Short piece in the HouChron: I expect a longer one in tomorrow’s paper.
The article goes on to quote the judge’s order as stating “that grand jurors are investigating ‘possible criminal conduct by members of the Harris County district attorney’s office.'”
Latest update from the runaway Harris County grand jury:
They’re asking for an extension of their term, and for the district judge who set up the grand jury to appoint a special prosecutor.
They’ve also issued subpoenas to at least some of the assistant DAs in the office. Wonderful thing, a subpoena.
More from the Honorable Murray Newman.
Edited to add: And more from The Hon. Mr. Newman. I do loves me a good Nixon reference.
We have previously covered Harris County’s problems with their Blood Alcohol Testing (BAT) vans. Those problems can perhaps best be summed up as: they weren’t reliable.
Now comes word from the HouChron that:
The DA’s office is…not pleased. As Murray Newman, a former DA, puts it: “The Grand Jurors excluding the prosecutors from the testimony is kind of the equivalent of the President being booted out of a Cabinet meeting.”
The HouChron piece is short. The Hon. Mr. Newman’s piece over at his site provides more background: he has his own spin on things, but he’s also more familiar with the background and the people involved than I am. Summarizing his position, it seems like the DA was trying to get revenge on the BATVan whistle blowers by pushing for a grand jury indictment, but it looks like the grand jury is digging into the conduct of the DA’s office instead.
This could turn interesting real quick.
This was kind of an odd case, with a bizarre ending. Planet K, a local chain of head shops – excuse me, “adult novelty stores” – has been planning to open a location in Bee Cave, and had local artist Kerry Awn do a mural for them. The city of Bee Cave claimed the mural was an illegal sign, and went to court.
At trial, the judge issued a directed verdict – basically, ordering the jury to return a “not guilty” finding – because the city of Bee Cave failed to prove that “AusPro Enterprises”, the company being prosecuted, actually owned the property or had any connection to the Planet K chain.
In my experience, directed verdicts are rare. I can’t remember the last time I heard of one being issued around here. And it sounds like somebody in the Bee Cave DA’s office failed to do their homework.
The final grades have been posted in my “Constitutional Criminal Procedure” class.
And?
Or, to put it another way, I have done made the Fourth Amendment my…well, you know what I mean. The streak is still going.
(I’m also running out of awesome, though I do have one more “Star Trek” reference in the pipeline. I may have to resort to posting Plastic Bertrand videos.)
(“20% cooler in 10 seconds flat” explained here. Sort of.)
Headline: “Texas Equusearch wants Casey Anthony to answer questions under oath”.
That’s nice. I want a pony.
From the linked article: “Texas Equusearch is suing Casey to recover the more than $100,000 it says it spent on searches for Caylee Anthony in 2008.”
On what basis? Texas Equusearch is a non-profit organization that volunteered their services. They had no contractual agreement with Casey Anthony, to the best of my knowledge, so what basis do they have for filing a suit to recover costs?
She may be guilty as all get out. But the courts disagreed: only God knows, and he will pass judgment at the appropriate time. Let it go, people.
He plays that Choctaw stickball every Friday night.
Ask not for whom the bells toll at Notre-Dame: Angélique-Françoise, Antoinette-Charlotte, Hyacinthe-Jeanne and Denise-David are going to be melted down and replaced next year.
The other day, I mentioned the California rogue PI setting up ex-husbands for DWI (plus running a brothel for the cops and selling drugs for cops) case. Balko covered this as well, prompting a lively discussion in the comments.
One of the commentators posted a link to a longer article from Diablo Magazine about PI Chris Butler, which I think makes for interesting reading. The writer apparently started out expecting a standard human-interest story about PI moms; it’s fascinating to watch his skepticism develop as things start not adding up.
The first part of that statement would have raised red flags with me: I’m not aware that Glock officially sponsors private detectives (though they do sponsor competitive shooters). It seems like something that would have been easy to check with a call to Glock’s PR department; curiously, there’s no indication that the author ever did make that call.
A long, long time ago, in the before time, back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, we noted that it was a bad idea to walk into someone’s office with a bottle of wine in one hand and an unloaded gun in the other.
That case took some strange turns. Ultimately, it seems to have marked the beginning of the end for Triton Financial, which turned out to be a huge Ponzi scheme.
But what of the gun-wielding woman?
The felony charge was for aggravated assault. She still faces a misdemeanor charge of “unlawful carrying of a weapon”.
