Archive for the ‘Law’ Category

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Gratuitous snark.

Tuesday, December 11th, 2012

<sarcasm>
If only we outlawed fireplaces, natural gas, razor blades, and speaker wire, Dr. Cecilia Chang would be alive today.
</sarcasm>

Setting aside the point (that people who want to kill themselves are going to do it, with or without guns), this NYT story is interesting reading.

Dr. Chang, a dean at St. John’s University in Queens, associated with a whirlwind of characters: Catholic priests, Chinese gangsters, American lawmakers, a Taiwanese general and a fantastically corrupt city politician, to name a few. She had been married three times. One husband, she had told several people, was involved in organized crime; another told the police before succumbing to gunshot wounds that she was behind the attack.

Dr. Chang was basically a rainmaker for the university: she brought in millions of dollars in donations. Many of those donations were from what we might call “questionable” people. (One person who was awarded a honorary degree from St. John’s is currently a fugitive from justice.)

But that life, prosecutors charged in state and federal indictments, was enabled by fraud and embezzlement. Federal prosecutors accused her of forcing foreign students to perform household labor in exchange for tuition grants, stealing over $1 million from the university and taking $250,000 from a Saudi prince to organize academic conferences that never happened.

Dr. Chang took the stand at her trial. It did not go well for her, according to the NYT account, and she killed herself shortly thereafter.

Posted in Clippings, Guns, Law, Sarcasm | Comments Closed

Morris, Weingarten, and MacDonald.

Friday, December 7th, 2012

I have written before about my complicated relationship with Gene Weingarten and his writing.

I have a tremendous admiration for Errol Morris as a filmmaker.

I own, but have not yet read, A Wilderness of Error: The Trials of Jeffrey MacDonald.

The intersection of these three things: Weingarten in the WP profiling Brian Murtagh, the federal prosecutor in the MacDonald case. And, in the process, taking on Morris and his book. Weingarten believes MacDonald is guilty:

I’ve concluded this both because I have researched the case extensively, and because, as a writer, I see exactly how Errol Morris prejudiced his account while shrewdly appearing not to do so. I admire his skill but not his book. I think the media have been careless and gullible in reviewing it, perhaps partially because the story of a grievous, enduring miscarriage of justice presents a more compelling narrative than the alternative.

So Weingarten should maybe be taken with at least a small grain of salt. But he does bring up several places where Morris himself admits problems. For example, a woman named Helena Stoeckley allegedly confessed to a federal marshal, Jimmy Britt, that she was present when the killings took place. Britt filed a sworn affidavit stating that Stoeckley confessed while he was transporting her to the trial. Both Britt and Stoeckley are now dead.

None of what was about to come out was in Errol Morris’s book, though it was available to him in public records.
Jimmy Britt, evidence suggested, had not transported Helena Stoeckley from South Carolina at all; he’d never had hours to talk to her. The transport had been done by a tag-team succession of other marshals. Some of the paperwork still survived. Two of the transporters testified.

More:

There are many significant, incriminating facts glossed over in, or completely omitted from, “A Wilderness of Error.” Conversely, much is made of nonsense. An entire chapter is devoted to the supposedly startling fact that Helena Stoeckley reported seeing a broken rocking horse in Kristy’s room. Yes, the horse had been clearly visible in newspaper photos, but no one, Morris argues, had ever publicly disclosed it was broken.

Punchline: it wasn’t broken. And:

Just before this story went to press, Errol Morris and I spoke for nearly an hour; he concedes there are some things he wishes he’d written differently — for example, disclosing that there were some credible challenges to Jimmy Britt’s story. Morris allows that he may have used some facts selectively to make a case for what he believes — selectivity, he says, is part of all journalism — but adds that his belief remains solid that MacDonald did not get a fair trial. He also thinks MacDonald is innocent, but of that is less certain.

The entire article is pretty long, but I commend it to your attention if you have any interest in the MacDonald case.

(Hattip: Ted Frank by way of Popehat on the Twitter.)

