02 August 2005

Around the Web

1. You must break the law to follow it.

2. As opposed to the "Love Crimes" symposium it hosted last year.

3. The end justifies the means. A surprising thing to hear from Tom.

4. The only way you truly understand the criminal justice system is to work in it for an extended period of time. And, let's face it, the Harvard, Yale, and Stanford law students who clerk for Circuit Court Judge the Honorable Aloysius BigMuckityMuck Feeder III and then get their chance to serve as a clerk for Justice the Honorable "Here because I have no papertrail" Smith are the people most likely to come back and serve on the court. Somehow, I just can't picture these folks taking a prosecution job at a Commonwealth Attorney's office.

5. Calling out judges for putting private attorneys first on the docket. I can't speak for others but around here there is often some jockeying to be the last case (or at least near the end). The thinking is that the judge is more likely to cut your client some slack if there's no one else in the courtroom to see it and then demand that their attorneys ask for the same thing. The other way I've seen to guarantee that you are at the back of the docket is to be a lawyer with a reputation for being difficult. Everyone, prosecutors and defense counsels, wants your trial moved to the last spot because they are worried you will - once again - turn a 10 minute driving suspended trial into a 2 hour lecture on the constitution (and lose, just like the last 7 times).

6. But if there are fewer clerks per justice, what will all the Harvard, Yale, and Stanford grads do? OMG, they'll have to get "real jobs!"

7. Wait a sec . . . Blonde Justice blogged about something legal?!? No, wait, it was actually a story about her dad. Still, it was kinda there. Yeesh, if she keeps doing that she won't have time to blog about all those strange reality TV shows I don't watch. However, shall I keep up?

8. The hibiscus task force is shut down. Not entirely shocking.

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