The case of the penurious judge

Justice Magoo has announced – yet again on the front page of the NY Law Journal – that he can no longer bear the sight of his children starving on his beggarly annual dole of $144,000. Now the Appellate Division will have to muddle through without him because he’s leaving to be a partner at Flywheel Shyster & Flywheel. “I’ll miss public service, but I have to do the right thing for my family,” the learned deemster pronounced (NYLJ 5/24/11).

The firm has “fabulous clients,” he enthused (not like some firms whose clients are a menace to society).
How does he know they’re fabulous? From deciding their cases, he says. A fabulous way to look for a job.

(Scene: Oral argument at the Appellate Division. Presiding Justice PIZZA, flanked by Justices NOODLE, GOYA, HOTSY-TOTSY and MAGOO)

Pizza: Next! Megadeath Corporate Acquisitions vs. Baby Seal Protection Charitable Trust.

Lawyer: May it please the court, Waldorf T. Shyster of Flywheel Shyster for Megadeath. This case raises a vital issue of statutory interpretation. My client’s yacht was not responsible for the accident. A seal clearly assumes the risk when he or she –

Magoo: Where’s Mr. Flywheel?

Lawyer: Er – I believe he’s relocated to Brazil, your Honor.

Magoo: Brazil?

Lawyer: Well, one of those countries where they don’t have extradition. Now, if I may read from this paragraph subsection of the Admiralty law –

Magoo: So you have an opening at your firm?

Lawyer: Why yes, indeed, you can start as soon as we get this little matter settled about the damage to my client’s yacht –

(cut to the post-argument conference)

Pizza: Megadeath doesn’t have a leg to stand on. Yachts may have the right of way on the high seas but this was the seal pond at the Central Park Zoo.

Noodle: Darn tootin’. Let’s sign that summary judgment and get it over with.

Magoo: But they’re fabulous clients!

(Everybody stares at him)

Magoo: (wailing) I can’t bear the thought of my poor wife hunched over a washtub from dawn to dusk, my starving wee bairns begging in the street – all because I indulge in public service!

Goya: Maybe we could give them jobs as court attorneys. Can they handle a rubber stamp?

Hotsy-Totsy: There, there, Magoo, why don’t you run along and write one of your nice long concurrences?

Magoo: (sulking) I bet nobody even reads them.

All: Perish the thought! Your immortal concurrences will be classics of legal analysis long after the Supreme Court has faded into oblivion.

Magoo: (brightening). You really think so? Oh, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious! I’ll get started right away.
(exit).

Noodle: Will Flywheel Shyster take him off our hands?

Pizza: (sighing) We can only keep our fingers crossed.