Posted in Books, Clippings, Law, Movies | Comments Closed

Random notes: December 7, 2012.

Friday, December 7th, 2012

Happy Pearl Harbor Day. On this date, as always, I will pause for a moment of silence to remember the Japanese-American graduate of Texas A&M who, on December 7, 1941, bombed Pearl Bailey.

Jim Letten, the chief federal prosecutor in New Orleans, has resigned over the comments scandal in his office. For those who weren’t following the story: two of the prosecutors in his office, including his top assistant, were exposed as the authors of pseudonymous comments about active cases on nola.com.

The exposure of Ms. Mann, months after Mr. Letten’s avowals that Mr. Perricone had acted alone, raised doubts about the effectiveness of an internal investigation by the Justice Department. The revelations could also jeopardize hard-fought convictions — including those last year of police officers involved in post-Katrina killings on the Danziger Bridge — as well as continuing inquiries like a bribery investigation that appears to be steadily encircling C. Ray Nagin, the former mayor.

Oh, isn’t that special? The Danzinger Bridge convictions might get tossed because a couple of prosecutors couldn’t behave themselves online. Thanks, guys.

Posted in Clippings, History, Law | 2 Comments »

Random notes: December 5, 2012.

Wednesday, December 5th, 2012

So has anyone been following the Indian Olympic Committee story? In brief: India wants to elect people to their national Olympic Committee following their rules, the IOC says “No, you’ve got to follow our rules”, and suspends the Indian committee. Suspension means that Indian athletes can’t compete in IOC sanctioned events, there will be no IOC funding for Indian athletes, and Indian sports officials can’t attend international meetings.

The Indian committee has basically said “F you” and elected Lalit Bhanot secretary general of the committee. Bhanot was unopposed.

Bhanot also spent 11 months in jail before he managed to make bail. Why? Corruption charges, specifically related to the 2010 Commonwealth Games.

The humiliating Olympic suspension follows India’s hosting of the Commonwealth Games in 2010 in which a pedestrian bridge collapsed, suppliers went unpaid, human excrement was left in athletes’ quarters and the budget ballooned to $8 billion from $75 million, much of it unaccounted for. Local newspapers, citing internal documents, detailed $80 rolls of toilet paper, $61 soap dispensers that normally cost $1.97 and $250,000 high-altitude simulators that usually sell for $11,830.

“to $8 billion from $75 million”? Wow. That’s corruption on an epic level: gold medal worthy corruption, if you ask me.

And speaking of corruption, the NYT explains how a Ferrari crash led to a change in the leadership of the party:

China’s departing president, Hu Jintao, entered the summer in an apparently strong position after the disgrace of Bo Xilai, previously a rising member of a rival political network who was brought down when his wife was accused of murdering a British businessman. But Mr. Hu suffered a debilitating reversal of his own when party elders — led by his predecessor, Jiang Zemin — confronted him with allegations that Ling Jihua, his closest protégé and political fixer, had engineered the cover-up of his son’s death.

“The Maid of the Mist” folks, who run the tours on the NY side of Niagara Falls, have made a new deal with the state that should keep the boats running. (Previously. Also.)

“Restaurant Impossible: The Musical!” All singing, all dancing, all Robert Irvine!

Okay, we kid. Slightly. But Adam Gopnick of the New Yorker is working with some other folks on a musical based on Gopnick’s book The Table Comes First: Family, France, and the Meaning of Food.

As long as we’re on the theatre beat:

The musical “Scandalous,” Kathie Lee Gifford’s Broadway debut as a lyricist and book writer, will close this Sunday after 31 preview performances and 29 regular performances, the producers announced on Tuesday night.

It is a little late now, but perhaps, if we’re lucky, this will free up Ms. Gifford for more Christmas specials.

Also closing: “The Anarchist”, David Mamet’s latest play.

Posted in Clippings, Food, Law, Sports, Theatre | Comments Closed

Your Austin nightclub trial update.

Tuesday, December 4th, 2012

(Previously.)

