Around the Web

1) A false story about a body guard turns into a real story about State officials violating federal law.

2) A motion not to refer to the complaining witness as "victim" or the prosecutor as "representing the people." (Jackson Case)

3) I respectfully dissent's comments on the magical visitation abilities of TV crews.

4) Hmmm . . . John Behan seems to be dropping a hint here.

5) Sure, why develop a record? I mean, if the judge just makes a bald ruling (ie: "continuance granted") it's not as though the defendant might be held to a standard of proving through the record that the prosecutor is at fault.

And, if you look at the article itself the prosecutor asserts that under Virginia law the prosecutor is the only one who can ask for a competency exam of the defendant. This means all those times I've asked for my clients to be evaluated for competency and sanity I must have been wrong. Maybe I just misread the statute when it says "upon hearing evidence or representations of counsel for the defendant or the attorney for the Commonwealth" the judge can order an eval. Maybe I should go back and tell all the judges they were wrong to grant the order.

6) Ah. The joy of clients blowing a trial.

7) If the Guidelines are advisory the judge can also increase the sentence.

8) Y'know, I've had clients who've inquired but I've never told them that given the paltry sum of $50,000 . . .
LvArb&Cap

9) AHA!!! The next time a government expert pulls out that one in 6 billion number in a DNA case I know what I'm going to refer to.

10) Who needs a jury when it might get in the way of conviction? I mean, if a small group of people of whom the politicians were afraid were causing laws to be written which did not reflect the views of the majority why would you want to expose that to a jury?

11) My College sent a group of students to the Supreme Court. Cool. I knew there's a reason Centre is better than the schools ya'll went to. ;-)