Trial the rest of week, so postings likely late
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Using Empirical Studies as a Basis for Updating Intestacy Laws
Danaya C. Wright & Beth Sterner, Honoring Probable Intent in Intestacy: An Empirical Assessment of the Default Rules and the Modern Family, 43 ACTEC L.J. 341 (2017). Sergio Pareja The principal goal of any intestacy statute is to determine the probable intent of individuals who die without a will. Presumably, that means determining what most people who die without a will would want their wills to say if they were to have executed a will before dying. This is a particularly challenging endeavor, given that intent changes over time and may not be consistently the same throughout a large, multicultural country. In their excellent article, Professor Wright and Ms. Sterner analyze 493 wills that were probated in Escambia and Alachua Counties, Florida, in 2013. They do this, the authors say, “[i]n light of the fact that marriage is a waning institution and a majority of children are currently being raised in nontraditional families—defined as blended,…
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Bad News Or No News
It was announced by twit: The Denver Post would be cutting 30 people from its newsroom, a third of its staff. That’s 30 more people, as it’s the third round of cutting in the past two years. The Denver Post recently cut 10 positions in 2017, according to the Denver Business Journal. More than 20 staffers also took buyouts or were laid off in 2016, according to Westword. It was a good newspaper, the major paper of Denver, which is a real city and should have a real paper. Now it will be a shell. The paper is owned by a hedge fund, Digital First Media, which is being blamed for putting profit above people, savings above mission. But then, newspapers are cutting, closing all over. And not just old dead tree papers, but digital media as well. And the ones that remain are too often staffed by children, who work cheap and know nothing, with maybe a star journalists here or there to maintain the facade of credibility. Is this okay? Kevin O’Keefe saw it as…
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Patricia Del Río y la inteligencia absorbida por intereses y no por principios
La bella señora Patricia del Río, comparto su opinión aunque NO la comparto, y no la comparto porque llega a conclusiones que, por la influencia que pueda ejercer en sus lectores muchos sin la educación de calidad que todo ser humano merece. No estoy de acuerdo cuando escribe: "Tampoco sabemos si, de darse la vacancia, nos gobernará el vicepresidente Martín Vizcarra o asumirá la batuta el presidente del Congreso para convocar a nuevas elecciones. Aparentemente el embajador en Canadá tiene juego propio y se le están congelando las buenas maneras, por eso ha decidido hacerle hielo al presidente Kuczynski, en lugar de marcar una posición clara sobre lo que hará en caso de que PPK se tenga que ir." El párrafo es un disparate, lo es porque limita la capacidad de decidir del Vicepresidente y, es obvio que, si no declara es porqué NO está de acuerdo con lo que…
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End Immunity For The Dirty Prosecutor
Hard as it is to hold a cop accountable for his violation of constitutional rights, given Qualified Immunity, liability does occasionally accrue. Yet, the prosecutor holding his hand walks away unscathed because his immunity isn’t qualified, but absolute.* Senior United States District Judge Frederic Block of the Eastern District of New York says it’s time to end this travesty. According to Taylor v. Kavanagh, based upon Supreme Court law, “The falsification of evidence and the coercion of witnesses…have been held to be prosecutorial activities for which absolute immunity applies. Similarly, because a prosecutor is acting as an advocate in a judicial proceeding, the solicitation and subornation of perjured testimony, the withholding of evidence, or the introduction of illegally-seized evidence at trial does not create liability in damages.” Subornation of perjury? Concealment of evidence? Introduction of illegally-seized evidence? Not the…
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What You Say on Facebook May be Used Against You
Whether or not Larry Recio on May 15, 2015 possessed a firearm was until March 8, 2018 an issue of contention. The contentious issue was resolved that day when the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld Recio’s “a felon in possession of a firearm” conviction. On that May 2015 day, two Prince George County, Maryland police officers, Shane Pumphrey and Christopher Rothenberger, spotted Recio while they were on patrol. Knowing he had outstanding arrest warrants, they observed him at which time they saw a gun protruding from his waistband. Recio bolted as the officers approached. They gave chase—one in the vehicle, the other on foot. Suspect Gets Away, Cops Find Discarded Firearm During the chase, one of the officers saw Recio toss the weapon. The suspect managed to get away. The officers found the loaded weapon he had discarded. Recio was subsequently arrested the following month. The government indicted Recio on August 17, 2015…
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Bagaric on Disclosing One's Own and Others' Offending
Mirko Bagaric (Director of the Evidence-Based Sentencing and Criminal Justice Project, Swinburne University Law School) has posted Abolishing the Curious Sentencing Anomaly in [Australian] between the Voluntary Disclosure of One’s Own Offending and Assisting Authorities with the Offending of Others...