Another one down, another one down, another one bites the dust:

Nizar Hakiki pleaded guilty Monday afternoon to a single count – transferring a firearm used in a violent crime and aiding and abetting – according to court documents obtained by the American-Statesman. He’d been set to go to trial this week.

(Aren’t those actually two different charges? How did he plead to a single count?)

Posted in Clippings, Law | 1 Comment »

Random notes: December 3, 2012.

Monday, December 3rd, 2012

Jim Washburn is out as defensive line coach of the Eagles. Yes, already.

Obit watch: David Oliver Relin, journalist and co-author of Three Cups of Tea. I wish I had more to say on this, but right now I’m not sure what I can say.

As I recall, the case of the lawyer who shot at a census worker was well publicized at the time. The lawyer. Carolyn Barnes, denies the incident ever happened. But she was declared incompetent to stand trial and sent off to a state mental hospital.

Here’s the punchline: her law license is still valid, and she’s representing at least one client.

From Barnes’ perspective, the fact that she has been permitted to continue practicing law is clear evidence she should be released from her forced confinement in the state hospital and be allowed to proceed to her own trial. Her logic: If she is legally able to represent Gourley, as she has been doing, then she is more than capable of understanding the charges against her and participating in her own defense – the legal standard used to determine if a defendant is mentally competent to stand trial.

So, in other words: if the state hasn’t taken away her law license, she’s sane and can be tried for shooting at the census worker. If the state takes away her law license, that just certifies that’s she’s insane and can’t stand trial. That’s some catch.

Posted in Books, Clippings, Firings, Law, NFL, Obits, Sports | 2 Comments »

Merry freaking Christmas.

Friday, November 30th, 2012

Austin, like many other cities, has a program that gets the police department involved in collecting toys and getting them to poor kids. Here, we call this “Blue Santa“.

The “Blue Santa” program started in 1972. Before that, we had an organization called the Christmas Bureau of Austin and Travis County. For as long as I’ve lived in Austin, these two organizations have collaborated closely.

Not this year. The Christmas Bureau, as you may have guessed if you clicked on the link above, seems to have packed up their manager and slunk off into the night, leaving the Blue Santa people holding Santa’s bag.

What happened? That’s still not clear, but the police are investigating. Part of the issue may have to do with new leadership at the Christmas Bureau: the previous leader passed away last year, and the new guy has what we like to describe as a “colorful” history. This includes an arrest for meth possession after an encounter with police in the parking lot of one of our finer local strip clubs this past August (which, of course, does not imply his guilt in this affair, but does make one think).

In the meantime, the Blue Santa folks are trying to fill the gap, if you feel like helping.

Edited to add: It looks like the Christmas Bureau website is working again (it was giving a “500 Internal Server Error”) but hasn’t been updated since last December.

Posted in Christmas, Clippings, Cops, Law | 1 Comment »

Ump-diddily-ump update.

Friday, November 30th, 2012

Hey, remember the tennis umpire who was charged with beating her husband to death with a coffee cup?

The LA County DA has dropped the charges.

After the hearing, Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the D.A.’s office, said the case remains an ongoing police and district attorney’s investigation and declined further comment that might compromise that work.

The charges can be refiled if the investigation turns up new evidence.

Posted in Clippings, Law | Comments Closed

Those kids today.

Monday, November 19th, 2012

While the lion’s share of youth anti-smoking efforts has focused on cigarettes, a new report in the CDC journal Preventing Chronic Disease suggests more needs to be done to reduce the number of teens smoking flavored tobacco from hookahs.

According to the study, “18.5% of 12th-grade students admitted to using a hookah in the previous year.” I’m trying to wrap my mind around this:

Maybe I’m stupid, but I just have a real hard time visualizing large numbers of teens either buying hookahs and tobacco off the Internet and smoking with their friends (and all the fuss that entails) or hanging out at the local hookah bar.
Unless by “teens” they mean “18 and 19 year olds”, in which case they need to smoke a heaping hookah of STFU flavored shisha.

Meanwhile, in the LA Unified School District, “student stores” are making money hand over fist selling food to students unhappy with the school cafeteria’s “healthy” options.

