraging Words from an Unlikely Source
Photography has been recognized as a form of expression protected by the First Amendment. While conceding that, the court of appeals nevertheless concluded that the statute "regulates a person's intent in creating a visual record and not the contents of the record itself."But that conclusion does not necessarily exempt the statute from the First Amendment's protections. The Supreme Court has recognized that the First Amendment includes, as a component of freedom of expression, the protection of "freedom of thought," 5 including the freedom to think sexual thoughts. It is not enough to say that the statute is directed only at intent, if the intent consists of thought that is protected by the First Amendment.
Keller, P.J., 28 March 2012, dissenting from refusal to grant appellant's petition for discretionary review in Ex Part Nyabwa, Nos. PD-0073, 0074, 0075-12, citing Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557 (1969).
Law Tech: AppointmentReminder.org
The thing that has always bugged me most about the business of law is potential clients making appointments, and then failing to post. When someone fails to appear for an appointment, I have wasted my time, which raises my blood pressure and makes me cranky.
I have, through the years, contemplated or tried various solutions-don't make appointments more than 24 hours out; require a credit-card number to make an appointment; ask the potential new client to call me if she needed to cancel or reschedule. I had no satisfactory solution until now.
Now I've practically eliminated no-shows by using appointmentreminder.org to schedule appointments with potential clients. I plug the client's appointment time and mobile number into the calendar, and the system sends her a text message the day before, and a text message the day of (it'll also send emails and make recorded voice calls; I haven't tried those modes), asking her to confirm, cancel, or request a callback.
Let My People Go
Geraldo G. Acosta: 255 juvenile cases / 387 misdemeanor cases/ 278 felony cases / 4.1 times the National Advisory Commission on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals recommended public-defender caseload (i.e. 200 juvenile cases or 400 misdemeanor cases or 150 felony cases per lawyer).
David L. Garza: 599 misdemeanor cases / 295 felony cases / 3.5 times the recommended caseload.
Ricardo N. Gonzalez: 444 misdemeanor cases / 63 felony cases / 3.2 times the recommended caseload.
Humberto Trejo: 470 misdemeanor cases / 278 felony cases / 3.0 times the recommended caseload.
Kerry Hollingsworth McCracken: 419 felony cases / 2.8 times the recommended caseload.
Juan Aguirre: 603 misdemeanor cases / 184 felony cases / 2.7 times the recommended caseload.
Herman Martinez: 495 misdemeanor cases / 223 felony cases / 2.7 times the recommended caseload.
Cultivating Requisite Variety?
Jury selection, properly conducted, is an unscripted improvisational exercise. In Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art
Galurnphing ensures that we rernain on the upside of the law of requisite variety. This fundanmental law of nature states that a system intended to handle x amount of information must be able to lake on at least x different states of being. In photography, for example, if we want to capture three levels of light, we need a camera with at least three apertures or shutter speeds. In music, if we want to transmit three kinds of emotion, We need to be able to draw the bow or blow our breath or strike the keys with at least three kinds of touch-preferably many more. This is what we call "having technique to burn"-having more powerful and flexible means available to us than we need in any given situation. A would-be artist may have the most profound visions, feelings, and insights, but without skill there is no art. The requisite variety that opens up our expressive possibilities comes from practice, play, exercise, exploration, experiment. The effects of nonpractice (or of insufficiently risky practice) are rigidity of heart and body, and an ever-shrinking compass or available variety.
A Proud Moment
Recalling one of the proudest moments of my career. I'd been practicing law for about five months. My client, who had been badly "hometowned" in court in Palestine, Texas, in the Piney Woods, had moved from there to Houston with her child. I moved to transfer the case to Houston while there was a motion to enforce pending against her in Palestine, so transfer would have deprived the hometown judge of authority to enforce the decree. The ex-husband's lawyer hadn't bothered to respond to my motion to support. The whole of his argument to the court was, "Mr. Bennett is a slick big-city lawyer who uses the rules to his advantage."
I loved it.
The motion was denied, of course-welcome to the Piney Woods, slick big-city lawyer-but the mandamus was a slam-dunk.
ProTip:What to Do if There's a PI Surveilling You
Peter A. Barone: Asshat Prosecutor of the Day
This came in today:
Hello to all,
This is an announcement regarding ASA Peter A. Barone. On January 7, 2013 Peter A. Barone finished his final defense for his Ph.D. and was officially announced as Dr. Peter A. Barone.Dr. Barone spent 5+ years obtaining his degree and would like to request that during formal court proceedings that you please refer to him by his proper and legal title, that being Dr. Barone. This request is similar to the manner in which the sitting judge is called Judge or Your Honor, or as his fellow attorneys are addressed as counselor or Mr. or Ms., and not by their first name during formal proceedings. Dr. Barone would like to thank his fellow colleagues for their cooperation in this matter in advance and realizes that at times it is difficult to remember a title change and is willing to assist by advising and correcting his colleagues during official proceedings of his new and permanent title if they inadvertently forget. Victor Garcia-HerrerosLegal Assistant for Dr. Peter BaroneState Attorney's Office of Highlands County411 S. Eucalyptus StreetSebring, FL 33870(863)402-6553Fax: (863)402-6563
I Don't Watch Law And Order Either.
I want to see Zero Dark Thirty, but I won't pay to see it.
Personal Sovereignty and the Guns of New York
Scott Greenfield emailed me to ask if I enjoyed the exchange with personal-sovereignty proponent Bernard Weckmann (EDITH's husband) here. In fact I do. Weckmann is monomaniacal and essentially delusional-he thinks that the Australian Government formed a corporation called BERNARD WECKMANN when he was born, and that any document referring to him in uppercase letters refers to this corporation, so that if the government files papers with his name in uppercase letter he can ignore them and deprive the government of jurisdiction. (Woe betide Weckmann and the other "personal sovereignty" hobbyists and hucksters when the government discovers 21st-century typography.)
Engaging with Weckmann (or WECKMANN) is probably a violation of Rule One. But there is always a grain of truth in delusion, and Weckmann's delusion is no exception. It is born of practical experience: he stopped registering his car; a magistrate wanted to impound his car for three months; he denied the magistrate jurisdiction; two years later the car is still impounded. Along the way Edith got arrested. Weckmann still doesn't have his car, he and Edith haven't been compensated for their lost time and property, and nobody has been punished for all the wrongs done to them. But she's not in jail, he's not in prison, and he has ginned up liens against the cops (not publicly filed, so without effect) so to Weckmann personal sovereignty works.
PSA: Disability Insurance
Insurance companies sell this stuff called "disability insurance." The bookies at the insurance company will make a bet with you: that you will not become disabled. If they win and you don't become disabled, you lose the money you've paid them. If you win, they pay you a monthly stipend whilst you are disabled.
Insurance-company bookies know odds. For them, financially, disability insurance is a good bet. The chance you will become disabled, multipled by the benefits they will pay if that happens, is smaller than the premium you will pay. Which means that for you, financially, disability insurance is a bad bet.
Four Houston criminal-defense lawyers have suffered crippling strokes in recent years. Americans have about 795,000 strokes a year (I don't know if lawyers are more susceptible to stroke than others, but sedentary occupation + lots of stress = good candidate for stroke.). When a trial lawyer has a stroke, it's like a laborer losing a leg or an artisan losing a hand-she might eventually recover her earning capacity, but it's going to be a long hard road.
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