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Recent Blog Posts
Ladies: Is Compliance Sexy?
(H/T up front to Scott Greenfield and his ostreoid Simple Justice, in the ABA's Blawg 100 once again.)
"I... watch him working at the stove. His easy concentration, economical movements, setting up in me a procession of sparks and chills."– Alice Munro, Dear Life, according to this post by Stewart Baker.
I am not a woman, but I am a cook. And I can imagine why a cook's easy concentration and economical movements might set up in a woman a procession of sparks and chills: it's genetic.
Cooking invokes core male competencies that men are genetically programmed to exercise and women are genetically programmed to admire: control of fire, control of knives (dangerous things), creative thinking, providing for others.
looking to lose on appeal – s4ll
Is this illegal?
A Splendora woman is facing charges for allegedly posting a personal ad on a classified website for her husband's ex-girlfriend as a joke.Christy Dawn Rash, 35, is facing an online solicitation charge. According to court documents, she's accused of posting the classified on Craigslist earlier this month with the victim's photo and cell phone number.The victim contacted Pasadena police after she says she received several calls from men requesting to have sex with her. Through an investigation, police were able to link the ad to Rash, who is married to the victim's ex-boyfriend.
(More on KTRK.)
Here's the criminal complaint (PDF). The defendant is accused of using the complainant's "name and persona" with the intent to "harm, defraud, intimidate, and threaten" to "post one or more messages on and through an Internet website, namely, Craigslist" without the complainant's consent.
Criminalizing Dissent
Prosecutors can find it challenging to prove the intent to harm was present in online interactions. "It's a hard burden for us to prove with any activity on the Internet," Wakefield noted.It is common for users to mimic celebrities or politicians by creating fake social media accounts, but Wakefield said it would be difficult to prove the intent to harm with satire or joke accounts of a public figure.In a case in which someone creates an account of a well-known figure and tries to damage his or her character, then that action would fall under the law, he said.
John, John, John. I know that you've grown a bit fuzzy on this First Amendment stuff, prosecuting those online-solicitation-of-a-minor cases, but could you at least make sense? One person can't "damage" another person's "character." One's character isn't affected by what other people say about her.
The Ethical Masochist's Dilemma
Suppose that you have a client. The client, after thorough consultation with you, wants you to take some action. That action is in the best interest of the client, is legal, and is ethical.
You do it, right?
Now suppose that the action is not in the client's best interest, but is legal and ethical.
Again, you do it. It's not your call.
Now suppose that the action is in the client's best interest and is ethical but is illegal.
You don't do it.
Okay. Now it's in the client's best interest and legal, but is unethical.
Do you do it? No, of course not. Your ethics trump even the client's interests.
But wait. Suppose that the only person who might be harmed by the ethical violation is the client, and that you've advised the client of this possible harm, and the client still insists that you take the action.
What do you do?
A ridiculous hypothetical? Unimaginable? Highly speculative? Nope. An everyday situation in federal criminal defense.
Outsource Your Marketing: Jared Pomranky / Net Profit Marketing Edition (Updated)
Detroit lawyer DD should not be representing criminal defendants.
DD left this comment on this post:
"I agree with these guest posts you really don't get anything expect for me content you don't agree with or matches up with your site."
One of a criminal-defense lawyer's core competencies is the ability to string together a series of letters into what we in the business call "words," and then to string those words together into "sentences" with what is known as "meaning." (It is helpful also to be able to string those sentences together into paragraphs, but that's the advanced course.)
Writing a meaningful sentence is a matter of a) having an idea; and b) converting that idea to written words in a way that the reader gets a close approximation of the idea. Converting ideas to written words is much the same as translating them to spoken words, except it's easier because the writer has more opportunities than the speaker to edit.
TSA: All That is Wrong With America
Curtis Robert Burns, also known as "Blogger Bob," the Tokyo Rose of the TSA, responded publicly-and petulantly-to Amy Alkon's post questioning TSA thugs concealing their identities from the traveling public (which I wrote about here and Greenfield riffed on here).