For students, the stores provide an alternative to the cafeteria food one sophomore described as “meh” and a junior called “crazy healthy.” For the schools, the stores provide a much-needed cash supplement for their slashed budgets. Proceeds pay for such things as athletic uniforms, school dances and graduation decorations.

Street price for a bag of Flaming Hot Cheetos is a buck, by the way.

Posted in Clippings, Food, Law, Stupid | Comments Closed

Four years.

Saturday, November 17th, 2012

Almost a year after he was convicted, former Spokane PD officer Karl Thompson has been sentenced for beating Otto Zehm to death. (Previously.)

U.S. Attorney Mike Ormbsy, who credited the work of assistant Timothy Durkin and Justice Department trial attorney Victor Boutros, said the prosecutors started the day thinking they would be arguing to preserve a court pre-sentencing report recommending about two years in federal prison.
But by the end of the afternoon, Durkin and Boutros had convinced U.S. District Court Judge Fred Van Sickle that the circumstances of the case called for an actual sentencing range of nine to 11 years for the 65-year-old Thompson.

Nine to eleven years. That doesn’t sound too bad.

The judge then cited Thompson’s lifelong service as a law enforcement officer and gave him a downward “variance” in imposing a sentence of 51 months in federal prison, which is 19 months longer than the two officers convicted in the 1991 beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles.

So he gets a “downward variance” for being a cop, even thought the crime he committed was in the line of duty and under the color of his authority as a cop, and even though he and his fellow cops tried to cover up his actions? That’s…special.

(Hattip to Balko on this. I missed it earlier in the week.)

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Another round of Earthquest updates.

Saturday, November 17th, 2012

By way of Soapboxmom. And boy howdy, we’ve got a real doozy here.

Update #1:

http://www.ourtribune.com/article.php?id=14410

Don Allen Holbrook continued to receive payments from EMCID for the defunct Earthquest Institute charity that he helped to run into the ground as its CEO and president. Frank “The Bank” McCrady is also withholding documents showing what he has paid in legal fees for the Earthquest debacle being investigated. Disgusting!

I recommend clicking through to the link. As noted, EMCID is still funding Earthquest, “despite the fact that after eight years, the property developer declared bankruptcy, investigations have been launched by the Montgomery County District Attorney, the Texas Rangers and the FBI, and the voting public tossed out two incumbent board members.”

The Institute has no board members, no employees, no meetings and no revenue, but EMCID has wired funds or written checks to Holbrook for $42,653.69 in the first five months of 2012 alone. EMCID cash flow statements note payments are attributed to either “EarthQuest Institute” or “Transfer to Don Holbrook EarthQuest Institute.” Board members directed McCrady to stop paying Holbrook at the June board meeting.

EMCID has also spent over $300,000 in lawyers in the first nine months of 2012.

Update #2:

The updates just keep coming:

http://www.ourtribune.com/article.php?id=14410

http://pvtimes.com/news/from-the-editor-congratulations-newly-minted-public-servants-get-to-work/

Thanks for your support!!!

To be honest, I am slightly butthurt by some of the comments in that second link, since:

  1. I am one of the “gun nuts” referred to.
  2. It is always interesting that people who don’t like guns say, “I don’t want to take away anyone’s guns, I just want to make sure that people who have them are properly trained”…and then sneer at anyone who engages in training.

That being said, though, I will give the Pahrump Valley Times editor a pass, since this brings to my attention something I was unaware of.

Don Holbrook’s latest scheme (or, at least, one of his latest) apparently involves getting the county to put $63,000, and the city of Pahrump another $63,000, to fund the expansion of a shooting range/training school. It sounds like the idea is similar to ECMID: create a “tax improvement” district, and the funds will come from sales taxes paid by all the people who flock there. Here’s an article from earlier in the year discussing the plan.

But we’re not just talking about any training facility. We’re talking about Front Sight, run by the man Tam refers to as “Four Weapon Combat Master Dr. Ignatius Piazza“. To put it mildly, Dr. Piazza has a colorful reputation in the gun community, complete with several lawsuits, at least two of which involved accusations that Dr. Piazza is a Scientologist. More here.