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Factors in a DWI Case That May Reduce Your Sentence in NJ
If you were arrested and charged with a DWI offense in New Jersey, you may be looking at the potential for harsh penalties. Every DWI charge comes with the potential of jail time and high fines, even for a first offense. Moreover, the MVC may slap you with surcharges and additional payments if your license is suspended. However, most of the penalties in a NJ DWI offense are optional penalties, or they are part of a range of potential penalties the judge may choose from. This means you can have your penalties reduced or increased in a DWI case, based on certain factors. The Atlantic City DWI defense lawyers at The Law Offices of John J. Zarych offer free consultations to help you understand how you can fight your DWI charges in South Jersey. Potential DWI Sentences Before understanding how your DWI sentence can be reduced, it is important to understand what the potential punishments are for DWI in New Jersey. For a first time, lower-level DWI…
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What Gear Should You Wear to Make You Safer on a Motorcycle?
If you are driving a car there is no need to wear special clothing to protect you. However, if you are a motorcyclist, the gear you wear can be the difference between life and death or at least serious injury. Here is some clothing that will make you safer on a motorcycle. Helmets In Georgia, wearing a helmet is not just about protection. It’s the law. Although wearing a helmet is not mandatory in all states, numerous studies point out wearing a helmet will increase your chances of surviving a crash. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration points out riders wearing a helmet have a 37 percent better chance of surviving a crash than those who do not. Helmets also offer protection from bad weather, debris, and bugs which can be distracting and cause crashes. Additional Eye Protection You don’t need additional eye protection like goggles if you wear a full-face helmet. However, if you wear a skull cap or an open face helmet, you should wear glasses or goggles…
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United Sends Dog to Japan Instead of Kansas City
For the second time in a week, United is in the doghouse for its mishandling of a passenger's beloved canine: This weekend, a family checked its dog when flying from Oregon to Kansas City. When they went to doggie claim in Kansas City to... [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]
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Manatee County Murder Suspect Gets a New Trial Because Police Interviewed Him Without His Lawyer Present
There are certain rights guaranteed to every citizen. One of these is the right to legal counsel in your criminal matter. If you think that you or a loved one is suspected of a domestic violence crime, it just makes good sense to act without delay and retain the services of an experienced Florida domestic violence attorney. The police are very skilled at their jobs. Make sure that you have skill on your side by having counsel representing you. Once you’ve retained counsel, you have a right to have that attorney present when being questioned by the police, in many situations. If the police fail to follow this rule, you may be entitled to get statements you’ve made to them excluded from evidence. An example of this was the case of a Manatee County man named Cornelius. On the afternoon and evening of June 6, Cornelius had been acting strangely while visiting his parents’ home. By 4 a.m. on June 7, the parents took Cornelius to the hospital, and he was…
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Warum man im Knast hinter schwedischen Gardinen sitzt
„Hinter schwedischen Gardinen sitzen“ – dass das wenig mit den schönen längs-gestreiften Vorhängen von Ikea zu tun hat, kann man erahnen. Klingt es doch deutlich netter als „in den Bau wandern“ oder „im Knast sitzen“, ist es ein schöner Euphemismus, um eine Haftstrafe zu umschreiben. Woher diese Redensarten kommen, wissen allerdings die wenigsten. Der Ursprung dieser umgangssprachlichen Synonyme wie „Bau“, „Loch“ oder „Bunker“ erklärt sich wahrscheinlich aus sich heraus. Bei dem Begriff „Knast“ und bei der Redensart „hinter schwedischen Gardinen sitzen“ springt einem das hingegen nicht so leicht ins Auge. Wieso sagt man Knast zum Knast? Den Begriff „Knast“ leiten Etymologen aus dem Jiddischen her. Als „Knass legen“ wurde zunächst die Verlobung bzw. die Bekräftigung der Gültigkeit des…
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San Diego Doctor and Seven Others Arrested for Allegedly Prescribing Opioids to Homeless, Dead and Incarcerated People With Medications Then Sold On the Street
The United State's Attorney's Office in San Diego has recently charged a physician and seven others in a case involving a clinic where pain medication prescriptions were then diverted. Here is the press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office on the case. An Indictment is not evidence and the doctor and others are presumed innocent.