As usual, TSA's response to criticism is that they did everything "by the book." What Burns and his fellow authoritarians are unable to comprehend is that this is not a defense of the conduct, but an indictment of the book.
Alkon and Greenfield have both replied to Burns's response.
TSA: Anonymity Breeds Contempt
I don't, as a general principle, allow anonymous comments here. Chief among the reasons is that the more anonymous people are, the worse they behave. People do things behind tinted glass on the freeway that they would never do on the sidewalk. They say things from the cover of darkness that they would never say in the light of day.
Why do TSA goons steal? They steal because they can. They steal from your checked luggage because when you get to Chicago and your cufflinks are missing, there is no way for you to track down the guy in the Atlanta airport who stole them. If TSA wanted to stop its employees stealing from checked luggage, there'd be a simple solution: any TSA employee who opens a bag puts his name in it.
But that would create accountability, and the security state cannot operate if its functionaries are accountable. If screeners knew that their mothers were likely to read on the internet about what they were doing on the job, they would be on much better behavior, which would not aid in the government's avowed program of unquestioning compliance.
The Secession Petition: The President's Response
The much-discussed Texas secession petition on whitehouse.gov:
We petition the Obama administration to:Peacefully grant the State of Texas to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government.
Here's how I might respond, were I the President of the United States:
To all the people who have signed this petition:Look, I appreciate that you're frustrated, and I'll do what I am able to restore your confidence in the Union.But I've gotta tell you: you haven't actually asked me to do anything. "Peacefully grant the State of Texas to withdraw from the United States of America and create its own NEW government" doesn't mean anything. Grant Texas what? Grant Texas permission? Grant Texas the right? If you had asked me to grant Texas permission to secede, I'd happily have given it. Seriously. Thirty-four solidly Republican electoral votes, two Republican senators, and a net loss of fourteen Republicans in the House of Representatives? It's a political no-brainer: godspeed, and good luck securing your southern border. Of course, my permission to secede and a buck fifty still won't buy you a decent cup of coffee: if you want out, you're going to have to sell it in Congress.But here's the thing: you didn't ask my permission, and because over a hundred thousand of you (I'm not counting those in other states who think you're a bunch of ignorant rednecks and want to be rid of you-because they're wrong) clamored for my attention by signing a semiliterate petition asking that I grant you absolutely nothing, I am concerned for you. The intellectual deficit you demonstrate by taking seriously this meaningless nonsense suggests that you're in need of adult supervision, if not guardianship.I have seriously considered this grave situation, prayed on it (see, I knew you'd like that), and decided to have you evaluated for competency. Five hundred of you will be randomly chosen as a representative sample, black-bagged, and disappeared temporarily for psychological testing. Fear not: you will be returned unharmed with your memories of the experience erased. Nobody will even know that you were gone. The results of these tests will determine the fate of Texas.In the unlikely event that most of the five hundred chosen are competent to conduct your own affairs, I'll leave Texas alone and get back to the serious business of bringing Marxism to North America (that's a joke).Otherwise, I'll ask the Supreme Court to appoint a neutral third party as Texas's legal guardian. What third party? You guessed it: the United Nations. Expect black helicopters. I suggest you go into hiding now.You bunch of barking moonbats.-POTUS
Outsource Your Marketing, Guest Post Edition
We get the offers in our email all the time:
Hello,I was checking out your Defending People blog and was wondering if you accept guest posts. I have original content that I am looking to post. These articles are written by attorneys focusing on criminal defense and personal injury law as well as a host of other areas.If this sounds like something you would be interested in please contact me.Thanks,/Adam Nikulicz
or
Hello Mark, I am a legal blogger for www.nerdlaw.org. I am currently looking for guest blogging opportunities and I was wondering if you would be willing to write a guest post for my blog, and if possible, allow me to write an article (on the subject of your choice) for your site with a link?I'd like to contribute a piece about Criminal Law . If you're interested, let me know if you'd like for me to pitch a topic for approval.Thank you for your time and I look forward to your response,Donna Breen
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