I haven’t been to Front Sight, so I can’t pass judgment on their training. (Nor do I want to go: if i was going to travel for training, I’d be going to Gunsite.) I don’t have a problem with Dr. Piazza being a Scientologist (if indeed he is one) as long as he doesn’t try to convert me. I do have a problem, though, with trying to get taxpayers to pay for the expansion of his facility, especially when he’s involved with Don Holbrook.

Posted in Clippings, Earthquest, Guns, Law | Comments Closed

Quote of the day: special “nothing to do with Guy Fieri” edition

Wednesday, November 14th, 2012

Perhaps they have moisturizer in Hell, sir, although one thinks it unlikely.

—from Lowering the Bar, by way of Overlawyered.

Posted in Law | Comments Closed

Random notes: November 14, 2012.

Wednesday, November 14th, 2012

I kind of like Guy Fieri. But I’d note this review whether it was of a Guy Fieri restaurant, or some other random place in NYC. Not since Ninja can I recall a review this vicious in the NYT.

Did panic grip your soul as you stared into the whirling hypno wheel of the menu, where adjectives and nouns spin in a crazy vortex? When you saw the burger described as “Guy’s Pat LaFrieda custom blend, all-natural Creekstone Farm Black Angus beef patty, LTOP (lettuce, tomato, onion + pickle), SMC (super-melty-cheese) and a slathering of Donkey Sauce on garlic-buttered brioche,” did your mind touch the void for a minute?

(Also, Jacques Pépin wants you to steam your turkey. I thought that was an Albany expression.)

Jessica Tata: guilty of felony murder.

Why is it so hard to get Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army?

Why the well-armed and -equipped foreign troops have been unable to snuff out what little is left of a militia that once numbered in the tens of thousands is explained by the complexities of geography, politics and poverty, historians and human rights advocates say.

In other words, something that’s not easily solved by posting videos on the Internet.

Karolina Obrycka, the bartender who got the crap beat out of her by a Chicago police officer in 2007, has been awarded $850,000 in damages against both Anthony Abate, the cop who beat her, and the city itself.

The eight-woman, three-man jury found that Abbate was part of the conspiracy to cover up the beating and that the Police Department had a widespread code of silence that emboldened Abbate to beat up Obrycka.

Can we have Federal supervision of the Chicago PD now? (Also: LAT coverage.)

Posted in Clippings, Cops, Food, Law | Comments Closed

Sampler platter.

Monday, November 12th, 2012

Think of this as sort of like a fruit basket, without the fruit. Or the basket.

This is a headline as it currently appears on the LAT website:



Here is the actual story. Some things that are worth noting:

There are so many things I could say about this next story, but (with one exception) I am going to avoid saying them:

The puppeteer who performs as Elmo on “Sesame Street” is taking a leave of absence from the popular kids’ show in the wake of allegations that he had a relationship with a 16-year-old boy.

The one exception (and this isn’t snark, just a statement of fact): this was the same thing that destroyed Jeff “Frugal Gourmet” Smith’s career.

Detroit and Washington still have a shot at going 0-82 this NBA season (0-7 and 0-5 respectively).

Yet another election result that amuses us: Cynthia Brim was re-elected to her seat as a judge in the Cook County Circuit Court. Why does this amuse us?

Because Judge Brim is batshit crazy. Really. As in, “can’t be prosecuted because she was legally insane at the time” crazy. Even better:

Judge Brim has been suspended from hearing cases since March, and it’s not clear when she’ll be returning to the bench. During the suspension, she’ll continue to collect her $182,000 salary.

63.5 percent of the vote, folks. (Hattip on this to Overlawyered.)

This next story pushes a couple of my better hidden hot buttons. Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church is located in San Francisco; the church is “the oldest black pulpit in the city”. Bethel’s previous minister, who had been there for twenty years, left to take over the First AME church. First AME is kind of a big deal among AME churches: “It became a regular stop for Democratic political candidates over the years, including Bill Clinton, Al Gore and President Obama.” First AME’s minister, Rev. John J. Hunter, was transferred over to Bethel AME.