Last one, folks. This might be of more general interest, for reasons I outline below.
United States v. Aukai is unusual for a couple of reasons:
In Aukai’s case, he made the mistake of trying to get through airport security with a meth pipe in his pocket and meth on his person. Even dumber, he made the mistake of doing this without ID, which meant he was automatically selected for secondary screening. During the secondary screening, Aukai tried to withdraw consent and leave the secured area of the airport: TSA detained him, and eventually discovered the meth pipe and meth.
Aukai challenged his conviction for possession with intent to distribute on the grounds that once he stated he didn’t want to be searched and went to leave the secured area, the TSA had no authority to detain and continue searching him; thus, the meth pipe and meth were products of an “unreasonable” search and seizure and should be excluded as evidence against him.
Gregory Powell, about whom we have written previously, is seeking “compassionate release” from prison. Mr. Powell has been turned down 11 times for parole.
Former LAPD Officer Ian Campbell was unavailable for comment.
Edited to add 10/19: Not going to happen.
California seems to be the home of that defense. I can’t find the post where I wrote about the teacher who had guns and drugs planted in his car (on school property) by his ex-wife and her boyfriend, but I do recall mentioning that.
Now we have a private detective agency that was allegedly taking money to set up ex-husbands on DUI charges.
I’ve got to admit that I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the way the LAT spins the story. I understand two chicks lured you to a bar, I understand one of them showed some cleavage; however, keeping under the legal limit is still your responsibility. There’s no evidence (and no accusation) that they drugged this poor guy’s drinks or anything like that.
On the other hand:
That puts a different spin on things, but you don’t find out about these accusations until about halfway through the article.
Interesting legal note:
I wonder if Texas has a similar law?
I wasn’t planning to say anything about the Texas Rangers: last year was significant, this year, well, what can you say other than that they’ve gotten good?
However, I can’t help but take the opportunity to gloat a little here, since it appears that a Rangers/Cardinals World Series has John Gruber extremely upset. Poor guy.
Loser update tomorrow: Miami plays tonight.
Somewhat buried lead: the MP-5s were converted to fire blanks only.
I am not an MP-5 armorer, but I would guess: probably none. I doubt any of those parts are serial numbered like AR lower receivers. And I’m curious where the LAT reporter got his information.
Steven Seagal, that is.
You may remember (from here or elsewhere) Mr. Seagal’s stint with the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office, followed by his guest appearance with Joe Arpaio and the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office. (I believe I failed to note that the subject of the cockfighting bust is suing Mr. Seagal.)
Anyway, Mr. Seagal has taken on a new law enforcement role: deputy with the Hudspeth County Sheriff’s Office. Hudspeth County is right on the border with Mexico (Wikipedia map.)
The current status of “Steven Seagal: Lawman” is unclear to me, but I welcome updates.
Just saying. It doesn’t look like they were good luck for Whitey Bulger.
Seriously, I’ve been meaning to throw up a link to this long and entertaining Boston Globe article about Whitey and his life on the run for a couple of days now. It has everything, including a former Miss Iceland who apparently ratted Whitey out. (My mother also forwarded a link saying that Miss Iceland is going to collect the $2 million reward offered by the FBI. Good luck to her: I hope Whitey’s friends, if he has any left, don’t reach as far as Iceland.)
Joseph Hyungmin Son, who played “Random Task” in the Austin Powers movies, is doing time in prison “after having been convicted of torture and sentenced to life in prison without parole in connection with the 1990 Christmas Eve rape of a woman out walking her dog.”
I think that was generally well known. That’s not the WTF moment.
According to the LAT, he’s now suspected of killing his cellmate. He’s been in prison for a little over three weeks now…
Here’s the case brief for Chimel v. California. I ruthlessly edited it down to only three pages this time.
Chimel is interesting because it helped to define the limits of a search “incident to arrest”. Mr. Chimel was arrested, at his home, and charged with burglary of a coin shop. After he was arrested, the police searched his entire house (even having his wife move stuff around) without a warrant, and claimed they didn’t need one since their search was incident to a valid arrest.
The Court said, “Nope. Doesn’t work like that. ‘Search incident to arrest’ only covers the person and the area under the person’s immediate control. You want to search someplace other than that? Get a warrant.”
We’re wrapping this class up. Next Monday is the final; there should be one more case brief, too.