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Los Angeles Dentist Charged in Federal Health Care Fraud Case
On March 12, 2018, a Los Angeles dentist was charged in federal court with six counts of health care fraud and two counts of aggravated identity theft. The identity theft counts are usually added in these cases since they add additional and potentially mandatory prison time which increases the pressure on those charged to plea. An Indictment is not evidence and the dentist is presumed innocent. Here is the link to the U.S. Attorney's Office Press Release.
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Measuring Common Claims About Class Actions
Joanna C. Schwartz, The Cost of Suing Business, 65 DePaul L. Rev. 655 (2016). Nora Freeman Engstrom Joanna C. Schwartz’s 2016 article, The Cost of Suing Business, comes out of the Clifford Symposium on Tort Law and Social Policy at DePaul University College of Law—an annual gathering now in its twenty-fourth year that, under Professor Stephan Landsman’s singular stewardship, has been the site of so much valuable inquiry. In the article, Schwartz questions a narrative that has succeeded in both Congress and the Court: that “class actions are the most significant scourge on business ever conjured up by man.” (P. 655.) In her words: In brief after brief to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Chamber of Commerce and other business amici tell the same story: Meritless class actions, filed by rapacious plaintiffs’ attorneys for the ostensible benefit of consumers, employees, and shareholders, are so devastatingly expensive to defend against, and…
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Murder By Empty Words
The trend to reimagine a drug overdose into a murder has been going on for a while. Hysteria takes hold, the word “epidemic” grabs us by our throats and we begin to accept the premise that “something must be done.” But turning the corner from a useful, rational approach to solving a problem to the knee-jerk resort to harsh, unhelpful and carceral responses is just a breathlessly outraged scream away. When a bullet-riddled body turns up in a gutter, there’s no question that a police investigation will follow. When a person dies of a drug overdose, however, police often dismiss it as a case of self-harm and close the file. That’s a mindset that should change so that victims’ families get justice and so murderers — make no mistake, dealers in fatal overdoses are murderers — get taken off the streets. “Make no mistake” isn’t an argument. It’s playing your emotions by circumventing reason because someone…
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The latest account of Trump Administration's latest punitive ideas for responding to drug problems
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No Reason To Investigate If You “Believe The Victim”
The list of accusations by Eboni Sanders against Thomas Mowbray, and later Patrese Thompson, because she “put herself into the situation when she began seeing Mowbray,” is long and prolix. And if that was as much as you knew about the situation, this poor woman who was subject to threats, harassment and domestic violence, you wouldn’t feel all that bad about the time Mowbray and Thompson spent in cells after their being arrested by Pittsburgh cops. Except none of it was true. Sanders fabricated all of it, from calling in threats to herself to creating a phony Facebook account to solicit a contract killer to do her in. And almost every aspect of the accusations against Mowbray and Thompson was subject to collateral evidence, videos, fingerprints, telephone records, that would have proven as conclusively as possible that Sanders was fabricating it all. But the cops didn’t bother to investigate her claims. Instead, they believed the victim. In reviewing the…
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"Evaluating ballot initiative support for legalised marijuana: The case of Washington"
The title of this post is the title of this interesting new piece authored by Loren Collingwood, Ben Gonzalez O’Brien and Sarah Dreier published int The International Journal of Drug Policy. Here is the abstract: Background In 2012, Washington and Colorado became the first U.S. states to legalise recreational marijuana....<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/MarijuanaLaw/~4/nTsgjFsiooU" height="1" width="1" alt=""/>
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Fraud, Identity Theft Raps for LA Dentist
Fraud, Identity Theft Raps for LA DentistA Los Angeles dentist faces federal fraud and identity theft charges following an investigation by the FBI. According to investigators, the dentist filed fraudulent healthcare claims with Medicaid and also to Denti-Cal for services not provided. They claim the dentist used patient information to file claims without the patients’ knowledge. Federal prosecutors have charged the dentist with six counts of filing fraudulent healthcare claims and two counts of aggravated identity theft. Fraudulent healthcare billing carries a maximum 10-year sentence. Aggravated identity theft carries a maximum two-year penalty. Los Angeles Fraud Lawyer When you face federal fraud charges, the first step in building your defense is to hire an experienced fraud lawyer. Robert Helfend has nearly 35 years of criminal courtroom defense experience and takes federal and state fraud cases. The federal government vigorously prosecutes fraud cases. Many…
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