But Bethel doesn’t want him.

The next morning, church members said they stood on the steps of Bethel AME on Laguna Avenue an hour before the early morning service to block Hunter from entering. Hunter was not present when the service began at 8 a.m.
Thirty minutes later, Hunter and a bodyguard bypassed the lone guard who monitors the front entrance, church members said. Officials said that when they blocked Hunter from the pulpit, his demeanor shifted.

And why doesn’t Bethel AME want Hunter? Are they just upset at losing their pastor and throwing a temper tantrum?

In 2008, Hunter acknowledged using First AME’s credit cards for $122,000 in personal expenditures on items including suits, jewelry, vacations and auto supplies. A year later, the Internal Revenue Service said he owed more than $300,000 in back taxes. Hunter has said he repaid both debts.

More:

For years, critics of Hunter complained that he was inaccessible, overspent on personal security and refused to live in the South L.A. community where he preached. They said the church’s membership, tithing and its activist profile declined during Hunter’s tenure.

The LAT also alludes to, but does not detail, a sexual harassment lawsuit filed against Hunter during his tenure at First AME. Sounds like something more than a tantrum, doesn’t it?

Posted in Clippings, Law, Loser, Sports | 2 Comments »

Here. Have some more crap.

Thursday, November 8th, 2012

A/V Club obit for Elliott Carter.

NYT obits for Darrell Royal and influential former wine columnist Frank J. Prial.

Another election result that amuses me:

The referendum in Tuesday’s election asked voters whether Michigan should retain a recently enacted state law that allowed the governor to appoint “emergency managers” with broad oversight of financial decisions, budgets and union contracts for struggling local governments. The law was intended to help municipalities avoid bankruptcy or default, but it has been criticized for infringing on the rights of local governments.

The referendum failed, 53% – 47%.

Emergency managers currently oversee three school districts in Michigan, including the Detroit public schools, and the city governments in Benton Harbor, Escorse, Flint and Pontiac. Now it is unclear what the vote means for their work, as well as for a fledgling financial consent agreement between the state and Detroit, which has wrestled with billions of dollars of long-term debt and nearly ran out of money this year.

And another one: voters in San Francisco actually rejected a proposal “that would have taken the first steps toward draining Hetch Hetchy Reservoir and drastically revamped the way much of the Bay Area gets its water.”

The Prop. F initiative was the culmination of a years-long effort by environmentalists to restore Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park. The valley was flooded in 1923, when the city dammed the Tuolumne River to create a water system that now serves 2.6 million people in San Francisco and 29 other Bay Area cities.The measure, supporters said, would have compelled the city to take a much-needed look at its water usage and come up with a plan to replace the water and power now supplied by the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. A separate vote in 2016 would have been required before the O’Shaughnessy Dam could be demolished.

From the Department of Wow: University of Houston cornerback D.J. Hayden is in the hospital. His condition is listed as “critical but stable” according to the HouChron. What happened?

Hayden had surgery to repair a tear in the main blood vessel that leads to the heart, an injury suffered when he collided with a teammate during Tuesday night’s practice, a person familiar with the situation told the Chronicle on the condition of anonymity.

This Statesman “story” is…just…odd.

Edited to add: A little more information on D.J. Hayden and his injury:

In a statement released by UH, [team physician Dr. Walter] Lowe confirmed that Hayden required immediate surgery Tuesday night for a tear of the inferior vena cava, the large vein that carries blood from the lower half of the body back to the heart.

More from Dr. Lowe: “This injury has never been seen or reported in association with a football injury and is more associated with high-speed motor vehicle.” Huh? There’s a photo caption: “…a freak injury normally associated with high-speed motorcycle wrecks.”

Dr. Lowe also apparently said that this kind of injury has a “95 percent fatality rate”. I have no problem believing that.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Food, Law, Media, Music, Obits, Politics, Sports | Comments Closed

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